Quiet Rapture

by lalazee

Summary:

That A/B/O fic where cocky Alpha Bakugou falls in mate-love at first scent, while Midoriya is just a poor bookstore-owning Omega who got his nose punched in is a kid and can't smell a damn thing. Also known as: That time an Alpha had to use his actual personality to woo his mate instead of relying on his scent.

Chapter 1

The last thing Katsuki had expected upon walking into some dusty old bookshop was the fist of scent that punched him square in the gut.

Reeling in the open doorway, fingers wrapped with crushing force around the handle, Katsuki inhaled a shuddering breath against the onslaught, his knees buckling. Eyes huge and scavenging the small store for signs of this - this oppressive, mouthwatering musk, Katsuki stalked inside, the door shutting behind him with a great gust of frigid winter air.

Nostrils flaring with the hunt, with the deep, earthy scent so unlike the sickly sweet ones of most Omegas, Katsuki approached the cashier desk and looked around. He didn’t see anyone, but fuck if his mouth wasn’t watering with a flavor of Omega he’d never encountered in his life. The unbridled strength of it alone had him reeling – reeling and wondering what idiot was out there, leaving their scent utterly unrepressed.

“Oiy!” Katsuki slammed a fist on the counter top, his skin tight with barely contained restraint against the force of this Omega scent. Who the actual fuck? “You got a customer here. You can’t smell me? Goddamn.”

“Wow,” said a smooth, melodic voice from one of the tall stacks. “Aren’t you a charmer.”

“I don’t give a sh-“

Around the corner came a short, stocky guy with a perplexed smile and large green eyes. His hair was a riot of deep green curls, his frame dwarfed in a thick, oatmeal-hued, cable knit sweater with leather elbow patches. Katsuki hadn’t even realized until now that people still wore corduroy pants.

Looking at him, Katsuki was consumed with the overwhelming compulsion to encompass this person in his arms and bury his snarling mouth into the crook of his fragrant neck.

Oh, shit.

“I’m sorry?” the guy said, his eyebrows raised in question as he came around to stand behind the counter. “Are you okay, sir? You look a little red and –“

Teeth bared, Katsuki lofted over the counter, spilling pens, cards, and knick knacks in the fray as he landed, spun the stranger in his arms and slammed his back against the ridge of the desk. Hands slammed down on the surface either side the Omega’s waist, Katsuki caught his own scent pluming through the air like clouds of smoke, overtaking everything else, a fire that consumed as much as he wanted to gorge himself the nameless person caged in his hold.

A shiver skated down Katsuki’s spine as he leaned in to sniff, waiting for that throat to be bared, for the Omega to prostrate himself, to wilt beneath the force of his scent, of the power radiating from within Katsuki like a forest fire. Katsuki’s eyes flicked to the stranger’s face for a brief second, widening as he realized that gaze was not averted, but lancing right through him like a sword.

Katsuki didn’t have time to react before the Omega’s hand rocketed up. The palm strike cracked Katsuki square on the noise, pain streaking through his eye sockets. Stumbling back a half step, Katsuku dropped his hand from his nose to bare his teeth, but something inside him snapped his mouth shut, as if he couldn’t dare act with aggression towards his –

His?

His what?

Katsuki couldn’t think. Not when his entire face was pulsing in time with his heartbeat, which was racing up towards his throat and prepping to dive at the nameless Omega braced before him with two scarred fists poised in front of his face.

Did this nerd just stop a powerful Alpha in his tracks without so much as an Omega whimper of anxiety?

Double shit.

“Tell me your name,” Katsuki said, still standing, still wading through this thick, humid rainstorm and lightning scent that drenched him to the bone. He winced as he pinched his nose and tipped his head back to stop the blood. Copper rolled down his throat, while ironically exposing his own neck to the Omega like some kind of pathetic weakling. “Please.”

“Are you done?” the guy said, his voice taut, his fists raised and ready.

“Dunno,” Katsuki said. What was this truth shit pouring out of him like this person deserved it?

Something primal and deep, forged of fire and ash spoke from gut, echoing through his veins.

He deserves it. He deserves so much. He smells like summer in the middle of winter.

“Didn’t know I was doing it ‘til I’d done it.”

“I’ve heard that one before.”

“You’re a helluva hard-ass for an Omega, know that?”

Was Katsuki grinning? Katsuki sucked in through his nose, swallowed the congealed blood and realized that, yeah, he was fucking grinning over this little asshole who’d nearly broke his nose upon first sight.

Granted, Katsuki had come at this guy with the deep, instinctive intent of finding submission in the Omega, but – well, that’s what an Alpha did when they…

When they came across the one scent that didn’t just smell different from all the rest. But called to the beast within him, both tempting and soothing and taunting in tandem.

“I don’t want to have to throw you out.”

Katsuki blinked, realizing his nostrils were flaring, his gaze going foggy and dazed as he leaned in towards the stranger’s fists to catch the scent drifting from his wrists. Thunderstorm, ozone, electricity.

The hairs on Katsuki’s arms stood on end. His attention flicked up, past those hands with inexplicable layers of scars, met wary forest eyes.

“You’re not gonna throw me out,” Katsuki said. “You feel it too.”

The Omega’s straight, serious brows bunched together, a frown tugging at his lips, his stare narrowed, and head cocked. He dropped his hands with a sudden soft laugh, shaking his head and dragging fingers through his wild mess of curls.

“Gosh, okay. Okay, I get it. I’m sorry for the mix-up, but –“

“What’s your name?” Katsuki said, wanting to press closer, to rub his cheek against the unmarked line of this Omega’s freckled neck. “I need to know. Now.”

“Listen,” the stranger said with a placating smile as he leaned one hip against the counter and folded his arms, body language closed from Katsuki, so beyond anything he’d ever experienced from an Omega that Katsuki was beginning to wonder just what the fuck this pine and wet earth musk actually was. “This is all a big misunderstanding. I know that I kinda stink –“

“You smell like I want to roll in you naked,” Katsuki said, clenching his teeth against the words even as the Alpha in him offered them up to this person for which his body was crying out. Just where the hell was his mouth running off? Just who the hell was this person and why was Katsuki losing his goddamn mind within ten minutes of meeting him?

Well. He knew.

Deep down, he knew. But this couldn’t be real. People didn’t just –

“That’s really, uh, sweet? And all. But I can’t actually, you know –“ The omega waved a hand vaguely in the air, glancing to the ceiling, not in submission but pure awkwardness as his cheeks pinked up. He met Katsuki’s eyes and shrugged, lips pulled in a closed mouth smile. “Can’t smell you.”

Katsuki blinked.

“Hah?”

“I can’t smell you,” the stranger said, shrugging once more as he hefted a sigh and shoved his sleeves up to his elbows. The chunky sweater revealed thick, muscular forearms. A hot, liquid pull curled up low in Katsuki’s gut.

“Can’t smell me,” Katsuki said flatly, starting at the Omega’s arms.

“Yeah, uh.” The guy laughed a little. “Got my nose shattered in a fight as a teenager. My nasal cavity is all collapsed and stuff. I can barely smell, hardly taste a thing, and I snore like a buzz saw.”

Katsuki gaped.

“You can’t smell me?”

The Omega's attention flicked to Katsuki’s throat, lingered. Looked up, met Katsuki’s wide eyes.

“Nope. I’m sure you smell great and uh, stuff?”

“You – you can’t smell what’s going on here?” Katsuki said, his world dropping from beneath his feet. "Between us?"

He was going to tear down this entire fucking store with his bare hands. Set the fucking world on fire. How could this one person not smell him? Omega’s had been fawning over him since he was fourteen and showed no signs of stopping.

But this one person. This one Omega whose scent had nearly taken Katsuki to his knees from the first moment, had no clue that they were… That they were -

“What do you mean? What’s going on?”

“Tell me your fucking name or I’m going to rip someone's throat out,” Katsuki said between his teeth, fists clenching at his sides to keep himself from yanking the collar of that ugly sweater aside to lave the flat of his tongue over the gland apparently working in overtime to drive him utterly fucking crazy.

The Omega smiled, obviously confused.

“Why?”

“Because you’re gonna date me and then mate me and I’m never gonna let another person even fucking look at you for the rest of your life.”

The guy stared at him for half a second before he burst out laughing, his smile wide and beautiful and lighting his eyes up like sunlight through a thick canopy.

“What? I’m sorry, who are you? Is this a prank? Did my friends set you up? Wait, you’re not a prostitute are you? They didn’t hire you because they knew my heat was coming and wanted me to get laid, because this is the last time I’m gonna let them get away with –“

“Haaah? I’m not a hooker!” Katsuki gawked. Did he really have such little effect on this person? How the hell was he supposed to convince this Omega that everything Katsuki felt was true? Talking? What the fuck Alpha loser did that shit anymore? “I’m Bakugou. Bakugou Katsuki? I’m motherfuckin’ Ground Zero, dammit!”

The Omega’s laughter stilled, then, as he surveyed Katsuki with lips softly parted, awe in his expression for the first time. A sudden swell of musk and impending rain swamped Katsuki’s sense, left chills along his skin and electricity sparking in his chest.

“O-oh,” the Omega said, mouth opening and closing as if he didn’t know what to say.

So he had a weakness for heroes, huh? Katsuki at least had that going for him right now.

“Yeah,” Katsuki said, squaring his shoulders, chest puffing out as he eyed the Omega narrowly. “So I’m a fuckin’ catch, alright? You at least owe me one damn date –“

“Midoriya,” the no longer stranger finally said, his face flushed, his eyes flitted across Katsuki’s scowl. “Uh, Midoriya Izuku. Bookshop… owner?”

“Good, great, hi, what’s up. Now you can go out with me.”

Midoriya blinked, as if coming out of a dream. His scent abated to a softer glow. That wrinkled brow and confused smile returned as he cocked his head.

“Sorry, can I ask why you’re here in the first place? Can I help you find something?”

“I’m lookin’ for a pet dog.” Katsuki’s nose scrunched as he sensed Midoriya’s bewilderment. “For fuck’s sake, I’m obviously looking for a book.”

“Oh, well –“ Midoriya vaguely gestured behind him. “I have those.”

“No shit, shortstack. I got a stakeout for a couple days comin’ on. Need shit to keep me going.”

At this, Midoriya noticeably brightened, his gaze attentive on Katsuki’s face as his arms finally uncrossed.

“Really? What do you like to read?”

Katsuki shrugged, looking over Midorya’s head at the vast, high shelving units, testing his own ability to not stare at this Omega like he wanted to strip him of those bulky clothes and lick him from top to bottom.

“Non-fiction. War, biographies, that kinda stuff.”

“Hmm.” Midoriya turned his back to Katsuki, and what the fuck was he thinking doing that? Did this guy have zero sense of self-preservation or was he that confident in his ability to fend off the stronger, larger breed with his own puny strength? “A couple of things come to mind, but – Are you sniffing me?”

“Yeah,” Katsuki said, his timbre husky, his nose just an inch from Midoriya’s lush curls. God, how did he smell like summer, like spring and life and sun when it was so bitterly cold outside?

With a sigh, Midoriya walked away and disappeared into the shelves that smelled of parchment and dust, and dreams in printed word.

Like a hound on a trail of a fox, Katsuki followed, his hands itching to touch.

He’d never felt anything like this. Not remotely. As a hero, he took high-quality suppressants for his ruts, and rarely had the time or inclination to even look at another Omega. While it was true he found himself the target of many an Omega’s attention – he’d simply never been interested. Ever.

By twenty-five, he’d come to terms with and had very little problem with the fact that not only did he have little time for a mate, but the inclination was also missing. And that had been fine.

This, however.

Katsuki leaned lightly against a shelf, ankles loosely crossed as he considered the compact Omega with the winning smile, suspicious eyes, and a palm strike like a professional MMA fighter.

Could he seriously not smell Katsuki’s scent? He knew his was especially potent, that of an Alpha firing on all cylinders, his glands practically steaming with power, aggression, perfection.

And Midoriya here was acting like they were going for a fucking stroll through the park, rather than whimpering and averting his eyes, chin tilted to offer his neck. No shivers or quakes or any damn thing Katsuki had ever seen or heard or read about.

Katsuki was half-way in love, his own Alpha body entirely decided on this one enigmatic person, and the Omega was content to sell him a fucking book and send him home.

Triple shit.

“All Quiet on the Western Front?”

Katsuki frowned, a remnant expression of his thoughts.

“Heard of it. It’s fiction, though, ain’t it?”

Midoriya hummed in thought, lips pursed as he turned and met Katsuki, still clutching the book to his chest.

“Yes and no. The writer was drafted to the military as an eighteen year old and this book, among some of his others, focuses less on the physical side of how war destroys a person, and more on how you go into it as a civilian, and come out of it something altogether different.”

Katsuki slipped the book from Midoriya’s hold, his stomach clenching as his fingers brushed against his chest. Bowing his head, Katsuki flipped through the book as Midoriya continued to speak with a rising sense of passion to his pleasant, lilting voice.

“It’s one of my favorites. Growing up, I’d wanted to be a hero for – well, forever. As long as I'd known what one was. And when I found out I couldn’t be, I was devastated. Things got dark for me, I got into a lot of fights, I was so full of anger and bitterness. I’d take on anyone, guys twice my size –“

“That makes sense now.”

“But after reading this.” Midoriya’s voice trailed off, and when Katsuki flicked a look up, he saw Midoriya was also looking at the open pages in Katsuki’s hands. “After I read this, I thought, maybe I don’t want to be broken like that. Being a hero from a young age is the same as being thrust into war. Sure, you choose it, but you don’t choose what happens to you once you're there.”

“I love being a hero,” Katsuki said, scowling. “There’s nothing wrong with it. I’m the fuckin’ best.”

Midoriya huffed a sound of amusement through this nose and raised an eyebrow at Katsuki, the corner of his mouth quirked.

“You sure are. And that’s good. The country needs you. All the same, I read it and I felt like, maybe there’s more for me than this kind of future, this end.” Midoriya’s lips curved slowly, his lashes lowered, dark and thick as he spoke in another tone altogether. Reverent. “I want that quiet rapture again.”

“Hah? What’re you-“

“I want to feel the same powerful, nameless urge that I used to feel when I turned to my books.” Midoriya raised his gaze to Katsuki’s, and his scent rose up like the first rain hitting a long dead ground, filling Katsuki’s senses with clean musk and humming skin. “The breath of desire that then arose from the colored backs of the books shall fill me again, melt the heavy, dead lump of lead that lies somewhere in me and waken again the impatience of the future, the quick joy in the world of thought, it shall bring back again the lost eagerness of my youth.”

Midoriya leaned in, his eyes bright, intent.

“I sit. And wait.”

Katsuki sucked in a breath, entranced, falling. He swallowed hard, his eyelids growing heavy as that scent cradled him, roused the Alpha that had been lurking, waiting for this with a patience Katsuki himself did not recognize.

“That’s –“ Katsuki licked his chapped lips. “That’s from the book?”

“Mhm.” Midoriya’s attention flicked to Katsuki’s mouth, then back up. “Well, this has been a day.”

“I think I’m in love with you.”

Midoriya’s smile was instant. Fuck, he had a dimple in one cheek. Midoriya patted Katsuki on the shoulder as he brushed past and made for the desk once more.

“I’d say you're sweet but I’m not sure I can say that since you tried to pounce me about five minutes ago. And, for the record, you’re not in love with me.”

Katsuki followed, bringing the book up to his nose as he trailed behind. The pages smelled of Midoriya, clung on to his earthly scent.

“You really can’t smell me?” Katsuki said as he approached the opposite side of the counter. He was absolutely positive this was not how it went in the movies or books.

“You just don’t give up, do you?” Midoriya said with a breathy laugh as he shook his head and rung up the purchase. “Anything else?”

“Just a date.”

“Anything purchasable?”

“I can buy you a date.”

“Yes, but you can’t purchase me. Insert your card, please”

Katsuki gritted his teeth as he fumbled with his wallet and did as he was told. They completed their transaction in silence, Midoriya all the while with a pleasant, if not a little amused, expression on his freckled face.

With his bagged book in hand, Katsuki hung back at the desk, openly staring at Midoriya. Again, there was no aversion of eyes, no head tilt of submission. He just met Katsuki’s fiery gaze, a steady, sturdy rock.

“I’m going to come back,” Katsuki said, his face stern.

“Enjoy your stakeout,” Midoriya said, finding the actual nerve to wave at Katsuki as if he were a child heading off to school.

“You’re gonna get on my nerves real fuckin’ fast, aren’t you, Omega?” Katsuki gritted out as he turned on his heel and headed for the door.

“Not if you don’t come back!” Midoriya called cheerfully. “Bye!”

Chapter 2

Summary:

“I just… I just did it. It felt right.”
“That doesn’t mean it was."

Notes:

IDK where y'all ABO readers been hiding, but damn have you come out of the woodwork. And I'm happy to see you! Thank you for the comments and kudos and bookmarks - like, damn! I hope you enjoy the ride. It's going to be a long one. They both have some ways to go.

“Okay,” Kirishima said, puffing out a breath from his nose and rolling down the window to the winter night air. “Mina told me it was rude to say anything, but I can’t take it anymore! What is that scent coming off of you?”

“HAAH?” Katsuki rounded on Kirishima in the small car, a snarl at the ready. “You got a problem with how I smell, Omega?”

“I have a problem with feeling like I want to climb out of the window while we’re on a stakeout,” Kirishima said, folding his arms across his chest with a huff. “You smell like Omega and rut – only not rut, it’s like this weird beckoning scent, like for the first time in your existence as an Alpha, you’re trying to call a mate over.”

“Since when did you learn the word ‘beckon’?” Katsuki said with a snort, tilting his face to lean back against the headrest of the car. He allowed his eyes to fall shut for a moment as he tamed his scent, the mindless call he’d been emitting for two days. Two days of obsessing over Midoriya Izuku, the nerdy bookshop owner with eyes like lightning and a tongue just as quick.

The more Katsuki replayed their interaction, the more questions arose. The greater the need to know and learn and keep that man.

Did he smell so strongly because he was unable to catch his own scent and rein it in, or was it Katsuki’s sensitivity to this particular person that made it so overwhelming? A mix of both? Did Midoriya take suppressants? If so, they weren’t working very well. Some people had a naturally strong scent – usually, the stronger the person, the stronger the scent. From the way he’d popped Katsuki in the nose, and the brief mention of Midoriya’s past with fighting, Katsuki gauged him as strong – and, concurrently, well-worthy of Katsuki’s desire.

Somehow, the object of Katsuki’s interest did not agree. At all. In fact, he hadn't gotten rid of Katsuki quick enough.

Who the hell looked at Bakugou fucking Katsuki and thought, Get Him Out Of Here?

Okay, a lot of people.

Regardless.

“I know things,” Kirishima said with a pout. “And I also know that something’s up with you, man. You’re all kinds of weird and jumpy. Like that –“ Kirishima jammed an accusatory finger at Katsuki, who was inhaling the scent of the book Midoriya gave him because it smelled like him. “That! What the hell are you doing? What’s going on? You’re scaring me, dude.”

“Don’t be such a fucking drama queen,” Katsuki said, glad for the evening darkness hiding the way his cheeks heated upon realizing he’d been unconsciously sniffing the book. If Kirishima knew the extent of this – this lunacy – he would laugh his head off. “Probably just need to up my suppressants. It’s been a couple of years.”

“Don’t let that stuff hurt you,” Kirishima said, genuine concern radiating from him as ever. “When was the last time you let yourself go into rut? UA? That was like ten years ago, bro.”

“Yeah, yeah,” Katsuki said without heat, gaze lowered as he thumbed through the corner pages of the already twice-read book. “That ain’t my thing.”

Or, it wasn’t, until two days ago. Now, something was brewing within Katsuki, rising to a heated simmer.

They fell silent then, still waiting in a grubby, nondescript van, across the street from a supposed villain club entrance. Katsuki inhaled deep and pushed back thoughts of Midoriya and his smile. Kirishima’s scent filled the car, one which had long ago become familiar – hell, familial, like a brother. And he’d been bonded to Mina since graduation. Kirishima smelled as much like himself as he did his Alpha.

“What did you mean I smell like Omega?” Katsuki said, his temple pressed to the window, staring out. It had been days. He himself only had the book by which to remember Midoriya.

“Dunno,” Kirishima said, shrugging a shoulder as he pulled out his phone and flicked through some texts. “Like someone rubbed up on you. Or you got laid.”

Kirishima’s head whipped around, his eyes huge, his toothy smile blinding.

“Holy shit, Bakugou, did you get laid?”

“I didn’t get fuckin’ laid, hair-for-brains!” Katsuki snarled, unconsciously clutching the book to his chest. “What is wrong with you? Mind your goddamn business.”

“Your business is my business, buddy,” Kirishima said with a grin, patting Katsuki’s thigh amiably. “And the fact that you’re the most celibate Alpha I’ve ever heard of is, in itself, a serious worry of mine. You’d be so much more chill with a girlfriend. Or just – y’know – sex. Of any kind. At some point in your life. Would be helpful. For everyone’s sanity who works around you and –“

“Stop, stop!” Katsuki dragged his hands over his face and groaned. “You’re un-fucking-bearable.”

“And you’re a seriously miserable virgin, but we love each other anyway,” Kirishima said matter-of-factly.

“Nobody loves you,” Katsuki grumbled.

Stupid fucking Kirishima. Everybody loved him.

Katsuki pursed his lips and slid a slow glance over, eyeing Kirishima’s profile as he texted someone with a half-smile. Probably Mina, probably gossiping. Fucker. But a well-liked fucker.

“Why do people like you so much?” Katsuki said.

Kirishima looked up, and Katsuki could see his cheeks darken, even in the blue evening light.

“I – uh. What do you mean?”

“You go places and everyone fawns over you like you’re a fucking Disney character incarnate. How do you – ugh, I don’t fucking know. Use your personality to make people like you?”

“Use my –“ Kirishima blinked, blinked again. “This is nothing new, but, uh, I don’t think I know what’s going on. Do you not use your personality to make people li – okay, no, nevermind, forget I asked. I mean, I just be myself? And be nice.”

“That sounds like a fuckload of work.”

“It really doesn’t.”

“So, what? Just be nice – that’s it?”

“Maybe just start there. Why are you asking, anyway?”

“Can’t I just make conversation?” Katsuki snapped, his attention fixed out the window, ignoring the press of Kirishima’s gaze against the side of his face.

“Okay,” Kirishima said, gentle enough to have Katsuki’s hackles rising. “If you wanna talk about it, I’m here.”

“Of course you’re fucking here!” Katsuki said, losing his shit enough to have Kirishima laughing as he mock-cowered against his car door. “I’m stuck with you in this godforsaken car!”

At the very least, Kirishima’s laughter distracted him for a while.

 

Be nice.

Katsuki grimaced as he wrapped his orange scarf around his nose and mouth, squinting as a gust of snow flung into his face. Trudging down the street, wrapped in layers, Katsuki navigated the packed holiday crowd, toward the hole in the wall bookshop he’d discovered just a week ago.

When he opened the door and stepped in, the wind slammed it shut behind him, bringing in the cold with his entrance.

“Holy –“

Katsuki leaned back against the door and inhaled sharply, then once more, filling his lungs, refusing to exhale as that evergreen and sunlight shower scent battered his senses like an incoming storm. A shudder trailed down his spine, weakening his knees like no scent had ever come near, not even close. Never had Katsuki been so utterly consumed, so shaken by an Omega. Releasing a slow breath, Katsuki opened his eyes and –

“Hi.” Midoriya said, his head cocked a little, eyes narrowed not in aggression but curiosity, like Katsuki were a strange animal at the zoo. He held a stack of books with identical spines. “You’re back.”

“You’re surprised?”

“I don’t know,” Midoriya said, his mouth in a soft pout akin to a thoughtful frown.

Today he’d dressed in a striking black and red plaid, flannel shirt. His forearms were exposed once more, and Katsuki couldn’t help lingering on the scars up the single arm, the large hand. The top button of his shirt was open, his clavicle freckled and smooth, his shoulders now remarkably wider and thicker than when drowned in an oversized sweater. His jeans were tucked into roughened, steel-toed work boots. He looked like he’d just stepped out of the woods.

Katsuki wanted to devour him.

“Maybe I thought you were just one of those Alphas who get excitable over the first available Omega they see that day.”

Katsuki clenched his teeth.

“Do I look like the type?”

“Yes,” Midoriya said, his grin distracting as much as it was goading and obnoxious. He turned and headed into the maze of shelves.

“Are you available?” Katsuki said, trailing behind as he unraveled his scarf and shoved it into the pocket of his parka. He followed that scent as if it were a curled, beckoning finger beneath his nose. Warmth nestled low in his gut.

Midoriya huffed a short laugh.

“What?”

“You said, the first available Omega. Are you available?”

“Who knows?” Midoriya said with a sigh, turning to face a shelf. He promptly side on the ground, cross-legged, and began to finagle the books into the relatively small slot.

“I’m not asking because I respect that,” Katsuki said, serious, as he dropped to a squat and balanced back on his heels. “I’m asking to know if there’s some asshole I need to fight.”

“Do you even know if I’m gay?” Midoriya said, turning his head to stare at Katsuki with a frank, clear expression. He was so utterly guileless, so without apparent dishonesty.

“Does it matter?” Katsuki fired back. “You’re my destined mate or whatever it’s called. It’s not supposed to matter what we were or are before each other.”

“Did you read that in a book?” Midoriya said, his smile humorless and thin this time. He returned to his work, shoving books onto the shelves with increased aggression. His scent had soured, like bitter, unripe blackberries on a forest path. “Well, I’m not gay. And I know you couldn’t be my destined mate in a million years. So, thanks anyway.”

“I don’t believe that.”

“What part?” Midoriya said, not bothering to look at him.

“Any of it.”

“Well, that’s not my problem.” Midoriya finished shelving his books and sighed, pushing off his knees to a stand. He waited for Katsuki to follow suit, met his eyes with ones almost sad. Katsuki’s heart tugged. “This has been entertaining and all, but your time is wasted on me. I’m about as defective as an Omega can get, Mr. Zero. I’m not mate material.”

Katsuki scoffed.

“The fuck’re you talkin’ about?” He spun and followed Midoriya, who had swept past him toward the front of the store. “What’s defective about you? So you can’t smell. You look perfectly fine to me. Better than fine.”

“Wow,” Midoriya said with a laugh, whirling with his arms folded as he considered Katsuki from head to toe. “Perfectly fine, huh? I guess I’m flattered. I wish I could say the same for you.”

“Hah?” The Alpha in him flared up, chest puffed out and preening for his mate. Katsuki flung off his coat and dropped it to the floor, the full span of his shoulders, his muscled arms, straining in the long-sleeved grey thermal he wore. “You think this doesn’t add up to fine? Not good enough for you?”

He stalked over, hands moving to cage Midoriya against the desk, much like before.

Midoriya’s eyes flashed, and just as quickly, a foot was slipping behind Katsuki’s heel, tripping him up and sending him toppling back against the endcap of a shelving unit. A scarred hand lashed out, wide palm slapping against the wood beside Katsuki’s ear.

Eyes wide, instantly hard, Katsuki gawked down at the deep, secret forest eyes, shrouded in anger. Midoriya smelled like a forest fire. Frustration crackled between them like a lightning storm waiting to strike. Katsuki knew he’d already been hit by it.

“You,” Midoriya said, voice deeper. This was an Omega? Just what the fuck was he? “Don’t pull that Alpha shit in my store. On me or anyone else.”

“There’s only you,” Katsuki said, his chest heaving, his thighs quivering with the repressed urge to pounce, to claim. In this moment, he was thankful Midoriya couldn’t sense the lust steaming off him in thick, sticky plumes of musk.

Meeting Midoriya’s fierce gaze, Katsuki reached up, tentatively wrapped his fingers around Midoriya’s wrist. His scent gland.

“What’re you doing?” Midoriya said, his eyes widening a little, attention flicking between Katsuki’s face, and the thumb that rubbed slow circles over the thin skin of his wrist, releasing summer storm and damp soil scent. Midoriya’s eyelids went a little heavy, thick lashes fluttering as he seemed unable to look away from Katsuki’s ministrations. “What is…”

Katsuki had sunk into instinct, into the steps of calming his Omega, the beast inside of him needing to cool the forest fire that burned between them, to soothe. Releasing a shivering, uneven breath, Katsuki bared his wrist, slicked it across Midoriya’s.

A wave of relief swept over him, like oceans lapping at his soul. Calm, peace, inner silence fell like a soft, grey morning fog, smelled like damp early moments of muted dawn and grass clinging with dew.

Marked. They’d smell like each other for days. Midoriya would be safe from the Alphas – for a time.

Katsuki opened his eyes, unaware he’d closed them. Midoriya’s lids were shut too, his free hand no longer pinned to the shelf but, at some point, moving to cling to Katsuki’s collar, fingers bunched in the fabric. His rosy lips were softly parted, breathing shallow.

Midoriya opened his eyes, a softer, hazy green.

“What –“

“Yeah,” Katsuki said, his voice a deep croak of sound. He swallowed, wet his lips. Dropped his hand from Midoriya’s. “That was –“

“What the hell did you do to me?” Midoriya said, his words suddenly sharp, his hand slipping away from Katsuki's chest.

Katsuki blinked, smelled the confusion curling around him like wisps of smoke. Saw the way Midoriya’s eyebrows weighed down low.

“I don’t – I mean.” Katsuki shrugged, unable to find the words for pure instinct. “I just… I just did it. It felt right.”

“That doesn’t mean it was,” Midoriya said, his expression unreadable as he stepped back. “I should ban you here and now.”

“For what? Showing you what I already know?” Katsuki’s laugh was harsh and hard. “You’re mine, Midoriya Izuku. Whether you accept it yet or not. I didn't peg you for a wimp.”

“As much as the whole stalker thing is absolutely charming and all,” Midoriya said, turning to pick up Katsuki’s coat and shoving it in his arms. “You can go now. Don’t come back.”

“Oiy, oiy!” Katsuki said, whirling around, snarling as Midoriya physically pushed and coaxed him backwards toward the door. “I didn’t even get to buy a book!”

“Read the first one twice, Alpha.”

With that, Katsuki was very literally forced out into the street, into the biting cold.

Midoriya stood on the other side of the glass door, fists on his hips, with a face like the apocalypse.

Katsuki was completely in love.

Notes:

Before anyone asks, YES, Midoriya is blatantly lying about not being gay LOL.

THANK YOU FOR READING AND COMMENTING! I'm so happy to share the beginnings of this story with you!

Chapter 3

Summary:

“You feel it, too. I smelled it on you.”
“I’m pretty sure what you smelled was your own arrogance. Alphas get that confused a lot.”

Notes:

Hello hello! Happy Holidays to those who celebrate, but also: Yay for no more holidays, because I can get back to posting every 7-10 days, yay! Thank you so much for your absolutely overwhelming response to this fic. I'm thrilled to bring this to you. Please enjoy! Every third chapter will be Izuku POV.

ALSO: Let's all just pretend my ABO 'science' is real science for the sake of this fic. Just. Don't give yourself a headache. Don't fight it. Go with it.

“Get off me,” Izuku said with a low chuckle, smiling at the insistent weight upon his chest. A nuzzle against his jaw had his lashes fluttering as he pushed away the intrusive face with one hand and rubbed at his eyes with the other. “I’m up, I’m up. Breakfast?”

The three and a half foot, fifteen pound Maine Coon cat the color of beach sand and gold headbutted Izuku’s temple hard enough to ache and yeowled in his ear.

“Act like I starve you,” Izuku mumbled, rolling to sit at the edge of the bed, feet on the cold hardwood. Blue winter light cast long shadows, darker than it should have been at seven in the morning. A chill crept across the floor and up his legs, goading him to curl into the warm cradle of downy blankets and fleecy sheets for a day of nesting and resting.

Another headbutt akin to a toddler punching in him the back had Izuku groaning to a stand, ruffling his hair as he aimed a quelling look over his shoulder.  Natsume sat there, a king among cats, as large as a three year old and as fluffy and magnificent as a lion. However, his grumpy expression rarely changed. Especially as he stared up at Izuku, clearly waiting for his morning meal.

“Come on, then,” Izuku said with a sigh, padding from the bedroom on sleep-wobbled legs.

Scratching his hip through rumpled All Might boxers, Izuku yanked open the refrigerator door and set about plating up a massive meal of his own homemade cat chow. Once Natsume was devouring his feast with muffled grumbles and smacking lips, Izuku wrapped himself in a worn, faded robe of moss green, grabbed his phone, and sat upon a kitchen countertop to check messages as he waited for his kettle to boil.

Feet idly swinging, heels knocking back against cupboard cabinets, Izuku smiled to himself as he skimmed a 4am text. Only one person contacted him at that hour. He opened Hitoshi’s message.

Early lunch at 10:30? I’m coming off a night shift.

Izuku sent confirmation and set about his day in earnest. The wind was once more clawing and whipping at the window frames of his small, cozy apartment, and so he bundled and layered up in his usual pieces. A long-sleeved thermal in deep, brick red and an oversized, chunky knit cardigan in shades of warm, mellow grays. Black jeans, ripped at the knees from years of wear, with red thermal leggings beneath for extra warmth. Izuku did not enjoy being cold. His double layer of socks told that story.

Turning on the radio for Natsume, Izuku collected his things, his worn leather side satchel, his hiking boots, and outerwear.

“Food,” he mumbled to himself, already forgetting to eat again by the time he’d buttoned himself into his coat, hat, and scarf. He always kept a stash of protein drinks in the tiny back room fridge at the shop, anyway.

“Shit, pills,” Izuku said as he locked the door of his apartment. Heaving a sigh, he let himself back in, ignoring Natsume’s moans and groans at him for falling out of schedule. Making a beeline for a kitchen cupboard, he cracked open the tops of his suppression and depression meds, popped them in the mouth, and swallowed them dry.

Not that one of them made much a difference. The guess as to which would be easy for anyone who met him even once.

Saying a final goodbye to real and only Alpha in his life, Izuku shut the door on Natsume’s displeased face and braved the cold.

The sour, acrid taste of the suppressant stuck chalky and dry on Izuku’s tongue, and he hated every minute of every day of it. They barely made a difference anyway. He’d been to doctors all over the place after he’d presented. His scent, so instant and volatile, had been a cause for concern among his school and his family.

Turned out, Izuku’s affliction was rare. Extremely so. Heterozygous alpha.  In a nutshell, Izuku’s genes had held both the possibility of Alpha or Omega. Due to a birth defect, he prominently carried both genes. Only one could win, and in this instance, the Omega had been the victor. Had the Alpha prevailed, he'd have been heterozygous omega.

However, the side effects of such a disability included an overpowering scent from the glands that formed to accommodate a more aggressive, pungent sent of an Alpha, the musculature and agility of an Alpha, and, well, an Alpha’s disposition on many accounts. Aggression included.

Izuku had wished he’d never known. As a sixteen year old who’d missed out on being a hero, missed out on the profession he’d desperately dreamed of for a lifetime, finding out that he could have – should have – presented as an Alpha had crushed him. Utterly.

And so, the Omega suppression pills barely worked, and the Alpha ones certainly next to nothing. Dead End.

Izuku stared out the bus window, watching hundreds of people mill about their mornings in the slush and snow. Overcast skies bled into gray buildings which bled into gray sidewalks. He missed color, vibrancy, vitality.

Red eyes and the devil’s grin peeking over a bright orange scarf snapped into view, sparked in his chest.

Izuku huffed and promptly set that on a high shelf. What an absolutely self-important, classic Alpha.

Someone sat beside him, a man in his periphery in his early forties, handsome and graying at the temples. Izuku didn’t have to smell him to know he reeked of Alpha. Lacking the ability to sniff out others’ presentations had only made Izuku more keenly aware to their habits, dispositions, and expressions. All three gave them away, more often than not.

Izuku was about to spread his own knees since the guy next to him seemed to feel like he could open his legs to encompass two seats instead of one, when the man inhaled sharply, his shoulders going stiff.

Frowning, Izuku slowly looked over and up, meeting eyes that were a little wide and a nose scrunched in distaste. The grown man whimpered – just once, quick and short, and cut-off early as he abruptly stood and found a spot at the back of the bus.

Izuku faced forward his seat, puzzled. He stared at the back of a stranger’s head as he ripped at the chapped skin of his bottom lip, lost in thought.

Such a scene had occurred seven times in the last three days. Two Alphas had even straight-up apologized for standing next to him. No one had hit on him at all. In three days. That had to be a record within the last ten years of his entire life.

Izuku opened up shop at precisely nine, downed a protein drink without any joy or taste for it, and put on some coffee in anticipation of Hitoshi’s later arrival. Sipping from his own mug behind the cashier counter, Izuku began his lazy morning. The shop made fairly good business. Located just a block from a train station, travelers were always popping in on their walk to the tracks, grabbing a book or magazine to flip through as they sped off to distant towns.

Izuku liked it. This peaceful existence. Never would he imagine he’d have ended up here, owning his own bookstore in a busy area of town and enjoying every single day – but here he was. So far from the life of a Pro Hero.

He owed it all to Mr. Yagi. The tall, emaciated gentleman who had intercepted Izuku’s disaster life on more than one occasion in the past. The man who had passed this place on to him, and him alone. 

“Ding dong,” said a lazy drawl.

Izuku peered up from a book he’d been rereading, already grinning as he watched Hitoshi unravel from a white scarf that circled around him three times over. An inordinately long scarf. Hitoshi's smile was wide and welcoming, his eyes as dark and shadowed as ever. His wild mane of hair was tamed into a hat with a puffball atop.

“How was work?” Izuku said, coming around the counter for a short hug and slap on the back.

“It was – woah.” Hitoshi took a step in retreat, his brows knitted as he scanned Izuku up and down. “You alright? You stink.”

“Stink?” Izuku glanced at himself. “Like what?”

“Like aggression and bro pheromones.”

Izuku locked eyes with Hitoshi, his heart a dull thud in his ears.

“I smell like Alpha?”

“You smell like you’ve been purposefully marked by an Alpha, is what you smell like.” Hitoshi cocked his head, the edges of his smirk returning. “You get laid?”

“No, I didn’t get laid,” Izuku said, grimacing. “Who in the world would I be sleeping –“

“Whoever stank you up, I’d say.” Hitoshi raised an eyebrow and leaned in once more, his nose hovering at Izuku’s neck. He sniffed delicately then coughed like he’d inhaled too much smoke. He waved Izuku off and leaned back against the countertop, lounging his elbows upon them. “Don’t you remember, y’know, when you could smell? Two kids in high school presenting, and dating, and the next day they’d smell like each other and no one would wanna go near them?”

“I know what marking is,” Izuku snapped, aggravated with himself and with Bakugou fucking Katsuki, current bane of his existence. “I’ll break his nose for real this time.”

“Whose nose?” Hitoshi said, snorting a short laugh, no doubt at his best friend’s expense. “Who did this to you? Whoever it was, I wanna shake their hand. I bet you’ve had Alphas cowering from you left and right the past couple of days.”

“How do you know it’s been a couple of days?” Izuku said, now pacing the center of the store, big black boots scraping the over-treaded carpeting.

“It’s a little distant now. Can’t smell it so much when you’re five feet away as when I’m right next to you. However many days ago you saw the person, and let them do fuck knows what to you, the Alphas were probably diving into nearby bushes. You smell scary, Izuku.”

Izuku scrubbed his hands over his face, biting back an instinctive growl. He tamped down the lightning storm that crackled and flashed in his chest, ready to snap and burn.

“I’m gonna kill him.”

“As much as I love the whole mystery surrounding this, because – let’s face it – your life is about as exciting as a game of backgammon at the old folks’ home these days, let’s spit it out. Who did you let touch you long enough to mark you?”

“That guy,” Izuku said, dropping his head into his hands, his voice muffled in shame against his palms. “You know. The stalker.”

“The –“ Hitsoshi’s laugh was raspy and full of delight. “The stalker? The stalker. Oh my god, the –“

“Alright, alright.” Izuku whimpered, his shoulders folding in a rare display of distress as he approached and dropped his forehead to Hitoshi’s shoulder. Broken Omega or not, there were times when the comfort of another person akin to packmate was all the savage soul required.

Hitoshi sighed and patted Izuku’s back in steady, soothing rhythm.

“He didn’t… hurt you, or anything, right?”

“You think I’m that weak?”

“You know I don’t. You remember how we met.”

“Couldn’t forget.”

“So, I know you're not weak. I’m just wondering how you went from ranting about the obnoxious Alpha barging into your store to letting him mark you a week later. You had to have known what he was doing.”

“I – hm.” Izuku didn’t move, his eyes shut, lost in thought, harking back to what Bakugou had brought out in him. “I guess I knew, on some level. But there was just something that he – there was a way about him and I don’t know how to explain it. Like I couldn’t move or think, couldn’t –“

“I hate to pause the trip down memory lane,” Hitoshi said, placing both slim hands on Izuku’s shoulders and bringing him back a step so Izuku could look up at him. “But I’m just gonna stop you right there. You know you were reacting to him as an Omega does an Alpha, right? I mean, you fucked with Alphas in university. I remember.”

“I – I mean,” Izuku paused, pouting in thought. “I did but I never – I never felt like that with any Alpha. I mean, I couldn’t smell them. We just had sex because I was physically attracted to them and they were – I don’t know how attracted they were to me, rather than my scent. But I personally didn’t feel what I… felt. With him.”

Hitoshi considered him for a moment, his bruises beneath his eyes highlighting the pale purple shade of his irises with eerie intensity.

“Then I guess your body might know something you don’t.”

“That’s bullsh-“

A snarl rose up like thunder, Hitoshi bashed in from the left. He toppled into a spinning shelf of novels and was back on his feet in seconds with a face ominous as the reaper.

Izuku blinked owlishly against a hard, heaving chest of muscle and bone, two arms encasing him close. Against his ear, a crescendo of growls mounted, more animal than human. Izuku couldn’t move, his arms pinned to his sides as he gawked at Hitoshi from his prone spot against a body he recognized a little too well for having only met him twice.

When Hitoshi grinned, Izuku’s stomach dropped.

Oh no. This was the whole reason he hadn’t used the stalker’s name.

“Bakugou?” Hitoshi said, folding his arms as he rocked back on his heels, considering the two of them. “You’re the stalker?”

Izuku tilted his head, his hair brushing Bakugou’s chin as he inwardly startled at the vision of Bakugou’s teeth bared, a feral growl still coming, low now. His pointed canines glinted, his pupils were pinpricks surrounded by blood.

Once more, Izuku didn’t have to smell him to know he was saying, Mine mine mine.

“Wow,” Hitoshi said, wandering a lazy circle around the two of them, his smile only growing. “Is it okay if I take a picture? This is – I mean, I never thought I’d see the day. This is the shit of legends. No one would ever believe me.” Hitoshi held up his hands in peace, his gaze notably and smartly averted. Eye contact would be a Bad Idea right now, and if there was anyone more calm and collected in a tense situation than Hitoshi, Izuku had yet to meet them. “Not that I would. Tell anyone.”

Bakugou’s response was to bring one hand from Izuku’s back to bury in his curls, shoving his face further against his chest as a threatening, thunderous warning rolled up mindlessly from his throat.

“Hey,” Izuku said, wiggling, looking for room in the iron hold. “Hey, stop that right now! Stop. Bakugou!”

Bakugou’s frame twitched, his growl cut off like a switch.  Eyes narrowed, attention never leaving Hitoshi’s slightly ducked head, the grip around Izuku began to loosen. Bakugou buried his nose in Izuku’s hair before he could escape, inhaling deep and slow. His shoulders slumped, rounded out with a sense of calm that somehow flooded Izuku’s body with warm licks of fireside comfort.

Opening his eyes without realizing they’d closed, it dawned on Izuku that Bakugou had stroked and smoothed his throat across Izuku’s, over the pulsing gland that ached like a second heartbeat upon his neck

With a gasp, Izuku stumbled back, then again, until he bumped in Hitoshi. Familiar, comforting hands lightly held his biceps, steadying.

“It’s fine,” Hitoshi said lowly, as they watched Bakugou look at Izuku like he’d been smacked in the face. He hadn’t yet spoken a single word. Izuku had never really seen the animal take over in Alpha up close. Not like this – not when he was involved. “You released a scent of distress and he calmed you both with his own. Nature being nature.”

“Nature doesn’t mean he can barge in here and – and – and – “

“Midoriya,” Bakugou said finally, his voice a ravaged husk from overuse. He was still dressed in his winter jacket, a sheen of sweat across his forehead, his hat and scarf strewn on the floor. “I’m – why is he here?”

“That’s none of your business,” Izuku snapped, his face hot as he folded his arms across his chest.

“I’m his friend,” Hitoshi said easily. “You know about those, right? I hear you still have a few back from 1-A.”

“You don’t get to touch him,” was Bakugou’s only reply, stalking forward with a finger pointed.

“Watch it, Explodo Boy,” Hitoshi said, taking a step in front of Izuku. “You know I’m Omega, and you know I’ve been bonded with Shouto for near five years now. Your aggression isn’t just misplaced. You look like a brainless Alpha who thinks with his dick. And I can tell you right now that this guy?” Hitoshi jerked a thumb to the side. “He’s seen all that before and he’s not impressed. Ever.”

Bakugou’s face twisted up in a vicious smile that had nothing to do with humor and everything to do with the kill.

“You don’t know me, Shinsou. Haven’t for a good long time.”

“I know everyone better than they think,” Hitoshi said with a sigh and shrug, like it was a great weight to carry.

Bakugou scoffed.

“Well I –“

“Excuse me,” Izuku said, his voice dripping with venom as he marched forward, hooked his arm in Bakugou’s and yanked him away. “Can I talk to you for a second?”

“Wh-“

“That wasn’t a question, Alpha.”

“I’ll just wait here, then!” Hitoshi called, laughing in the distance as Izuku dragged Bakugou to the back of the store and urged him into the break room.

“You insufferable asshole!” Izuku said, pushing Bakugou’s chest hard, livid. “Are you out of your mind? Just what do you think you –“

“Oiy, oiy,” Bakugou said, catching Izuku’s wrists, his face screwed up in a frown, his brow wrinkled deep. “Calm down.”

Izuku’s eyes flashed. He streaked into action, gripping Bakugou’s wrist at the right angle, shifting his compact body to throw Bakugou off balance, and spinning him around until Bakugou’s arm was locked behind his back in an instant.

Five foot five or not, Izuku pressed his weight against Bakugou’s back, ignoring the curses that spewed from Bakugou’s mouth as his cheek was smashed against the wall.

“Move now, and your arm will snap,” Izuku said, his voice shaking. “But you already know that, Mr. Zero.”

“Fuck, you’re strong,” Bakugou said, his voice strained. It was either Izuku’s imagination, or Bakugou had arched his ass back against Izuku’s crotch.

Regardless.

Izuku took a breath, calmed the roiling storm that threatened within.

“Now let me make this clear. Come at me or my friends again, animal instinct or not, and I’ll make sure you’re probated from Pro-Hero work for as long my charge against you will let me. Got that? Alpha or not, you don’t throw your weight around in here. Nobody does that but me.”

There was a pause, Bakugou unmoving against Izuku’s body, his breathing still irregular and irritated by the rise and fall of his shoulders.

“Yeah. Alright.”

Izuku gritted his teeth, nearly every instinct in his body telling him not to let this Alpha off so easy. Except for the instinct in his heart, the heart Hitoshi had always claimed was too soft on any and all people who came into his life.

With a sigh, Izuku released Bakugou and took a cautionary step back, his gaze wary when Bakugou turned and met his eyes.

“Also,” Izuku said, earning another disgruntled expression from Bakugou. “Don’t mark me without my permission.”

“Does that mean you’ll eventually give me permission?” Bakugou said, his arms folded across his chest, his eyebrows climbing toward his hairline expectantly.

“I –“ Izuku sputtered, eyes huge and bewildered. “What? No. No! What?”

“You’ll change your mind,” Bakugou said, taking a step forward, his head ducked slightly, almost – what? Passive? Never. “You feel it, too. I smelled it on you.”

“I’m pretty sure what you smelled was your own arrogance. Alphas get that confused a lot.”

“Midoriya.”

“What?” Izuku snapped, his fists on his hips, his equilibrium entirely off kilter by this bizarre conversation.

Another step forward and Bakugou was too close, his nostrils flaring, his cheeks flushing as his fiery gaze dragged over Izuku’s tense figure.

“I came here to bring you lunch, y’know. Before I saw that asshole with his hands on you. I hate that guy.”

“I’m sure he’s not a huge fan of you, either,” Izuku said dryly. He cocked his head. “You brought me lunch?”

“Yeah, I guess,” Bakugou said with a shrug, his frown exhibiting his own confusion about the situation. “I can’t stop cooking. I’ve been cooking for three days. My friend, he – he said it was some instinct or whatever. To, uh, provide for you. Or something.”

“That’s… nice,” Izuku said carefully, taking a single step in retreat. His back bumped against the office door. He met Bakugou’s gaze plainly. “But I can’t eat that. I don’t even know you. What if you poisoned it? Or you’re secretly a murderer who drugs the food of your latest victim and waits until they collapse so you can bring them back to –“

“You think way too much, buddy,” Bakugou said, a flash of his white grin cutting across his devastating features.

Izuku huffed.

“I’m just careful. Like I said, Pro-Hero or not. Classmate of my best friend or not. I don’t know you.”

“So, get to know me,” Bakugou said, advancing two steps. So close. Stalking his prey with hungry, blood red eyes and a wicked grin. “Go on a date with me.”

“Ohhh no,” Izuku said, sputtering a laugh as he waved his hands in front of him. “That would – no. That’s never happening.”

“You want to, though,” Bakugou said, his voice dropping an octave as he hunched his shoulders to lean in, looming. His nose grazed the line of Izuku’s jaw. “Don’t you. Izuku.”

“I –“ Izuku swallowed, a hand coming up to rest upon Bakugou’s chest, to push him away. He did not push. Bakugou’s heart was like a warrior drum in full attack against his palm. “I don’t want to.”

“I don’t believe you,” Bakugou murmured.

I don’t either.

“I have a book for you,” Izuku said quietly, his gaze lowering.

Bakugou paused and stood straighter, his voice almost, maybe, excited.

“A book? Give it to me.”

“C-come on,” Izuku said, demanding of himself that he shake off the effect Bakugou had on him.

Once more, a feeling he’d never experienced with another Alpha. Nothing that seeped into his bones like curling in front of a warm fire, wrapped in a thick blanket.

Izuku could feel Bakugou trailing behind him. His presence, his attitude, his desire.

Pausing at a shelf, Izuku plucked a thin paperback and held it out with a sober expression. Bakugou took it, their fingers brushing like a flicker of fire against Izuku’s skin.

“Kokoro?” Bakugou said, his smile wide and too charming for his brutish nature. “Are you giving me your heart?”

“Nice try,” Izuku said dryly, though his chest constricted. “You need to read this if you ever want to, y’know…”

“Fuck you?”

Izuku gawked.

“Go on a date with me!” Izuku yanked at the book in Bakugou’s hands, his face gone up in flame. “You know what? Forget I ever –“

Bakugou held onto the book tightly, using the force of Izuku’s grasp to pull him in until their faces were close.

“Thank you,” Bakugou said softly, his breath soft and warm upon Izuku’s lips. “For this. And the date you’ll eventually give me.”

Izuku swallowed, pressing his lips tightly together so that he might not fall into the magnetism of the man before him, caught in the shadows of hundreds of book with their hundreds of fairy tale romances. Izuku had read them all. Didn’t mean he believed in them. Or this.

“Let’s just –“ Izuku released the book and spun on his heel. “Let’s just ring you up so you can go, already.”

“Pushy.”

“Says you.”

“Hey, boys,” Hitoshi said, having sat himself atop the counter as he flipped through a bicycling magazine. He eyed Izuku once, and when he received a nod of okay, relaxed his smile on Bakugou as he slid down to his feet. “This was such a fun day.”

“I hate you,” Bakugou said dismally, making a point not to touch Hitoshi as he swerved out of his way and took out his wallet.

“You miss me,” Hitoshi said, giving Bakugou’s back a solid thwack. “We should have lunch together.”

“It’s not you I want lunch with,” Bakugou said, his voice taut and barely repressed as he paid for his purchase and Izuku kept quiet, listening.

“Wow,” Hitoshi said, in awe as he peered between Izuku and Bakugou. “You must feel so awkward right now. I don’t think you ever even looked at a anyone in high school, and here you are basically professing your –“

“I’ll shear off your hair and shove it down your throat,” Bakugou said, turning on his heel with his bagged book. He looked over his shoulder, and when his eyes pierced Izuku’s, Izuku had to swallow a gasp at their intensity. “Sunday. You, me, lunch, this book.”

“Uh.”

Bakugou headed for the door, gesturing to a large paper bag left at the entryway.

“Eat that. It’s for you. Shinsou, don’t touch it or I’ll know and I’ll kill you. Bye.”

The door shut with a frigid gust and they both stood their silently, like they’d just witnessed the destruction of the entire bookstore.

“So,” Hitoshi said, turning to Izuku with a smirk. “Let’s eat all that food.”

Notes:

This is such a slow burn, guys. Much slow. Such patience.

ALSO: This is what Izuku's cat looks like. Basically, like Bakugou as a cat.

Chapter 4

Summary:

For the record, there were no search results for: How Do I Make A Guy Like Me When He Can’t Smell How Awesome I Am?

Notes:

Hello, all! It's your resident asshat who hasn't updated in a month. I am sorry for this, Life And Whatnot got in the way.

I want to thank you from the bottom of my heart for all the support and accolade this fic has received in its very short lifetime. I'm so excited for the world I'm going to build for you all. I relish your comments, take them to heart, and never take them for granted. I know I say this a lot, but I want you to be reminded of it every time - how much I appreciate every single one of your reads and comments. Thank you! Please enjoy!

 “My Alpha.”

Warm, soothing voice, panting damp at Katsuki’s ear. Unrushed hands, calloused and scarred, skimming his shoulders, scraping blunt nails down his back as that compact powerhouse body lowered upon his lap, taking his aching cock in full, squeezing tight, unrelenting.

Arms clinging around each other, embracing in a sweat slick hold, their entwined scent like a forest fire raging, burning, consuming. Finally, finally, Katsuki could graze his teeth over that fragrant junction of neck, drown in it, frantically rub this throat over it, over that beautiful face, marking, claiming every span of freckle-scattered skin.

“Stay,” Katsuki managed, his cock throbbing to breed as that hot, taut body slowly, idly worked up and down. Like they had all the time in the world. Like they had the world. “Stay.”

Thick, muscular thighs wrapped and clenched around Katsuki’s waist, a welcome weight, sinking his dick deeper, razing all thoughts to ash.

That sinful mouth was at his ear still, a scrap of tongue lapping at his throat, tasting his smoky scent, savoring him as their hips rocked together, barely parted.

“Fill me, my Alpha,” the voice crooned, both soft and steel at once, both heady and anchoring. “Please.”

Katsuki’s eyes shot open with a gasp, his body mid-arch, his boxers warm and sticky.

Breathing shallow, quick, and shock, Katsuki gaped at ceiling, cast deep blue in early morning shadow. He didn’t know how long he laid there, but his lips were dry from not having closed his mouth in quite some time, and when he got up to shuck away his boxers, the mess he wiped from himself was cool.

This was getting pathetic.

No, Katsuki had passed pathetic the moment he’d practically – literally – begged for Midoriya’s name.

Naked, Katsuki wandered to the kitchen, a scowl already marring his mouth.

Filling his kettle to boil and preparing a mug of matcha with practiced movements, guided by years of habit, Katsuki flicked on the morning news and listened in with one ear while he scrolled through his phone.

“-nother Alpha attack on an Omega in the early morning hours this Sunday morning.”

With a sigh, Katsuki tossed his phone aside and folded his arms across his chest as he meandered toward the television, intent on the screen.

“This is the fourth attack by the same assumed culprit. Reports say that, once more, the Alpha approached the Omega from behind, ripped out her neck glands with his teeth. When the Omega was lying prone upon the ground, the assailant chewed on the wrist glands until damaged, and left for the victim for dead. Thankfully, the Omega survived. A recent update on the previous victims confirm that the second Omega has since passed from their wounds. This has been –“

The electric kettle boiled over with a pop and Katsuki turned on his heel to pour his tea.

Fucking Alphas, he thought as stirred his tea and was reminded of someone’s green eyes. Ninety percent of manslaughter, domestic abuse, and aggravated assault crimes stemmed directly from Alphas. The remaining percentage was nearly all Betas with an extremely rare smattering of Omegas.

Sipping his scalding tea and enjoying the aggressive burn on his tongue, Katsuki wandered into his bedroom and opened his closet to peer inside.

A flash of Midoriya’s fierce expression just before he’d wrenched Katsuki’s arm behind his back and slammed him up against the wall. The authority in his relatively unassuming, almost sweet-toned voice.

Katsuki’s future mate was indeed an extremely rare Omega.

He was a complete fucking badass.

Who happened to want to kick Katsuki’s ass from here to Sunday.

Today just happened to be Sunday.

Peering over the rim of his mug as he drank, Katsuki eyed his clothes. What did a person wear to a date? Katsuki could take down twenty-five men on his own, but what the fuck pants did a person put on when they needed to impress someone who actively disliked them?

Since their last encounter, Katsuki had bit the bullet and done some proper research. He was a smart guy, smarter than most, so why the thought hadn’t occurred to him until recently was beyond him. His only explanation was the way Midoriya made him feel.

Like Midoriya was the sun and Katsuki couldn’t escape his gravity since he’d walked into that damn bookshop. He blinded and brought Katsuki to his knees, made his instincts rise up his throat and speak for him, act and think for him.

Did everyone feel this way after meeting a potential mate? Katsuki had never paid attention. If anything, he’d found it distasteful, obnoxious, and a very clear waste of time.

How many times had Kirishima failed a test simply because he’d been too busy mooning over Mina in class? How many times had they gotten detention after being caught in a goddamn broom closet?

Now what? Katsuki felt like a teenager. Worse than a teenager, because he was a grown-ass twenty-five year old Alpha male at the top of his game as a hero, known throughout the literal world for his triumphs –

And here he was, mooning over a guy who smelled like deep, dark woods and old parchment scrawled with secrets. A guy who appeared not merely uninterested, but actively distasteful of Alphas.

Yanking out a pair of casual, black khakis and a soft, almost violet-grey crewneck sweater with quieter grey dress shirt beneath, Katsuki tossed them on the bed and walked out. He was early – way too early.  Having only Sundays off during the week, his daily regimen bled over to his free day and he found himself waking at six in the morning, regardless of duty.

With a sigh, Katsuki dropped onto his couch, comfortably nude as he stretched his legs out down the length and grabbed his phone once more. Tea in hand, he flicked open the recent article he’d been reading on the science behind bonding.

Previous to this line of research, his main concern had been: Why Am I Suddenly Acting Like Such A Tool?

Mina might have laughed and pointed out that Katsuki had needed to read an article like that ten years ago.

But this was different. Katsuki had no intention of changing. What he wanted to know was why he felt so out of control when he was around Midoriya. Why the tenuous grasp upon his feral desires was so slippery, writhing to be free, to latch onto Midoriya and refuse to let go. Why he couldn’t stop cooking. Why he instinctively growled at pathetic, shitty Alphas who might approach him on the street. Why he’d had to fight back to urge to eviscerate his own former classmate, a fucking Omega and bonded at that, for just having his hands on Midoriya’s arms.

Midoriya was right. They didn’t really know each other.

That didn’t make Midoriya any less his, though. Of this, Katsuki had been sure, the minute he’d been overwhelmed by that scent, entranced, enraptured so wholly.
If only Midoriya felt it, too.

For the record, there were no search results for: How Do I Make A Guy Like Me When He Can’t Smell How Awesome I Am?

This date would make a difference. Midoriya would see what Katsuki was like. Strong, brave, cool, a top hero, smart as hell, desired by all. He was the ideal fucking Alpha, wasn’t he? Even the magazines said so.

If Katsuki could just pull Midoriya out of that bookshop, he would see. He’d see how well they could match, and what a catch Katsuki was.

Speaking of the date, Katsuki had never given a time to meet. Or anything, for that matter. He’d been pissed off and desperate – the former he was used to, the latter an entirely unfamiliar emotion – and he’d just screamed the first thing to come to mind. He knew Midoriya would be there, though, working.

In fact, he seemed to be the only person who worked there. Did he ever have a day off?

He seemed like the workaholic type. Serious, studious, undoubtedly intelligent.

So how did a person become a bookworm stuck in the body of, to Katsuki’s impression, a miniature Alpha? The lightning cracks in those expressive eyes were anything but meek.

Curiosities clinging to the frowning corners of Katsuki’s mouth, he headed for the shower. He’d take his time getting ready, and would show up when he showed up.

After he’d dressed and decided there was never and could never be a thing done with his hair, Katsuki switched out his chunky parka for a black peacoat. Tugging taut, black leather gloves over his crooked, broken five-times-over fingers, Katsuki glanced at the book sitting upon his kitchen table. He shoved it in the back pocket of his khakis.

Wrapping his orange scarf around his nose and mouth as he took the stairs down from his apartment, Katsuki slipped on his sunglasses before he stepped out and found himself appropriately hidden from the public. Winter always benefitted him on that level, at least. It was easier to cover his face.

Being loved by the people of his city was great and all, but it had gotten old, fast. The glory and recognition had always been a driving force in Katsuki’s life, but what had always mattered most was winning the war. Emerging victorious. Racking up a record like no hero before him.

Past or present, there was no one else like him on his planet. Everybody told him so. The facts told him so.

Brisk air bit at his cheeks, but wasn’t as harsh as previous weeks. The sun shone, reflecting like sharp shards of glass against snow drifts. Shouldering through the cluttered Sunday crowd, Katsuki scanned faces, expressions, what people held in their hands. Tuned in to passing conversation. It wasn’t just his heightened senses at work, but the hero in him never off-duty. His ‘day off’ had stopped being a day off by the time he was eighteen.

The trip from his apartment to Parchment, the simply named, hole-in-the-wall bookstore near a bustling train station, took a good half an hour. Katsuki’s muscles warmed from the walk, his hands growing familiarly damp as he peeled off his gloves and shoved them in his pockets.

Pulling a monogrammed handkerchief of ultra-absorbent material from his coat, Katsuki wiped the nitroglycerin from his hands and crumpled it away. The last thing he needed was to put his sweaty, flammable palms on a paperback and accidentally burst the entire shop into flames.

Katsuki didn’t know shit about dudes or dating, but he had a fucking clue that wouldn’t go over well.

The buzz from Katsuki’s pants had his teeth baring as he yanked the phone out, swerving between obnoxious shoppers. Katsuki’s snarl dropped to a frown as he opened Sero’s text.

Are you seriously going on a date today?

Katsuki considered demanding who the hell spilled the beans, but he recognized a worthless line of questioning when he saw one. Kirishima had jumped onto the counter with joy when he’d pried the information of him. He’d hugged Katsuki longer than comfortable. There had been tears. One-sided tears. Then, more tears after Katsuki aimed a right jab to Kirishima’s ribs.

Then, unavoidably, the news would travel from Kirishima to Mina, Mina to Denki, and Denki to Sero. Hell, if the information had reached Denki, then half a dozen other people probably already knew. Mouthy little fucker.

Before Katsuki could pointedly not reply to such an intrusive question, another text popped up, followed by more.

Let me give you some advice.

I don’t know this girl, or if she’s Omega, Beta. Either way, when you walk into that room, she’s more important than you. Remember that the whole time, and you’ll be fine.

I pray you’ll be fine, anyway.

Also, make sure she’s not a gold digger.

Fuming, Katsuki stood in the center of the sidewalk, bumped left and right as he extinguished the urge to set his phone ablaze. He’d lost too many phones that way.

Promptly ignoring the messages, Katsuki skulked down the street, his mostly masked face and black ensemble opening a path for him as he stomped on with a vengeance.

No one fucking knew him. Not really. Not even his best friends. He wasn’t complaining, but it was the truth all the same. Hell, they didn’t even know he was gay.

Katsuki preferred it that way. He kept himself to himself. If people didn’t know him, they couldn’t involve him in their drama, nor could they cause drama in his life.

Unraveling his scarf to reveal a scowl, Katsuki slipped through the front door, sliding his sunglasses atop his head. A sweet and sour mingle of mixed scents hung heavy in the air, cloying and nauseating as Katsuki wrinkled his nose and stepped inside. He eyed the multiple adults idly wandering the store.

Customers, Katsuki thought bitterly. He’d only ever come on weekdays at random hours. A weekend, just before noon, looked like prime opportunity for the swarm of Omega and Beta nerds to clog the aisles of Midoriya’s shop.

Speaking of.

Katsuki inclined his chin, nostrils flaring. His lashes fluttered as the familiar wave of pine and drenched earth both soothed his body and invigorated the beast within. His throat rumbled softly, quickly cut off and subdued.

Choosing an aisle at random, Katsuki unbuttoned the length of his coat as he meandered between tall book cases. A scatter of giggles drew him in to the very back of the store, opening up to a bright and cheerful children’s area he’d been too preoccupied to previously notice.

Katsuki’s lungs expanded and paused, his chest full as he lagged back behind a few scattered parents.

Midoriya sat, cross-legged, cheeks rosy he held a large book upon his lap. He read slowly, his enunciation both clear and emphatic, a storyteller’s voice. A half-moon of toddlers and small children sat before him, engrossed in every word spoken in that sweet, smooth rise and fall.

“Know when to speak,” Midoriya said, staring pointedly at a boy with very red hair. The boy’s gap-toothed smile was shameless. “Know when to listen. No matter how you look at it, there’s so much to discover.”

Expression neutral, intent upon Midoriya’s face, Katsuki leaned his back against the endcap of a shelf and folded his arms. Up until this point, he’d hadn’t been given – or given himself – the opportunity to study Midoriya in his natural habitat, relaxed and quietly confident.

“If you make a wrong turn, circle back,” Midoriya said, and the children hung onto his words with eyes that swallowed the book whole, with the dozen little fish painted inside. “If something gets in your way, move around it. Set aside some quiet time to relax and reflect. Every day.”

Inexplicably lulled, Katsuki watched Midoriya’s full, soft mouth move, conjuring kindness and courage into the world, these kids, and maybe even the parents around. This was the same man with scarred hands, crooked fingers like Katsuki’s own, arms like steel beneath brushed cotton and thick wool and worn-out flannel. Deep doe eyes, and the wolf lurking in the lush, green underbrush.

Where did Midoriya come from? Everyone knew everything about Katsuki – everything that he wanted them to know, anyway. The public knew his life story, had watched it unfurl from his days as an outstanding but volatile, unpredictable First Year, up until this point, some ten years later.

He wasn’t a stupid fifteen year old. But the twenty-five year old version of himself felt a little more than lost when he came up against Midoriya Izuku, and that wasn’t just frustrating – it pissed him off.

Where did Midoriya come from? How had he become what he was?

The book in Katsuki’s back pocket burned a hole. He’d be told to read it – why? To learn about Midoriya? Katsuki couldn’t see how.

Some young man, lost and lonely without knowing it, looking to an older man who was just as lost, but better at hiding it. The both of them wandering through life like blind idiots, one of them knowing they hadn’t found a place for themselves – the other totally unaware and living in a dream world where he assumed his life was just fine.

What did that say about Midoriya? Was he the young man? He didn’t seem like it. Didn’t seem ignorant or blind to a damn thing, except the way he should be feeling about Katsuki. He didn’t have a fucking clue.

And here was motherfucking Ground Zero, top of his game, desired by thousands as a mate – and he was standing in some tiny, poorly lit bookshop, obsessing over a mysteriously aggressive, unbearably intelligent, gentle-hearted, anxious Omega with an arm lock like a pro hero. And he had absolutely no interest in Katsuki.

So why continue to pursue him?

The beast within him pawed at his ribcage, whimpering a little as Midoriya finished up the book.

“There’s only one you in this great big world, she said.” Midoriya paused, his gaze calm and kind upon the kids. “Make it a better place.”

Katsuki gritted his teeth as the children clambered to their feet and assaulted Midoriya with chatter.

How could Katsuki not pursue him? That intoxicating scent had told him everything his instincts had needed to know. Every minute in Midoriya’s presence cemented what his body already understood.

Getting to his feet, Midoriya brushed off the back of his green corduroy pants and straightened the hem of his plain grey flannel shirt. The sleeves were rolled to his elbows once more, showcasing a wild array of freckles and scars scattering the contoured plains.

Tugging a hand through his mass of hair, Midoriya looked up and they locked eyes, forest to fire. Paused for a half second, vividly startled, then recovered fast enough to have Katsuki bristling, and turned away. Katsuki opened his mouth to speak, but Midoriya kept his head bowed as he brushed past without making physical contact, aiming for the front of the store.

“Oiy,” Katsuki said, low, not wanting to draw attention in a tiny store where his face would undoubtedly be recognized by at least one person. With that in mind, he dropped his sunglasses down, fast on Midoriya’s heels. “Oiy, what’re you –“

“Why are you here?” Midoriya said, swiftly turning. He blinked up, scrunching his face in confusion. “Why are you wearing sunglasses indoors?”

“The fuck’re you talkin’ about?” Katsuki said, hunching, leaning in with a harsh whisper. Midoriya’s scent curled around him like cool mist, enticing him like a man dying of thirst. He swallowed hard against the saliva that pooled upon his tongue. “We have a date.”

“Uh.” Midoriya’s eyebrows shot up as he took a step back. “I-I – no. We don’t? That is, you –“

“Last time I saw you,” Katsuki said between his teeth, his eyes falling to rest at the scent gland peeking from the open collar of Midoriya’s flannel. “Last time I saw you I told you we were going on a date today.”

Midoriya stared for a second, his serious brows low until he sputtered a laugh and took another step in retreat, wiping at one eye with the back of his hand.

“You really are all the same.”

Taken aback by everything happening in his entire life at this point, Katsuki straightened sharply, a low rumble deep in his throat.

“I’m not like anybody. You’d see that if –“

“I didn’t agree to any date with you, Mr Zero,” Midoriya said in a deceptively soft tone, folding his arms across his body, his chin jutting forth as he eyes went deep and daring. “You ordered a date, and I’m not a person who takes orders from Alphas. I’m sure there’s someone in this very store who would just love to take my place today, so why don’t I just –“

Horror dawned on Katsuki.

“Don’t you fuckin’ da–“

With a stubborn set of jaw, Midoriya strode away to the front door of the shop, raising his voice above the murmurs of adults and children shopping.

“Excuse me, everybody! We have as surprise guest in our humble shop today. Mr Ground Zero is here! Please grab a recent copy of My Hero Magazine up at the front of the store and get your autograph and picture with our greatest pro hero!”

The entire store went up in a frenzy of chatter.

From across the shop, Katsuki flicked Midoriya off with both hands and pocketed them as Midoriya’s mouth curved in triumph. Was this payback?

Apparently Midoriya Izuku was a spiteful little Omega, too. He had balls.

“Come on now,” Midoriya said, clearly biting back a smile as he crooked a finger. “Don’t get nervous on us, Mr Ground Zero. Everyone just wants an autograph.”

“I’m not nervous,” Katsuki said, raising his voice as he lurched down the aisle, hunched, hands in his coat pockets as he looked from side to side where people were gathering in excitable groups, pulling out their phones and ravaging the magazine stacks. He flashed a heated look Midoriya’s way and kept his tone soft, shaking with barely reined control. “I’m pissed the fuck off. You owe me, short stack.”

“Says every Alpha ever,” Midoriya said under his breath. He clapped his hands once, putting on a bright smile that hadn’t once been aimed at Katsuki himself. “Let’s form an orderly line, shall we?”

Sheer hell followed in the next hour.

People texted their nearby friends. Kids – while nice enough and Katsuki didn’t have it in him to snap – were literally climbing him like a tree, and everyone wanted more than just one photo. Eventually, thankfully, Midoriya called out he’d be closing for a short lunch and that Mr Ground Zero – it sounded so fucking condescending coming from Midoriya’s mouth – had hero business to attend to for the rest of the day.

The click of the lock on the front door had Katsuki breathing a sigh of relief.

“You’re a sneaky fucker, know that, Omega?”

Midoriya sighed and rounded the cashier counter, sat upon the stool, and pillowed his head upon his arms, his eyes falling shut. His voice was low and exhausted.

“And you’re an entitled, cocky, fire-for-brains Alpha. What else is new? You can go whenever. Thank you for all of your hard work.”

“Like hell I’m leavin’ after all that,” Katsuki said as he approached and leaned his palms upon the counter, scowling at the back of Midoriya’s curly head. His fingers ached to touch, to test the texture and weight of that hair in his fist. “What’s wrong with you, anyway?”

Midoriya propped his cheek upon his open hand and peered up at Katsuki with shadows beneath his eyes.

“You know, all this time I thought pro heroes had to pass some kind of etiquette classes in order to graduate school. You’re managing to dissuade every preconception I’ve had up until now.”

“Fuck off, I’m charming as hell,” Katsuki said, his face twisted up with insult as he leaned further against the counter to go head to head.  Midoriya didn’t even blink. “You, on the other hand.”

“I am an innocent bookshop owner minding his own business. You are a person who would cause someone to worry for their safety if they weren’t me.”

Katsuki sputtered, gawking. Where the hell to even begin with this guy?

“First of all, I am the epitome of your goddamn safety. Second, why don’t you out and tell me just who you are, then? Huh?” Katsuki leaned in further, the rising, thickening scent of Midoriya’s stormy aggravation filling his senses. “Huh? I’m here, aren’t I? I’m telling you I fuckin’ want you, aren’t I?”

“You are utterly unbelievable!” Midoriya said, pushing off the counter, his cheeks flushed, his eyes flashing with fury. He came around the register, full steam toward Katsuki. “You stormed in here just, what, two weeks ago? You forced your Alpha ideals onto me, marking me, talking to me like you know me when you don’t know the first,” a finger jammed against Katsuki’s chest, “damn,” a hard poke, “thing about me.”

“Watch your mou-“

“You should be watching your mouth with me,” Midoriya said, perfect teeth bared, startlingly pointed canines nothing like any Omega should have. A low thunder wracked through Midoriya’s heaving chest, a growl no one would dare aim Katsuki’s way unless they were looking for a fight. “I don’t believe in destined mates. I don’t believe in the romance novels on these shelves. I don’t believe an Omega should have to submit to an Alpha when they’re made of the same flesh and blood and heart, and I don’t believe you could ever find a place in my life, unless it’s your face on a magazine page that I use to line my cat’s litter box.”

“You think you’re so fuckin’ smart, don’tcha, little Omega?” Katsuki managed between gritted teeth, the inside of his cheek tasting of copper, his face burning hot. “And yet you haven’t noticed that I have no goddamn idea what I’m doing with you, have you?”

Swollen pupils swamped in green scattered over Katsuki’s features, Midoriya’s lips faintly parted.

“What –“

“I don’t give a flying fuck about romance,” Katsuki said, his fists tight his sides, knuckles as strained as his voice as he attempted to bank the flames that dared to flare up. “Never have and still don’t. Never wanted another person and sure as fuck never wanted to waste my time winning over some asshole who didn’t already know I’m as good a mate as anyone could get.”

“Oh boy,” Midoriya muttered, rubbing his eyes with the heels of his hands.

“I’ve never believed in that romance novel shit. Certainly never wanted some Omega hangin’ onto my ankle like a ball and chain, stoppin’ me from the important shit I gotta do with my life. Then –“

“So?” Midoriya said, folding his arms over his chest once more. Protecting himself? From what? Midoriya’s closed-mouthed smile was soft, his eyes a dark, haunting moss. “So why don’t you just – just leave me alone? We both don’t want the same things. We’re a non-match made in heaven.”

“You interrupted me,” Katsuki said, advancing a step, the Alpha inside keening to caress throat to throat, to inhale a scent no longer tinged sour and rotten with anxiety and sadness. “I never believed or wanted any of that. Until I smelled you.”

Still hugging himself, Midoriya’s fingertips dug into his arms, creasing the soft grey fabric of his shirt. His freckles were stark on his pale cheeks.

“Love at first scent doesn’t exist, Mr Zero. You don’t love me, and I certainly don’t love you. I – frankly, I don’t know how we’re having this conversation. You’re no different to me from a stranger on a street.”

Katsuki took another step forward, a fire burning in his eyes that threatened to burn Midoriya’s defenses down with every match he had left.

“I don’t know anything about the whole love thing. But I know I want you.” Katsuki reached out, hand pausing just shy of brushing Midoriya’s strong jaw line. His voice went husky, deep. “Need you. I know you could need me too, scent or not.”

Midoriya remained still, embracing himself, gaze flicking to Katsuki’s hand and back to his face with a frown.

“No matter how full one's head might be with the image of greatness, one was useless, I found out, unless one was a worthy man first.” Midoriya reached up, seemingly careful not to brush Katsuki’s wrist as he placed his hand atop Katsuki’s and pushed it down and away. “Does that sound familiar to you?”

“Kokoro,” Katsuki said, dropping his hand to his side, nails digging sharp crescents into his closed palm.

Midoriya cocked his head, his eyes narrowed. His small smile was a little more genuine, a little more relaxed.

“You’re either good at guessing or good at studying.”

“I graduated top of my class, you nerd.”

“Says the nerd,” Midoriya said, surveying Katsuki from head to toe, a shimmer of amusement skimming his expression.

Katsuki huffed a sharp breath through his nose.

“I was never a nerd. I’m gifted.”

“Just goes to show you don’t really become a finer person just by reading lots of books.”

“Stop quoting that fucking book at me!” Katsuki snapped, looking on suspiciously as Midoriya snorted a short laugh and hefted himself upon the counter to sit, his legs idly kicking. His face looked clearer, maybe more at ease since they’d managed to scream and threaten each other.

“Just checking if you’d actually read it.”

“I read it twice, like you damn well know you told me.”

“Hm.” Midoriya stared at Katsuki for a long moment.

“What?” Katsuki snapped. “You wanna fuckin’ fight about it because, mate or not, we can have a damn go at it.”

“Oh yeah?” Midoriya said, pursing his lips in thought as he considered Katsuki’s balled fists and twisted scowl. “Sorry, Mr Zero, but I don’t do that anymore.”

“Do what?”

“Fight.”

“Why?” Katsuki shook his head, negating his question. “Why did you fight in the first place?”

Midoriya aimed one of those endless, considering looks Katsuki’s way once more.

“You’re twenty-five, right?"

“So?”

“So, me too. We could have been in UA together. Wouldn’t that have been strange? I’d have probably idolized you – the way I was before. Young and stupid.”

Katsuki studied those big, sad eyes that Midoriya probably thought didn’t look sad at all. His feelings were written there, Katsuki was beginning to learn. In the damp, heavy scent of his sorrow and the way his gaze glistened.

“You applied for UA? What’s your Quirk?”

“Did you read the first book I gave you?”

“Hah?” Katsuki shifted to Midoriya’s side, leaned one elbow upon the counter and inclined his chin to meet Midoriya’s studious expression. “The fuck’re you –“

“All Quiet On The Western Front. Did you read it?”

“Yeah.” Half a dozen times.

“What did you think of it?”

“What part, exactly?”

Midoriya crossed one leg over his knee, toward Katsuki, the toe of his booted foot fidgeting lightly as he leaned his palms back on the counter and looked to the ceiling in thought.

“What did you think about war’s effect on the soldiers too young for it? How death affected them until they were just hollow little boys who just wanted to go home instead of waiting to die?”

Lips tugged downward in thought, Katsuki’s gaze followed the lines of Midoriya’s profile.

“I guess I thought that I’m pretty fuckin’ lucky I love what I do and I’m doing what I’m meant to.”

Midoriya looked over, met Katsuki’s eyes.

“That’s not the kind of answer I was expecting.”

“Yeah, well, don’t think you know me either, nerd.”

Midoriya’s lips curved.

“Maybe. So you didn’t feel anything when Paul Bäumer said: We are not youth any longer. We don’t want to take the world by storm. We are fleeing. We fly from ourselves. From our life. We were eighteen and had begun to love life and the world; and we had to shoot it to pieces.”

A shiver cast a cold slick across Katsuki’s arms.

“If you’re trying to relate that to pro heroes, you’re doin’ it wrong. We don’t run from shit. We don’t fear. S’not part of our job.”

Midoriya looked into him like he could see Katsuki’s soul, all big, earnest eyes searching for truth and honesty.

“You don’t think pro heroes aren’t children of war in their own way? That learning how to become death machines from age fifteen – and having that be their goal from the age of five – damages their ability to be a child with peace of mind from a very young age? What was your childhood, Mr Zero? Did you have one? How many bones had you broken in your body before you’d even presented as Alpha?”

“You ask a lotta questions for someone who ain’t no hero,” Katsuki snapped, his hackles rising.

“You seem pretty threatened by a book about the psychological devastation of war on young soldiers for someone who is apparently entirely unaffected by murdering people multiple times a year.”

“We don’t set out to murder anybody,” Katsuki said, cracking his head and neck from side to side in aggravation, his shoulders stiff. He pushed off the counter and to his feet, pacing away until he whirled around, hands upon his hips, eyes bright and hot. “You’re obnoxious as hell. Fuck. I’m – I’m leaving now. If you’re not havin’ lunch with me then I’m –“

“Sorry,” Midoriya said, grinning now as he hopped to the ground and strained out his shirt. “I didn’t know a big strong Alpha like you would get so touchy about a subject that apparently has nothing to do with him.”

“Just –“ Katsuki glowered, his shoulders slouching in unconscious, momentary submission as he shoved his hands in his pockets and dragged his feet to stand before Midoriya’s curious expression. “You got another book?”

“You want another?” Midoriya asked, his eyebrows bowing, his expression suddenly sweet and confused. “From me? You know that won’t end well for you, right?”

“I ain’t a lil’ bitch, short stack,” Katsuki said with a wide, toothy smirk. “You don’t scare me. Your pacifist propaganda don’t, either.”

“If you say so,” Midoriya said, throwing his hands up and turning on his heel.

Katsuki followed instinctively. For all the aggravation grating him the wrong way, he felt dared by Midoriya, excited and vibrating with it. He was pissed off and a little hard.

Fuck, Midoriya smelled good. Watching him walk away, the slim fit of his flannel shirt shifting around his hips, the way his pants clung almost a little too tight to thighs that had to be thick with muscle, if they were any reflection of that ass –

“Here.” Midoriya turned and held out another book. “Maybe this one will give you some insight.”

“Into what?” Katsuki said, turning the book in his hands. I Am A Cat, by Natsume Souseki. Same author as Koroko.

“You. Me. Humanity.”

“You think you sound deep, but it just makes me wanna bite your mouth ‘til you shut up.”

“Put your teeth anywhere near me and you’ll be missing some, Mr Zero.”

“Stop calling me that,” Katsuki snapped, clenching the book hard, clashing his gaze with Midoriya’s stubborn one. “Bakugou. Hell, Katsuki. Anything.”

“Anything, huh?” Midoriya said, scratching his jaw in thought. “I’d say as long as you’ve got all this reading to do, you’ll stay Mr Zero to me.”

“What, m’I your pet project or some shit now?”

“Are you going to keep stalking me?”

“It’s courting. Courting.”

“I’ve been courted and this is not courting. This is stalking and hoping your unconventional charm gets your foot in the door.”

“Has it?” Katsuki shifted, his hand skimming past Midoriya’s shoulder to grip the edge of a shelf. He loomed in, lashes lowering as he inhaled, long and slow. The heady, mouthwatering scent of Midoriya’s skin, his throat, had Katsuki near panting.

Midoriya’s chewed on his full bottom lip briefly, the faintest tilt of his head calling to Katsuki’s beast.

“No,” Midoriya said tightly, ducking beneath Katsuki’s outstretched arm and heading back to the register.

“Patience,” Katsuki hissed, slamming his fist against the shelving. “Patience.”

He turned and strode after Midoriya.

“Fuck patience.”

Midoriya was already bagging Katsuki’s book.

“That’ll be –“

“Go on a date with me.”

“No,” Midoriya said, then rattled off the price.

Katsuki yanked out his wallet, fumbling for his card as he refused to back down, only glare daggers at the object of his obsession.

“Why the hell not? Have you met me?”

“That would be why I’m saying no.” Midoriya sighed and peered up. “Read the book, Mr Zero. I can’t give you a date, but maybe I give you some insight past the world you’ve let shape you into this person up until now.”

“Oiy!” Katsuki slapped both palms upon the counter and leaned in close, his nostrils flaring, soaking up the flicker of excitement that lit up his gut when he saw Midoriya’s eyes widen, his pulse quicken at his throat. “I like who I am. I fuckin’ love who I am. Can you say the same shit about yourself?”

“You know,” Midoriya said, his jaw taut as he came around from the register and went to the front door. As he unlocked it, he spoke in quick, sharp bites. “The more I see you, the happier I am each time to see you go. Goodbye. Mr Zero,” Midoriya said, holding the door open expectantly.

“Sure. Whatever.”

Katsuki whirled and made for the door. He paused as he passed Midoriya, looked over his shoulder and down at him.

“Let me scent you. To keep the Alphas away.”

Midoriya’s eyes went wide.

“I’d rather fight off half a dozen Alphas a day than let people think I’m yours. Goodbye.”

Notes:

My pal actualdevil summarized this fic/chapter best with:

Deku: Open wide, Kacchan!
Bakugou: Ahhhh~
Deku: (starts shoveling anti war literature into his gaping maw)

ALSO: I highly recommend both children and adults read the book Only One You, by Linda Kranz. The link is to a two minute video of the book being read. I bought it for my little girl a couple of years ago and its a big fav in this house. Has good lessons for you stressed out grown-ups, too.

Chapter 5

Summary:

A moment of silence passed around the table in memoriam for Katsuki’s love life.

Notes:

This chapter is relatively short. The next chapter, the Deku chapter, will be twice as long. So just, be patient with me haha. And, as always, enjoy! Your comments have been bringing me TO LIFE, Y'ALL!

"Okay okay okay.” Cheeks red from beer, electric blonde bun in a frizzy mess atop his head, Denki slammed his emptied bottle on the table and made hazy eye contact with Katsuki across from him. “You’re drunk right?”

“I’ll fuckin’…” Katsuki aimed a narrowed look at Denki, waiting for his vision to clear. “Break that bottle over your head.”

“He’s drunk,” Mina said simply, sipping her sake as she gave Denki the side eye.

“M’not,” Katsuki mumbled, not sure if he was lying or not. He couldn’t be drunk, could he? Wait, he was. He definitely was. He was getting drunk because of that stubborn little shit.

“So now I can ask,” Denki said, leaning too far over the table, the long gold chain he wore dragging across the sticky, alcohol-spilled surface. “Your first date was a total flop, wasn’t it? You can tell us.”

Katsuki’s hand whipped out in quick fire, fisting the necklace and yanking Denki’s face forward, nose to nose.

“Changed my mind. I’ll shove this bottle up your ass and you can pray it don’t break.”

“Eek.”

Sero’s hand patted Katsuki on the back firmly, then gripped his shoulder, easing him into his chair.

“I think it’s safe to say that it didn’t go well.”

“Didn’t go at all,” Katsuki said under his breath, signaling the waitress for another round. Thumping his elbow on the table and pillowing his cheek on his palm, he idly spun an empty beer bottle in circles, watched it go around and around while his head swam.

“Seriously, man?” Kirishima asked, frowning from Mina’s side. The coddling scent of his concern radiated off of him, easing the tension in Katsuki’s shoulders. “What did you do?”

“What did I do?” Katsuki said sharply, biting off every word as if too sour for his tongue. “That person is insufferable. Not only are they beyond stubborn and opinionated, but they think they know every goddamn thing about me before I can even open my mouth. Swear I can’t have a fuckin’ conversation with them without them starting a fight with me!”

“Sounds familiar,” Sero said with a shrug, then offered a smile to the waitress who brought four beers to the table. “Thanks.”

“Maybe you’re not right for each other,” Mina said casually, pouring herself more warm sake.

“No,” Katsuki said a little too quickly, his fist slamming to the tabletop with a resounding boom.

Everyone at the table jumped in their seat a little, four sets of eyes on him at once.

“Fuck.” Katsuki dragged his hands through his hair, head heavy, thoughts dragging. “It’s not that. I know it isn’t.”

“You sure?” Mina said, pursing her lips in thought as she hovered her small cup before them. “This is the first person you’ve ever been interested in. Ever.”

“Ever,” Kirishima said emphatically.

“Ever,” Sero and Denki said in tandem.

Katsuki didn’t have the energy or drive to knock everyone’s hollow heads together. He gave his beer a long swig. Wiping his mouth with the back of his hand, he eyed his friends.

“Y’don’t think I know that? Doesn’t fuckin’ matter. The last thing I’ve ever wanted is the whole –“ With apparent disgust screwing up his face, Katsuki gestured flippantly between Kirishima and Mina. “That shit. It’s gross and annoying and a hindrance to our very professions.”

The offending party shared a long look.

“Gee, thanks,” Mina said, her lips curved in good humor as she pressed a kiss to her Omega’s temple.

“Vom,” Katsuki said, finishing off his beer, straight-up chugging it down.

“So, what?” Sero said from beside him, nipping the beer from Katsuki’s hand and moving the remaining three bottles down the end of the table, out of his reach. “You don’t want to kiss this girl or do you?”

“I do and I’m pissed about it!” Katsuki snarled, “Obviously.”

“Must be some girl,” Denki said, pulling out his phone. “Listen, if you screw it up royally, mind giving me her number?”

Wordlessly, Katsuki grabbed Denki’s mobile and chucked it across the restaurant. Shrieking, Denki stumbled from the table and raced off in retrieval.

“Good dog,” Katsuki said, rubbing his eyes with the heels of his hands and groaning. “Shit. Why’m’I so fucked up over this? I’m all –“

“Horny?” Mina said.

“Confused?” Kirishima said.

“Hormonal?” Sero said.

“Like I want to lock him away in my house and murder anyone who goes near him,” Katsuki said darkly, standing to reach across the table for a far away beer.

Silence prevailed as Katsuki drank.

“Uh,” Sero said slowly. “I don’t even know where to start with that.”

“Well,” Mina said, “Besides the disturbing revelation that Bakugou is currently overflowing with Alpha-driven murder feels –“

“Are you gay?” Kirishima said, gawking. “Why didn’t you tell me, bro?”

“What?” Katsuki said, unaware of what he’d said. He snarled, baring sharp canines, his fiery, acrid scent of aggression rising up. “Who told you that?”

Kirishima’s instinctive whimper and lowered chin were immediate. Hands slammed on the table as Mina reared up with a scent that burned Katsuki’s nostrils to the point of sobering him up a bit.

“Calm your ass down,” Mina said, her chin canted, their gazes clashing. “You’re embarrassing yourself.”

Katsuki blinked, the boil in his blood simmering as he slowly slumped to his seat.

“You’re gonna be so hung over in the morning,” Sero said, patting Katsuki on the back and giving no reaction when the latter snapped his teeth at his hand.

“M’not gay,” Katsuki said into the mouth of his bottle.

“You’re gay?” Denki said, returning to the table. “That makes so much sense.”

Mina groaned held her face in her hands.

“He’s apparently not gay,” Mina said from behind her palms. “Though it would be absolutely fine if he was.”

“I don’t care what you dimwits think,” Katsuki said with a sniff and a hooded, pensive expression. He peered down into his beer. “It’s nobody’s business.”

“True,” Sero said. He gently plucked the beer from Katsuki’s hand and set it aside. “It’s all cool. Maybe you could tell us a little about him.”

“We could help,” Kirishima said eagerly, practically wagging a tail. “We’re good at helping. Is he an Omega like me?”

“He’s Omega, but he’s not like you,” Katsuki said with a short bark of a laugh. Shoulders hunched, he dropped his elbows to the table, flicking a glance over his shoulder to make sure no one was listening. “He’s smart.”

“Hey!” Kirishima said.

“I mean really smart. Not smarter than me, but probably close.”

“Okay, that is smart,” Kirishima said with a hefty sigh.

“He owns a bookstore,” Katsuki said, like it was some kind of heinous crime by the way he scowled into the distance. “A fuckin’ bookworm, y’know? Can talk circles around me. Put me in one helluva arm lock, too.”

“Just how big is this guy?” Sero asked warily.

“Don’t tell me you’re into bears,” Mina said.

“An Omega put you into an arm lock?” Kirishima said, eyes huge.

“He’s fuckin’ strong, alright, assholes?” Katsuki said defensively. “And a fighter. Or he was, I think. He’s skilled – fast.”

“You sure he’s not a vigilante?” Sero asked. “He sounds suspicious.”

“Bakugou would never date anyone suspicious,” Mina said pointedly, smacking Denki’s phone from his hand when he became too busy texting. “He’s a good boy.”

“Fuck you,” Katsuki said with little heat.

“So,” Mina said, leaning across the table with a sly smile. “What’s this brawny Omega’s name?”

“Like hell I’m tellin’ you!” Katsuki said with an incredulous laugh. “You’d go through the criminal database straight away and find out everything you could about him. Visit his place of work to interrogate him and shit.”

“Me?”

“You did do that with my last girlfriend,” Sero said with a shrug.

Katsuki pointed at Sero with the beer he resnatched, eyebrows raised in a told you so expression.

“Okay, okay.” Mina heaved a sigh and retreated back in her chair, leaning into Kirishima as he draped an arm over her shoulders. “Well, what does he look like?”

Captivating, soft, strong. Delicious.

Katsuki felt his cheeks heat.

“That’s an answer if I ever saw one,” Mina said with a warm smile. “We’ve never seen you like this, Bakugou. I almost thought you weren’t into the whole dating-mating dance.”

“I’m not,” Katsuki said, on automatic. “It’s just him. I don’t have a choice, y’know?”

Mina flicked a look to Kirishima, her lips quirked.

“I know.”

“Then what’re you doing wrong?” Denki said, his head cocked. “You’re like, the ideal Alpha male specimen.”

“I know!” Katsuki said, gesturing to himself.

Sero and Mina groaned.

“You should know something is awry with the situation when Denki and Bakugou agree on something,” Mina said into her drink.

“So,” Sero said, pinching the bridge of his nose between his fingers. “You think –“

“Know.”

“Know this guy is your mate. And he feels…”

“He doesn’t give a shit.”

Mina frowned and stole Kirishima’s beer, taking a short drink.

“He doesn’t smell the same thing?”

“He…” Katsuki grimaced and nabbed Denki’s beer from his hand. He chugged it down, cracking it back to the table. “He can’t smell.”

“Anything?” Kirishima asked.

“Anything.”

“Nothing?” Kirishima said, scratching his jaw.

“I mean, I ain’t his fuckin’ doctor. I dunno the full extent of it, but pretty damn much.”

A moment of silence passed around the table in memoriam for Katsuki’s love life.

“I’m going to regret asking this,” Sero said, “but have you attempted to be an extremely nice and accommodating gentleman?”

“I’m a perfect gentleman, dickwad,” Katsuki said, flashing a hot red glare.

“God, yeah, totally,” Sero said, nodding, deadpan.

Kirishima chimed in from across the table, his cheeks pink from booze and the buzz of excitement.

“As the only Omega at this table, could I give some advice?”

“I’ll just get out my notebook and pen,” Katsuki said, but waved a hand to encourage Kirishima to continue.

“Give him space. Don’t touch him unless invited to, and make him feel super comfortable around you. Omegas want to feel safe, you know?”

“This one don’t need that,” Katsuki muttered. “Snarky little pacifist is a fuckin’ brick house.”

“And I’m indestructible,” Kirishima added with a shrug. “I still want to feel like my Alpha has my back and will make a safe space for me.”

“Ugh.” Giving up, Katsuki laid his forehead upon the tacky wood surface, shut his eyes, and felt his world tilt and whirl. “What does that even entail on my end?”

“How about this,” Mina said. “Any time you’re about to open your mouth without thinking, shut it, count to three, and find a different way to say it. A nice way.”

“I am nice.”

“Let’s not have that conversation.”

“Oh!” Kirishima added, his face brightening. “And buy him something fluffy and cozy!”

“I’m not buying him a fuckin’ kitten!”

“A sweater!”

“A sweater?” Katsuki frowned. Midoriya did wear a lot of them. “He’d probably like that.”

“Great!”

“Okay,” Mina said, pointing at Katsuki with renewed vigor. “Tomorrow. Buy sweater, get it wrapped, deliver it quickly and calmly. Do not engage past: I’ve been and asshole, I’m sorry, here’s a present as apology.”

“I’m not saying that,” Katsuki said, his heart flat-lining at the very premise.

“You’re saying it.”

Their second Alpha stare-off of the night stretched out across the table.

Katsuki sighed.

“If this doesn’t work, you owe me.”

The conversation dwindled toward Sero and Denki’s own dating lives, and Katsuki was content to drink the glass of water placed in front of him as he sobered up and considered the next day.

When was the last time he’d ever apologized to a person? He couldn’t remember. He never had anything to be sorry about – that he was aware of, anyway.

In this case, it had quickly become evident that however Katsuki was being – no matter what his opinion of himself – Midoriya’s impression of him was less than favorable. All Katsuki could do was try another approach.

Gentler, apparently. Nicer.

Midoriya was going to bite his hand off at the wrist.

Katsuki was glad for the innumerable beers he’d poured down his gullet, because he passed out cold for the night and slept straight through his normal alarm. Despite working the night shift the incoming evening, he was more than a little perturbed at having woken later than his habit.

Dressing casually in baggy black jeans some random skull shirt of many, Katsuki tied tight his worn out hiking boots, shrugged into his ratty parka and braved the cold.

A thin layer of snow had carpeted the city overnight. Katsuki zipped his jacket to the top, the tip of his nose peeking from the collar as he slipped on sunglasses and headed toward the shopping district. Pausing at a store specifically for Omegas, Katsuki squinted through the window and fought back a reflexive gag.

So many pastels.  Fuck that shit.

Frowning, Katsuki stood in the center of the sidewalk, surveying the line of shops across the street.

What did Midoriya wear? Comfortable clothes. Old, nerdy university professor clothes.

Attention lingering on the nearby camping store, Katsuki considered Midoriya’s plaids, his boots so similar to ones he himself owned.

Twenty minutes later, Katsuki emerged from the shop, bag in hand. Bursting with pride for his choice, he loped with long legs down the street, toward the man who was making him do a dozen things he’d never imagined possible.

Katsuki salivated at the mere thought of seeing Midoriya again – smelling him. Talking to him. Although the talking inevitably led to his downfall. But he was on a mission this time, and if there was one thing he was good at, it was sticking to a mission.

Approaching the attractive window display of Parchment, Katsuki took a calming breath, his heart alight, aching for the soothing balm of Midoriya’s voice, his scent. Even as he walked through the front door, he wasn’t disappointed.

Midoriya was everywhere. A waterfall, fresh and bright, pouring sunshine and spring showers down upon him, flooding his senses, refreshing his soul.

Would he ever grow used the way this made him feel? Would he ever get better at managing it, rather than just standing at the entryway like a fool?

Inhaling deep, Katsuki glanced around the front of the shop, noting its emptiness. A radio played distantly, toward the back, something acoustic, warm, and delicate. Taking silent steps, Katsuki passed each aisle until he found Midoriya at the furthest.

Katsuki bit back a groan as he watched Midoriya stretch to his tiptoes, reaching for the highest shelf with a book, the outrageous curve of his ass straining against clinging khaki pants. Another thick, cable knit sweater dwarfed his body in deep navy, but Midoriya’s efforts exposed a trim waist and tucked in white shirt.

Unconsciously, Katsuki chewed his bottom lip and shifted to knock his temple none-too-gently against the edge of a shelving unit.

Why did he have to be the only one suffering here, dammit?

Without a word, Katsuki approached Midoriya from behind. Careful not to brush his body up against Midoriya’s back, he reached out, nipped the book from Midoriya’s scarred hand, and slotted it in place.

Whipping around with large eyes like deep green lakes, Midoriya released a shaky breath, his palm coming up to calm his heart.

“You surprised me. I’m shocked at your ability to be that stealth.”

Katsuki raised an eyebrow and took a purposeful step back.

“It’s my job,” he said simply.

Midoriya’s jittery gaze scattered over Katsuki’s form, lingered on the bag in hand.

“S-so it is. Uh. Can I help you with something?”

“Did I scare you?” Katsuki said, tilting his head with a frown. “Sorry.”

Saying sorry was good, right?

Midoriya’s eyes flashed, a quick crack of lightning.

“You don’t scare me. What do you need, Mr Zero?”

“Oh, um, well.” Katsuki thrust the bag forth without fanfare, causing Midoriya to take a step back. “That’s for you. Because I’m an asshole and sorry about it.”

“I…” Midoriya flicked a furrowed gaze between the bag and Katsuki, like either of them might bite. “Thank you, but uh. I can’t take that. Thank you, really.”

“Well,” Katsuki said, locking eyes with a stubborn set to his jaw. “If you don’t want it, then chuck it in the trash. I got it for you as an apology, so you can take it or leave it.”

Midoriya aimed a narrow look his way, his attention dropping to the still-presented bag.

"Are you really this enamored with my scent?"

"What?" Katsuki said, taken aback. "Sure, I mean, at first. Not now. You're not what I thought I'd like until I realized I like who you are. Or, whatever the hell I know of you."

Midoriya studied him, eyes scanning as if reading a difficult book. 

“I’ll just. I’ll look at it.”

“Great, fine,” Katsuki said sharply, totally unaccustomed to a scene like this. Who the fuck turned away presents? Well, Katsuki did, but that wasn’t the point.

Gingerly, Midoriya took the bag, their fingers not touching. Plush lips in a thoughtful pout, Midoriya rummaged through the crinkly wrapping paper and pulled out a plaid flannel in hues of deep burnt orange and muted, mellow rust. The lining of the shirt and inner sleeves were plush, cream fleece.

“I dunno if it’s too bright for you or whatever,” Katsuki said, “But I like orange. More people should wear orange.”

“I like orange,” Midoriya said hollowly, holding the shirt out, the bag having toppled to the floor. His expression was blank, unreadable, his eyes wide. “This is too much, though. All I’ve done is give you a hard time.”

“Only because I am, uh, how I am,” Katsuki said, skimming his gaze over the bookshelves instead of Midoriya. “Anyway. Like I said, trash it or whatever the fuck. I don’t care. I gotta – I’m gonna go.”

Katsuki turned on his heel.

“It’s soft.”

Stopping dead in his tracks, Katsuki slowly looked over his shoulder. Midoriya stood there, eyelids heavy, almost drugged, as he caressed the fleece lining across his rosy cheek.

“Um,” Katsuki said smartly, clearing his throat. He felt hot. Was it hot in here? “Yeah. You like comfortable stuff, right?”

“Mmm,” Midoriya said, practically a purr as his long, dark lashes fluttered. He turned his face into the shirt and breathed in deep.

Katsuki frowned. Without a doubt, Midoriya could not smell. Was it the shirt or the situation coaxing the blatant Omega nuzzling from him?

“I change my mind,” Katsuki said, licking his chapped lips as he watched Midoriya drowsy eyes opened, his scent rising up look cool, cloying fog. “Don’t throw that away, alright? Wear it.”

“’Kay,” Midoriya said simply, his voice husky and sweet, his cheek still snuggled into the flannel. “Bye, Mr Zero.”

“Walk away,” Katsuki said under his breath, already turning around so he didn’t ravage the Midoriya against the bookshelves like the beast clawing and drooling inside of him told him to. “Walk away.”

Days later, Katsuki was still shocked he’d managed to exit Parchment with both of them in one piece.

Notes:

Update 3/6/18: Three beautiful pieces of art from the end scene of this chapter have been gifted to me and I am just overwhelmed by their soft atmosphere and beauty!

Piece 1, by chicorae_draws
Piece 2, by actualdevil
Piece 3, by yitamisdraw

Chapter 6

Summary:

"My mind is my own, Mr Zero. And that’s stronger than any animal drive – always will be. I don’t know what my body knows about you, but it can’t be more important than my autonomy."

Notes:

I'm unbelievably overwhelmed by the amount of support this, so far, short fic has garnered. Just, wow. You readers are fucking incredible. The art has been incredible, too. Ya'll are wild and I fucking love you for it. I hope you enjoy this chapter. It's relatively short, but I promise the next chapter will be far from short.

Damn that man.

Face set in sober lines, Izuku busied himself with the meticulous placement and decoration of the storefront window display. Sunset dropped fiery curtains across the late December slush, casting lush pinks and gold across Izuku’s scarred hands and face as he worked. Calm had settled like new snowfall within the shop, but Izuku was anything but.

Damn that man.

With a groan, Izuku stood up, only to slouch against the side wall and knock his temple there, none too gently. Pinching the bridge of his nose and wishing away the dull ache that pulsed low in his gut, Izuku stomped down the weight of embarrassment having accumulated upon him over the past five days.

He’d acted a complete fool. Him, a grown man. A man trying to keep a bizarre, brazen ultra Alpha at bay. Had Bakugou scented Izuku’s encroaching heat and taken advantage, or had it been simple coincidence?

Either way, it had been several minutes past Bakugou’s exit before the thrall of soft, snuggly nesting instinct had cleared Izuku’s clouded mind. Puzzled and, admittedly, utterly floored, Izuku had stood there for who knew how long, frowning at the shirt in his hands, sifting through the brief conversation and the more reticent, controlled version of the human wildfire, Ground Zero.

The gift wasn’t necessarily what puzzled him most.

Izuku’s own reaction left him stumped.

With a sigh, Izuku left his work in favor of sitting on the stool behind the cash register and sipping lukewarm tea. Cupping both hands around the fading heat of the mug, Izuku peered over the rim, lost in thought.

Never in his life had he reacted to an Alpha’s presence in the way he had the other day – incoming heat or not.

Izuku had always assumed his condition had not only left him with Alpha tendencies, but some level of Alpha immunity to their hormones, their influence. He’d slept with a couple of Alphas in university, but through pure pleasure-seeking behavior – not out of some primal Omega need. Izuku simply, embarrassingly, found an Alpha’s demeanor and build more attractive. Or was that the Omega talking all along?

Izuku’s life was rather more complicated than he preferred.

With his sexual preferences and experiences in mind, Bakugou was a riddle. Izuku’s physical reaction to him was a mystery. For fuck’s sake, he’d instinctively inhaled the shirt, breathed it in as if his body were desperate to imbibe of whatever intoxicating scent with which Bakugou must be dripping.

It wasn’t as if Izuku liked Bakugou. That was definitely not why his body had wanted to curl into the fleecy fabric like it was home.

“Well,” Izuku said to the empty store as he set his cup down with an unnecessary crack. “Whatever. It’s just the heat. Probably a strong one. Oh!”

Izuku plucked his cell from his pocket and dialed. The phone rang once before it was answered in a clipped, clear tone.

“Hey,” Chisaki said, his voice even keel as ever. “Something wrong?”

“Why do you think something is wrong whenever I call you?” Izuku said, smiling.

“Call it a lingering habit from your teens.”

“Hey,” Izuku said a half laugh, “I haven’t gotten into a fight in over five years. What about you, huh? Five days?”

“The less you know, the better,” Chisaki said, but there was a low key humor humming beneath the words. What the vigilante did during his free time was indeed better left unknown. “What do you need?”

“Can you fill in for me soon? I don’t know when it’s coming, but it’ll be within the next couple of days. Are you free? If not, I can see if Inasa can get some time off wo-“

“As if I’d let that oaf take care of an entire business himself,” Chisaki said. “I’ll make time. Text me when I’m needed.”

“Thanks,” Izuku said, bringing his thumbnail to his teeth. “Hey.”

“What?”

“Please don’t start any fights while you’re working here.”

“I’m insulted you’d think I would.”

“Try to sound more genuinely insulted the next time you say that,” Izuku said, refraining from biting his nail as he curled the hand into a loose fist upon the counter. “Seriously, though. I have a… a regular customer who happens to pro. Don’t start something with him, Chisaki. He’s the type who’ll take you up on it.”

“Don’t get me so excited,” Chisaki said, his tone deceptively casual despite the tension quickening his speech that no one but his closest friends would notice. “Who’s the guy?”

“He might not even come,” Izuku said. “Forget I said anything.”

“I’m not going to let anything happen to your shop, Izuku,” Chisaki said with a put upon sigh. “I’m not a heathen.”

Izuku snorted a soft laugh through his nose.

“Yeah. Alright, I’ll text you in a couple of days.”

“Sure. One more thing.”

“What’s that?”

“Aren’t you early?”

“Early?”

“Your heat.”

Izuku frowned, mentally pulling up a calendar and scanning through the weeks. His schedule normally repeated every six weeks – less often than an average Omega, Izuku assumed, due to his faulty physical mechanics.

“Maybe a little. Yeah, a couple of weeks, actually. Weird.”

“Keep an eye on that,” Chisaki said.

“Okay, dad,” Izuku said softly, his lips curved.

“Disgusting. Hanging up now.”

Izuku couldn’t help but laugh as the dial tone sounded in his ear. Intentionally or not, his friends always managed to cheer him. Chisaki and Hitoshi more than most. The three of them had a history, deeply rooted in blood, sweat, and tears.

Handsome heroes with sharp sneers and soft gifts pushed aside, Izuku turned the music up within his little haven and hummed along as he finished his book display by the setting sun.

Some time later, deep winter evening having crept up and pressed its icy face against the windows of the shop, the door opened with a howling wind behind it.

“Oh,” Izuku said from the back of the store. He peeked his head out of the storage closet, unable to see the front of the building, and called out. “Hello, good evening! I’ll be up front shortly – please look around.”

Hearing a grunt of reply, Izuku popped back into storage and finished stacking a few heavy boxes of books. Wiping his dusty hands upon his corduroys, Izuku turned and gasped.

The punch flew with the same lingering habits to which Chisaki had referred.

“Shit,” was all Bakugou managed before he evaded –

Too slow.

“Oh my god!” Izuku gawked, arms a dead weight at his sides as Bakugou clutched his jaw and gaped. “I’m so sorry, I –“

“You punched me.”

Izuku’s hands fluttered uselessly for a second and dropped again.

“I – I – crap. I’m sorry. I’m so sorry. I just clipped you a little, right? Here, let me –“ Izuku rushed into Bakugou’s space, gently holding Bakugou’s wrist to pull his hand back for a look.

“You punched me,” Bakugou said, hollow, eyes dark and fixed on Izuku.

“You should be used to that,” Izuku said softly, a soothing tone as he winced a little at the instantly forming, black shadows. “It’s – it’s not the worst. Come on, let’s get you an ice pack.”

Izuku kept a hold on Bakugou’s wrist, leading him back to the children’s area.

“How the hell did you get a punch in on me?” Bakugou said. Was that wonder in his voice or numb shock?

“I’m a little on edge today,” Izuku said, gesturing for Bakugou to sit back in a cheerful neon green beanbag chair. “I’ll be right back.”

“That’s a little on edge?” Bakugou said, still holding his bruised jaw as Izuku disappeared into the break room. “You a vigilante or somethin’? It ain’t ideal but we can make it work.”

“I’m so relieved to hear that,” Izuku said dryly as he returned with an ice pack wrapped in paper towel. He dropped to a crouch before Bakugou and held it out with a faint, muted smile. “Here. You shouldn’t sneak up on people, you know. You seem to have the habit.”

“You make it a habit of punching customers?” Bakugou said, accepting the pack and sliding a considering look to Izuku, who took a seat beside him in the other beanbag chair.

“Ones who soundlessly stand two feet behind me in an off limits room?” Izuku said, evenly meeting Bakugou’s gaze. “Yeah.”

“You’re a lot sweeter to everyone but me, y’know that, shortstack?” Bakugou slouched and slid down the bean bag until his long legs stretched forth, crossed at the ankle. Head pillowed in the beanbag, he angled his chin to look over and up at Izuku beside him with a raised, expectant eyebrow, ice pack pressed to his jaw.

“I can’t afford to be nice to you,” Izuku said, his face flushing as his attention trailed down the endless line of leg. The hot pull in his gut pooled lower, heavy and insistent between his thighs. “I don’t want – don’t want you getting the wrong idea.”

The beat of unusual silence had Izuku looked up quickly, meeting Bakugou’s now narrowed eyes.

“W-why are you looking at me like that?” Izuku said, the nape of his neck aflame, his hairline growing damp. He folded his arms across his chest, shifting in the chair, highly aware of the awkward crinkly noises the beanbag made beneath him. “You may keep coming here, but I’m not going to let you think it’ll make any difference in –“

“You.” Bakugou’s nostrils flared, his pupils swelling, gaze lingering on the ache that had begin to pulse at Izuku’s throat some days ago. “You’re – right now.”

“I’m not,” Izuku said too quickly, snapping off the words like brittle bones as his eyes grew wide. Something like a dark shadow loomed over Bakugou’s demeanor, over the strong contours of his face. The harsh change in countenance startled Izuku, charged the blood in his veins to pump faster, his heart aflutter with – what, fear? No. “I’m not.”

Izuku didn’t know what it was, but his knees trembled with it, and the coiling heat between his legs curled tighter.

“Midoriya,” Bakugou said, the ice pack fallen to the floor as he slid from his seat.

“D-don’t – I – what’re you doing?” Izuku stood up, stumbling a little as Bakugou stood in tandem, neither of them touching, but close enough to feel each other’s breath on mouths and cheeks.

Stunned into stillness, Izuku could only pant, lips parted as Bakugou’s nose trailed the Izuku’s ridge of shoulder, right up to his throat, lingering at the delicate, blushing shell of his ear.

“Do you know,” Bakugou said, pausing to inhale the crook of neck and jaw, “how delicious you smell right now?”

Goosebumps scattered his arms. Izuku burned from head to toe, legs growing weak, flooded with warmth. Every logical part of him screamed as he bit off a whimper and subtly cocked his head, exposing himself prone.

What the hell was happening? This had never happened before – even in a heat!

“Never smelled anything like it,” Bakugou said, voice crumbled to gravel, his mouth just hovering above Izuku’s skin, untouched. “Like you. Barely know what the hell t’ do with you, but I know I wanna watch you and that smartass mouth moan for me.”

“Bakugou,” Izuku released with a shuddering breath, tilting in, their chests bumping. “That’s – no. I-I don’t know you and –“

“You don’t know me?” Bakugou said with a snarl so sudden that Izuku jumped. Teeth bared right beside Izuku’s ear. “You don’t know me? Your body disagrees, doesn’t it? I just came in to see you after a long day at work. It was your scent begging for me on its knees.”

“My –“ Izuku swallowed hard and took a torturous step back. He regretted his decision immediately, because now he could properly see Bakugou. The predatory hunger in his eyes, the wide set of stiff shoulders beneath his chunky winter coat, the flushed lips and cheeks. For the first time in a long time, Izuku actively wished he could smell. This man probably emitted sin.

Izuku shook his head to clear it and held up a hand to keep Bakugou at bay, careful not to actually touch him.

“My body is a – is a construct of thousands of years of instinct and – and impulse.” Izuku’s palm came to cup the side of his throat, rubbing the heartbeat thumping in the swollen gland. “But my mind is my own, Mr Zero. And that’s stronger than any animal drive – always will be. I don’t know what my body knows about you, but it can’t be more important than my autonomy.”

Bakugou blinked, head cocked as he watched Izuku closely.

Izuku cleared his throat, shifting from foot to foot as he crossed his arms before him and looked away.

“This is, uh, admittedly awkward, but – well. It’s just nature, even for me. You’d do best to keep your distance.”

At the back of Izuku’s mind, he was actually more than a little impressed how Bakugou kept his distance. Izuku had sought out an Alpha or two for his heats back in his university days, and had come out worse for wear when they had let loose on him. Bakugou remained… remarkably still.

And, now that Izuku’s addled brain caught up, he realized Bakugou had yet to touch him. Close, but nothing.

The Omega within keened high and mournful. Izuku pointedly ignored it.

“Keep my distance,” Bakugou said carefully, with a stare like two burning brands. “How? You’re all I think about. And now you’re – “ He gestured with a flailing hand at Izuku’s everything. “And I can’t have you?”

Izuku’s hackles rose, eyes narrowed.

“Of course you can’t have me. I – do – not – know – you.”

Bakugou’s snarl erupted from the depths of his throat and, under normal circumstances, were Izuku in full control of his body, a fight would have kicked off then and there.

Instead, to Izuku’s horror, he whined, tripped forward, and ducked his head beneath Bakugou’s chin, nose frantically nuzzling the underside of his throat. Bakugou’s arms came around him in an equal rush, yanking him in closer, humming deep as he caressed his neck, his glands over Izuku’s head, the side of his face.

The moment lasted less than ten seconds.

With a raspy growl of his own, teeth bared in alarm and fear, Izuku pushed from Bakugou’s arms, sending Bakugou crashing into a bookshelf.

“What the fuck are you doing?” Izuku nearly screamed. “Who the hell do you think you are? Get out!”

“ME?” Bakugou said, voice booming as he stomped back to jab a finger in Izuku’s face. “You did that, you delusional idiot! How full of yourself are you, hah? I didn’t lay a hand on you ‘til you jumped me and – and you scent marked me! Omegas aren’t even meant to do that shit. You were there for it, so don’t attack me for what your body is obviously telling you. If you want me, you can have me, for fucks sake!”

Izuku gawked.

“Excuse me? I don’t want anything to do with you, you – you stalker! You think you’re god’s gift to Omegas? Here’s a newsflash, Mr Zero. You’re repulsive. The world is better off without you ever mating.”

“Well, same to you, defective Omega,” Bakugou snapped, chest heaving, face red. “You seem to like being alone. Now I see why it suits you.”

Izuku wetly sniffed back hot, angry tears, his hands fisted and aching at his sides as he remained still in their face to face standoff.

“Don’t ever come back here,” he said, throat torn up with emotion. “You were never welcome in the first place.”

Bakugou held Izuku’s stubborn gaze.

“Gladly,” he said, voice grave as he stood straight and turned around. Striding toward the door, he tossed over his shoulder, “Nice shirt, by the way,” and was then gone.

Izuku looked down at the incriminating burnt orange flannel and groaned.

“Damn that man!”

Chapter 7

Summary:

Around Midoriya, Katsuki was different. Because of Midoriya, Katsuki was different.

Notes:

Hello beautiful people! Once more and not for the last time: thank you thank you THANK YOU for your comments, your input, your messages, your kindness, your cheerleader. I truly treasure you all, and as this story begins to pick up momentum, I hope you enjoy the ride with me.

Also: Apologizing ahead of time that this chapter is a lead-up to extremely exciting things, Deku does not feature at all except by mention, and Katsuki has thoughtful moments, but nothing necessarily happens.

Trust me when I say the next chapter is gonna kick it up a notch, or ten.

“He landed a punch on you?” Kirishima said from above, his stupid face upside down and gawking at Katsuki with awe as he kept his hands near to the weighted bar Katsuki lifted, prepared to spot him.

“That all you’re gettin’ outta this?” Katsuki snapped as he slowly brought the bar to his sweat-stained tank top. He pushed the lumbering weight up, hissing the word asshole on the way.

“I mean,” Kirishima said, cocking his head a little as he considered Katsuki’s increasing effort. “Kinda? What can I tell you, bro? Approaching your mate while they’re in heat is one thing. Approaching an unfamiliar and, from what you’ve told me, weirdly aggressive, Omega on the edge of heat while they’re in starter stages of anxiety and itchiness? Not the smartest thing you’ve ever done.”

“The smartest thing you’ve ever done is keep your mouth shut,” Katsuki said, his voice tapering off to another harsh breath as he continued his increasingly difficult number of reps. “Anyway,” he continued, breathing harder between each word. “He – came on – to me.”

“That’s his body talking, not him,” Kirishima said, his closed mouth smile apologetic and so fucking punchable.

That’s exactly what Midoriya had said.

“Fuck – you.” Katsuki huffed for air as he completed the set, Kirishima lightly lifting the bar away with barely a grunt, and setting it in place. Laying there, Katsuki blindly grappled at the side of the bench for his water bottle and guzzled it while he considered his friend’s face. “He pisses me the fuck off. I should clock him one, see how he likes it.”

“That – that’s not – I wouldn’t –“

“Now that sounds like my kinda plan,” said a familiar feminine voice on the approach. Katsuki was already rolling his eyes until Camie promptly shouldered Kirishima aside and placed her hands on her hips, leaning down until Katsuki's eyes were in line with smirking, pink-glossed lips. “Did I hear that right? Ground Zero interested in an Omega? I wouldn’t have pegged you for the weakling sort.”

Unaffected by Camie’s closeness – she’d been in his face for years – Katsuki raised a brow.

“You’re an Omega. And the person I’m talking about isn’t weak.”

“Whatevs,” Camie said, standing at full height and tightening the messy bun atop her head. “You’re on the market for a strong Omega these days and you didn’t text me?”

“Must'a slipped my mind,” Katsuki said blandly, rebuffing the cloying come hither scent Camie swirled into the space between them. “And by slipped I mean, was never there in the first place.”

“Hella harsh,” Camie said, mouth quirked as she stepped aside for Kirishima to bring the bar back to Katsuki’s calloused palms. She pulled out her phone, scrolling through with a thumb garnished in Barbie pink nail polish as she spoke. “TBH, I didn’t hear anything about the guy except for face punching. I just wanted to give myself an entrance.”

Katsuki would have sighed had he not been busy with his repetitions. Count that as another asshat who knew he was gay. The more people who knew – friends or not – the closer the information got to the public. Sure as hell wouldn’t be the end of the world if it did, but the way his newly discovered romantic life was headed – if it could even be considered romantic at this point – the last thing he needed was unknown factors butting in to his progress.

Or lack thereof.

“What’s this Omega like, anyway?” Camie said, frowning down at her phone. “There’s plenty of dating sites where you can find someone better for you. Like, Hero’s Hideaway would at least pair you with an Omega who can handle themselves. Our kind have gotten so, like, complacent. You’d think we’d get better about it, but it’s like this ‘free to be me’ trend among the Omegas now which they’re just using as an excuse to find themselves an Alpha who’ll cater to them for life.”

“We’re not all like that,” Kirishima said, hefting the bar from Katsuki and setting it on the rack above Katsuki’s head once more. “You’re not, I’m not. Tamaki –“

“Point totes proven,” Camie said, aiming finger guns at Kirishima with a grin. “We are, like, heroes. Presentation barely comes into play. Everyone else? Mega thumbs down.”

“I’d rather barf in my own mouth and swallow it than join motherfuckin’ Hero’s Hideaway.”

Katsuki sat up from the bench, bunching the hem of his shirt to wipe his dripping brow.

He didn’t necessarily disagree with Camie. Never in his twenty-five years had it even occurred to him to find a mate, or a date, or – hell, someone to fuck in a rut. That kind of shit had always felt unnecessary to his existence, and a straight up inconvenience.

Knowing Midoriya now, Katsuki had to wonder how much of that lacking desire for a mate grew from how fucking dependent Omegas presented. They wanted the litter of kids, the home, the food and money brought to them. And while Katsuki had seen it work with plenty of mates in the course of his life – it had never looked appealing to him. As a hero, the last thing he needed were dependents.

But Midoriya wasn’t needy. He was fierce and clever and scrappy, with a heart too forgiving and soft and hurt from what Katsuki surmised were years of disappointment and hidden hardship.

Or were those his instincts talking?

Katsuki wasn’t stupid – and he certainly wasn’t blind to the fashion in which Midoriya’s scent intoxicated, beckoned, yanked at Katsuki’s leash. Around Midoriya, Katsuki was different. Because of Midoriya, Katsuki was different.

His body had been the first to fall for Midoriya. His mind was currently racing to match stride, make sense of it all. And his heart was ruthlessly dragged along the pavement behind him, not yet caught up with the ordeal.

A couple of months ago, Katsuki would have wholeheartedly agreed with Camie.

Now?

“Can’t compare every Omega to you,” Katsuki said easily as he stood and chugged his water. He swiped the back of his mouth and tossed the bottle to Kirishima as he smirked at Camie. “Some of them actually have taste. What the fuck is that on top of your head? You tryin’ to attract an Alpha or a fellow pineapple?”

Camie gaped, slapped Katsuki’s arm with the back of her hand.

“It’s a topknot, bitch! Shave your head.”

“I will if you do,” Katsuki said, striding away with Kirishima at his side. “We’re gonna go beat the shit outta each other.”

“Sparring,” Kirishima said quickly, chuckling nervously as he waved Camie’s way. “He means sparring.”

“Who said sparring? I got aggression to release.”

“You can try,” Kirishima said, excitement rising in his voice as he beamed at Katsuki.

“Call me when your Omega disappoints you!” Camie hollered, laughing brightly as she wandered toward the treadmills.

“Enjoy your D-list hero dating site!”

The distant swearing was enough of a victory for Katsuki.

“So, what’re you gonna do now?” Kirishima said as they meandered toward the sparring room. “You basically undid anything good you managed the other day.”

“Fuck you,” Katsuki said mildly, because he knew Kirishima wasn’t wrong. “He probably won’t even remember that shit happened. Heat fever and all.”

“Yeah, uh, it doesn’t work like that,” Kirishima said with genuine concern. “At all. You, um, you fucked up, man.”

Katsuki scoffed as they pushed through the double doors into a room that was rank with sweat and humidity. They made for the mixed martial arts octagon.

“Not everyone is as thick skinned as you are, you know?” Kirishima said gently, his hand falling to Katsuki’s damp back as they paused before the cage.

Katsuki spared a glance over his shoulder, brow arched.

“He is.”

“Or he acts that way because it keeps him safe from guys like you.”

Katsuki opened his mouth in rebuttal, and when he found nothing emerging, clamped it shut. Without a word, he dropped to one knee and aggressively retied one of his shoes, his expression drawn and thoughtful.

Well, fuck.

He had a visit to make.

 

Four days was long enough to be banned, right? Midoriya couldn’t have been serious, right? No one banned Ground Zero from anywhere or anything.

Anyway, Katsuki was merely checking in. He could do that. He could do whatever he wanted.

And if he got to see Midoriya – and sate the anxious, pacing beast inside of him that stressed to know if he’d weathered his heat safely or not – well, that was an added benefit.

Tucking his chin into his bulky parka and navigating the evening crowd all atwitter with the current swirling snowfall, Katsuki trailed the now familiar path toward Parchment.

With a subtle, mournful sigh that fogged up out of his coat, Katsuki realized he no longer smelled of Midoriya’s heavy summer scent. The sticky damp which coated the skin before a torrential downpour, the sizzling ozone in the air, the dark, swollen clouds desperate to burst. Four nights ago, the scent, the taste of Midoriya had drenched Katsuki to the bone.

His mouth watered with recollection.

Maybe someone more experienced with relationships would have read the situation differently. He probably should have continued his mantra of ‘walk away’. And he definitely shouldn’t have called Midoriya a defective Omega when he was far from.

Well, that was all in the past. Kirishima was full of shit. Midoriya was probably over it by now.

But the way he’d tucked himself beneath Katsuki’s chin with that submissive whimper. The way he’d gone to his toes to slick the length of his throat along Katsuki’s, frantic and feral, rubbing his cheek, his curls over Katsuki’s neck in turn – fuck. That was…

Well, Katsuki had endured enough mating lessons in school to know that Omega’s simply did not scent mark relative strangers, incoming heat or not. In fact, Omegas were meant to offer their glands, not instigate the exchange.

How had Midoriya already become this inexplicable new planet in Katsuki’s solar system?

Shit – who the hell was he kidding? Midoriya drew him in like the sun.

He should have been more pissed about it than he was, but Katsuki had never been one to deny himself his more visceral emotions. And in the case of the moody bookworm with a punch like a lightning strike, Katsuki’s body had already decided how to feel before he’d even had a say. Katsuki was scrambling to play catch up with himself.

Ducking through entrance of Parchment, Katsuki shook off the chill he carried, brushing his sleeves to rid the thin cling of snowfall.

He was frowning before he finished looking up, eyes narrowed as he registered Midoriya’s scent as a distant, faded one.

“Welcome,” said a civil, entirely unwelcoming voice.

Katsuki slid a glance toward the man lounging behind the service counter with a popular anti-hero magazine flipped open.

Unflinching, assessing yellow cat eyes, outrageously long-lashed, met Katsuki’s gaze evenly. Closely cropped dark hair, pale, firm mouth, all sharp cheekbones, jaw and chin. Despite being indoors, he still wore a green parka, the fur hood draped back over and behind his shoulders. The Beta’s scent was nearly nonexistent, as it was with most of their kind. If anything, he smelled like the city. Cold, merciless concrete and cigarette smoke.

“The fuck’re you?” Katsuki said, his top lip curling in distaste.

“I work here,” the intruder said, one thin, disdainful eyebrow quirked. “And you don’t. So I can’t comprehend why you need to know who I am.”

“Bullshit.”

“Struggling to find why it’s bullshit, but okay.” The guy waved a slim hand, a shooing motion reserved for a king and his court. “Go find a coloring book or something. I –”

The speed with which the stranger stood from the stool and drilled Katsuki with a gilded glare would have startled a lesser man.

“Ground Zero.”

Katsuki mirrored the asshole’s expression, his teeth bared as he snapped off each word.

“You suddenly a fan?”

“Oh.” The man’s smile was like a scythe. “Let’s not flatter the undeserving.”

Katsuki felt sweat bead at his hairline, the fire in his gut rising with vitriol.

“Just who the fuck d’you think you are? Where’s Midoriya – he not back yet?”

“What does it matter to – oh.” The guy’s lips curved without humor. “You’re the one he meant.”

“HAH?” Katsuki said, his heart flip-flopping to think Midoriya had mentioned him outside of their interactions. “What one? I’m what?”

“The kid’s not here,” said the stranger with a flippant, dismissive wave. With that, he returned to his spot atop the stool and pointedly flipped the page of his magazine, haughty angles of his face set in cool control. “And I’m not supposed to start any fights in his shop, so really, there’s no point in us continuing this interaction.”

“The fuck?” Katsuki said, boggling, his temper bubbling high. “Who the hell are you and what’re you to Midoriya?"

Pausing, the man peered up from those long lashes, eyes like interrogation lights.

“Chisaki. And you’re Ground Zero – the so-called pro hero I clean up after when your wreckage is complete.”

The name niggled at the back of Katsuki’s brain, something familiar.

“What –“

“And if I have anything to say about it – and I have plenty say – Izuku won’t be going near you with a ten foot pole. Especially not now.”

“Especially not now?” Katsuki said, taking steps forward to place his palms upon the counter. Looming over Chisaki like a volcano set to burst, Katsuki put no effort to reduce the growl growing in his throat. “Where is he? His heat – is it bad? Tell me. Let me see him. I should –“

Chisaki’s hollow, humorless laugh should’ve frozen Katsuki in his tracks, but only served to singe his self-control.

“You really are as cocky as they say. What’re you doing sniffing around Izuku, huh, boy? Where’s your owner? Do I need to chain you to a lamppost? I promise I’ll leave a bowl of water and a pillow to hump.”

“ENOUGH!” Clenched fists slammed upon the counter, black smoke seeping from them as he lunged forward, the searing spike of his aggressive scent piercing the air. Even a shitty Beta could smell it, and yet Chisaki remained motionless as Katsuki snarled. “How the fuck you think you are to talk to me like that? I could break you over my knee and use you as a toothpick.”

“I’d be entertained to see you try,” Chisaki said, the taut, clipped tone of voice belaying an edge of nerves as they faced off. Still, Chisaki did not budge.

The stench of Katsuki’s sulfur rose up stronger.

“Lay a hand on me,” Chisaki said, his smile thin and colorless. “Be a bad doggy. I dare you.”

Fuck, did he ever want to. Every aching joint and straining muscle howled for release, for attack.

Locked in a stare, statue still, Katsuki inhaled slowly through his flared nostrils. Forced his jaw to loosen, his palms to open, the blood returning to his bone white fingers. Exhaled.

“Provoke me again,” Katsuki said with quiet, raspy menace, “and I won’t be so lenient.”

“Terrifying, I’m sure,” Chisaki said flatly. He sighed and glanced over Katsuki’s shoulder like he had somewhere to be. “Can you go now? I really did promise I’d avoid fights while I’m covering his shifts.”

“How're you his friend?” Katsuki said. He could figure that much out. “He hates aggressive assholes.”

“I,” Chisaki said, a hand flat to his chest in sincerity, “am not aggressive. I merely react to my surroundings, which happen to be infested with pro heroes who care more about the glory and a paycheck than the destruction they leave behind and the lives they ruin without a second thought.”

Katsuki stared, bland and dead inside.

“Nevermind. I see why you’re friends.”

“Taught him everything I know,” Chisaki said offhandedly as his attention fell back to his magazine. “Can you go now? This is meant to be a quiet establishment, thank you.”

Fists and teeth clenched, Katsuki looked to the ceiling, eyes jammed shut as he talked himself from the ledge. More than he needed to clock this dickbag’s teeth out – he needed information.

“Right. Fuck.” Katsuki chewed on any number of venomous quips and swallowed them down for Midoriya’s sake.

Chisaki looked up at him with the most infuriatingly calm face he’d ever seen. His demeanor vaguely reminded Katsuki of Shinsou. Hell, if Midoriya and Chisaki were friends, then did Shinsou fit in there? Who were these freaks Midoriya collected? Katsuki would rather bathe in lava than be in the same room with the three of them.

“So,” Katsuki said, low and mumbled, hands shoved in his pockets. “Is Midoriya alright? I don’t really – I don’t know how long his, y’know, lasts. Is four days normal?”

Chisaki aimed a long, guarded look his way and shrugged.

“That’s not really anyone’s business but his. Ask him yourself. I’m sure it’ll go over splendidly.”

“Well, gimme his address, then,” Katsuki said, pulling out his phone to take it down.

“You’ve got to be kidding me.”

“No,” Katsuki said, meeting Chisaki’s feline eyes. “I need to – I have to see how he is. You wouldn’t understand but –“

I hurt with not knowing.

“Listen, Rover,” Chisaki said with a hefty sigh. “Despite the fact that I hate you on principle of everything you stand for, you’re also a stranger and an Alpha. You tick most boxes of Izuku’s ‘fuck off and die’ list. So I’m going to go ahead and say good night to you and if you shit on the sidewalk please pick it up with a baggy.”

They considered each other for half a heartbeat before Katsuki was turning on his heel and evacuating the store before he set the entire fucking place on fire.

Face burning, unfeeling of the winter chill, Katsuki ground his teeth to the beginnings of nubs as he scrolled through his phone and punched in a number.

Amajiki answered on the first ring.

“Bakugou?” he said softly, an waver of concern in his voice. “What’s the ma-“

“I need you to find an address for me,” Katsuki snapped, sweeping down the street, eating up the concrete in great, anxious strides. The beast in him clawed at his ribcage for its mate, his scent firing off in all directions without his control, calling in the man who wanted nothing to do with him.

“Address?” Amajiki said. “This is for work?”

“Yes for work, goddammit. How long you gonna make me wait?”

Hesitation and the clack of a distant keyboard filled the silence before Amajiki spoke.

“Okay, I have the system up. Who am I looking for?”

Katsuki fisted a hand at his side, the wind stinging his red hot eyes.

“Midoriya Izuku.”

Chapter 8

Summary:

Just who the heck was this guy? Most Alphas weren’t nearly as clever to use words to entice their Omega in. They took, and then took some more. Because it was their biological right – right?

Ass in the air, teeth sunk into the sheets, Izuku writhed up toward no one, his slick-sloppy hand grappling for purchase on the oversized vibrator he vehemently thrust inside himself. His own ragged breathing was the soundtrack for this mateless dance, this desperation for completion that drove his body to betray him month in and out. Burning, dripping, whimpering as his violently red cock singed with each brush against the sheets, Izuku clawed for release, reprieve from what held him by the collar, by the heart.

The blanket rumpled beneath Izuku’s cheek, damp from mindless salivation and tears, Izuku slammed at his aching hole, the vibrator grown too hot to handle from overuse. Thick waves of unquenchable lust filled his lungs, his throat, his mouth as he gasped and cried out for breath, for freedom. His insides twisted and curled taut, a spring close to snapping point.

Too wrecked to restrain his body or mind, Izuku’s skull swam through a lifetime of vivid memories. Powerful hands on his hips, merciless smiles and delirious Alpha eyes, drunk on Izuku’s scent as they fucked him through his heats, years into years. He’d asked for it – he’d asked for it like a bitch with her belly up – but oh, did they use him until every drop of slick was dry.

Izuku bit the blankets now, ass held high, one palm pumping his cock, the other frantic at his wide hole.

Alphas, Alphas, bathing in his provocative scent, draining him dry until the only wet thing was the mattress soaked in cum. Fuck, did he ever want to be striped with seed, fuck, how his skin vibrated off bone for touch, any touch.

"Are you really this enamored with my scent?"

A snarl ripped through the unwelcome memory as Izuku rolled to his back, gripped the vibrator anew and relished the wet suction sound between his splayed thighs.

This kept happening. Why this Alpha, this man out of all men thrust into his heat like he had some right to be there? Like he mattered? Was it because of the brief times they’d shared scents? The weekly proximity to an available, interested Alpha?

No. Izuku knew himself better than that. Knew his body wouldn’t just present for another man simply because he was nearest.

Groaning, the small of his back rising off the bed, Izuku’s flesh burned with the memory of Bakugou’s arms taking him in, sheltering him as Izuku whimpered and smeared his pulsing throat glands across Bakugou’s rough cheek and his thick, muscular throat.

Bakugou’s eyes hadn’t been clouded, hadn’t been drunk. He hadn’t held Izuku like he’d deserved him, even if the confusion and fury in his expression had been enough to melt lead.

"Sure, I mean, at first. Not now. You're not what I thought I'd like until I realized I like who you are. Or, whatever the hell I know of you."

Izuku’s lungs halted, his body wound viciously tight, his jaw cracking beneath the strength with which he bit down. His ass clenched, his free hand racing over his painful erection to finish.

I realized I like who you are.

Cumming alone during heat was never ultimately satisfying.

This time was different.

Izuku gaped soundlessly, sightless as he stared at the ceiling, his ears popping, muffling the world around him as he burst at the seams. The hairs upon his arms and legs stood on end, an ungodly gush slopping between his legs as he bucked off the bed with a meager croak.

Floating and high on it, body boneless, Izuku lay there like the dead, skimming in and out of consciousness.

I realized I like who –

A rapid knock at the door jack-rabbited Izuku’s heart into his mouth. His teeth bared in an instinctive, savage snarl that gave away the part of him that was so very un-Omega, Izuku rolled to all fours on the bed, dislodging himself from the burnt out vibrator and ignoring the slick that trailed down his inner thighs. Cocking his head, Izuku listened.

A thunderous rapping startled him a second time, revving Izuku’s protective pride into full gear as he jumped off the bad and bounded toward the door. Clumsy on heat-weak legs and jelly knees, Izuku screeched to a late stop and slammed into his own door, cheek and ear flattened against the paneling as he narrowed his eyes.

“Who –“ Izuku swallowed, his voice hoarse from four days’ disuse. “Who’s that?”

“Midoriya?”

Oh no.

“Oh no.” Eyes bugging out, Izuku tripped a step back, utterly naked, utterly a mess, his palms up in a defensive gesture. “No no no, you’re not – you can’t be here, I –“

“Fuck, Midoriya,” Bakugou’s said clearly from the other side, parted from Izuku by a few slabs of mere plywood. “Is that your scent I – I can smell you. Oh shit, I didn’t think it would be like –“

“Leave!” Izuku launched himself forward, slammed a fist on the door. He couldn’t blink for horror at the situation, couldn’t breathe for the all-too-familiar waves of desire dripping down his fading sanity. “What the hell do you think you’re doing here? Who – how did you – go, just go! This is an O.B. building!”

An Omega-Beta only building. An Alpha just – just wandering in, especially one like Bakugou who seemed to radiate a dominant nature – shit. This was not good. For Izuku, for anyone.

“Midoriya,” Bakugou choked out, clearly already struggling. “I’m – I can’t leave.”

“What do you mean you can’t leave?” Izuku said, a panicked screech to his voice. “You’ve got legs! Big strong hero legs! Get out of here before I – before I –“

A low, long moan welled up in Izuku’s throat, spilling over like sticky honey, coating the air between them as Izuku rubbed his cheek, the glands of his throat, against the door. His lashes fluttered once, closed, then snapped open.

Izuku burned.

“Get the hell out of here before I break the door down and fuck you on the stairs,” Izuku said with a voice like distant thunder.

“HAAAH?” Bakugou’s incredulous reaction would have been funny if Izuku hadn’t started lightly thrusting his hips and half-hard cock against the paneling. “What the hell are you? And why is this door padlocked from the outside?”

“It hurts,” Izuku whimpered, scrunching his eyes shut, bitten nails faintly raking against the door. His gut twisted up, the fire raging, a fever scorching his flesh. “It’s never hurt like this before. Why does it hurt, Zero?”

“The fuck’re you doin’ to my body?” Bakugou rasped out, the door subtly shaking as Bakugou rested either his forehead or fists upon the surface.

“Wha?” Izuku shook his head, his thoughts slippery, dripping between his quivering fingers. His hips stuck to the door, grinding, swaying against the wood for friction. “Don’t know what you mean. Can’t think. Wh-why’d you come here? How?”

A guttural groan from the other side hummed down Izuku’s chest, buzzing low and encouraging, deep in his tightening balls.

“What’re you doin’ to me, dammit? I’m – I feel –“

“You wanna fuck me?” Izuku rasped through the door, his cheek smashed hard, his hips rolling on automatic against the wood. “Everybody does. All the time. You’re not going near me.”

“You were the one threatening to fuck me!” Bakugou hissed through the barrier, his voice splintering as he spoke. Another bang of fists, louder now, shuddering the hinges of the door.

Despite every protest in Izuku’s mind, his body flinched in reaction to the sound of an angry Alpha. His spine curled, his frame recoiling in on itself as a yearning whimper eked out. When Izuku popped his eyes open, it was with a gasp of realization that he was smearing his throat, his damp, needy glands across the wood, no doubt seeping a distressed, desperate scent.

Biting down on a groan, his nails digging into the door anew, Izuku thumped his forehead against the wood, nose smashed, lips dragging across the faded paint as he spoke between huffs of breath. His hips still arched forward for friction, his cock raised high, mercilessly trapped between the door and his sloppy stomach.

“I can’t help it.” The small of Izuku’s back ached, his slick dripping between his thighs moreso than he’d ever experienced. Was this Bakugou’s proximity? Was this all that guy’s fault? Izuku sobbed out a breath and humped the door in full, one hand gripping the brass knob, rattling it in mindless demand. “My body – oh, Zero, my body. Touch me, touch me please.”

“Holy shit.” The doorknob startled in Izuku’s palm in return. A scrape and drag sounded from the other side – Bakugou imitating Izuku’s frantic movements against the wood? Surely not. Bakugou wasn’t in rut. He couldn’t desire Izuku that bad. “Holy shit, I can’t –”

A fist slammed against the door, hard enough to make Izuku flinch and moan, rub his cheek and cock against the panels.

“Let me in,” came a suddenly deeper, more intense voice formed of darkness and ageless instinct. “Let – me – in.”

Drugged, lulled in by the power of that Alpha voice rumbling beneath Izuku’s skin, he sighed, lips faintly curving as he rutted in a slow, easy rhythm. But the friction wasn’t enough, and too grating against his hyper sensitive skin. Forehead dragging as he went, Izuku slid and dropped to his knees, his face pressed into the door as he brought a hand around his cock.

Eyes rocketing open once more, a snarl ripped from his chest as he lashed out like a whip, both palms smacking against the paneling with enough force to crack.

“No no no! I don’t know you!”

The replying roar froze Izuku on the spot, eyes wide as the inhuman aggression arrowed right to his ungodly hard erection.

“Your body is fuckin’ dripping for me right now, isn’t it, Omega?” Bakugou’s voice snapped through the door, perfectly in line with Izuku’s ear mashed against the wood. “You on your knees for me? ‘Cause you’ve sure as hell dragged me to mine and I can’t find it in me to be pissed about it just yet. Wait ‘til I am, though. This isn’t my fuckin’ ideal either, y’know.”

Inhaling deep, cheekbone crushed too hard against the door as if he might melt through into Bakugou’s hold if he did it hard enough, Izuku exhaled on a slow count.

“I don’t want you,” he said softly, licking his trembling lips. “My b-body wants you. There’s a –” another shaky breath, “a difference.”

“Fuck, Midoriya,” Bakugou grated out, voice a harsh rasp that bristled against Izuku’s skin, pricked goosebumps along his arms, his back. “Your scent’s beggin’ me for somethin’ else. You can’t expect me to –“

“I don’t want anything to do with you!”

Izuku launched at the door, fingertips digging in, scraping down, old paint crusting beneath his nails. He hiccupped, a short sob as he thumped his brow against the wood again, again, again. The swelling in his cock hadn’t abated, his slick glistening upon the floor, slipping beneath his aching knees as he remained kneeling on the bruising skin.

“It hurts so much, Zero,” Izuku whispered, lips cracked and dry, the fire in his gut spreading further, consuming. His hands itched to touch, to be touched, to be cherished, to mate. “I burn, I’m burning.”

“That’s your fuckin’ problem if you wanna reject me when I’m right at your door, dammit!”

“I can’t get out ‘til I’m through this,” Izuku retorted sharply, fuming as his palm unconsciously closed around his cock and started a slow job of it. His eyelids fell shut, his mouth kissing the door as he spoke to it, through it. “Don’t you know that lock’s outside for a reason?”

A moment of silence. A brief, heavy thud of the padlock being handled, then released back against the door.

“Midoriya.” Bakugou sounded taut, breathless. “I just wanna make you feel good. You that stupid? Can’t you feel it too, dumbass? You think I’m crazy about humping the door just to get to you? I could shatter that lock in a second if I damn well wanted.”

The image of Bakugou tearing steel and wood and doors off hinges just to claim him had Izuku’s dick spurting precum over his sweat-damp hand. An involuntary guttural groan rose up Izuku’s throat as he stroked himself quicker.

“Y-you’re,” Izuku swallowed back a gasp of pleasure. “You’re not going to?”

“HAH? I just wanted to see if you were okay, you shitty Omega! God, I’m – I can’t think. I can’t fuckin’ think and it’s pissin’ me off now. I’ve never – d'you make everyone feel like this?”

Drifting in and out of the smoke that clouded his thoughts, Izuku snorted a soft, incredulous laugh. Just came to see if he was okay? During a heat? Not gonna bust the door down to fuck him senseless? Just who the heck was this guy? Most Alphas weren’t nearly as clever to use words to entice their Omega in. They took, and then took some more. Because it was their biological right – right?

“Feel?” Izuku managed, hissing between gritted teeth as his length wept sticky pearls of impatience. “F-feel like what?”

A lightning crack of fist crunching against the flimsy door, just shy of where Izuku’s forehead rested, shocked a thrill through his loose, lax limbs.

“Like I’d do anything for you, dumbass!”

Soundlessly mouthing oh my god, Izuku’s sped up the thrust of his hand, the hot, wet fist suctioning around a cock just aching for the Alpha on the other side of the cracked and battered door. He couldn’t smell him, but his body knew – knew everything Izuku didn’t want to know.

“Just go,” Izuku breathed out softly, the last thread of himself fogged over in the humid heat rising between them. “Go. Now!”

“You smell like sin,” Bakugou murmured with his own soft moan. Was he touching himself, too? “I wanna lick it off your skin. Every damn inch.”

A low hum threatened to pass Izuku’s lips as he ground his brow hard against the door, his curls clasped to his skull with sweat, his wrist smarting with the relentless pumping.

“No,” was all Izuku said, mindless denial as he drove himself higher to the sound of this Alpha.

“Wanna fill that clever mouth with my cock, wanna open you up for me, beg for me.”

“Never.” Izuku bit down on his lip, his gut flaring, rising with the power of his body’s lust. “Fuck.”

Suddenly, Bakugou’s tone swerved toward desperate, blathering, disconnected as if disoriented with desire as deeply as Izuku.

“Gotta see you like this. Gotta touch you, Midoriya, lemme just touch you. Dunno half what I’m doin’ but I’ll do whatever you want, however you want it, just let me – Midoriya?”

Hot, heavy breaths huffing without guile, Izuku jacking his cock with unrepentant cries of need and loud, slick slaps, Izuku meekly moaned the moment Bakugou stopped speaking.

“Keep talking, keep talking, go go go.”

A tick of silence before Bakugou spoke like a man running a marathon.

“Fuck. You – you really don’t feel this? You’d break down this door for my cock, wouldn’t you, Omega? Not for any Alpha’s cock, I bet. Mine. Me. You don’t know me. Fuck, I barely know you. But my body – it hurts. It hurts, too. Shit, I can hear you – I can hear you ready to cum for me. Can smell how open you are for me. Pisses me off. I’m weak right now, y’know? Some asshole could stab me in the back while all I can think of is poudin’ you on my dick until you scream.”

Wide eyes huge and blind toward the door, the burning coil within melting through, reading to snap, Izuku reached his free hand around and shoved fumbling fingers into his wide, sopping heat, choking on the pleasure.

“Zero, I – I’m gonna –“

“Flood you with my cum, mate you with it. Knot you like you’ve never known. Sit you on my cock for hours.  Fill you up ‘til you can’t walk for it. My Omega, my –“

Izuku’s resounding wail should have set off car alarms. The orgasm smacked him like a sun-flare, devouring, searing him to ash as he collapsed in his own mess at the front door, cheek flat on the blessedly cool hardwood.

Shuddering through errant, popping sparks of lingering ecstasy, Izuku groaned and went dark.

 

“You alive?”

Izuku didn’t open his eyes, but his panic rose up like a fist around his heart.

How long had he been out? He felt sticky and disgusting. By the dried mess in the low trail of dark hair below his belly button, he’d been passed out for long enough.

Cracking one eyelid, Izuku found himself pinned by Natsume’s unblinking stare. The massive orange cat sat on the far counter in the kitchen area, eyes narrowed and awfully darn judgey.

Izuku sighed, and found his voice hollowed out when he spoke.

“Go home, Mr Zero. Please.”

“Call me that again and see what happens!” Bakugou hollered a little too loudly for Izuku’s ears.

Wincing, Izuku pushed himself off from the floor, casting a baleful eye across the state of himself and the floor. Christ, the door. Telling scratch marks branded the entire paintjob.

Unsure of his footing but too stubborn to let himself lay in the filth of being an Omega in heat, Izuku lurched to his feet. His legs wobbled, infuriatingly weak. Izuku slapped a hand on the door and leaned against it for the moment, nude, head hung down between his shoulders, judging his ability to walk and move. Familiar heat was already crawling back up his legs, infusing a warmth that left his traitorous body all too open for people like the one on the other side of the door.

It wouldn’t be the first time Izuku had dealt with a hungry Alpha at his door. Only time and mistakes had taught him to put a lock on it. For both of their sakes.

Mouth dry and teeth feeling fuzzy like a man just out of a long sleep, Izuku scrunched his face in distaste and tried to swallow. Failed.

“How did you get here?” Izuku croaked.

“You should eat something,” Bakugou said immediately, gruff and bossy as hell. “Drink. Shower. I read about this shit. Your Alpha is meant to help you –“

“Did you read that in a magazine, Mr Zero?” Izuku said, his lips quirking. It was kind of sweet. There was something strangely innocent about him. Clueless puppy or something. That couldn’t be less accurate, of course. An Alpha like Ground Zero would not be without a lifetime of undoubtedly needy Omegas, heats, ruts – the works. “I believed that stuff, too. Once upon a time.”

“Shut the hell up and drink some water. Why you gotta mouth off over every damn thing? Fuck, man.”

With a lingering withering stare at the door and the obnoxious Alpha behind it, Izuku wordlessly turned on his heel and took the few steps toward the fridge.

He downed two large bottles of water, inhaled a protein bar that tasted of chewy nothingness as always, and flopped face first down on his couch.

His back and arms burned, a continuous pulse like a fresh, raw sunburn. Evening cast the apartment in damp blues and greys, a lingering bruise. The sound of traffic drifted in from of the cracked window. A frigid breeze swept over his spine, a welcoming respite. Despite the snow outside and the dropping temperature, Izuku had long turned off his heating.

Izuku couldn’t remember the last heat he’d experienced as fierce or fiery as this one.

Hissing at his hips’ involuntary rut against the couch and the way the too-sensitive skin of his cock reacted, Izuku turned his face from its downward, smashed position and blandly stared at his blank television. His faint reflection looked back at him in dim, dark relief.

“Still here?” Izuku said softly.

“As long as you’re like this, I’m sittin’ here.”

Gaze narrowed at nothing, Izuku huffed a breath from his nose like a bull.

“Th-that’s called trespassing and I will call someone about it.”

“Go the fuck ahead. See how far it gets you when the police come to call on a top pro hero.”

Izuku paused, let that sink in. This wasn’t a man afraid of anything. Men like that were the most dangerous. The most appealing. The most fascinating.

“That’s a risky thing to throw around.”

“If it keeps me here, I don’t give a shit.”

Izuku rolled his eyes and shut them tight. He sighed.

By far, this Alpha was the most persistent. While it intrigued him how stubbornly Bakugou remained on his side of the door, even when Izuku was a walking porno, the Alpha was still a danger to him. Like they’d both admitted now, neither of them knew each other. And no Alpha had ever exerted enough energy to, in fact, know Izuku. He was a sex toy and nothing much more.

“Go home, already. I’m – this isn’t something I do – with, you know. Other people.”

“Why?”

The question sparked a million replies. Bakugou had a way of demanding things from Izuku like he deserved them. Seemed like Ground Zero preferred to sear through the exterior of things, right to the truth and heart.

Well, Izuku’s stony walls were tougher than any fire.

“I’m going to go lay down now.”

A pause. Bakugou’s voice, plain and straightforward.

“I can still smell you right here.”

“Well. I’m laying down right here.”

“Good. Me too.”

Izuku stifled a short laugh.

“You’re stubborn.”

Bakugou snorted derisively.

“So’re you, short stack.”

Izuku frowned into nothing, wondering at this situation. Puzzled at Bakugou’s sudden presence. He was so tired. His body, his mind, his emotions. Wisps of concern, of anxiety floated just out of reach, his mind too smoke-choked to grasp just how Bakugou was here, or why his presence momentarily eased the forest fire raging through him.

“You asleep?”

“No,” Izuku said, sure he’d spoken to quietly for Bakugou to hear.

“I’d read to fall asleep when I was a kid.”

“Me too.”

“So, you want me to read to you or what?”

Izuku opened his eyes and frowned at his reflection once more. His reflection was of no help, only mirroring his confusion with the sudden change of pace.

“I-I don’t have an opinion on it.”

“Now there’s a first.”

Izuku made out a shuffling sound, then the unmistakable whisper of book pages. What book would a man like Ground Zero carry around with him?

“I am a cat,” Bakugou said, his tone surprisingly even, almost studious. Not at all embarrassed to be reading aloud in a hallway during an Omega’s heat. Izuku almost laughed out loud. He would have laughed. Definitely. If his heart didn’t hurt so much, all of a sudden.

Yes, this was a very strange heat for him.

“As yet I have no name. I’ve no idea where I was born. All I remember is that I was meowing in a dampish dark place when, for the first time, I saw a human being.”

Izuku drifted to the low lull of an Alpha’s voice, to a story he knew too well. Dipped in and out of Bakugou’s speech patterns, and the way he sounded so unlike his usual crass, uncultured form of speech.

“My master seldom comes face-to-face with me. I hear he is a schoolteacher. As soon as he comes home from school, he shuts himself up in the study for the rest of the day; and he seldom emerges. The others in the house think that he is terribly hard-working. He himself pretends to be hard-working. But actually he works less hard than any of them think. Sometimes I tiptoe to his study for a peep and find him taking a snooze. Occasionally his mouth is drooling onto some book he has begun to read.”

Dizzy and warm and dazed, Izuku’s lips curved as he mouthed the upcoming line in time with his very own pro hero sitting against his door.

“Living as I do with human beings, the more that I observe them, the more I am forced to conclude that they are selfish.”

Chapter 9

Summary:

Was Midoriya keeping someone out or himself in?
Both?
What could any of that mean?

 

NOTE: Mind the tags.

Notes:

HELLO HELLO, MY LOVELIES! Welcome back to the night that changed everything. I have a few things to mention, so if you could stick with me here before we continue forth, that would be awesome.

1. I read all of your comments. Don't even doubt that I do, PLEASE. Don't ever doubt that your comment doesn't matter to me. Every chapter of every fic I write, I read all of the comments for each chapter AT LEAST TWICE. I know your screen names, I make an effort to keep them in my memory. I appreciate you SO much. Your encouragement, kindness, and generosity. Thank you so much. I cherish them and you.

2. I'll never be ditching this fic. I get a lot of worried or frantic comments. DON'T WORRY, Y'ALL. Your gurl here is a single mama to a five year old - AND it's summer, so no school. I got a lot goin' on, y'know? But I don't abandon fics. I just. Don't. So, stick with me!

3. Feel free to message me or send asks (you can talk to me Anonymously on Tumblr, too!) right over HERE. I'm always happy to chat.

4. Do use my Twitter tag #lalazee or #quietrapture I'm on there as Lala_Zee, too!

A bleary gaze at his phone with gritty eyes told Katsuki he’d been asleep for a little over two hours.

I Am A Cat lay open upon his lap, the words blurred to him. Exhaustion – emotional, physical – settled heavily upon his frame. He’d continued to read to Midoriya for quite some time, occasionally catching the man on the other side of the door murmuring in time with his own recitation. It should only figure that the book which Midoriya had sold to him in a fit of annoyance would be another he’d likely read too many times to count.

Disoriented with a numb ass to boot, Katsuki hissed as he pushed off the floor and stood. He back pocketed the thin book, the spine already conforming from days and days in the same pocket, wherever he went.

Rolling his shoulders with a sigh, Katsuki critically eyed the padlocked door before him. He’d be the first to admit – at least, privately – that he didn’t know shit about heats, other than what he’d read online. But this stuff couldn’t be normal. Katsuki didn’t see a padlock latch drilled into the doorway opposite Midoriya’s. He never heard reports of Omegas in heat running amok. They usually just laid there and writhed around, right?

Was Midoriya keeping someone out or himself in?

Both?

What could any of that mean?

Frowning, Katsuki cupped the padlock in his palm, thumb smoothing over the rough, scarred keyhole. It looked well used. He allowed it to thunk back against the door, his hand resting on the peeling white paint of the door.

Eyelids falling shut, he inhaled deep.

Wet, wild hills and valleys of deep lakes and lush forest closed in on him, same as if he were there. Katsuki could nearly feel the thunder of thick, fat drops dampening his brow, soaking him through as the sky rumbled with impending shocks of lightning. The hairs at his nape stood to attention, his arms prickling. Katsuki shivered, drinking deep of lush green leaves dripping fresh rain, the howling wind at his back, pushing, urging him toward the Omega on the other side.

A flash of fire shot through his groin and seared, springing Katsuki’s eyes open, mouth agape as he dropped to his knees. Clutching his stomach and biting down on a curse, Katsuki clenched his teeth and breathed through the fading brand of heat faded off within the minute.

Swallowing hard and heaving with breath, Katsuki ground his forehead against the door, hands fisted upon his thighs as he rode through the confusion and fury that tore through him.

“What the fuck,” he whispered to himself, licking his cracked, chapped lips as he boggled down at the floor.

The same thing had happened just hours ago. Midoriya’s scent pooling on his tongue – salivating, invigorating, maddening. He had hurt. Had felt the burn Midoriya had described as if they’d been opposite sides of the same coin, tossed into the hearth.

The word RUT smoked and fumed in Katsuki’s gut, a choking smog of flame in his lungs, watering his eyes.

Couldn’t be.  Katsuki took the pills. Best money could buy. He hadn’t rut since his first ever rut, ten years ago.

Katsuki didn’t do that bullshit. Didn’t let it take up his time, his energy. He was a hero, for fuck’s sake. Any hero worth a damn knew well enough that they couldn’t let biology control their ability to perform their duty at peak performance.

Suddenly bemused, his grimace falling to a slack frown, Katsuki flopped back onto his ass, knees bent as he stared blankly at the door.

Wasn’t that what the infuriatingly stubborn man locked away from him had said time and again? His biology wasn’t who he was – wasn’t what controlled him and his life?

Didn’t Katsuki feel the same of himself? At least, when it came to his profession.

And yet, here he was. Hunting down Midoriya’s address, banging and humping at doors like some brainless dick that he absolutely fucking was not – and all the while expecting Midoriya to just, what?

Open the door?

“Shit.” Katsuki raked his hands back through his hair, linked his fingers at his nape as he stared at nothing but saw a whole lot more. “Shit.”

“Zero?”

Katsuki whipped his head up like a beast with blood scented, teeth bared in a silent snarl at the sound of his mate’s hushed voice. Midoriya’s aroma smacked him in the face like a crack of thunder, the feral fringes of Katsuki’s brain instantly registering the smell of Midoriya’s shower, his grassy soap, and the lingering musk of his cum hinting he’d gotten off in the bathroom while Katsuki had been sleeping.

Fuck, if this didn’t piss him off.

“Yeah,” Katsuki managed, his voice a hollow croak as he willed his muscles to lax, his shoulders to sag. “What.”

“When are you going to leave?” Midoriya murmured, no malice in his voice, just something reined in and resigned. A shuffle and a sigh as Midoriya seated himself near the door once more.

Why? Why didn’t he just go into the bedroom and ignore Katsuki completely? And why was Katsuki expecting Midoriya to walk away when he was the invader here?

And why the fuck couldn’t Katsuki find it in him to leave first?

“Don’t know,” Katsuki replied, a scowl twisting up his face with the admission. “You want me to leave? You really wanna be alone through this shit?”

“Better than a stranger.”

“I know you,” Katsuki said lowly. He shifted, rested his back against the door. Knees bent, arms folded across them, his rested his brow and shut his eyes. “Or. Shit. I don’t know. The fuck you choose to do this alone, man?”

Silence spanned, brittle ice sheets across deep water.

“This is the best option.”

“How.”

“I wouldn’t expect you to understand, Mr Zero. And I’m fine with that. The less involved you are with me, the better. For both of us.”

“Yeah,” Katsuki said, tone dry as bone. “We’re regular goddamn strangers on the street at this point.”

“This has all been your doing, okay?” Midoriya snapped, stress souring his scent like an oil spill in the fresh, salty sea. “I didn’t ask you to come. How the heck did you get my address in the first place? You’re taking over every part of my life and – and it’s my life. Not yours. Go home, Mr Zero. Bathe in needy, star-struck Omegas who’d do anything for a single heat with you. You’re famous. What are you doing in a poorly lit, unheated hallway in the dead of winter? What are you doing here, really?”

“I came here because I had to, okay?” Katsuki spat, face still buried in his arms. “You think I want to be here? I’m cold. I’ve had a hardon for hours which, in case you didn’t know, would be like a medical fucking emergency if it weren’t for this specific situation, and I can’t stop thinking about – about –“ Katsuki sputtered, head knocking back against the door as he grimaced and fisted his smoking hands. “About you and how you got here and why and who, who that Chisaki asshole is to you and –“

“Chisaki? How do you know –“

“I came to the store lookin’ for you and that cat-faced asshole was waitin’ for me.”

The soft chuckle up against Katsuki’s back had him bristling.

“Chisaki is… He’s very special to me.”

“Write a fuckin’ romance novel about it, why don’t you,” Katsuki mumbled under his breath. Then, louder, “Why.”

“Why?”

“Why’s he so fuckin’ special?”

“He – hmm.” Midoriya yawned. What time was it? Getting late. Perhaps past midnight. “He showed me how to be a man who doesn’t need a hero in his life.”

Katsuki didn’t like the sound of that one fucking bit. He choked back an insult and managed to speak, quick and sharp.

“What about tall, pale, and purple, then? He’s a hero. He’s in your life.”

When Midoriya spoke, the smile was evident in his lulled voice, and Katsuki saw flames behind his eyes.

“Hitoshi’s my best friend.  Has been since for ten years now. He gets me, I get him. It’s mutual.”

“You two aren’t anything alike,” Katsuki said with a snort.

“Just shows how little you know either of us,” Midoriya shot back, his tongue sharpening along with his scent.

Katsuki blinked against the sucker punch, his heart pinched up in his chest.

“Yeah,” he said, tilting his head further back to stare at the cracked grey ceiling. “I’m getting that. I guess.”

Midoriya didn’t reply to that. Maybe he’d fallen asleep. Maybe the heat was taking him again. From the smell of things, though, the worst of the storm was dwindling.

What had Katsuki set out to accomplish tonight? He couldn’t begin to guess. Instinct had consumed him, had made his decisions for him. He hadn’t been in rut, but he’s still relinquished his control over to the animal and let it run wild until he’d run full force into Midoriya’s door.

In reality, something in him had simply wanted to be near. Needed to be. Even now, his body howled and crooned for the Omega who locked himself away like he was going to hurt the world and vice versa.

“Lemme ask you a question,” Katsuki slurred, biting back a wide yawn.

Midoriya hummed, a noise that painted images of pooled sheets bathed in blue winter light, of freckles splayed across a clean white pillow case, forested curls like down fluff between his fingers.

“One,” Midoriya said, faint and far.

“What’ve Alphas done t’you?”

The hush that hung in the air lasted so long, Katsuki was sure Midoriya had fallen asleep.

And when Midoriya did speak, Katsuki’s chest instantly tightened, his stomach dropping out. The weight of his voice struck Katsuki as an epitaph, like words on a headstone or spoken of someone dead. Katsuki had been to enough funerals to know.

“Sometimes I wonder if I had the ability to go back and change the past, I would. Would I have fought back more? Would I have said something to end it faster? Would I have been strong enough to fight the biology which you seem so insistent governs who we need, what our body desires, and even who we love?”

Midoriya’s short, coarse laugh was a bitter cough.

“My body loved how Alphas made me feel. Not – not in my heart, or in my head – but the way they made me feel, you know? Like I wasn’t going to peel out of my skin. Like they could physically hold me down – keep me from hurting myself, like I seemed to do on every other level since I was practically a kid.”

Midoriya cleared his throat, his voice cracking like an old record player as he spoke.

“The thing about letting an Alpha hold you down? You don’t get a choice when they let you back up.”

A chill cut down Katsuki’s spine.

“And then your body – your instincts, your nature, whatever you want to glorify it as – your body isn’t loud enough to drown out your thoughts, or your feelings. The high you get from sharing that heat, from letting go, doesn’t feel so high when your face is shoved into the mattress and you can’t breathe. Not choking for being unable to physically breathe, but for the way your mind starts hurting you all over again for what you let them do to you. For what you let happen to yourself.”

“Midoriya –“

“I don’t need you,” Midoriya said, soft and sturdy all at once. Two things Katsuki had come to associate with this person. “I don’t need any Alpha. Not in the way I thought I did, as a method to gag the Omega in me. I learned to control myself a long time ago – to take responsibility for what and who I am, a long time ago. If an Alpha never touches me again –” Midoriya chuckled, seemingly in earnest. “If an Alpha never touches me again, I think I’ll be the luckiest Omega in this city.”

Katsuki’s head swam. The implications of Midoriya’s words – a history Katsuki could never have envisioned when he looked at those emotive eyes and found himself time and again face to face with Midoriya’s authentic, almost unbearably honest nature… He couldn’t merge the two. The past Midoriya with the present one.

The list of instances in which Katsuki had began to realize just how naïve he’d been with this person were now innumerable.

Perhaps Katsuki had come here without intention, without thought but for what his body told him. But now he sure as hell knew he’d been here for a reason.

“I believe you,” Katsuki said, low, careful – unsure of his own tongue, as clumsy as it proved to be around his person. “That you’d rather bite off my hand than be touched by it. I don’t get it, ‘cause I ain’t you – but I believe it.”

When Midoriya didn’t reply, Katsuki tried again. Midoriya was tenacious, but so was Katsuki.

“But I’m also not an Alpha who wouldn’t let you breathe. I’m – uh, I’m a certified EMT, y’know.”

Katsuki grinned at the ceiling as the splutter and bubble of increasing giggles echoed from the other side of the door. Midoriya’s mirth trigged his own, Katsuki’s shoulders shaking, his cheeks aching as Midoriya sucked in sobs of laughter, near hysterics that filled the chilly, dull hallway like the first green of spring.

After some time, the two of them trailed off, limp from laughter and late night exhaustion. Katsuki’s head refused to stay upright, and remained lolled to the side against his shoulder, his legs outstretched, crossed at the ankle into the short hallway as he drifted.

He thought Midoriya said something quiet and candy sweet to him, but that was likely a dream.

“I’d better be wildly hallucinating right now,” came a familiar drawl that had Katsuki rocketing from sleep and to his feet in his seconds. Shinsou gawked at him, weighty shopping bags in either hand. “But I’m pretty sure those mushrooms I ate were just shiitake and I’m about to have a headache from whatever the fresh hell is happening here.”

“The fuck’re you doin’ here at, at –“ Katsuki glanced at his wrist, which had no watch. “Ass o’clock in the morning with – with –“

“Groceries. They’re called groceries, and I’m allowed to be here because unlike you, I know where Izuku lives and you don’t. Or, didn’t.” Shinsou remained at the top step, both eyebrows raised, his height allowing him to look right down his nose at Katsuki. “Just what are you doing sniffing around our boy’s door, Sparky?”

“Fuck you,” Katsuki snapped, swiping his parka from the cement floor and going toe to toe with Shinsou’s smug ass. “What are you –“

“Yeah, no, we already had the part of the conversation,” Shinsou said, cocking his head. “Let’s talk about you instead. Before you quietly and politely get the fuck off my BFF’s property the –“

“I’m in the goddamn hallway, you –“

“No one knows Izuku’s address,” Shinsou said, his lithe, lanky form caving inward to loom closer to Katsuki. They locked eyes, and it gave Katsuki just the slightest tinge of a grin to see the Omega in Shinsou flinch at the eye contact. But Shinsou was a professional – a twitch was all Katsuki would get out of him, under the circumstances. “And certainly no fire-wielding Alphas with god complexes.”

“You talkin’ about your boyfriend or me?” Katsuki retorted, his razor thin smile anything but friendly.

“Why are you here,” Shinsou said, all levity dropped like a stone, his expression just as hard, merciless.

“That’s between me and M-“

Katsuki’s lips went lax, his eyelids heavy and body like lead.

That motherfucker! He’d tear that snarky sonofabitch a new asshole when –

“Such angry eyes,” Shinsou said in a voice he’d use to subdue a grumpy baby. He stepped around Katsuki’s statue frame and dropped the groceries at the foot of Midoriya’s door. With a sigh, he unraveled his ungodly long scarf and tucked a hunk of it in the pocket of his grey pea coat.

“Let’s try this again.” Shinsou sighed. “Turn around first.”

Katsuki did so, his scent rising up with acrid fury.

“Now now,” Shinsou said placating, patting Katsuki’s cheek with pursed lips and pale, ruthless eyes. “Put that stink away. Rancid garbage fire doesn’t suit you. Someone’s going to call the police. You know this is an O.B. building, right?” Shinsou shrugged when Katsuki inevitably couldn’t respond. “Anyway. Let’s chat. I’m sorry we had to do it this way. I know it’s illegal and all but, um.”

Shinsou smiled and slung and arm around Katsuki, pulling him in close for a too-rough noogie as he spoke with hollow fondness.

“You’re not exactly living up to your squeaky clean record these days, either, huh? So, tell me, Bakugou. How did you know Izuku was here?”

“Chisaki.”

Shinsou rolled his eyes.

“So you went to the shop. Chisaki didn’t tell you shit. He’d rather cut off a finger. So how did you get this address?”

“I called Amajiki.”

Shinsou released Katsuki from his hold and frowned at him, more like a pout as he scratched his jaw.

“And he just… gave it to you?”

“No.”

Katsuki was going to buzzcut Shinsou in his sleep. He didn’t know how, yet, but it would come the fuck to pass.

“Why did he give it to you?”

“I told him in was part of a job.”

Shinsou’s brows dropped low as he seemed to survey Katsuki anew.

“That’s. Not like you.”

Katsuki sucked in a sharp breath as he felt his body release like a marionette cut from strings.

“Yeah, well.” Eyes low, jaw stiff, Katsuki shrugged into his puffy jacket and zipped it in a sharp motion. Why did he feel admonished by Shinsou Hitoshi, of all people? Why did he feel guilty about being here all of a sudden, when he hadn’t up until – well, up until he realized he was doing everything wrong as an Alpha toward an Omega. “I know.”

Shinsou’s omniscient gaze lingered before it fell away. He dug through his jean pockets for some keys, plucking a tiny one from the glob of key chains and baubles as he spoke quietly, casually.

“This is gonna blow up in your face, Bakugou.”

Katsuki couldn’t tell if he meant the misuse of an agency database, his courting of Midoriya, or – or combination of his entire life at this point.

“You don’t know the first thing about what’s going on here,” Katsuki said, watching as Shinsou clicked the latch of the padlock. “He’s sleeping on the floor. Don’t open the door too fast.”

Shinsou looked over his shoulder, eyes narrowed.

“I’ve never seen you serious like this, so I’m gonna throw you a bone here. When it comes to Izuku, stop thinking with your dick. That’s the last thing he’s interested in.”

“I don’t need your advice,” Katsuki snapped, his knees trembling with the mere knowledge of that single lock undone. He couldn’t tear his attention from the doorknob. Midoriya was just on the other side. Sleeping peacefully. Couldn’t he just see him for a minute? Ten seconds? Just –

“I’m not opening this door with you around,” Shinsou said, grave and somehow a little sad in the eyes. Katsuki briefly flashed to their years in 1-A together. Fighting side by side. Bleeding for each other. Killing for each other. Watching one another cry and know there was nothing the other could do but Do Better Next Time.

“Yeah,” Katsuki said, dragging his palms over his face, slapping his cheeks with both hands once. He blinked hard, clearing his eyes as he aimed on last guarded look Shinsou’s way. “Take care of him.”

“Listen,” Shinsou said, mouth sober. “If Chisaki hears about this – or, hell, even Inasa –“

“Inasa?” Katsuki frowned. “Tornado Golden Retriever?”

And an Alpha.

“They’re friends,” Shinsou said, gesturing with a jerk of his head toward the door. “If Chisaki or Inasa hear about this, you’re –“

“Enough with the warnings!” Katsuki bit off, his voice rising with heat and force. “Are you the fuckin’ oracle now? You shittin’ tarot cards these days? Your balls turn into crystal all-seeing ones? Lemme sleep on the floor of my stupid, stubborn-ass mate’s hallway, alright? JEEZUS FUCK.”

Shinsou blinked, his nose wrinkled.

“Okay, well.  You both smell like jizz. That’s one thing my crystal balls can’t deduce, all things considering. So maybe you should go home and take a cold shower.”

“I –“ Katsuki growled and spun on his heal, bounding down the steps two by two. “DON’T TALK TO HIM ABOUT ME.”

Shinsou’s heinous laughter mocked him down and out of the building, straight into the cold.

Icy hands in pockets, face burning, Katsuki stepped back further and further. Into the snow, into the center of the empty night street, chin tilted until he caught the window of Midoriya’s apartment.

The light turned on.

Chapter 10

Summary:

“Don’t be nice. It messes me up if you’re nice.”

Notes:

Hello, I wrote this on a sick day today, so if it's wildly misspelled or whatever - I don't actually care. This is me we're talking about ahahaha. Anyway, please enjoy all of my favorite boys!

“I’ll neuter him.” Chisaki’s face was as grave as the cemetery Bakugou would inevitably end up in should the two of them meet. Sipping slow from his tumbler of whiskey on the rocks, Chisaki peered up with drunk-flushed cheeks and yellow eyes to match the dim bar lightning. “Disintegrate his balls right in front of him.”

Izuku clicked his shot glass with Hitoshi’s from across the table and knocked their drinks back with a chaser of beer and a hiss between clamped teeth. Scrunching his face up in distaste, Izuku eyed Chisaki with a wary eye.

“That’s – that’s really not necessary.”

“You know what’s not necessary?” Todoroki said around a long slurp of udon, his face aimed down toward his bowl. “Talking about balls while I’m eating.”

“Specifically,” Hitoshi added, waving a spicy chicken wing around with a flourish, “Bakugou Katsuki’s balls. Which, need I remind you, Shouto and I have seen our fill of in three traumatizing years.”

“Another shot!” Izuku called out sharply, hand raised to the waitress. His head swam as he plucked a wing from the center platter and shoved the majority right into his mouth.

“And let me tell you,” Hitoshi continued as he chewed. “That guy’s got no shame. I mean, yes, his body is comparable to Atlas or –“

“Who’s an Atlas?” Inasa boomed from beside Izuku, slamming down the now empty beer he’d been silently chugging in one full go. “Ground Zero? I’d say he’s more of a Hercules.”

“Hades,” Hitoshi said pointedly.

“You’ve never seen Bakugou naked,” Todoroki said, incredulous as he jammed accusatory chopsticks across beside him. He’d had the least to drink and was easily the furthest gone. “You’d have told me.”

“You’d have told all of us,” Chisaki muttered into his drink, swirling his ice. “Whether we liked it or not.”

“You’re the only one I haven’t seen naked, Chisaki,” Inasa said with a sigh, dropping his elbows to the table and plopping his chin atop his fists. They locked eyes from across the table. “It’s a matter of brotherhood, you know? A pack! An Alpha should be familiar with his group’s most basic nature.”

“You hear that?” Hitoshi said, elbowing Todoroki too hard with a lanky arm and pointy elbow. “He’s challenging your position. Let’s fight about that instead.”

“He can have it,” Todoroki said dully, signaling the arriving waitress for one of the shots she brought over. “I don’t want anything to do with Chisaki naked. Unlike some people at this table.”

“Leave me out of this one,” Izuku mumbled, choking back his offered shot without fanfare or tradition. He just needed it.

“We weren’t even dating, then!” Hitoshi squawked, gesturing wildly between the two of them. “You wouldn’t have anything to do with me! He was just there.”

“Please,” Chisaki said with a groan as he massaged his closed eyes. “Let’s not –“

The low growl resounding from Inasa’s barrel chest sent warning sparks through the two Omegas at the table. Izuku silently bared his teeth across the food and drink, his lips curling back on years of ingrained, beaten-in instinct.

“You!” Todoroki whipped a hand out, slapped it over Inasa’s mouth and the sharp canines pronouncing themselves altogether angry at the mere mention of Hitoshi and Chisaki’s long passed past. “Stop. Eat something and stop making a fool of yourself.”

A handful of seconds with Todoroki’s hand clamped over Inasa’s mouth, and then Inasa’s hackles calmed, his eyes big and apologetic over Todoroki’s fingers.

Hitoshi snickered oh-so-quietly.

“Who’s Alpha now?”

“I’m sorry, Chisaki,” Inasa murmured as Todoroki’s hand fell, metaphorical tail most definitely tucked between his legs. “I’m –“

“A fool,” Chisaki said flatly. “Look what you did to Izuku.”

“No one did anything to me,” Izuku snapped. He aimed calmer eyes and tone toward his gigantic moping friend. “Inasa, why don’t you find yourself a nice Omega to mate with? You deserved someone sweet and good and –“

“Not a vigilante,” Hitoshi added with a sober nod, diving in to the wing platter once more.

“Not yakuza affiliated,” Todoroki said, returning to his endless slurps.

“Not about to rip everyone’s asshole out their esophagus,” Chisaki said calmly, finishing his drink off with a final flourish. “But seriously. Someone give me that guy’s address. I’ll make it worth your while.”

“I should go there right now!” Inasa boomed, jerking from his seat to stand with enough exuberance the knock over Hitoshi’s half-full beer. “I’ll have a good talk with him, Alpha to Alpha! An Omega’s innocence should never be assaulted in such a –“

“His innocence or lack thereof isn’t the thing in question,” Chisaki said under his breath. “It’s classic hyper narcissism, inevitably present in a practically worshiped Pro Hero of his caliber and unfortunate presentation.”

Inasa remained standing, half of his winter jacket on one arm as he stared at Chisaki like he’d begun speaking in tongues.

“So, do I – I mean. I should go now, right? Find him.”

“No one is finding him!” Izuku hollered, frantically waving at Inasa. “Sit down, sit! Good, thank goodness. You guys – it’s not – shit.” Izuku heaved a sigh and raked his hands over his booze-numbed face. “I’m furious, okay? He took – he took advantage of the situation, of me, of his work place, too, I guess. But what the heck am I gonna do about it? He’s not going to just stop. I can tell.”

And it only further fuelled Izuku’s indignant flames that he could no longer place just how angry he actually was at that piece of knowledge.

“He thinks I’m something I’m definitely not,” Izuku said quietly. “He thinks I’m a lot of things that I’m not.”

“That’s because you’re more,” Chisaki said, signaling for further drinks. He nudged Izuku’s shoulder with his own – rare physical contact from a man who permanently wore gloves. “Fuck him. N-“

“Literally or,” Hitoshi chimed in.

“Next time,” Chisaki continued with increased force, rocketing a glare across the table. “Next time tell him you’ll file a restraining order. Or, like I said. Give me his address. They’ll never know it was you.”

“It was me who what?” Izuku yelped, looking on with dawning horror. “Chisaki, don’t tell me. Just. Don’t continue with that line of thought.”

“Yeah,” Hitoshi said, following by a wide yawning as he flung his arm over Todoroki’s shoulders and slumped against him. “Don’t make me file a report on your ass.”

“Why don’t you just call him?”  Todoroki looked around as the table fell silent and still. He shrugged, his tone even as his eyes glazed over with alcohol. “What? Calling is good. You don’t have to look at anyone in the face. And he can’t set anything on fire. Or. Not anything near you, anyway.”

Izuku worried his bottom lip with his teeth.

“It’s been over a week and he hasn’t appeared, though. Maybe he has given up?”

“He’s on a mission,” Hitoshi said, mouth full. “They inquired into Endeavor’s agency, but we’re off next week on heat leave, so.”

“I shouldn’t call him if he’s on a mission,” Izuku said quickly. “I’ll just wait and –“

“Here, it’s ringing,” Hitoshi said with a smirk, holding out his cellphone.

“What – it’s what? I –“ Izuku fumbled with the phone, tossing it around before he clamped it to the side of his head with both hands like it would slip away. His heart thudded louder with each ring.

“SOMEONE BETTER BE FUCKIN’ DEAD, YOU OVERGROWN TROLL DOLL –“ Izuku winced and held the phone far from his ear, struggling to stand and scoot away from the table and toward the entrance, “- TWO IN THE MORNING AND UNLIKE YOUR UGLY ASS WHO NO AMOUNT OF BEAUTY SLEEP WOULD DARE TOUCH –“

“Zero?”

All sound on the other end went dead.

“H-hello?” Izuku said, needlessly bowing way too many times to the owner at the front of the shop before he tripped out into the thick snow and deep cold. “Bakugou? Are you-”

“Why are you on Shinsou's – no, you’re friends, right,” Bakugou said, his words stumbling as much as Izuku. “I – hello? Hi. Do you – are you okay? Is everything okay? Do you need –“

“I don’t, I’m fine,” Izuku answered quickly, standing in a snow drift with one arm wrapped around his waist. The night was frozen in stillness and silence as he looked around, scrambling to sort out everything he’d wanted to say. “Hitoshi told me what you did.”

“What I did? You were there.”

“So were you,” Izuku said, his tone hardening. He sniffled, his nose already beginning to run. He hated this cold and grey, colorless world. “And you shouldn’t have been.”

“Yeah, well –“

“None of that nonsense.” Izuku paced the front windows of the shop, making the mistake of glancing through the glass to see the entire table of his friends staring at him like a panda at the zoo. “You don’t get to brush this under the rug just because of who you are, Mr Zero. What you did – it violates everything you could have –“

“So I was fuckin’ wrong, alright?” Bakugou’s voice hurled through the phone. “You need me to say it or some shit? Yeah, it was fucked up, but at the time I didn’t feel like I had a choice. I didn’t –“

“There’s always a choice,” Izuku said. His voice dropped, hushed as he tucked his chin against his chest and stared at his bulky winter boots. “I shared things with you. Things I wouldn’t normally have.”

“Well, maybe you needed to.”

Izuku barked a laugh and looked to the sky as he began to pace anew, watching the plumes of his breath escape to the stars.

“You’re full of excuses, Mr Zero. I shouldn’t have expected anything less.”

“And aren’t you, too?” Bakugou snapped back. “Aren’t you full of your own excuses and bullshit and safe little lies? You don’t see me callin’ your gorgeous ass out on every justification you shove in my face.”

Izuku ground down on his back teeth, his ribs aching beneath his skin.

Bakugou wasn’t lying. He rarely seemed to.

Izuku had slipped his secrets beneath the thin gap of the door that night, expecting the worst to come of it. And what had Bakugou done?

Make him laugh.

“You –“ Izuku burped with his mouth shut, a wave of nausea and beer and shots washing over him. “Ugh. That doesn’t. You still don’t have the right to –“

“Are you drunk?”

“I can get drunk!” Izuku said, way too loudly even for his own ears. “I’m an adult.”

“You’re tellin’ me,” Bakugou said softly. “Hey.”

Izuku swallowed hard, feeling sick.

“What,” he managed.

“I really am sorry, okay? I don’t do this shit. Ever.”

“Apologizing or stalking?”

“Both! Jeezus, you’re a hard ass, aren’tcha? Fuckin’ merciless.”

Izuku’s lips couldn’t help but twitch.

Instantly, he frowned.

“Don’t,” he said, stern now as he glanced over his shoulder, noted his friends still watching. He turned away. “Don’t apologize like that.”

“Haaah? The hell?”

“Don’t be nice,” Izuku said softly, already pulling the phone from his ear and up to his face to squint out the hanging up button. “It messes me up if you’re nice.”

“Midoriya? Midoriya? IZUKU WAI-“

Burping again, this time louder with a wince, Izuku groaned to himself and stumbled back inside and to his table. He dropped down to the floor seat with a thud and held the phone across the table, wagging it around until Hitoshi curiously nipped it from his fingers.

“So?” Chisaki said.

“Has your innocence been preserved for a future mate?” Inasa said around a huge mouthful of Todoroki’s leftover noodles.

“Intact,” Izuku said, unable to rein in his smile at Inasa’s protective instincts, as misguided as they could be. “Innocence utterly intact.”

“His innocence has nothing to do with where his dick has been or is going,” Chisaki said pointedly. He stared distastefully at the disappearing platter of spicy Korean wings before he sighed and slipped off his gloves to grab one. “Stop acting like his father.”

“It’s okay,” Izuku said, face hot from the booze as he lolled his head against his palm, elbow propped on the table. He grinned across the way at Inasa. “I handled it. Thanks anyway.”

“I mean, if we’re talking innocence here,” Hitoshi said, smirking as he skimmed a look toward Todoroki and noticed him nodding off while sitting up. “I can’t speak for these days, but in UA, Bakugou was pretty damn vocal about having zero to do with nasty, needy Omegas.”

Izuku frowned, his own eyelids heavy but his interest perked despite himself.

“What d’you mean?”

“I guess idle conversation is the last thing you two have been having between being at each other’s throats,” Hitoshi said, lazy eyebrows raised as he took a small sip of beer. “That guy went on suppressants practically the day of his initial presentation. Never dated or wanted to. Thought it was gross or troublesome or whatever.”

Izuku narrowed his eyes, listening hard. He supposed Bakugou did mention something about not being particularly happy with this situation. It was difficult to keep track of it all when most of the time he’d been trying to figure a way to weasel the stranger out of his store.

“Still doesn’t.” Everyone looked at Todoroki, silent. Todoroki blinked tired, blurred eyes and stifled a yawn. “He’s still like that. Midoriya is – he must be special to Bakugou. Logical assumption at this point.”

Something warm and strange and unwelcome nestled in Izuku’s stomach, his face flushing anew.

“You know that’s not true,” Izuku found himself saying, the words slithering up his throat from some deep, dark part of his gut. “It’s never like that. It’s how I smell. You know that. Everyone here does.”

“I’m fine!” Inasa said, his hand rocketing up as if still in class. “I don’t mind, Midoriya! Your scent is safe with this Alpha!”

Izuku smiled into a lukewarm glass of water with the ice long melted.

“I know. Thanks.”

Something about pack mentality, or brotherhood, or whatever bond Inasa felt so vehemently with the four of them. Or perhaps it was simply that Izuku’s aroma was a far mismatch from Inasa’s tastes, and so Inasa smelled him as he was, but felt nothing for it.

“What does Chisaki smell like?” Izuku said, shoulders starting to shake with a bubbled up giggle at the mere thought.

“Cigarettes,” Todoroki and Hitoshi answered in tandem.

Chisaki rolled his bright cat eyes, busy chewing on a chicken wing, bright red sauce sticky on his fingertips. He kept his pinky finger slightly risen back from his hold on the food. His free hand flipped the bird.

“The sky,” Inasa said, leaning across the table, his great height allowing him nearer to Chisaki’s face than was safe. Chisaki chewed, swallowed, and took another bite of food in silence, his eyebrows thin and straight and demeanor unimpressed. “Mountaintops. When someone comes in from a snow storm and they smell like the cold, even though cold shouldn’t have a scent. I half expect you to have wings, Chisaki Kai.”

Chisaki directly met Inasa’s gaze. Head subtly cocked, he dropped the messy bones he held with a clank to the plate below, reached out, and placed his saucy hand on Inasa’s face, pushing him back with just enough force to send him away.

“Gross,” Chisaki said. He got up. “I’m washing my hands.”

Inasa grinned wildly, eyes bright as Todoroki sighed and fumbled a napkin over Inasa’s face.

“Invigorating!”

The table busted into eruptive laughter, and didn’t subside until Chisaki returned and threatened an unholy list of injuries that had them all splitting the bill and layering up in their winter gear.

“Who’s splitting the ride?” Chisaki said, already pulling out his phone to order a car.

“Me,” Inasa said, sliding up behind Chisaki as they filed outside, his figuring towering over Chisaki’s slim frame.

“Aside from you.”

“I’m close,” Izuku said as he fitted a thick hat over his head. Mom had knitted it a little too big and it fell over his eyes too many times, but it was warm and soft and reminded him of home all the same. “I’ll walk.”

“We’ll walk you,” Todoroki said, arm in arm with Shinsou.

Izuku quirked a brow, a grin pulling at his chapped lips.

“I’m ten minutes away, guys. I don’t need a hero to walk me home. Let alone two of them.”

“How about two friends?” Hitoshi said with hooded, sleepy eyes. Sidling up and tucking his free arm in the circle of Izuku’s, he nodded at Chisaki and Inasa – the latter who kept his face busy in his phone. “Sleep tight, you two. Don’t let the big Alpha bite.”

Inasa’s face flamed up to the ears.

“Why I – I would never just – just –“

“I’d break his teeth,” Chisaki said with a sigh, shoving the phone in this pocket. He looked up, tilting his head far back since Inasa still loomed protectively behind him. “Car’s on its way. I’m sitting in the front. You practically take up two seats.”

“Goodnight guys,” Izuku said with a silly smile, letting his weight rest against Hitoshi, allowing his head to swim and slosh. “I love you.”

“Get him in a bed,” Chisaki, his attention lingering on Izuku’s stupid expression. A quick flash of an underutilized smile before he slipped a white face mask over his nose and mouth, hooked the elastic expertly over his ears. “Keep your guard up a little better, kid. Otherwise I really will find that address.”

Everyone made their sloppy goodbyes and headed in their separate directions. The crunch of crusted over snow beneath three pairs of boots echoed down the still side street.

“You like him,” Hitoshi said simply.

“What!” Izuku squawked.

“Hitoshi,” Todoroki snapped. “Leave him be.”

“I’m just saying,” Hitoshi sing-songed. His voice dropped instantly, sober. “I can’t see I see you two living happily ever after –“

“That’s handy,” Izuku said dryly, “because I literally have zero plans of that in the history of ever.”

“But I don’t know. I’ve been wrong before.”

“Marking the calendar of this admittance,” Todoroki mumbled.

“If you can remember this in the morning, then go ahead.”

“I don’t like him,” Izuku said, not pouting at all.

“You’re curious about him, though. When was the last time you were curious about anyone? I couldn’t begin to tell you. Nothing I ever noticed.”

Izuku couldn’t argue. Hitoshi did notice a lot more than anyone around him would like to admit.

“He’s not some piece of shit Alpha with a bad disposition and zero self control,” Hitoshi eventually added into the silence.

Both Todoroki and Izuku looked at him, narrow-eyed.

Hitsohi sighed.

“Okay. I mean – Shouto can back me up here. Bakugou isn’t a bad person. Not like the scum you fucked with before. This guy idolizes All Might like a father. He never broke curfew, never snuck out of the dorms, never got anything less than top marks. He talks and spits like a delinquent but that’s because it’s the only thing he lets himself get away with.”

“He’s not wrong,” Todoroki said. “We’ve fought alongside him. Lived with him. He’d turn off every light in the dorm before he went to bed and everyone was terrified to turn them back on lest they incur his wrath. People tiptoed to the bathrooms in the middle of the night.”

“Apparently he likes his beauty sleep,” Izuku muttered.

“What?”

“Nevermind. Why are you telling me? Suddenly you want us to date? Do you realize how badly that would end? The guy is a loose cannon.”

“And you’re a fortress,” Hitoshi said pointedly. “Maybe it’s time to come out of the high tower, Izuku.”

“And maybe it’s time you drop me off at my door,” Izuku said tiredly, pulling out the key to the entrance of his building.

Todoroki and Hitoshi surveyed him with equally concerned, pitying looks. Izuku hated that.

“What?” Izuku snapped. “He fucked up, guys. Royally. Not that he hadn’t before. A stranger basically took advantage of me when I was vulnerable. He could have busted that door down whenever he pleased.”

“But he didn’t,” Hitoshi said, Todoroki nodding beside him in solidarity. “I saw him when I came around. Yeah, I was pissed, too, but I was also as curious as you are, I guess. I’ve never seen him so, well, placid about getting a talking-to. There was something weird as hell about it.”

Izuku eyed them both, pointing the key at them.

“Just whose side are you two on?”

“Yours,” Hitoshi and Todoroki said together. Earnest eyes, faces. Izuku’s people, his pack.

“Yeah, alright,” Izuku mumbled, turning to unlock his door and step inside. He stood there, gloved hand on the handle, considering his friends. One of them knew him back to front. Had seen him at his worse. Bruised, bloodied, full of rage. Drunk. Making poor decisions. Dating straight up villains out of some misplaced need for belonging, acceptance, comfort. Hurting himself because he felt he deserved it.

When Hitoshi talked, Izuku couldn’t help but listen.

Izuku breathed a soft sigh through his nose. His voice was serene, tired.

“So what do you suggest I do, then?”

“Give it time,” Hitoshi said. “Hell, it took me five years to convince this one to go out for coffee with me.”

“I actually asked you out for coffee,” Todoroki said.

“Uh, yeah, after five years!”

“I don’t even drink coffee.”

“Not every relationship can be perfect.”

Lips curved in affection, Izuku said goodnight and shut the door. Through the glass, he could still hear the two f them bickering and laughing as they wandered away.

Each stair to the third floor felt like increasing lead to his feet. Head bowed with exhaustion and ale, Izuku finally arrived home. He kicked off his shoes while greeting a yeowling Natsume, murmuring comforts and conversation as he dropped his winter layers dead on the floor. Natsume rolled in them, shedding gold and ginger everywhere.

Fully clothed, Izuku dumped himself face first onto the rumpled bedspread and inhaled deep, smelling absolutely nothing.

What did Bakugou smell like? Up until now – up until a week ago, when Izuku was mindlessly jacking off against his own door, he’d never put real thought into it. Why should he have? Bakugou had just been some unhinged, horny Alpha looking for a good time.

Now?

Izuku wasn’t so sure of any single aspect of his assessment on the guy’s character. Unhinged? Bakugou was clearly a well-spoken, intelligent person when he wasn’t screaming bloody murder and slurring like a hooligan. Horny? Sure, but he’d witness Bakugou hold himself better than any Alpha interested in his body.

No, he hadn’t broken down the door.

Looking for a good time?

Hell, they were past a good time. Bakugou wasn’t just torturing himself with Izuku’s presence, but was actively throwing himself in these situations, claiming – claiming what? Mates, bonds, meant to be?

“Fuck,” Izuku said into the blankets.

His lungs startled with an oof when Natsume’s gargantuan body lofted atop his back, kneading through his flannel with full, exuberant nails. Natume was the type to show his love through bullying – bumping his head too heart against Izuku’s. Digging nails into him with extra loving kneads. Biting his ankles wand calves with excitement.

Izuku supposed he knew someone else like that, now.

Give it time.

Izuku rolled over and smushed Natume’s grumpy face in his palms.

“I don’t think there’s another choice.”

Chapter 11

Summary:

“Ain’t nothin’ to do with us. We fight the living, not hunt the dead.”
“Sometimes you have to do both to be the kind of hero that can sleep at night.”

Notes:

I understand that in my fog of sickness, my last chapter was a hot ass mess. I'll fix it. Eventually. In the mean time, enjoy some more mess!

“Cops are here.”

Katsuki didn’t look up from the paperwork on his screen. Kirishima’s excitable scent vibrated the air like tangerine sunshine.

“Like I care. I don’t fuck with cops. They’re ten rungs down the ladder from us, dumbass.”

“Detectives, then,” Kirishima corrected with a sigh. He dropped his chin on Katsuki’s shoulder. “You don’t wanna see Momo and Ojiro? It’s been a couple of years since they’ve stopped by.”

Katsuki’s ears pricked, his nostrils flaring as he caught a very distant, familiar pair of scents. Frowning, clicked his laptop closed and shoved back from his chair hard enough to send Kirishima toppling away.

“Them – why? Some kinda serial killer?”

“The Omega Murders,” Kirishima said, his mouth thinning uncharacteristically at the mere mention. Sometimes Katsuki thought he was too sensitive for this job. “I guess there was another. Let’s go.”

“Fine, fine.” Katsuki thrust his hands in the pockets of his black khakis and slunk along in Kirishima’s wake. “Ain’t nothin’ to do with us. We fight the living, not hunt the dead.”

“Sometimes you have to do both to be the kind of hero that can sleep at night.”

Sulking, Katsuki followed Kirishima out of the office and down the hall.  When had his friends dared jump ahead of him? Or had he been falling behind all this time? The idea had never occurred to him.

Rapping chapped, bruising knuckles on the conference room door and holding his ear to the wood, Kirishima waited until he heard an affirmative and entered.

“Look who I found,” Kirishima sing-songed in the least professional manner as he shimmied into the room with his hands dramatically splayed to present Katsuki’s entrance.

“I’m not in the mood to break your face today, but I will if I have too.”

Katsuki strolled into the room and gave the pair of Beta detectives a faint wave and something less than as scowl.

Momo remained a towering beacon of poise and Japanese beauty, her dark hair cropped short and sharp since he’d last seen her, with makeup subdued and subtle enough not to enhance her looks any more than her natural features managed. Her navy pantsuit went a long way to concealing those busty assets which she’d accidentally flashed way too many times in battle.

Ojiro was as big and beefy as a nightclub bouncer, and a hundred times smarter than any meathead image he might convey to people who didn’t know better. His familiar, easy smile emerged as Katsuki gave him a sober nod.

“It’s been a while,” Katsuki said by way of greeting as he slumped into a wheeled desk chair beside Amajiki. Kirishima splayed in the one on the far end of him, next to Mirio. “Who needs me involved in this? I got police reports to file.”

“Bakugou.” Mirio’s tone was rare enough to bank Katsuki’s irritation. “Anyone seen Camie?”

“Here she is,” Camie said as she glided in without a knock, her hair damp and her skin scenting of blood despite the shower from which she’d evidently returned. Her glittering lavender sweatsuit was her after-shift comfort habit. “Hey, Detectives. What’s up? My day hasn’t been murdery enough by far.”

Katsuki rolled his eyes as Camie took the seat closest to him. When she propped her fuzzy-socked feet atop his lap, he shoved them off, and earned nothing but a giggle.

“Now that we’re all here,” Momo smoothly segued, her voice silky and feminine, “let us indeed talk of death.”

Ojiro dropped a thick file atop the table with a thud. As Momo spoke, he opened the manila folders and stretched a line of graphic photographs, reports, and scribbled notes against the length of the table.

“Five attacks in twice as many weeks, three of them ending in death. The fifth and most recent, a single Omega mother of three and recent escapee of an abusive relationship, was pronounced dead on the scene. Last seen walking home from her second job in the early hours of morning.”

Katsuki didn’t glance at the photos. He didn’t connect to shit like faces, like lives left behind. A hero could drown in bodies like that.

“From those five attacks, three of those victims reported witnessing their attacker.” Momo’s lips twisted while Ojiro tossed forth three substantially varied artist renderings. “How much of this is accurate, I couldn’t say. All three swore by their accounts, and although I have no reason to disbelieve what they’ve seen –“

“It means this isn’t the work of one person.” Ojiro frowned at the disjointed map of death between them. “Perhaps three men, perhaps more. Possible gang activity.”

“Why would a gang go after five seemingly innocent people?” Mirio asked, mimicking Ojiro’s expression, his brow wrinkled as he leaned in close to the photos of viscera and gore. “These people are civilians. They left behind children, families, friends. None of them even have a record.”

Mirio got invested. Mirio was a drowner. Lucky he’d already learned how to hold his breath for so long.

“If anything,” Ojiro added, standing to compile the forms of personal information, “all five have been victims of violence in the past. Regular abuse, restraining orders filed on loved ones, robbery, car-jacking.”

“So?” Camie popped a stick of gum in her mouth that reeked of watermelon. “They’re all weak Omegas. You can’t walk two steps without bumping into half a dozen. What Omega hasn’t been victimized at some point?”

“How can you badmouth your own kind like that?” Kirishima said, standing tall from his seat so he could meet Camie’s unconcerned expression over the heads of Mirio, Amajiki, and Bakugou.

“How can you be that blind to what the world is like outside of our hero schools and agencies?” Camie said with a cocked head and pursed lips, her eyes large and direct, unflinching. “You don’t remember your life before you surrounded yourself with unnaturally powerful Omegas? We’re basically the one percent, Eijirou. The rest of them are weak and meek - borderline useless, sometimes. You know that, right?”

Midoriya’s sweet, stumbling voice snuck into Katsuki’s concentration.

Don’t be nice. It messes me up if you’re nice.

What had Midoriya’s life been like up until now if Katsuki was suddenly his fucking concept of nice?

A week had passed since then – two weeks since the night of Midoriya’s disastrous heat – and Katsuki had neither heard from Midoriya, nor had he made a point of wandering his way back to Parchment. Something about that night – and even the brief phone call – had disabled Katsuki’s balance. Left him unsure if his next step would lead him to new ground or over a cliffside.

“-gou? Bakugou?”

Katsuki blinked at Amijiki’s sincere concern so close to his side. He bristled and recoiled, pushing his foot off the ugly grey carpet to slide back enough for safe distance.

“What?”

“I asked,” Mirio frowned from around Amiki’s shoulder. “What do you think of this? You haven’t said a word. I know you’re not particularly interested in the plight of the Omegas, but –“

“I’m plenty interested,” Katsuki snapped, erratically scooting back to the table to finally face off with the photos, the data. He paused, staring between the three artist renditions.

He stood, massaging his already tired eyes between his fingers as he spoke.

“I think these assholes had plenty opportunity to kill every victim and remain unseen. They’d attacked under the cover of night and appear to be fast, strong, and skilled. Majority left alive and minority left for dead? Ain’t no coincidence. Whoever these people are, they want their faces seen. Why? Fuck if I know.”

Katsuki considered the quiet crowd and shrugged.

“That’s what I got. So, yeah. I’m gonna go take a dump.”

 

Katsuki swallowed a shriek when he left the bathroom and Amajiki was standing directly in the doorway like a pale fucking ghost.

“Fuck, man! Let a guy shit in peace.” Katsuki gritted his teeth as he brushed past his boss. The hand that wrapped firmly around his bicep had him reeling, turning. “What? What the –“

“The man you called me about a while ago,” Amajiki spoke over him, his voice forever soft, but now firm with intent. His dark, honest eyes bore into Katsuki’s. There was something about an Omega’s plaintive gaze. Alphas might have been born to lead, but this wasn’t the first time Katsuki had found himself wondering at the compelling, almost persuasive weight an Omega held over their opposite. “Why did you ask about him? The sheer number of juvenile priors he has –“

“HAAH?” Katsuki rent his arm from Amajiki’s grasp and took a step forward, teeth bared. “He’s nothing. I made a mistake. What’s with you? Why the fuck you so intense about some –“

“Do you think he’s related to the murders?”

Katsuki gawked, his shoulders gone lax as he took a weak step back.

“I – hah? No! You’re so far off I –“ Katsuki laughed, dragged a hand through his hair as he turned a circle in the hallway. “I’m – that guy wouldn’t hurt –“

“His record details otherwise.” Amajiki looked sad – fuck knew why – as he peered at Katsuki. “He’s not wanted for any outstanding warrants, and has remained clean for some six years sans filing a restraining order a then unknown, but now  currently known villain –“

“Stop – stop!” Katsuki’s fist drove through the wall like a bullet train, his roar unheeded as he ripped his hand from the splintering wood and met Amajiki’s expression of mute horror. “Don’t talk about him like you know him. Don’t you dare –“

The wind screamed from Katsuki’s lungs as he dropped to the floor, his ribs clattering with the landing as the whirlwind of Mirio’s inhuman, Alpha snarls thundered through the corridor. Katsuki’s cheek cracked against the ground, his arm hollowing as his bent elbow pressed against his back.

Boiling under the skin, Katsuki struggled against the hold, his teeth snapping, his canines drawing blood on his own bottom lip. The very concept that anyone would come for Midoriya was maddening. Fury was a fire that incinerated any other thought.

Sound muted out and muffled like a blow to the head, like blood flooding his ears, Katsuki screamed against the weight pinning him down. Another Alpha, an Alpha that smelled of rot and sewage, keeping Katsuki’s face to the floor like a weakling, like –

A sharp, searing, branding burn at the nape of Katsuki’s neck, at his hairline. Teeth, sinking in, clamping down and holding.

A flood of relief swamped Katsuki’s limbs, tranquilizing, cooling the flames, loosening his lungs, his quick, shallow breaths. Instant respite, solace from the rage. Silence inside.

Time swayed and swooped over him like something flying far and away. Seconds or minutes could have passed until Mirio released the dominating scruff bite at his hairline.

With Katsuki’s arm suddenly released and the world upended as Mirio rolled him and took his hand to yank him to his feet. Wavering, faint, Katsuki tilted, his brow dropping to Mirio’s thick shoulder.

“What…” Katsuki swallowed, taste blood.

“Bakugou.” Mirio’s tone was gentler than how he’d speak to the dumb babies he met in strollers on the street. “Are you in rut?”

Katsuki straightened, willing his knees to hold him up as he boggled. He could barely think straight. Where was Amajiki? How long had he been scruffed?

“Hah? No. Obviously, I am fucking not. I’m just -”

“Take the day off,” Mirio said, his arms folded across his barrel chest, his golden physique filling the hallway like some minor god. His lips curved, no anger in his stupid button eyes. “Get your head on straight. In fact, it’s Friday. Take Saturday off, too. Have a three day weekend.”

“Like fuck I’m gonna –“

“I want to see you back here on Monday,” Mirio said, his smile widening to the freaky thing he did when he used kindness to kill. “Monday. And when I do, I want you clear-minded and ready to explain what’s going on here. If you can’t give me one, then we’ll talk. Either way, go take care of yourself, okay?”

Katsuki’s face screwed up, ugly and disgusted.

“Whatever. Fine.”

“Come on now.” Mirio reached out, clapped his big hand on Katsuki’s shoulder with enough force to sway him. His expression was bright and cheerful now as he pulled Katsuki in for a bear hug that went wholly unreturned on Katsuki’s end. “I know it’s hard having eyes on you at all times. You’ve never given the agency any real problems. I know how hard you work for this. So give yourself a break and figure out what you need to figure out.”

“Yeah, yeah. Jeezus, get a fucking talk show already.” Katsuki pulled away, ruffling his hair for lack of anything better to do with his hands as he turned and stalked toward the office for his coat. “Monday.”

“Monday!”

 

Wandering around midday on a Friday with no job or purpose to call his own was fucked up.

With a face like looming death, Katsuki plowed through the crowds, intent on the direction of his home with no idea what he’d do when he got there. When was the last time he didn’t work a Friday? A hospital would no doubt be involved. If he counted every Friday of his years in UA, and never missing a single day of middle school – the last time he’d had a free Friday would have been about thirteen years ago.

Biting back a growl at his own situation, Katsuki powered along, slowing only when the bottom of his boot slid and slicked across an icy patch. Fuck this weather. The New Year couldn’t come soon enough.  Maybe he’d glean some luck from it.

Just what the hell did he have to do to get Midoriya to look at him like he wasn’t the big bad wolf?

Not specific enough. Midoriya had briefly, and oh-so-rarely in their interactions, looked at him like he’d been hungry for a millennium. What Katsuki most desired was to pause those moments and work them open slowly, purposefully, with the intention of widening those instances until a full interaction came to fruition.

Shit.

A bystander bumped Katsuki’s shoulder and he snarled at their vile Alpha scent.

Alphas. Again and again, it came back to them. To him. Just what did Todoroki and Inasa have that Katsuki didn’t? Both heroes and Alphas? Who did they have to kill into order to get into Midoriya’s good graces?

Screeching to a halt in the icy street, Katsuki fumbled is phone from his parka pocket with numbed fingers. Scrolling through his contacts without letting himself turn back, he hit the call button and waiting, dead center amongst the weaving crowds.

“Bakugou?” Todoroki’s voice was always deeper than Katsuki remember. Less sulky teenager and more adult hero. “What have you done?”

“ME?” Katsuki screeched as he restarted the rush to his home. “Fuck you! I did nothing!”

“Not from what I heard.”

“Snark me from the start and this conversation is over before it begins, princess.”

A sigh.

“Can I help you with something? I’m in the middle –“

“I don’t care if you’re shaving your fucking pubes right now. I –“

“That was one time.”

“I want to talk to you. In person. About a thing.”

“Does this thing happen to dislike you specifically and –“

“And dresses like an eighty year old college professor meets lumberjack? Obviously. Don’t make me say this shit.”

“What do you want to talk to me about? It’s not business. Izuku's been more closemouthed about your mess than you’d think.”

“I need – ugh.” Katsuki felt nauseous, his grip on the phone threatening to crack the screen. “Just let me come over already.”

The pause was too long for Katsuki’s liking. His chest clamped down on his heart.

A sigh from the other end.

“Alright. Don’t expect much from me.”

“As if I would. Text me your address.”

“I find myself filled with instant regret.”

Katsuki pocketed his phone with a sickly sense of mingled dread and anxiety, a nauseous heave in his stomach he only got when he knew he’d have to ask someone for help. Rubbing the back of his sore neck and feeling the indents there, Katsuki hissed a curse and decided on a pit stop home to change into a turtleneck. The weather called for it, anyway.

When Todoroki opened the door to him in the exact same turtleneck, Katsuki instantly wished he had the ability to eviscerate himself on the spot.

Todoroki stood in the doorway, taller and slimmer than Katsuki’s own bulk, the doorknob loosely gripped as he surveyed Katsuki head to toe.

“Well this is –“

“What the fuck is wrong with you?” Katsuki snapped as he shoved his way inside and crouched to work at his boots. “Don’t say it out loud.”

“Sorry.” Todoroki’s mild tone still managed to sound wholly unapologetic. His white socked feet padded across the floor toward another room. “Do you want coffee, tea?”

Katsuki scented the air, his nose wrinkled as mingled scents of Todoroki and Shinsou clung to the furniture of the immaculate apartment. The walls were painted in a mellow, warm-toned grey with dashes of muted teals and deep purple peppering the area rugs, accessories, art. The place felt like a weird ass spa. Katsuki half expected lit candles everywhere.

How many times had Midoriya hung out here? Had slept over, splayed out on that deep-cushioned couch of lush leather plum. What did he look like in just his boxers – those thick thighs always hidden in overly baggy corduroys or khakis, then other times straining against taut, worn out denim.

“Bakugou.”

Katsuki blinked out of the daze, top lip curling on instinct of another Alpha invading his thoughts, his space.  He turned, shoulders squared, and frowned when he found a mug of green tea offered out. Meeting Todoroki’s quieted stare, Katsuki took the cup, held it close in both hot palms.

Todoroki gestured toward the living space, taking his spot at the end of the couch, folding his legs in a meditative pose. Katsuki sat across from him, stiff and uncomfortable with everything going on here. He brought the tea to his lips, gaze hard on Todoroki’s unflinching one.

Todoroki inclined his chin, mouth sober in thought.

“What’s wrong with you?” No recrimination in the tone, just socially inept at saying the right thing at the right time. “The last time you asked me for help with anything, you wanted me to construct a workable keg out of ice.”

Katsuki scoffed into his mug.

“It was Denki’s birthday. What the fuck else should I have done?”

“You’re right. My mistake.”

They sat in a silence that made Katsuki want to run rampant and tear the room to shreds. Todoroki’s stare had always been like standing on the other side of a microscope.

“What?” Katsuki snapped. “You ain’t gonna say nothin’?”

Todoroki shifted a shoulder, dismissive, as he glanced at Katsuki’s bitten down nails.

“You called me.”

Fuck. He was right.

Katsuki licked his lips, bit down hard on the inside of his cheek before he found Todoroki’s gaze once more.

“What d’you and Inasa have that I don’t?”

Todoroki’s eyes widened before his expression relaxed, his head cocked.

“What do you –“

“Alphas!” Katsuki flailed his free hand, a splash of searing tea soaking through his jeans. “You two fleabags are both Alphas. And heroes! Yet that guy calls you his best friends? What a crock of shit. What did you do? He owe you for something – that why he sticks by you? You save his life or some shit?”

Todoroki’s face screwed up in confusion before he huffed a laugh and shook his head in disbelief.

“Saved him? No. Neither of us have. In fact, Inasa and I have been friends with Izuku for the shortest length of time.” Todoroki frowned, fingers to his lips as he thought. “I started with Hitoshi at twenty –“

“Not for lack of trying on his side.”

“Yes, well, anyway. That was five years ago. Previous to that, Shinsou would invite me to hang out with them about two years prior, just out of graduation. Izuku –“ A sour twist crossed Todoroki’s normally serene features, his eyes flicking aside. The look passed, the conversation veering. “We got along. He was respectful, even kind, if not distant. Like how he would treat a customer, even though he wasn’t yet working in his shop at the time. Inasa simply started tagging along a couple of years later.”

“So, what changed?” Katsuki set his tea on the fogged glass table and leaned in, intent.

“I couldn’t tell you specifically. Trust? The passage of time? My bond with Hitoshi making me less of an inherent threat?”

Katsuki clicked his tongue in distaste.

“That don’t help me for shit. What about Inasa?”

Todoroki’s brow quirked.

“Inasa is harmless. If anything, Izuku attached to him quicker than he ever did me.”

“So why the fuck’m’I talkin’ to you about this,” Katsuki muttered under his breath.

“Because you stink of desperation and hormones,” Shinsou’s sleepy, slurred voice came from behind.

Katsuki’s face was already set in ominous stone when he glanced over his shoulder. Shinsou’s hair wasn’t styled up, instead scraped in a wildly thick bun at the base of his neck. His smarmy grin a mile wide, his eyes sunken deep in shadow, dressed in a familiar 1-A dorm staple of Pusheen pajama pants of days long gone, he was a sight that made Katsuki wish he were blind.

“You’re still alive?”

“I manage.” Shinsou slinked into the room and flopped back to the couch, wedged between his mate and his schoolmate. He looked between both of them, beaming. “Ah, this is nice. Like old times. Except I’m thriving and Bakugou is miserable. What a delight.”

Katsuki glowered at Shinsou’s pale profile.

“I’m not miserable. I’m –“

“Pining. Desperate.” Shinsou’s smile grew wider. He patted Bakugou’s cheek and didn’t flinch when Bakugou snapped at it, canines bared. “Alright alright, relax, Sparky. Let me guess – our dear Shouto has been less than helpful in your plight?”

“I shouldn’t have expected anything more.”

“Hey,” Todoroki said, with such a lack of heat it was basically an admittance of his guilt.

“That’s because you’re asking a guy who notices nothing about nobody.” Shinsou gripped Todoroki’s thigh and squeezed, aiming a fond look his way. “That’s okay. I see enough for the both of us. And let me tell you something,  Mister Number One Hero –“

“This oughta be enlightening.”

“It’s not about what Alphas are doing, it’s about what they’re not doing which earns Izuku’s trust.”

Katsuki’s face dropped.

“Great. Well, this conversation has been helpful. I’ll see my fucking self ou-“

“I’m saying,” Shinsou leaned in, a hand on Katsuki’s knee, lavender eyes sharpening. “Shouto and Inasa never did a single special thing between them.”

“Oh, thanks.”

“Quiet, you. Bakugou, Izuku lives in a state of constant terror of aggressive Alphas. He’s been through some shit – and, honestly, he’s put himself in a lot of those situations out of some confused desire to be near or around a man who will protect him or guide him in a way he never was guided or saved back before we’d ever met. It’s just that a lot of Alphas with those leadership qualities also end up to be douchebag lords.”

Katsuki rolled his eyes, but couldn’t argue the fact.

“On top of that issue he has with his scent – well, the fact that Inasa and Shouto never hit on him, expected anything from him, or hell, touched him. That’s what earned his trust over time.”

“So I can’t touch him?” Katsuki’s own voice sounded tight and whiny, even in his own ears. “How can I-“

“That’s not my issue to deal with.” Shinsou offered a squeeze of Katsuki’s knee and released. He looked up, held Katsuki’s attention. A slow smile spread. “Though I don’t think it’s a stretch to say he’d go a little crazy if you entirely restrained yourself. I’ve known Izuku a long time. I’ve seen every shitty relationship come and go. Violently. And I’ll tell you one thing – Izuku wants to be touched. He’s desperate to be touched. He just wants to be touched without the intention of being someone’s prey.”

 

Katsuki had left shortly after, Shinsou’s words weighing on his shoulders. Evening’s early cloak had begun to fall, deep and dotted with freckles of falling snow. Happy couples enjoying the weather skimmed his periphery as he walked with his attention aimed at his boots, dirty in the slush.

Midoriya wanted to be touched but didn’t? Did that make sense?

Katsuki supposed it could. He himself had never experienced the biological drive to touch and be touched by a partner. Even as a teenager presenting as Alpha, he’d stamped down his baser desires with suppressants as soon as he could. Even with suppressants, though, he knew plenty of his Alpha friends still found boyfriends or girlfriends. Still enjoyed sex, enjoyed having someone to depend on and be dependent upon.

Katsuki’s experience had been vastly different, and he’d never given it much thought until now. Until he’d walked into that bookstore and found himself brought to his knees by the most heart wrenchingly powerful scent, Katsuki had lived a life without the desire for any other person.

Now. Now.

The night was sharp with black ice and crisp snow when Katsuki found himself staring up at the light in Midoriya’s window.  He approached the front door with a frown, noting the shiny, new set of outer locks set on the building. That was new.

He checked the names on the side panel, held down the buzzer for Midoriya’s name. The wait wasn’t long before a familiar, sweet and cautious voice came through the scratchy intercom.

“H-hello?”

“Hi. Um.” Katsuki dropped his brow to the glass panel of the door and released a shaky breath, white plumes in his face. “I just – I just want to see you. Can I see you? Please.”

When the wait had grown long enough to be a reply in itself, Katsuki’s shoulders sagged. This had been a ridiculous attempt, anyway. He needed a better game plan. Katsuki turned away.

The door buzzed open.

Chapter 12

Summary:

His future had been decided. By his failures, by his biology, by society.

Izuku was going to lose.

He was going to lose and he knew it. But the odds had never grasped much hold on him these days. Izuku already knew this life was designed to crush him down. What mattered was how much he fought before the sky and ground fell and rose to paralyze him in between.

“Look at that little bitch bleed!” The crocodile-scaled teenager tossed head back in a hearty laugh, his private school uniform as stained as Izuku’s matching one. The ragged cartilage of the student's ear hung loosely, a scrap of meat discarded at the butcher, the slick of a stranger’s blood a sludge across Izuku’s teeth and tongue.

Looking between them, it was easy to tell who had been admitted on a scholarship and whose rich parents had paid the way.

Well, maybe not exactly right now.

Izuku smiled, a red, dripping scythe, breathing hard through his mouth as his shattered nose blacked out the vision of one eye and screeched like a siren in his ears. He swallowed a thick, soupy glob of blood streaming from his bleeding nose, down the back of his throat. Vaguely, he recognized he couldn’t taste the familiar copper bite.

“Everyone expects me to bleed. What are your friends going to say when they find out an Omega half your size ear-tagged you like some kind of farm animal?”

Crocodile Boy’s henchman, a pig-looking Beta to the other guy’s Alpha, snickered but gave the two of them a cowardly berth.

His schoolmate’s eyes narrowed, pupils shrinking with rage as he launched himself forward. A wave of nausea whirled within Izuku’s skull. The sparks in his eyes were from the beating he’d endured and not from the flying elbow striking him across the eyebrow.

The pavement met the back of his head and Izuku snarled, a new fire flaring through his veins. Something volcanically violent, nothing to do with being Omega, and everything with who Izuku was, fifteen years into this disappointment of a life.

Legs kicking out on instinct, his sneakers met sternum. But his strength couldn’t match up to an angry, newly presented Alpha, and soon wailing fists greeted his gut on a rampant, merciless loop.

“You think you’re better than me just ‘cause you’re smart? Nobody likes you, Quirkless Omega!” Rough, scaly fingers clung at Izuku’s neck, squeezing with every faint slap Izuku flailed forth with his fading consciousness. “Everyone in class hates your depressing attitude! No wonder you don’t have any friends – all you do is sulk around like a kicked puppy. Other Omegas just deal with it and move on, put on a good face, but you –“

“Wow,” came a lazy drawl from nearby. The air shrieked back into Izuku’s lungs. “Isn’t this a hell of a show. What’s goin’ on over here, buddy?”

“That’s none of your fuckin’ –“

Blinking his sight back, the roar in his limbs returning with a fury, Izuku rose up from the cement with a scream and launched a single fist.

The lax expression on his classmate’s face as his tooth went flying was satisfying until he dropped to the ground like a marionette with strings cut. Something wasn’t right with the blank stare in his bloodshot eyes.

Groaning, Izuku rolled to his knees, sitting back on his heels as he winced up at the tall, looming figure casting a vast shadow across the bloody scene. Izuku squinted hard, taking stock of the tall purple hair and pale eyes.

The familiar uniform stabbed him with disappointment, failure. A life without a dream.

“I don’t need saving,” Izuku mumbled around a mouthful of blood that slopped from his lips. He wiped his sleeve across his mouth, jolting when he brushed his swelling nose. “Find somewhere else to play hero.”

The UA student’s eyebrows rose, the dark sunken bruises around his eyes probably nearly as black as Izuku’s actual bruised eyes forming from his injuries.

“Just giving you a breather. Literally. I’m pretty sure you had this handled from start to finish.”

“Don’t make fun of me,” Izuku snapped, wavering to his feet on weak knees before he dropped right back down to pavement.

Shit. His mom was going to be so upset with him. She already cried when he came home like this.

What did she expect? Izuku didn’t have anything left. The very least he could do was physically prepare himself for a life of being the world’s chew toy.

Practice makes perfect. Bloody makes badass. He’d never be the latter, but he would do his best. All Might had always spouted that stuff about being your best version of yourself. Izuku didn’t have that version. Before he’d presented, he’d had a dream of who he could be.

Before he’d presented, he’d thought a lot of different things about this world.

Now, he just needed to work on the scar tissue of his fists.

“Hey,” the guy snapped, the strength in his voice stopping the piggy student in his tracks. “Where do you think you’re going, bacon bits?”

“I’m –“

Izuku’s classmate went still, eyes like empty hourglasses, same as the other bully’s had been. Nifty. Izuku burned with shame. With his ineffectual, useless nature.

“That’s better,” the lavender stranger said with a sigh. He faced Izuku once more and held out a hand, his wide mouth straight and serious. “Don’t worry. This is purely on a non-hero basis. If they were bullying you, you had the right to fight back.”

Izuku considered the slim palm and strong fingers.

“I’m Shinsou, by the way. How’s that nose?”

Shoulders sagging, Izuku took the offered hand and hefted to his feet with a wince. He delicately dabbed fingertips to his mouth, came away with blood he couldn’t tell was from his nose or elsewhere. The hollow behind his eyes pulsed red and black.

“It’s fine.” Izuku shrugged, offered half a smile. He couldn’t tell if this guy was Alpha, Omega, Beta. Tall, lanky, eyes that saw and understood shit. He flicked a wary look back to his bullies, one standing there like a vacant mannequin, the second flat out on his side, tooth missing, blood pooled around his mouth. “Are they going to be okay?”

Shinsou’s striking eyebrows rose toward his wild hairline.

“Do you care?”

“Don’t you?” Izuku frowned at Shinsou’s surprise. He wasn’t some monster – he was just sick of rolling over for Alphas like a bitch in heat. As was universally expected of their entire presentation.

But Izuku wasn’t Omega – he wasn’t Alpha, either. The doctor had recently told him so. He wasn’t anything real. He existed between the cracks – fallen, stuck, forgotten.

“Sure,” Shinsou said, only half convincing in a blasé, tired voice. He eyed the two bullies one last time and added, nice and clear, “Now you two think about what you’ve done. You can move when someone decides to help you out. Let’s see how long it takes.”

When Shinsou faced Izuku, it was to meet Izuku’s puzzled smile.

“Shinsou, huh? I haven’t heard of you.”

“Most people haven’t.”

“Well, I’m Midoriya Izuku. I can assure you no one has heard of me.”

Shinsou flicked a gaze to the bloodied classmate on the ground.

“Not yet, anyway.”

Izuku sucked in a glob of congealed blood from his noise, swallowed it with a scrunched face.

“Well. Thanks. I’d better –“

“Come on.” Shinsou waved a beckoning hand as he began to walk away.

For whatever reason, Izuku followed. Maybe because the guy seemed to respect him immediately, or because he hadn’t butted into his fight. Or perhaps it was the awe from an actual UA student interacting with him like he wasn’t worthless. Like they could have been classmates in a different life.

Whatever it was, Izuku fell into step with him, biting down on the snap of pain from his ribs.

“What year are you?” Izuku asked, long beyond feeling annoyed by having to look up at those taller than him. He could hold his own – well, sometimes. He was working on it.

“First.” Shinsou pulled a handkerchief from his pocket and handed it off. “Keep it. What’re you?”

“What am…” He cocked his head at Shinsou, forehead scrunched. “Um, I’m Omega?”

Shinsou smirked. His voice was very low, melodic, soothing. It was nice to hear him talk.

“Anyone could tell that a mile away. You’re not exactly subtle about it.”

Delicately, Izuku dabbed the handkerchief at this mouth and nose, ignoring the strange looks they got as they headed toward the city.

“Because clearly I look like the type who is interested in personal advertising.”

“I mean, what year are you?”

“O-Oh. I’m the same. First.”

Shinsou frowned as they walked.

“No offense, but if you’re trying to be a bad kid, you don’t look the part at all.”

Izuku bristled, even as he blushed to his toes. He knew very well how he looked. Doe eyes, soft hair, freckles. Compact body, slight stature, big hands and feet like a puppy.

“I’m working on it.”

“Omegas aren’t prone to much muscle definition, you know,” Shinsou sing-songed, his long, lazy strides easy to keep up with for how slow he strolled. “Shitty end of the chew toy.”

“And you’re the expert on Omegas?”

“Well, I am one, so.” Shinsou shrugged slim but sturdy shoulders. “I’d say I know about as much as you.”

Izuku gaped

“You’re an Omega?”

Male Omegas were few and far between, about twenty percent of Omegas being male. Let alone a fledgling hero. The odds in UA were undoubtedly even smaller.

That slow, knowing smile spread once more, Shinsou’s pale eyes both unnerving and fascinating at the same time.

“Sure. Your surprise is flattering.”

“Yeah, well.” Izuku pocketed his bruised and bloodied hands, kicking a stone along as they walked toward who-knew-where. “We’re not exactly in high demand.”

“I don’t know about you,” Shinsou said, his eyelids low and sleepy as he stretched his lean arms in a yawn, “but I don’t exactly mind not being able to have screaming mini mes.”

“Maybe you’ll think otherwise when you find someone you love, though.”

Shinsou was silent for a long time after that, his face pensive. Izuku frowned at the line of discussion. The unfortunate truth was that male anatomy did not support what the Omega presentation craved. The slick glands within could produce, as well as the come hither scent, but – nothing would come of it. Male Omegas were not only rare, but inherently useless on that level. They could, of course, father their own children with a female, but that was an entirely different conversation.

“Where are we going?” Izuku looked around, recognizing the area but unsure of their destination. A sting of panic pricked at his chest, his heartbeat squealing into a new gear. If this was some kind of trick, some –

“The ER.” Shinsou quirked an eyebrow. “I get that you’re fine and all, but you look like you went three rounds with a dump truck and ended up in the trash.”

“I’m really fine.” He growing accustomed to the ringing pain in his entire face place. “That’s really nice of you, but –“

“Hey.” Another smile from Shinsou, closemouthed but warm and quietly confident.  “You got a problem with people taking care of you, or is this a part of the bad boy image?”

“I don’t have a bad boy image,” Izuku mumbled, now simply following along. Maybe they’d give him some good medication.

“Now we’re on the same page.” Shinsou’s laugh was a little raspy, a little out of use. Izuku tried to be grumpy about the assessment, but couldn’t help but return Shinsou’s grin. He trusted his gut, and his gut told him this person was, despite appearances, was safe and good and humble.

“It really does hurt,” Izuku said under his breath. "A lot."

They both exchanged a look and burst into laughter.

Izuku couldn’t remember the last time he’d enjoyed a stranger so much. The trip to the hospital was actually fun. They talked about school, about their grades, comic books, the best nearby arcades. Shinsou's love for cat cafes.

In the tightly packed waiting room, Shinsou slumped down in the stiffly padded chairs, his long legs stretched out, crossed at the angle. With his arms folded across his chest, he was slunk so low that  his shoulder blades rested against the back of the chair. He looked up at Izuku with eyes like he might sleep any second, yet Izuku got the distinct impression Shinsou listened sharply to everything that came from his mouth. The feeling was foreign – to be listened to, to be acknowledged.

Shinsou breached the subject which tortured Izuku’s days and nights.

“Did you try out for UA?”

Nausea clamped in Izuku’s gut and squeezed, his stomach aching as he smiled thinly.

“I don’t have a Quirk.”

Shinsou didn’t seem to react, his gaze distant.

“Sorry.”

Izuku shrugged.

“Thanks. I’m used to it by now.”

He wasn’t anywhere near used to it. Less than a year ago, Izuku had presented as Omega on the morning of UA admissions. He’d actually planned to go – to throw himself into whatever challenges UA had in store for him that day and at least be able to tell himself he’d tried.

But he’d presented on that damn day. Stayed in bed writhing like some animal hit by a car, mangled up limbs and sweat and scent unruly.

When he’d properly come to consciousness the next evening, he had missed the tryouts. His future had been decided. By his failures, by his biology, by society.

“I actually…” Izuku swallowed, unsure why he was sharing this information with someone he barely knew. Shinsou felt like a listener. “I was going to try out. But I presented last minute and –“

“And it all went to hell. Shit. I’m sorry. I know I said it before, but –“

“It’s okay. I mean, it’s not okay.” Izuku’s laugh was short, harsh. “My mom never believed in me in the first place. She told me her relatives came from a long line of Omegas that had to mate Alphas and Betas into the family. I should have known better. I'd refused to believe in that stuff.”

“Fuck that.” Shinsou’s voice was taut and low, a hush beneath the chatter and groans of folk all around. “Fuck all of those people who tell you that you aren’t worth it, that you can’t do it. No one knows you but you.”

When Shinsou looked at him it was like buckshot to the chest. Izuku swallowed hard, his heart leaping in reply to this totally left-field positive reinforcement.

“Right?” Izuku leaned in, crusted-blood face earnest as he spoke with his hands. “It’s like my mom didn’t believe in me before I’d even presented. Like she didn’t think I had it in me to be something better than just –“

“Just an Omega. I know.” Shinsou nodded, his jaw terse despite his relaxed position. “My own foster families kept passing me around because they thought I was going to grow into a villain. All because of my Quirk. Something we all understand, if any of us remember that we have brains at our disposal – all because of a Quirk I had no hand in choosing.”

Izuku felt a stab in his soul for this person, the struggle he persevered through so admirably. He nodded more and more as Shinsou spoke, feeling riled, ready to fight anyone who told him he couldn’t be more than some barren, weak, Quirkless Omega.

“Hey.” Izuku placed his bloody-knuckled hand on Shinsou’s knobby knee with a sober nod. “I understand. But here you are. In the uniform and everything. You are where you were always meant to be.”

Something brightened in Shinsou’s eyes, a grey sky clearing lavender fields. A flash of teeth, a grin that might have unnerved others.

“You know what, Midoriya Izuku? I’m glad I walked in on your disaster life.”

Izuku rolled his eyes, his smile blooming even as he couldn’t find it in him to take offense.

“Yeah. Yeah, you too, Shinsou.”

“Hitoshi. Shinsou Hitoshi.”

The doctor set Izuku’s nose and marveled when Izuku didn’t shed a tear. Izuku didn’t cry over physical pain. The salve was slathered, the bandages placed to Izuku’s eternal discomfort.

He continued to glance at the clock, noting the late time. He and Shinsou had sat in that waiting room for two hours, just talking, listening. Izuku felt a piece of his soul unfurl like a summer cicada from the deep, dark earth.

“Is it normal that I can’t smell?” Izuku said with a frown as he tentatively inhaled.

The doctor frowned, tipping Izuku’s chin to shine one more mini flashlight beam up his nostrils.

“I don’t see anything specific covering the area, but it’s possible you have some bone shards blocking your nasal cavity. There’s also a lot of coagulated blood and swelling up there. You should be alright. Give it some time.”

With a shrug, Izuku slid from the hospital bed and peered over his shoulder. He couldn’t help but smile.

“You coming?”

Shinsou hopped off the countertop, aiming a lazy salute at the doctor’s sour expression as he eased by.

“Hey.” Izuku bumped Shinsou’s arm. “Let me treat you for this. Tomorrow, I mean. Food?”

“Can’t say no to food.” Shinsou had happiness in his voice, even if Izuku kept looking ahead, walking toward the bleeding citrus sunset. “Where do you want to meet?”

“Wherever you’ll meet me.”

Chapter 13

Summary:

"I think maybe you don’t know what you want.

The abrasive entryway buzzer physically jolted Izuku from his reading lull, his eyes bugging as he flinched from his bundle of couch blankets and pressed a hand to his heart. Huffing a laugh at himself and shaking his head, he tossed the soft cover aside and untangled himself from the heavy crocheted blanket of soothing grays and greens.

Thick, burnt orange socks padded toward the kitchen window as he placed a knee on the counter top to leverage himself up, pressing his forehead to the icy glass as he peered into the dusty snowfall and dark.

Frowning and unable to see the visitor underneath the shallow alcove of the building, Izuku sighed and hopped down.

Inspecting the newly installed intercom with a dubious eye, Izuku pressed the talk button.

“H-hello?”

The normally bold, brazen voice coming through the speaker in husky, muted tones melted right through Izuku’s bones, warming straight down to his toes.

“Hi. Um. I just – I just want to see you. Can I see you? Please.”

No bravado, no delinquent’s slur to his words. Bakugou almost sounded young – or maybe he sounded more his age than Izuku had ever encountered.

Izuku’s finger hovered over the entry button, his hand faintly shivering from something other than the cold.

The past weeks had felt like a lifetime. Like the years had shifted his perception, like he’d seen and felt more than should be reasonable in the span of time they hadn’t regarded each other face to face. A handful of weeks ago, Izuku would never have believed such an unsure voice could come out of a man forged of towering, volcanic obsidian, ash, and flame.

And, for the first time, when Izuku thought of Bakugou in the flesh, he did not envision a hulking Alpha of bullying hands and sharp teeth. There was…

There was more.

Shuddering forth a breath, Izuku thumped his brow to the door and squeezed his eyes shut. Without looking, he smashed the button down with his thumb and held it firm, long. And waited.

Forehead still resting on the door between which they’d both done strange and delirious things together but apart, Izuku opened his eyes and stared down at his ensemble.

Chunky woolen socks, his ratty high school gym shorts of faded navy, an oversized, thread-bare sweater that was so stretched out it nearly bared one full shoulder. Izuku sighed. His comfort clothes. Well, nothing could be done of it. He could already hear footsteps up the stairwell – a sound to which an average Omega wouldn’t be sensitive, but an Alpha’s heightened senses would pick up instantly.

Willing aside a nervous trill of high-pitched anxiety at the back of his skull, Izuku opened the door wide and leaned against the frame, arms folded across his middle in a self-hug as he waited. He tipped his temple against the doorway, pulled his bottom lip between his teeth and chewed.

When Bakugou came up the stairs to the right and stood solemnly before him with a brow twisted up like it caused him pain to be this close, Izuku resisted every urge to slam the door in his face.

I’m also not an Alpha who wouldn’t let you breathe.

Maintaining his seemingly relaxed pose against the door frame, Izuku looked up, quietly meeting Bakugou’s eyes. Red – red like pain or red like love? Izuku couldn’t yet tell which inference he could make with this man.

The corners of Izuku’s mouth dipped down as he scanned a tired, worn face, the shadows beneath Bakugou’s eyes, the disarray of his hair, the pallid complexion.

“You don’t look great,” Izuku said by way of greeting.

Bakugou made a sour face, his voice a cranky rasp.

“Your observation is a fucking treasure to me. How’re you?”

Izuku blinked at the question.

“Me? I’m –“ Confused. Anxious. Wondering what this is and why I’m opening my door to you. Why you’re at my door in the first place. Why you won’t give up on me. Why I don’t know if I want you to give up on me. “Why don’t you come in, already? You look like you’re about to drop.”

Before he could read into Bakugou’s shifting expression, Izuku turned and made his way past the living area, to the attached kitchen.

“Tea?” he said over his shoulder.

“Green.” Bakugou said as he slipped off his shoes and shut the door. The click of the lock resounded through the house like a gunshot, despite the dull mumble of the television in the background. “This place smells so much like you.”

“That tends to happen,” Izuku said, lips quirking while his back was to Bakugou.

On more than one instance now, Bakugou had made it clear that while he was undoubtedly attracted to Izuku’s scent, it wasn’t what he was really after. Izuku was beginning to believe him.

He’d noticed the way Bakugou’s hands had fisted upon Izuku opening the door. How Izuku’s aroma must have coiled around him like a noose, yanking him off his feet, demanding control. He’d noticed Bakugou’s nostrils flare and the swell of his pupils.

He’d also noticed how Bakugou hadn’t moved a single inch – hadn’t even shifted from foot to foot or moved a muscle – when standing before Izuku, waiting for an invitation into his privacy.

Izuku had never been very good at ignoring the good in people.

Setting the electric kettle to boil, Izuku turned and leaned against the countertop, his fingers clenched white along the cheap Formica edge. His heart rumbled like distant thunder as he caught Bakugou slipping off his parka, glancing over his shoulder at Izuku with those expressive brows and slash of serious mouth. Their gazes hooked and held, Bakugou pausing before he fully faced Izuku and discarded his coat.

“Where should I put this?”

“Hook by the door.”

Bakugou nodded without a word and returned to the entrance, hanging his jacket beside Izuku’s in a gesture that seemed so domestic it clenched at Izuku’s chest. But a bolt of panic struck when Izuku watched Bakugou notice the fresh nail marks scraped down that side of the door. His strong profile darkened, fingertips briefly tracing the lines.

Before Bakugou could see Izuku watching – or the bright red face he wore – Izuku turned around and grabbed two mugs from a cupboard, busying himself with the tea.

“It’s kind of strange to have you in here,” Izuku said, feeling his tongue go loose with familiar blathering social anxiety, the kind that made him mutter and chat until he forgot to breathe properly. “I mean – hah – very strange. You, uh, your friends – old classmates? My friends? They said nice things about you. Or, well, some of them. I guess growing up together in school would do that. I can’t say Shinsou ever mentioned you in anything but passing when we were teenagers, but he knew I was always kind of uncomfortable hearing anything about UA because I’d so badly wanted to, well – that doesn’t matter. It’s interesting we were always just one person apart from each other and never met, ri-IGHT?”

The end of Izuku’s sentence jumped several decibels as he turned and found Bakugou standing in the kitchen, head cocked as he’d been apparently staring at the back of Izuku’s neck as he fluttered around the kitchen and spilled his brains out through his mouth.

“I think that’s the most you’ve ever said to me,” Bakugou said, the flash of his grin more familiar than the narrow, searching look he’d scrapped. “When you’re not chewin’ my ass out, anyway.”

“Well, you’ve deserved it every time,” Izuku muttered, eyes low as he held out the mug to Bakugou.

Their fingertips brushed, and Izuku swallowed a hot rise of excitement when he noticed his own hands were bigger and than Bakugou’s. Probably something he shouldn’t mention.

“Maybe,” Bakugou said, taking the tea without a thank you. He cupped it both palms, considering Izuku, who was busy burning his tongue on the tea for lack of anything better to do. His nerves buzzed like tall electric utility poles, the air around him vibrating in his ears.

“What, um –“ Izuku set his tea on the tiny round kitchen area table and sat in one of the two chairs, pulling one leg up beneath him. He peered up, regarding Bakugou as he sat across from him, their hands nearly touching across the center of the scarred wood where they held their cups. “What are you doing here, Mr Zero?”

Bakugou’s sharp features went a little hard, his top lip curling back as if to shoot off some automatic response before he shut his mouth and took a sip of his tea. Their eyes met over the rim, watchful and wary in kind.

“I don’t know what to do about you,” Bakugou finally said, a gruff impatience prickling his words. He held up a hand before Izuku could get fired up and shoot back. “I don’t mean there’s any fucking thing to do about you like it’s within my control, alright? You think I don’t know that? I damn well – ugh. I damn well like you because you don’t take any shit. You take care of your own business, your own life. You’re not some needy Omega dragging at my heels, hoping for some idealistic mate to give them six kids and a white picket fence.”

“A fence wouldn’t be so bad,” Izuku said, pointedly eyeing Bakugou up and down. “Keeps out the riffraff.”

“Ha.” The corner of Bakugou’s mouth twitched as he brought the tea to his lips once more, the pink in his high, cliffside cheekbones losing their incensed color. He set the mug down with a quiet crack. He looked at Izuku with some expression of displeasure that Izuku couldn’t puzzle out for the life of him. “I want you.”

A fissure cracked up Izuku’s veneer of strength, of independence, of self-instilled loneliness. His fingers clenched around his mug, eyes widening on Bakugou as he powered forth. Bakugou leaned in, intent, eyes like brands, his words searing into Izuku chest.

“I want you, and I’m used to getting what I want. But I don’t want you if you don’t want me back. And I don’t want you just for –“ His cheeks flushed as he flicked his gaze away. “Just for that. You’re – you’re not boring like everyone else. You’re more alive that most people I know, I think. Or something.”

Izuku’s entire face had to be in flame. He knew it. He brought his thumbnail to his teeth on instinct, attention hinged on every movement of Bakugou’s scowling mouth, every flash of honest, impassioned eyes.

“I get that I’m somehow not your type. I mean, I don’t know how the fuck that’s a thing, but I now gather that it is and –“

“What?” Izuku yelped with a surprised laugh that probably shocked them both. He dragged both hands up and over his face, through his mass of curls, smiling in bafflement at this ridiculous situation. “No, I – the problem isn’t that you’re not my type, Mr Zero. That’s not – shit. I’m a mess.”

Izuku dropped his hands to the table and looked up, expression frank and true.

“I’m a mess. And I thought you were one of those guys who had a hand in making me a mess before, but – uh. You’re not, apparently. Not entirely. I can see that you’re trying and –”

“Who’s trying?” Bakugou scoffed, slouching in his chair like a sullen teenager, crossing his arms in a way that had Izuku smiling in puzzlement at the range of emotion this man exhibited. He was a livewire, spraying sparks left and right.

“You’re –” Izuku traced a fingertip around the damp rim of his steaming mug, lips faintly curved, lashes lowered as he watched the circular movement. “You’re frightening. Frightening and exhilarating. And there’s no way we’d end in anything but disaster. Don’t you think we’re a little too different, Mr Zero?”

Bakugou straightened then, intent on Izuku’s face as he leaned across the table and gripped Izuku’s wrist in a firm but not painful hold. Slowly, the calloused pad of his thumb snuck forth, painting long, languid strokes along the gland of Izuku’s inner wrist.

Shivers and shocks skated through Izuku’s veins, bursting between his legs. He crossed them quickly beneath the table, his cheeks flushing bright and hot, attention entranced on the way his wrist began to shimmer and softly slick with every deliberate smear of Bakugou’s finger. His breathing went shallow, rushed.

“Hey.” Bakugou’s voice had dropped deep, a thick rolling smoke over Izuku’s clouding senses. Izuku blinked hard, looked up and met eyes more pupil than iris. “Don’t you think we’re not?”

“Not?” Izuku licked his lips, foggy and out of focus as waves of warm bled through his skin. His voice sounded faint and far in his ears. “Not what?”

Bakugou’s smile was all teeth, sharp canines tempting Izuku’s tongue. A sticky-sweet pull like messy candy drew Izuku closer, leaning too far across the table. Was he sitting in his seat any longer?

“Bakugou,” Izuku murmured, eyes heavy as he placed both palms flat on the table and leaned in, chin tilted, mouth expectant. “You’re too much my ty-“

The small table tilted under Izuku’s weight, hot tea sloshed over the rim, splashed Izuku’s fingers, and he was shooting across the room to put his hand under the cold faucet, cursing all the way.

Bakugou was on his heels, swearing in turn as he gripped Izuku’s hand under the flow of water and spread his fingers gentle to glower at the bright red marks.

“Fuck, man. You okay?”

“I’ve had worse,” Izuku said archly. His brain scrambled for clarity, for distance from this man who apparently had the ability to deconstruct him like he was the original architect of Izuku’s body and soul. The knowledge was unsettling and, now that the air of danger of Bakugou as an unknown factor had passed, tempting as all hell. He flicked a look up, considering the way Bakugou grimaced at Izuku’s fingers like they’d done it to themselves.

Which, well, they kind of had done.

“Question,” Izuku said, a little too quietly for his own self-confidence. He needed to be clearer, louder, more assertive. But next to Bakugou, something inside him just wanted to curl up and nest. When those eyes shot toward him like iron brands, that same beast within Izuku rose up in an ineffectual attempt to scent the air. He found nothing – couldn’t begin to know whether Bakugou was putting out lust, anger, affection. “Um. If you don’t like Omegas so much – why me? Why not just find a Beta or –“

“I didn’t want anyone,” Bakugou said, simple, succinct. “Why would I? People are shitty and relationships are a pain.”

Izuku boggled, then snorted a laugh as he pulled away and dried his sensitive fingers on a towel. They were pink and lowkey burned, but nothing major.

“Maybe we are the same in some ways.” Smiling, he looked over his shoulder and caught Bakugou staring again. Izuku blushed and hated himself for it. “What?”

Bakugou’s voice was breathless, and that was new, too.

“You have no idea how long I’ve wanted to see your legs in shorts.”

Izuku straight up snorted an unattractive laugh, boggling at Bakugou as if he were ballistic.

“What?” Still laughing, he retreated further until his ass hit the back of the couch. He sat upon it, holding the edges, grinning wildly. “Are you kidding me? That’s your big bad Alpha kink? You really are an overgrown puppy, aren’t you, Mr Zero?”

The answering snarl resounded through Izuku’s core, and Bakugou was on him in half a second, not touching, but either hand fisted on the ridge of the couch beside Izuku’s hands, caging him in.

“You have no idea what I want to do to you.”

Izuku swallowed, his legs trembling for reasons he couldn’t untangle were good or bad. They were all so intertwined, still. The fears, the past, the desire, the current.

“I think I might have more an idea than you,” Izuku said carefully, a hushed secret.

Bakugou’s face went blank, then bloomed with recognition – recollection, Izuku assumed, of what he’d shared with Bakugou, that night on the other side of the door.

And, to Izuku’s numbed shock, Bakugou backed off. He took a step away, turned and began to walk the room, looking at photos on the wall.

He stopped dead, staring at the open entryway to Izuku’s bedroom.

“What the actual fuck is that.”

Frowning, Izuku found balance in his weak knees and rounded the couch. He grinned.

“Oh, that’s Natsume. He’s my cat.”

“That ain’t no fuckin’ cat.” Bakugou’s distaste couldn’t be any more prominent than when Natsume lofted onto the ouch, all three feet of him from head to tail, and stood straight and tall, staring. “That’s a lion. Izuku, did you know you’ve got a fuckin’ lion in your house? You won’t go near me but that thing could tear you to shreds in the night and lick your bones clean by morning.”

“He’s not a thing,” Izuku crooned, already in kitty mode as he scooped a silent Natsume up and cradled him like a baby. He was heavy. Like twenty pounds, heavy. “He’s my sweet baby! Aren’t you? Aren’t you?”

Bakugou shifted from one foot to the other, the visible discomfort growing the more Izuku used his warm, doting voice, and the more Natsume refused to look away from the new stranger.

“Natsume,” Bakugou said, sounding the word out. “Like that author you’re always shovin’ on me.”

“Like that,” Izuku said, grinning now that he had a cat as a barrier between them. “How do you like him, by the way? Is I Am A Cat still in your pocket?”

“No,” Bakugou said, patting the ass of his jeans for some reason. He wouldn’t take his eyes off the cat. Izuku had never seen him look so distrustful of a situation. “I didn’t change from work.”

“You came here from work?”

“I made a stop or two before I ended up here.”

Izuku raised an eyebrow at the odd evasion. From what he could tell, Bakugou was a straight shooter and painfully bad at lying. He didn’t even seem to bother.

“Do you like it?” Izuku said as he flopped back on the couch, taking Natsume with him. “Work.”

Bakugou watched as Natsume yowled like a grown man and wormed out of his hold. He padded to the floor and found his way to the kitchen table, the spilled tea. He hopped up and sat there, again, watching Bakugou carefully.

When Izuku thought on it, this may have been the first Alpha he’d ever brought into the house. In fact, Bakugou definitely was the first. He shouldn't even be here.

“I fuckin’ love it,” Bakugou said, and he sounded so emphatic that Izuku knew he could believe it. A familiar tug of jealousy, of regret, yanked at Izuku’s heart like a yo-yo. He hadn’t felt that way in a while, and it surprised him.

“You love it?” Izuku said with a curious purse of lips. “It doesn’t emotionally exhaust you at all? The battles, the killing?”

He folded his legs beneath him, watching as Bakugou sat at the far end of the couch from him. Distance. Interesting – new.

Izuku’s skin betrayed him – itched to have those wide palms and scarred fingers over him. Shit. This was how he’d always gotten into trouble before, wasn’t it? Listening to his body instead of his better judgment. But this time, even his discretion was leading him astray.

“Idiot,” Bakugou said casually, the word holding no meaning or specific insult as he regarded Izuku with bewilderment, “Who the hell loves the killing? It’s not like any of us set out to do so. We’re trained to hit non-fatal spots. And if we do, it’s because the situation is past saving. We aren’t serial killers or some shit. How twisted have you got that in your head? I thought you wanted to be one of us, once.”

Izuku went deer in the headlights.

“Did I say that?”

Bakugou shrugged, narrowly eyeing the cat.

“Sure. Something like that, once.”

“I’m surprised you remember.”

“I’m smarter than you give me credit for. And then smarter than whatever credit you’d give me.”

“Oh man.” Izuku rolled his eyes, but the laugh rolled off his tongue easily. “You’re confident, huh?”

“What’s not to be confident about?” Bakugou asked, eyebrows raised with such belligerent, golden-boy assurance that Izuku wanted to pinch him.

“Your attitude, for one,” Izuku said, smiling widely without even realizing it. “You’re unbearable.”

Expression utterly serious, Bakugou held his arms out, referencing himself for good measure.

“And yet here you are. Bearing me. It’s a Christmas fuckin’ miracle.”

Izuku’s cheeks ached from smiling, from giggling as he looked away, unable to hold back the grin or his cheeks from burning.  Natsume considered him with gold eyes of displeasure. Izuku aimed a look in return. Stop judging me!

“Question,” Bakugou said softly, mirroring Izuku from the kitchen.

Izuku went still, watchful, a deer on the edge of the wood.

“Depends on the question.”

Bakugou nodded.

“Will you go on a date with me?”

Izuku’s skin felt too tight, too hot as he regarded Bakugou with shuttered eyes.

“I don’t date. I’m sorry.”

Bakugou’s eyes narrowed, fiery kilns.

“Why?”

“Why should I tell you?”

“Because I damn well care about you. Can’t you tell? What kinda nerd are you who can’t read between the lines? Hell, just read the fuckin’ lines!”

“I said I don’t date,” Izuku said stiffly, struggling to a stand when his body screamed out warning signals left and right. Angry Alpha, angry Alpha! “I d-don’t need to explain my-myself to you. I don’t – I don’t owe you for being nice to me or interested in me.”

Bakugou stood, towering over him, face full of fury, or something Izuku didn’t know him well enough to read or understand.

Izuku waited for the tirade.

“Fine,” Bakugou snapped. “Whatever. See if I care.”

He turned, going for his winter boots, dropping to a crouch to work the high laces.

Izuku stood there, gawking at Bakugou’s sullen silence. He could still feel the air crackling and sparking with Bakugou’s sudden and intense disappointment.

Where was the yelling – the intimidation?

Bakugou stood and Izuku flinched with the movement, took a step back even though he was already more than an arm’s length away.

Slipping on his coat, Bakugou raised a haughty eyebrow, his mouth set in a thin line as he considered Izuku from head to toe.

“I’m gonna go. Thanks for letting me in. It’s been… somethin’, alright.”

Cemented in place and silent, Izuku watched as Bakugou yanked open the door with too much strength, the hinges creaking against the force. He crossed into the hallway and turned, eyes blazing as they met Izuku’s from afar.

“I still want you, Izuku. And I think maybe you don’t know what you want.”

Izuku couldn’t find it in him to reply. He could only watch Bakugou disappear down the stairs, jumping in place as the bottom floor door slammed behind him.

His own front door still wide open, Izuku dropped onto the couch, head between his knees, and stared at the floor.

Inhale. Exhale. Inhale.

How did this man cauterize his bullshit every single time?

Chapter 14

Summary:

“Not what I was expecting."
“What were you expecting?”
“A bear."
“I told you he wasn’t a bear. Die, already!”

Notes:

My greatest achievement has been writing a chapter with eleven main characters in it. God, what was I thinking?

Also, I just want to reach out to all of you who have contacted me in regards to either empathizing with Izuku's past sexual abuse and recovery, or understanding where he's coming from, or even feeling comforted to read this on some level. I'm so happy my words reach you and I hope you find peace and comfort within yourself and your possible future relationships. You will find someone who is patient enough to wait for your healing.

Healing is not linear.

Have a wonderful day!

The room spun and quaked with the force of Mina and Jirou’s cacophonous karaoke, and everywhere Katsuki looked, he saw Hello Kitty. Apparently every room had been booked for New Year’s Eve – sans the hot pink, black, and white glitter room adorned with wild rainbow lighting and a disco ball swirling above their heads. If Wonderland were hell, Katsuki imagined it would be something like this.

While the lush, white leather seats were comfortable enough, the room had long grown hot and musty with the force of half a dozen drunkards sweating and singing and slurping heavily alcoholic drinks. The party was in full swing, and midnight loomed over everyone’s head like the glittering disco ball. The entire crowd of idiots began to sing along with Mina and Jirou, a veritable sonic boom of sound.

Katsuki sipped his drink coolly, envisioning the entire ball snapping from the ceiling and shattering across the table before them.

Now that would be a fun night.

The song ended with a round of raucous applause, and Katsuki grinned a rolled his eyes as his friends made a show of accepting thanks for their performance. He wasn’t not having fun or anything – he’d never pass up an opportunity to watch his pack make fools of themselves – but there was something missing.

That which was his.

The conversation a handful of days ago plagued him. He’d had time to turn analyze every spoken word in all directions, to dissect Midoriya’s actions, his voice, the retreat and return of his gaze. Katsuki couldn’t claim any experience in romantic relationships, and he wouldn’t try to, but there was one thing he’d grown to know from the other nights’ conversation.

Midoriya did want him. They desired each other, and for a moment, Midoriya had looked as lost in Katsuki has he was in Midoriya. Whether or not the skittish Omega wanted to fully acknowledge or pursue that ever again was another matter.

Midoriya didn’t just have bruises. He had been eviscerated and sewn up with all the innards misaligned. The more Midoriya let Katsuki see of him, the more the illustration of a man, mangled and left unmanaged in the world, came into color.

All the same, Katsuki’s heart howled for him now, louder than ever. The beast in him bared its teeth for a bite, salivated for that summer storm scent.

The hunger kept him awake. Night after night, Katsuki had gripped his cock in the shadows, bringing himself to hot, sticky climax with the fresh image of those thick, sturdy thighs wrapped around him, welcoming him in. Katsuki had known those legs would be a fucking gift, simply from the look of them in jeans and ugly corduroys. The reality in threadbare gym shorts had been enough to frazzle his thoughts not once, but twice upon their meeting.

What Omega had a pair of thighs like bricks?

Okay, Kirishima was a fucking brick house, but he was a hero. He took an abnormal amount of nutritional supplements, consumed protein like a shark, and was on a regimen of testosterone shots to keep his muscles built and primed for his position as a high ranking Pro Hero. His routine wasn’t unusual for many Omega Pros who depended primarily on strength in battle. Kirishima’s Quirk also primed his physique and strength more than an average Omega.

So what was Midoriya’s Quirk? Omegas didn’t just walk around like Midoriya Izuku. The women were curvaceous and soft in shape, while the men were slim and more subtly muscled. True, male Omegas were few and far between, but Katsuki hadn’t been living under a fucking rock. He knew what a male Omega looked like – had grown up beside shitty Shinsou for years and years.

Midoriya was no average Omega. So, what the hell was his Quirk?

He could only ask. It wasn’t necessarily good etiquette to enquire these days, but since when had that ever dissuaded Katsuki from literally anything?

Katsuki sighed into his drink and finished it off, sinking into the warm slosh of alcohol in his system. He missed that little shit with the deep, wary forest eyes and slow-to-rise sunshine smile. A mind like a lightning strike and a stubborn streak just as bright and blinding.

Asshole. Couldn’t even enjoy a fucking night out these days without it ruined by thoughts of the mate who wouldn’t have him. No one else had to go through shit like this.

“You’re turn!” Mina dropped into Katsuki’s lap in a flurry of fake white furs and painted-on leather pants. She lolled her arms around Katsuki’s neck and grin, her black lipstick framing a demon’s smile. “Sing, Bakuboy, sing!”

Nonplussed and refusing the smile that played at his lips, Katsuki stared her down as Denki and Sero chanted on either side of him like brainless minions.

“I’m not singing,” Katsuki said flatly. “Gotta piss.”

“Don’t break the seal!” Kirishima hollered from down the cushioned seats. Jirou snatched a drink from his hand and took it for herself as he spoke. “You’ll pee the night away if you do!”

“Not all of us have bladders the size of Denki’s brain.” Katsuki promptly shoved Mina to the side and stood, righting his skewed, black dress shirt with the sleeves rolled up to elbows. At some point the top two buttons of his shirt had popped open to expose his collar and a faint fuzz of chest hair, but he was too far gone on whiskey to work with that shit. “Don’t destroy the place while I’m gone.”

“I’ll hold down the fort,” Jirou said with a flushed face and glazed eyes.

“Oh yeah,” Katsuki monotoned as he waved a loose hand and saw himself out. “That seems fuckin’ likely.”

The punch of petrichor was a sudden deluge to Katsuki’s senses, an overload that soaked him to the bone and weakened his wobbly knees. He dropped to a crouch with a sudden gasp, eyes wide, head whipping around this way and that to search the dim hallway for the source of the smell.

Mine, the deep growl came from the pit of him. Mine. Where!

Midoriya. Katsuki scrubbed his rough hands over his face and inhaled deep, slow, calming the beast. The hairs on his arms and neck stood to attention, his skin electrified, prickled with Midoriya’s presence. He was somewhere in this place, and Katsuki had to know. Had to see him, smell him, touch –

A low rumble rolled in his throat like distant thunder as Katsuki stood. Inclining his chin, he scented the air, eyes narrowed as he stomped down the hall to the first door beside his group. Face set in harsh lines, he whipped the door open and –

Midoriya paused mid-song – something from an old anime of their childhood – and looked over his shoulder with comically large eyes. He stood on the table, microphone in hand, cheeks pink, hair awry, wearing those ripped to hell jeans, a t-shirt that faded and seeped from green to grey, and a pair of garish red high tops. He was a mess and the most gorgeous thing Katsuki had ever seen. He wanted to throw Midoriya over his shoulder and carry him away.

“Bakugou?” The name bounced off the walls psychedelically lit room as Midoriya gawked and spoke directly in the microphone, his voice heavy and subtly slurred. “You look hot.”

Katsuki’s hand subconsciously reached up to touch his hair. Mina had fucked with it for half a damn hour before they’d left. Twin sets of thin braids on either side of Bakugou’s head, from temple to nape, framed his wild hair down the center in a disarrayed faux hawk. Bakugou thought he looked ridiculous, slim braids and all. He wasn’t in a fucking boy band.

But the way Midoriya devoured him with his eyes, a wolf emerging from the forest on the prowl, had him wondering just what he owed Mina to thank her.

“Well this sure is a thing,” was all Shinsou said as he lithely crossed his legs in the booth and took a long, considering sip of his drink. Todoroki waved weakly, his shoulders heaving with a sigh.

“Bakugou Katsuki!” The hulking mountain that was Inasa practically rattled the furnishings as he stood and approached Katsuki in a back-cracking embrace. “What a surprise! Are you here for our Midoriya, because I’m afraid I can’t let you have him. You see, his heart is like a delicate flow-“

“That’s enough.” A sharp, concise voice shoved in on Inasa’s rambling, and then the unholy cat eyes of that creep Chisaki were sneering around Inasa’s arm. “Clearly Mr Big Shot here has the wrong door. Make sure you close it on the way out.”

Flaring with the fight in an instant, Katsuki’s bloodthirsty smile stretched from ear to ear as he leaned into the doorway, peering past Inasa to loom his face toward Chisaki’s.

“Come out into the hall with me and I’ll gladly shut the door. Wouldn’t want to embarrass you in front of your friends. I could snap you in half over my knee.”

“So that’s how you solve all of your battles, huh?” Chisaki snapped back, now rounding Inasa to jut his sharp chin in Kasuki’s face. His angular face and eyes made Katsuki think of hawks, of wildcats, talons. “Abuse of Quirk – indiscriminate destruction? The usual hero playbook.”

“Hey now,” Shinsou said from the other side of the room.

“Like you’re perfect,” Midoriya’s voice cut through as he wedged himself from around Inasa’s otherwise and bumped Chisaki with a shoulder. His chastising look was stony and Chisaki’s was scalpel sharp in return. How the hell were these two friends? “Come on, let me just, uh –“

Midoriya carded a hand through his curls, blinking hard for a second. He was clearly a couple sheets to the wind. When his bright eyes focused on Katsuki, the swell of his pupils could have swallowed Katsuki up.

“Bakugou. Uh. Mr Zero. Hi. What’re you…”

“I smelled you.” Katsuki watched the wary darkness leech into Midoriya’s eyes as he scrambled to straighten his thoughts. “In the hall, in the fuckin’ hall, you idiot. I didn’t follow you nowhere, dammit! I’m just – I’m next door.”

“Next door?” Shinsou popped up from Inasa’s shoulder like a fucking meerkat. “Who? Everyone?”

“Who the hell is everyone?” Katsuki snapped impatiently, barely sparing him a glance. Midoriya’s face was running rampant with emotion, and the booze had clearly loosened his facial control. Confusion, distrust, concern – desire. “Yeah, I mean I guess. Go over there. Kirishima will shit himself.”

“Great,” Chisaki said, immobile at Midoriya’s side. A fucking gargoyle carved of merciless stone. “More heroes.”

Katsuki ran his tongue across his teeth, thumbs hooking in the belt loops as he unfurled his hunched shoulders to full height and considered Chisaki from down his nose.

“For someone who don’t like heroes you sure are fuckin’ with plenty of ‘em, hah, vigilante? Yeah, I looked you up. I heard a’you before. You’re that one who organizes all the anti-Hero marches, running the streets with your yakuza buddies offing villains like you got the right. And you talk about killin’ like it’s something only we do.”

Chisaki shifted to step forward and Midoriya’s arm snapped out across his chest, his scent tart with warning, even though Katsuki knew he had no control over how well he exhibited his fragrance. There was something of a natural leader in Midoriya, which made him all the more intriguing.

The fact that Chisaki did not break past the barrier spoke volumes to their relationship, and it itched between Katsuki’s shoulder blades over just what that entailed.

Chisaki’s voice was smooth as a blade, his gaze blazing gold.

“I deal with the real villains you idiots are too fumbling and stupid to unearth. The people behind me are more intelligent than the entirety of the room beside us –“

“Aw,” from Shinsou. “Inaccurate, but –“

“They got work done. Not how I’d do it, but they do it. They aren’t killing for the glory or the gold – they’re doing what they must to make this world a better place. They aren’t flaunting their Quirks like it’s a fucking show. You on the other hand.” Chisaki flicks a thin brow, long eyelashes sweeping low as he surveys Katsuki with a smirk. “You’re just Tokyo’s trophy wife, aren’t you? The pretty thing they put on the magazines. Vacant of genuine talent, vapid –“

“Say that a little closer, you sneaky fuck!”

And Katsuki was launching across the short space, fist flying in tandem with his temper.

Strong, scarred fingers snapped around Katsuki’s wrist in lightning speed, diverting his punch, sending it whistling past Chisaki’s ear. Inasa was wall before Chisaki and Shinsou, and Midoriya keeping hold of Katsuki’s forearm, glare dark as he inserted himself between the mayhem.

“Hey.” Midoriya’s fingers were firm and calloused but his grip was not painful as he took a step in, Katsuki’s arms trapped between their chests. Midoriya’s breath smelled like beer and his eyes unfocussed and refocussed on Katsuki’s lips. “Stop. Stop. Ignore him. I hate this stuff. It’s the New Year. Let’s just have a good time.”

Midoriya flung a look over his shoulder, and while Katsuki couldn’t see the face he’s making, Chisaki reacted with a sour expression of his own before slinking back into the room to collect his coat.

“Let’s head into the other room.” Midoriya considered Katsuki quietly as the group behind him broke down mumbling and grabbing their plates of food and drink for travel. “I’d like to know what kind of friends you keep.”

“They’re a lot friendlier than yours,” Katsuki muttered, the place where Midoriya wouldn’t release him growing feverishly hot. That scent was different tonight. Thicker, lush, monsoon wet and dripping. Katsuki shuddered against the onslaught.

“They’re overly protective.” Midoriya shrugged and finally let his hands fall to his sides. When he peered up at Katsuki through his lashes, it was with a curve of some self-deprecating smile. “I have a habit of picking the worst kinds of guys for me. I’m – yeah. Not the best judge of character, sometimes. Or maybe I know full well what I’m doing and I walk into it anyway. Either way, these guys know. Chisaki especially. I think he feels a little guilty because he –“

“As riveting as this is,” Shinsou said, leaning in to take a sip from the straw of the drink Todoroki held. “Let’s get into this UA reunion.”

Chisaki grimaced before he promptly pulled up the white medical mask that hung at his ears, up and over his mouth.

“I’m in hell.”

That was something with which Katsuki could agree.

Then Midoriya was at his ear, a clumsy hand on Katsuki’s hip as he pushed him into the hallway, allowing room for everyone to pass.

“Can I talk to you for a second?”

A coil of bright green vines and supple earth curled around Katsuki, soaked into him, made his mouth water.

“What – yeah, sure.”

Midoriya leaned against the wall behind the open door, using it as a barrier to hide behind while his friends ambled down the corridor. Those doe eyes had returned, wavering between his feet and somewhere over Katsuki’s shoulder. With his hands twisted behind his back and his chin bowed, Midoriya might have been mistaken for a ‘proper’ Omega. Katsuki was glad that he was nothing of the sort.

Katsuki wanted to loft him up by those thick thighs and press him against that wall. Wanted to grind into him, feel Midoriya’s belt buckle imprint cold and merciless against his stomach. Wanted to tangle and lose himself in that scent of secret gardens and fathomless forests. Slide his throat over Midoriya’s, streak his scent across him, rock into him until the snarling beast he’d heard on the other side of the door that night of heat returned in full force to rip at him in turn.

Don’t touch, don’t touch, don’t touch.

Katsuki curled his fingers into fists and cocked his head.

“We standin’ here all night or you gonna make somethin’ happen?”

“I’m sorry about before,” Midoriya spilled out in a rush, his cheeks a bitable shade of strawberry. “About getting, uh, weird all of a sudden. Not that I – not that I want to d-date you or anything, but, uh. The whole –“ Midoriya gesticulated with his hands, his mouth working soundlessly before he found his words, “You know. Romance, sex, whatever. I’m not – I’m not made for that kind of stuff. I did it and I was bad at it and they were really bad at it, and while you seem, um, something. Not awful. While you seem not awful, I’m not – I’m not interested in dating anybody. It’s not just… you.”

Midoriya finished with his voice going small, his gaze finally casting up enough to catch Katsuki’s eye.

They considered each other for a while, Midoriya seeming to grow more uncomfortable and fidgety the longer Katsuki stared, processed.

Eyes narrowed, Katsuki weighed the rejection in a way he wouldn’t have been able to some years ago. While he wasn’t necessarily used to the feeling, Midoriya’s words didn’t speak to him on the level that Katsuki’s cared about.

Midoriya didn’t want to date him. He hadn’t said he didn’t want him. The chemistry, the volatile connection remained. Midoriya’s coy scent still called to him. That strong, stocky body still told Katsuki what his beast needed to know.

But if Katsuki had learned anything, it was that as much of a fan as he was of Midoriya’s body – the Omega was not so agreeable.

“Zero?”

Katsuki snapped his gaze up from where he’d been salivating over the faint flush and pulse of the swollen gland at Midoriya’s throat.

“Nice speech.” Katsuki’s voice was coarse, husky. “You write that on note cards and everything? Come on, they’ll give us shit if we don’t appear. Probably think I’m ravaging you against your will or some bullshit.”

Katsuki placed a hand beside Midoriya’s ear and watched that face go up in flame. He leaned in, a grin slicing across his features.

“Not that what I do to you would ever be against your will.”

With that, he turned and swaggered down the hall, sure that Midoriya would follow.

Katsuki opened the door to a scene equivalent to an old renaissance painting in neon.

On one end, smashed between the wall and Inasa’s sky scraper form, was Chisaki. He drank deep from his glass, eyes a little too wide, pupils like pinpricks as he watched Denki and Kirishima bray off-key and with gusto. Inasa clapped along with meaty hands the size of Kobe steaks, grinning like a madman. Where he got a turquoise and yellow Hawaiian shirt mid-winter was beyond Katsuki.

Beside him, Todoroki looked glazed and sleepy, his hair ruffled and the collar of his shirt popped and skewed as he nodded seriously at whatever Jirou was showing him on her phone. In the time they’d been gone, Jirou had lost her shirt and was down to a black bra and some kind of mind-bending, full bodysuit of fishnet material. Sero had a leg flung over Jirou’s thigh, one arm slung over her shoulder as he peered over her to laugh at whatever he saw on the screen.

Katsuki had long forgotten that Mina and Shinsou had not only been connected at the hip in 1-A, but both went straight into Hawks’ agency to work for several years after graduation. The memories came rocketing back as he watched Mina throw off her shimmering fur coat and fling it over a grinning Shinsou’s shoulders. They spoke close, mouth to ear, hands on each other’s knees like twins.

Upon Katsuki and Midoriya’s arrival, pink and purple heads whipped up with matching smiles of glee. There was something going on there. It was then that Katsuki recalled Mina had been the one to insist on this venue.

“Shinsou,” Midoriya said gravely, only loud enough for Katsuki to hear over the raucous din of song and chatter.

“Fuckers,” Katsuki replied in the same tone. “Motherfuckers.”

Midoriya sighed, shoulders sagging.

“Well. Nothing we can do about it now.”

“Murder?”

“You and Chisaki have more in common than you think.”

“Diggin’ your own grave, shortstack.”

“Excuse me, sirs!” said a server from behind them.

Midoriya startled and slunk past Katsuki, rushing into the room, then stopping dead as he looked around like a lost dog. Katsuki took a step forward to help his mate – since when had that been a thing, the wanting to help some random Omega who could clearly take care of himself – but stopped and stared as Kirishima and Denki basically dropped their microphones on the floor and surrounded Midoriya like a pair of hungry wolves.

“S-sir…”

Katsuki turned on the server with a snarl and snatched the wide tray crammed with an array of bottles, glasses, and an impressive stretch of shots. Fuck. It was going to be that kind of night.

“You can go now,” Katsuki said, teeth bared on Beta, who scattered as fast as he’d appeared.

By the time he’d turned to place the tray, Midoriya had been snugly fit between Kirishima and Denki, dead center of the booth length, Shinsou and Sero sandwiching the former and latter with grins like hyenas.

Midoriya’s smile wavered as he looked from one side to the other, his hands folded neatly on his lap, fingers clenched white and feet pigeon-toed.

A swell of protective scent plumed from Katsuki’s pores, his skin growing hot from the fire in his veins that flared with possessive fire.

“Move,” Katsuki hissed, not waiting for an invitation as he promptly smashed himself in between Midoriya and Denki. “What’re you assholes, scavengers? Let him fuckin’ drink.”

“Aren’t you going to properly introduce us?” Mina said, hopping up on heels that teetered. She rounded the table and leaned full across the drinks, buxom tube top doing nothing to keep the girls restrained as she held out a manicured hand to Midoriya and beamed. “Midoriya Izuku, right? Shinsou told me about you a long time ago. I thought you’d be bigger. From Bakugou’s stories, anyway. I heard you punched him! Not many get the pleasure. I’m Mina. Ashido Mina. You can call me whichever.”

Midoriya’s gaze boggled the more Mina spoke, and he ended up simply holding her hand throughout the length of her speech.

“I’m – yes. Hello. Bigger? Why bigger?”

Mina winked.

“Let’s do shots.”

“Uh.”

As Mina held out shots and made a point of greeting everyone properly – a true genial Alpha leader if there ever was one – Kirishima leaned impossibly further into Midoriya’s space, teeth glinting neon pink in the wild lighting.

“Hi, I’m Kirishima Eijirou!”

“I know you,” Midoriya said a little quieter than Katsuki was used to – he’d grown more accustomed to a mouthy, barbed Midoriya. Maybe this was how he was with people who didn’t go right into hitting on him aggressively. What a thought. Midoriya’s curve of lips was tentative but true. “Omega Hero. You don’t see many of them around. Men, anyway. You’re Bakugou’s friend?”

“His very best,” Kirishima said with such pride that Katsuki’s face burned. He gratefully took the shot offered to him, wincing as it burned at the back of his tongue.

Mina dropped to a crouch in her murderous stilettos, leaning slightly against Denki as she placed a hand on Katsuki for balance and met his eyes.

“Not what I was expecting,” she said, low enough not to catch Midoriya’s attention as he traded contact information with Kirishima.

Katsuki flicked a brow.

“What were you expecting?”

“A bear,” Denki said, downing his shot.

Katsuki looked on in mild horror.

“I told you he wasn’t a bear. Die, already!”

“I don’t know.” Mina seemed to mull her words. “He smells off, you know.”

“Ashido.” Katsuki’s shoulders widened, his eyes flaring. “Who the fuck d’you think you’re talkin’ –“

“Calm your ass down,” Mina said, nails digging into Katsuki’s knee as he met his eyes in a steady dare. Just try me. “I mean, he’s not… He doesn’t feel like an Omega, does he?”

Katsuki’s brow scrunched. He flicked a look over, noticed Midoriya in deep, earnest conversation with both Kirishima and Shinsou.

“You just met him. Anyway, his nose –“

“Yeah, I know all about that already.” Mina frowned a little as she brushed him off and stood. She considered Midoriya’s profile. “Just different. That would be your type. Hey, Midoriya!”

Midoriya turned, his features less closed off, his expression clearer as he offered her a small smile.

“Yes?”

“Kanpai!” She beamed and clinked her plastic shot glass with Midoriya’s, who looked at her like she was an overwhelming solar system and not a single person before he nodded and threw back the shot in tandem with the rest of the group.

The next hour muddled by in a growing haze of glittering disco balls, the white fur coat getting passed around and worn with increasingly bizarre poses for photos, plus a range of musical numbers and tastes that challenged the thousand song library the place had to offer.

As usual, Jirou was the only one with enough emo heart to scream alongside Katsuki when it came to his eventual – forced, pushed, threatened – turn. And while Midoriya did not perform upon a table as he had for his friends, he did go up and do a number after the second shot, his voice a clear bell and his shy smile making Katsuki want to crush him in his palm and keep him in his pocket.

Katsuki learned that Midoriya was a laugher. He hadn’t realized. Denki made him laugh with his antics, Kirishima with his clueless questions, Sero with his well-timed dry wit. Even Mina, whom Midoriya seemed subtly intimidated by, managed to make him sputter into his drink on a dirty joke about Katsuki’s ‘tits’, as she forever called them.

On the occasions in which they’d lock eyes from across the small room, or over the heads of two people ducked down to exchange secrets in the booth, the reaction was ever the same.

Electrical storm, lightning strike. Wildfire.

Romance, sex, whatever. I’m not – I’m not made for that kind of stuff.

Neither was Katsuki made for ‘that kind of stuff’. And yet here they were, starting fires across the floor.

Katsuki needed to breathe.

The atmosphere was wild and free, fun and bubbling like champagne. Katsuki was glad for it. Considering their profession, they didn’t get many opportunities like this.

But this was the longest Katsuki had ever been around Midoriya. Surrounded by his scent, one that cut so clear through the nine other people in the room.

Was this how Mina felt at all times? Could she smell Kirishima’s anxiety, his delight, his calm? Because Katsuki could for Midoriya, and it was driving him to distraction. To hunger.

Murmuring a quick excuse to no one in particular, right in the middle of Inasa’s bawdy power anthem, Katsuki slipped out, leaving his jacket behind as he strode down the corridor toward the entrance of the building. He tangled through the crowded communal bar in the front area, narrowing his eyes dangerously at someone who recognized him and said his hero name out loud. They quickly pretended as if they hadn’t seen anything.

Bursting through the doors and into the frosty snap of night, Katsuki pocketed his hands from the cutting chill and rounded the side of the building. He leaned against the brick alleyway, watched his white breath ribbon toward the stars, and wished he still smoked.

His lungs greedily sucked in fresh air, cleaning erasing the sticky, humid scent of Midoriya close, so close, and for so long. No amount of ice could freeze out the memory of his fragrance, though. Nothing ever would.

Katsuki pressed the heels of hands to his eyelids, struggling for clarity. Would it always be this difficult? Would he forever wonder and wish? Would he ever be able to touch, taste, know? Had he finally met an opponent he couldn’t outsmart or beat?

“Zero?”

Nostrils flaring, gaze like hot coals, Katsuki seared Midoriya with the most unwelcome look he could muster for someone he wanted nothing more than to embrace.

“The fuck’re you doin’ out here?”

“Y-you’re coat? Um.” Midoriya approached, looking as wide as he was tall in an evergreen puffer jacket. He held out Katsuki’s parka and swallowed hard enough that Katsuki could watch his throat click. “You’re okay?”

“You care?” Katsuki said offhand as he shrugged into his coat, thankful for the warmth if not suspicious of Midoriya’s attention. Midoriya didn’t chase people – of that much Katsuki was certain. “You need something?”

“Need?” Midoriya looked around, his large hands looking small and white and cold as he picked at a hangnail. “No. Nothing like that. Just wanted to – I mean, thanks.”

Katsuki snorted and smirked.

“Thanks? The fuck for?”

“Tonight.” Midoriya shrugged, the strong cut of his jaw burying in the collar of his coat. The wind picked up, ruffled his curls. His hair looked black and bright pink in the neon street lights. When he looked up, his eyes glowed in the same shade. “I really had fun with your friends. With you. I don’t really – I like meeting new people, but I’m not necessarily good at it.”

“You sound like you’re not good at a lot of things,” Katsuki said with a huff of a laugh.

Midoriya’s expression tightened and flashed with something more familiar – with the challenge, the fight.

“Excuse – “

“No good at romance,” Katsuki rattled off as he approached Midoriya, hands still in his pockets, but their shoes nearly bumping. Chests close, thick layers of clothes between them as Katsuki dropped his tone to something warm, deep, fireside secrets. “No good at sex.”

Midoriya’s lashes fluttered, attention flitting between Katsuki’s chapped lips, then up to meet his hungry stare head-on. He smelled like dripping sap from thick, groaning trees. Like the shifting wind of an incoming storm.

Katsuki tilted his chin.

“No good at people. No good at this.”

“Bakugou.”

Midoriya’s eyes were already closed. He sounded swept away, lost, a whisper of intent in the single word.

Then crowds were flooding from the doors of countless bars down the snowy strip of street, praising the new year and crowding the cold with racket and rising joy, cheer and laughter. Katsuki looked up, over Midoriya’s head, aghast at the noise, the interruption –

“Hey.”

Icy hands cupped Katsuki’s cheeks and yanked him down, Katsuki’s eyes still open in shock as Midoriya pulled him close and met his mouth with a sweet, approving sigh.

Warmth, sunlight, flower buds yet unopened. Reeling, unsure what to do with his hands but place them lightly on Midoriya’s hips, Katsuki’s lids fell closed. Falling, floating, Katsuki held on, weak in the knees and wholly foreign to the feel of another person’s lips on his. When the tip of Midoriya’s warm, wet tongue licked at the part of his lips, Katsuki could only open with a broken groan, welcoming Midoriya’s exploration, his taste.

Katsuki would have stayed here until they were statutes, ice sculptures. But Midoriya parted from him too soon, the kiss quick and done before Katsuki could fight from his daze and process exactly what had happened. Midoriya's cold fingers laced at the nape of Katsuki’s neck, and when he opened his eyes, they were clouded, his mouth cherry bright and tempting, bitable.

“Happy New Year.” Midoriya’s voice was dazed, breath a snowy curtain between them, his expression honest, wide with wonder.

Katsuki couldn’t get his lungs to work. Couldn’t unclamp his fingers from Midoriya’s waist. When had his hands crept up beneath the oversized jacket and found skin?

When had Katsuki’s entire body lit up like fairy lights? His first kiss was done and gone before he could recognize it, appreciate it in full. He was only left with this subtle shimmer, this taste of something he'd missed in that moment.

“Izuku,” Katsuki whispered. “Do you feel it?”

Midoriya’s expression shuttered and he took a step back, away.

“Bakugou, I…”

“You can keep trying to run.” Katsuki took Midoriya’s hand, brought it up, hovering at his own throat. Midoriya stood stock still, face a blank sheet as he quickly looked between his hand and Katsuki’s face. “I’m starting to get it, yknow. I’m not fuckin’ stupid. You want that room to run.”

Slowly, carefully waiting for denial, for retraction, Katsuki swiped the wild pulse of Midoriya’s thick-boned wrist against the hot glance at Katsuki’s neck. Midoriya’s lashes fluttered, his breath shuddering out in erratic puffs of white.

“You want room to run, but you want me waiting when you return, right?”  Katsuki dragged Midoriya’s palm up the jut of his jaw, bared his teeth to scrape the point of his longer canine along the track of blue veins. “Right?”

A deep flush rose up Midoriya’s neck, stained his cheeks with blood, hazed over his eyes as his pupils swelled. He smelled humid and sodden, summer rainstorm soaked. Midoriya swayed, eyelids at half-mast, lashes blanketing the look of lust in his gaze. Fingertips curled, traced the curve of Katsuki’s ear, his cheek, before his hand slipped from Katsuki’s hold.

“Bakugou.” Midoriya took another step in retreat, rubbing his eyes as he mumbled against his palms. “What’re you doing to me?”

“What am I doing – me?” Katsuki sneered at the accusation, bursting into motion as he began to pass Midoriya’s unstable stance. “I can’t be your fuckin’ scapegoat for everything, y’know.”

“I mean. Wait.” Midoriya yanked on the back of Katsuki’s coat, meeting Katsuki’s snarl without a flinch when Katsuki growled over his shoulder. “I’m going back in, too. I just came out to –“

“To give me my coat.” Katsuki said as he rolled his eyes and headed back onto to the main street. “I know.”

“No, I –“ Midoriya tugged harder, and this time Katsuki rounded on him, snapping like a feral dog.

“What? You come out here, you kiss me and push me away and what? Listen, I know you got issues and shit and I didn’t lay a fuckin’ finger on you until you –“

“I really really liked spending today with you,” Midoriya interrupted, dropping his hands to his sides with an almost embarrassed look to the ground. “It was nice. Watching you with your friends, with my friends. Taking jokes, singing, just talking. Seeing you when you weren’t all – well, how you are with me.”

“And how am I with you?” Katsuki spat, folded his arms across his chest.

Midoriya quirked a smile at Katsuki’s sulk.

“Altogether different.”

Katsuki didn’t know what to say to that.

“You’re fuckin’ obnoxious and I want another drink now.”

Midoriya paused for a second before a sputtered a laugh.

“Yeah, alright. I could use a drink, too.”

“You could use some serious help,” Katsuki muttered.

Midoriya laughed louder this time and Katsuki couldn’t help the twitch of his lips.

“Right back at you, Mr Zero.”

“I swear to hell, you’ll die if you call me that again –“

“Alright. Bakugou.”

“Good. Better.”

Notes:

I hope you all enjoyed! It means a lot to me to hear from you all. I will say, though, I'm considering turning off comments due to the comment of unnecessarily negative or straight-up whiny comments I receive on this fic, simply when things don't go the way the reader would like. We'll see how this chapter goes, to be honest.

Chapter 15

Summary:

"Wanna throw you off a fuckin’ building right now, but I’ll damn well catch you before you hit the bottom."

Notes:

This chapter is 6.8k so, uh, I hope you enjoy it.
A reminder that I have a Quiet Rapture Spotify Playlist.
I also have a BakuDeku Playlist.
I also have a Tumblr.

“How does it feel?”

“What?” Face twisted up in concentration as they ran up the icy hill in a steady but fast jog, Mina barely flicked a look to Katsuki. “This? Feels like shit. What the fuck, Bakugou?”

Katsuki kept his head low, his thighs burning with the force of their intensely steep climb. The winter months made their pre-sunrise jogs even more brutal. The ice was a major contender – the merciless wind, too. The slush in their shoes and every other damn thing.

“Since when do you whine? Shut your mouth. How does it feel, your –“ Attraction, desire, empathy. “Your thing with Kirishima? It drive you insane or what?”

“You want me to shut my mouth or answer your question?” Mina asked between huffs of breath, her eyes narrowed on the pavement still lit with streetlamps.

“I hate you.”

They reached a plateau, the street balancing out as they fell into step, their arms and legs in time as they quickened their pace now. The wind cut at his face like needles. Katsuki’s spine dribbled with sweat, and his toes had long clamped up with cold, but it was good. The movement, the unspoken race once they reached the end and both he and Mina scrambled in a last minute competition.

“It doesn’t drive me insane,” Mina said now, her breathing easier, her shoulders lax with the ease of their current pace. “When I’m far from him, he’s just like a song stuck in my head, and when the tune changes I’ll get that something is up. Whether it’s good, bad, whatever. And when he’s close, it’s like when you’re at the club and you feel the music in your veins, your heart, the soles of your feet. The bass, you know. It’s nice. Makes me feel alive, vital.”

Katsuki frowned, his run unintentionally slowing. He didn’t feel anything like that.

Of course, he and Midoriya were far from mated. Barely connected on any level. But when they were together, it wasn’t how Mina described at all.

Midoriya was Katsuki’s environment. Stepping into a room with him was like heaving head-first into a hot house, a greenhouse of Midoriya’s irregular architecture. His emotions, his being, his bones. His scent crafted something around Katsuki and he was half sure there was no entrance or exit to be found. Katsuki couldn’t claim he’d looked very hard, but nothing inside him particularly wanted to.

Three days previous, he’d felt it all. Or, not all. There was no way. But it was as if the booze had knocked loose a bar of Midoriya’s own protective cage, and the outpour had flowed.

Had everyone felt it like Bakugou had? Midoriya’s light summer rain of amusement like a shimmer and a rainbow all at once? The rusty, metallic taste of his distrust, his melancholy and his doubt?

When he’d looked at Katsuki in the snow he’d smelled like log cabin and deep woods, of a door open and the hearth warm and welcoming. He’d invited Katsuki with a purpose, a kiss both too quick and still enough to tell Katsuki what he’d needed to know.

He was so fucking fascinating and it infuriated and thrilled Katsuki in turn. He could live without the obstinacy, but hell, he could live with it, too. If he could just keep Midoriya for longer than a handful of hours. More than just a night.

“Hello?” Mina cut in, amusement and a lilt of knowing to her voice. “Are we still on the same plane of existence?”

“Hah? Fuck you, I’m not the alien here. I’m just - hell.”

“Is this about you and tasty little cream puff coming back to the party with his scent all over you?”

Katsuki increased his speed, welcomed the burn in his lungs. The horizon stained bottom-of-the-lake blue, still murky, still only the suggestion of surfacing sun.

“Cream puff is the last descriptor I’d use.”

“But he is tasty,” Mina cooed in a way that rose Katsuki’s hackles.

“Can we stop comparing him to food? I’m not gonna fuckin’ -“

“Eat him?” Mina swallowed hard as she further the pace, her words puffing out breathless now. She clearly hadn’t the energy to grin any longer, but it didn’t stop the delight in her voice. “Aren’t you? I would.”

“Bitch, you said he smelled funny!”

“Funny doesn’t necessarily mean bad. And I said ‘off’, which he does, and you damn well know he does. The why is another matter altogether. I’ve never smelled another Omega like him. He’s like some kind of... Plus Ultra Omega.”

“The fuck do you know about it?”

“Nothing. Just curious about the guy whose managed to get you so wrapped up in him without being particularly interested in you in return.”

“He’s interested,” Katsuki snapped. “He’s not not interested.”

“Not not interested and interested are two different types of interested.”

“Not not punching you and punching you are still damn well gonna hurt.”

“Does it hurt?” Mina asked, with the same ease she enquired with everything. As with her Quirk, the manner in which she burnt down to bone, to the heart of the matter, was expert as ever and fucking obnoxious. “This thing you two have. Don’t have. I have no idea with you. There’s only so much information I can get out of looks across the room.”

Stairs. A vast alignment of stairs loomed in on their approach. Katsuki gritted his teeth through the burning in his thighs as they took the steps two by two, Mina winning the climb by half a second. Katsuki gulped at the hot spit in his mouth and grimaced at the way his guts turned and demanded water.

“Don’t know.” He grimaced against his own thoughtless, telling answer. Because he didn’t know. Not yet. Did this hurt? Would they hurt each other? Was he hurting Midoriya just by pursuing him? Was Midoriya hurting him by ignoring something that meant more to Katsuki than anything had in a long time. Or, ever. Would it all be worth it? “I mean, of course not. Don’t be fuckin stupid. Some help you are.”

Katsuki felt Mina’s lingering, thoughtful look more than saw it.

“Listen. Bakugou. I’m fucking with you. Well, mostly. I don’t want you hurt by some weird albeit friendly and really seemingly cool dude just because this is your first time interested in someone. But –“ Mina had to increase her speed to catch up with Katsuki’s sudden sprint, her voice rising just shy of a full yell as she tried to reach him. “Just because someone smells good doesn’t always make them mate material!”

The route’s end neared. Barreling toward Mina’s apartment building, first place shifting between them.

“Like you can talk!” Katsuki yelled, his throat burning. “You’ve only ever been with hair for brains.”

Rounding the corner and swerving between the innocent bystanders shuffling along the icy pavement to word, Katsuki emptied his mind of everything but the win. His muscles strained, hair whipping back from his face, his fingers clenched in fists as he rocketed toward the building’s entrance.

With a howl of victory, Katsuki slapped the brick of the building and grinned wildly, eyes alight with the chase.

“Suck on that!”

Mina’s smile was thin and placating, an underlying warmth of amusement softening her expression. With legs clearly gone to jelly, she finished the final feet in a wobbly stroll and stopped before him to bend over and grab her ankles in a long, languid stretch. Katsuki rolled his shoulders once and joined her in the stretch, right in the middle of the street.

Someone definitely clicked a photo as they passed, but that was the nature of the thing. Being so admired was the last burden Katsuki would complain about.

“That wasn’t always the case,” Mina murmured, her head still upside down, between her legs.

“Hah?” Katsuki relished the limber length of relaxing muscle in his hamstrings, his lower back. They hadn’t walked a cool down. They never did. Neither of them were patient enough to just walk anywhere.

Katsuki stood with a frown, gaze narrowing when he noted Mina’s unnaturally evasive expression. She stood on one leg, pulling the other up behind her, foot touching her backside. She rubbed her lips together, wet them, weighing her words in a way few people ever saw with her. She was the Alien Queen, the party girl, the one hero of them all who attended the most variety shows, interviews – hell, she was in talks to get pulled into her own hero reality show, a first of its kind.

People simply did not see Mina  go serious.

“There was a time once, just out of graduation, when we’d... explored other avenues. You were in America in the time, on that exchange program.” Mina switched legs and rolled her black and gold eyes at Katsuki’s mute horror. “I wasn’t sure, okay. About us, about everything. The thought of being mated to someone forever put the fear into me, even when my body, my instincts, told me this would be a good thing.”

Mina aimed a quick look over her shoulder, find the sidewalk empty and the sunrise barely scraping over the horizon. Katsuki wasn’t sure what the fuck to say to that. Mina and Kirishima had always been A Thing. They’d never not been. To think of them dating other people – or more – was utterly... what-the-fuckery.

“My mind wasn’t so sure. I don’t think my whole heart was in it yet, either. Scared, you know? It was a brief stint, and I met other people whose scents I very much melded with. Doesn’t mean they were perfect for me.” Mina rubbed the arms of her thin running jacket and shivered, her breath puffing out to mask the softness of her expression, but not of her voice. “Maybe it doesn’t mean Kirishima is even perfect for me, either. But it’s who I chose. It’s who my heart wants, over anyone else.”

Katsuki’s features settled into stillness, his brows crunched close, his mouth a thin twist in deep thought. So they hadn’t just… known? Right off the bat? Neither of them?

“I don’t know what you’re talking about,” Katsuki said gruffly, running a hand through hair going icy cold with his old sweat. He gazed off to the side, to the street growing more congested and noisy as the minutes passed and the sun peeked over buildings. “I knew. I knew from the moment I met him and he—and he has me, I guess. I don’t know how, but I know what I know. I never thought about or wanted anyone in the first place. It ain’t convenient, but I can’t ignore it, either.”

Mina blinked up at him, face clear of judgment.

“What do you mean?”

Katsuki scowled and shoved his hands in his pockets. He didn’t want to stand here anymore.

“Whaddaya mean what do I mean? He’s it and that’s it.”

Mina cocked her head, frowning.

“What, really? You’re serious-serious about this? Bakugou, you barely know each other. This is all new for you and -“

“It’s not like I’m in fuckin’ love with him!” Katsuki hissed between his grinding teeth, leaning in on instinct, looking to intimidate over explain himself. But Mina looked as unimpressed with him as ever. He backed off with grumbled and sigh. “But I - shit. I mean. I will be. Your body didn’t tell you that? Mine damn well does. Can’t sleep for it. He’s practically on the back of my goddamn eyelids.”

They looked at each other for a longer time than necessary. Maybe a staring contest, maybe not. Katsuki never knew if Mina was simply matching him as an Alpha or trying to overbear him. He wasn’t sure which he himself was doing, either. As was ever with their friendship.

“If that’s the case, then be careful.” Mina none-too-lightly punched Katsuki’s arm and flashed a short smile. Some kind of anxiety lingered at the tight corners of her mouth. “It sounds like you might have a connection altogether different from most.”

“The fuck’s that supposed to mean?” Katsuki said, relenting to the play fight by lightly shoving at Mina’s shoulder, sending her back a step with an easier, more mischievous grin.

“It means maybe the great and ever-single Bakugou Katsuki has stumbled upon his very own destined mate.”

 

For all intents and purposes, destined mates were basically bullshit.

Saying you believed in that shit past the age of sixteen was as good as saying you believed the fucking… the placement of the planets and stars having a say in your everyday life. Hundreds of thousands of books, poetry, movies, media have been dedicated to the subject, and yet only a handful of people here and there every claimed it really happened to them.

In truth, there were those who did claim destined mates and, in addition, agreed to perform necessary scientific examinations and experiments to test the depth of their connection. The results were always inconclusive with a side of strange and mysterious. The accuracy of the claim was as likely as someone saying they could speak to ghosts.

And while Katsuki was devoutly a scientist and man of facts, first and foremost… He couldn’t say he’d ever discounted those couples. He’d never given it enough thought.

Now, he was giving it damn well plenty.

What he really needed to know was this – did Midoriya feel any of what Katsuki felt? Not the destined shit, but any shit.

Walking into Parchment was like entering a fleecy embrace, warm amber with woodsmoke and evergreen. Katsuki’s cheeks flushed with the familiar scent – still so big, so encompassing, yet somehow fit exactly for him. Katsuki didn’t do anything by half-measures, anyway. Go huge or go home.

Instantly more relaxed than he’d been in three days, Katsuki stood before the rows of books and let his lids fall shut. He exhaled, and the tension seeped from his shoulders, melting to his toes. Some toothy beast within him turned around and around until it finally curled into a crescent, nose tucked beneath its tail, lulled by the aroma of home.

For the second time since he’d stood in this shop, Katsuki opened his eyes and Midoriya was standing there with a curious expression, his lips soft and cherry, eyelashes almost black and heavy over bright, intelligent eyes. His trim hips and sturdy shoulders were on display today with a long sleeved shirt in faded, earthen brown, and some kind of chunky, hand-knit scarf in shades of forest floor. And those legs. The unflattering corduroys were back, but it was too late. Katsuki already knew how unabashedly strong and shapely they were. Fuck.

Katsuki’s brain cells scattered, useless when he really fucking needed them.

“Hey,” Katsuki managed, his face contorting into a deep scowl that had nothing to do with Midoriya and everything to do with his own ineffectual shitheadedness. "You’re here.”

Midoriya’s mouth worked like a fish out of water for a moment. He looked around, hands hidden in his pockets as warily met Katsuki’s ugly face.

“Um, yes? I do tend to be. Is that – bad, or? What – how’re you? I mean –“

Katsuki wanted to lick those lips open and find out how to kiss for real.

“Fine or whatever,” Katsuki said distractedly, his gaze honed in on Midoriya like a mission. He strode forward, tearing up the space between them until Midoriya had backed up against the wall of an end cap. In a gesture that had somehow become second nature when dealing with someone so deliciously compact and perfectly sized to him, Katsuki slapped a hand to the open spot beside Deku’s ear and leaned in, his voice low and direct. “I wanted to see you.”

Midoriya’s pupils swelled, the rise and fall of his chest stuttering as he canted his chin to keep Katsuki in his eye line. The slant of his shoulders remained flat against the surface at his back, but his hips, his fucking hips faintly jut forth, just enough for the length of Katsuki’s thigh to brush Midoriya’s. Even through the thick pants, the heat of Midoriya’s lithe muscle was unmistakable.

Katsuki held his breath, unbearably still as his free hand found the subtle contour of Midoriya’s waist and skimmed the shirt there, lower, lower still until the splay of his fingertips met the goosebumpy skin above Midoriya’s belt.

Then Midoriya was gaping at him through the fog, his eyes painting portraits of anxiety soaked in the sins of partners past, and he was ducking beneath Katsuki’s arm in a swift, practiced motion.

“Ah – is this – is this thing going to become a habit, because… “ Midoriya straightened his shirt one too many times as he stepped away, his hands clinging to the hem as turned, his unhappy curve of lips casting a shadow across his face. “Is that your special move with everyone you pursue or –“

Katsuki folded his arms across his chest and daggered Midoriya with a glare.

“There’s never been anyone,” he said gruffly, side-eying himself.

Midoriya stared and, to the surprise of them both, yelped a short, hysterical laugh. He clamped a palm over his mouth, eyes huge as he quickly dropped his hand. Katsuki flared up red, his lips curled back as he inched toward Midoriya. With comical levels of growing horror, Midoriya flailed ineffectually, stumbling back a step, tripping over his own feet as he gulped.

“Sorry, I’m sorry! I’m not laughing at you, just – you’re – you’re you, so. That doesn’t. That doesn’t compute. What do you mean, anyone?”

Katsuki stopped short, his nose wrinkling.

“Are you stupid? I said there’s never been anyone.”

Midoriya looked at him like those goddamn brainless pigeons with nothing going on behind the eyes.

“Anyone like, that you’ve slept with or –“

“Slept with, dated, kissed.”

Did this really have to be such a big deal? He was a busy fucking guy. One of the busiest in the industry. And who needed any more baggage than his profession already carried?

Midoriya paled swiftly, followed by his neck creeping up with color, passing the hinge of his jaw to stain those freckled cheeks. Weakly he reached out a hand to the side, clearly looking for balance, and when he found none, simply propped his hands upon his hips and marvelled. His cheeks puffed up with a held breath and released slowly, all the while his attention rapt on Katsuki in some kind of dawning realization.

“Kissed. Kissed. Oh god. Oh my god, Bakugou, I’m so sorry that I-“

“Do I look sorry?” This wasn’t going how it was meant to, at all. Nothing with Midoriya ever went how Katsuki planned. A fire lit within his gut, the same that pushed him with mindless ferocity in the direction he chose. “I don’t care that I’m not experienced yet. Kiss me enough and I’ll learn real damn fast how to do it better’n you.”

Midoriya sputtered, helpless with those big lucky clover colored eyes. This was the most flustered Katsuki could remember him, and they were a solid teen feet away from each other. Maybe touch wasn’t the best way through to him. Words seemed to fuck him up a whole lot more.

Midoriya huffed a short, wheezing kind of laugh, shaking his head.

“That’s – that’s an admirable goal, but, uh – I don’t know how wise that would –“

“You don’t want me to kiss you.”

Statement, not question. The beast within sniffed at the air curiously, body alert at the control Katsuki exhibited.

Midoriya opened his mouth, snapped it shut. His frown edged on a disconcerted pout. When he wasn’t be an obstinate mess he was cute.

“Are you always – no. Nevermind. I was going to ask if you’re always this straight forward. I know you are. I mean – do you get less… intense? About, um, about everything? In existence.”

Katsuki puffed up his chest out of habit and cast an arch look down his nose.

“Don’t know what the fuck you mean. I’m just this and this happens to be better functioning than most people in this shitty world, so you should be damn well thankful for me.”

Midoriya’s eyebrows shot up, his blush clearing along with his anxiety-clouded eyes. His lips quirked as he cocked a hip and considered Katsuki from head to crown. The tension in the store racked down half a dozen notches.

“Really? I guess I’ll make note of that.”

“Might as fuckin’ well.”

With one lingering look, Midoriya gave Katsuki a wide berth and disappeared into one row of stacks. Thirsty as hell, Katsuki followed. Doggedly, if he had to use an adverb that would have impressed the local nerd.

Midoriya entered the back room, this time filled with cardboard packing boxes. He promptly sat on one, picked up a razor-sharp box cutter and deftly sliced one open. Katsuki refused to shift from one foot to the other, refused to act like some smitten schoolboy or worse – puppy love.

“You – I haven’t bought a book from you in a while. Got any good shit?”

Appearing considerably calmer and at ease with a weapon within reach, Midoriya plucked a form from the top of the book pile inside, and unearthed a pen from his baggy pocket. He spoke without looking up as he skimmed the list.

“What kind of good shit are you looking for, Mr – Bakugou. Bakugou.”

“That’s why I’m asking you, ain’t it? Something not narrated by a damn feline this time.”

“Unfortunately that narrows it down quite a bit,” Midoriya said, angling his head just enough to grin up at Katsuki, who still awkwardly stood in the doorway. “My degree happens to be in feline fiction.”

“Damn waste of a good education if you ask me.”

“So I’ve been told. I’ll bet you didn’t know Truman Capote was Truman Catpote before his agent told him no one buys books from cats these days.”

Katsuki stared.

“You’re a huge fuckin’ nerd, aren’t you?”

“I mean… I own a bookstore. That speaks volumes. Get it, volumes?”

“Yeah, I got it. What the fuck. Pick me a damn book. Something that’s more like this Midoriya than the one from before.”

Midoriya eyed him, eyes better than emeralds, but more evening lakes, the reflection of green mountains in them.

“Who’s the one from before?” he asked quietly.

Someone a lot more suspicious, a little slower to smile at him, and far too at arms to crack a joke, let alone be silly.

Katsuki shrugged and leaned a hip against the door jam, thumbs hooked in his jean belt loops.

“Doesn’t matter. This one’s better.”

Face tense, Midoriya watched Katsuki carefully for a solid ten seconds. Taut energy crackled between them, high-rise electrical lines sizzling and snapping, just waiting for a storm to send them sparking.

Then he was shaking his head and standing with a sigh.

“Something more like this me, huh?”

Katsuki didn’t move from the doorway. Midoriya had to brush by him this time, his shoulder to Katsuki’s wide barrel of a chest. The scent of Midoriya’s home whiffed by – the orange blossom tea he’d made, and the smell of his old leather boots and that giant fucking guard cat.

Chewing on the inside of his cheek to keep from outright salivating, Katsuki followed, determined not to look at the outrageous curve of that ass like it mattered or anything. Like it had a hold on him or anything. Fuck that ass.

Wait, oh shit, oh –

“Here.”

Katsuki startled from his own personal hell and blindly reached for the slim book held before him. Head bowed so as not to share with Midoriya the red of his face, Katsuki glared at the title.

“Heaven Has No Favorites. Sounds fuckin’ morbid.”

Midoriya snorted a dorky laugh and it was strange and somehow addictive.

“It’s less so than you’d imagine. It’s more about… the pretenses we would drop in our lives if we truly realized this was it for us. The people we’d be if we allowed ourselves to have nothing to lose.”

Katsuki lifted a brow at the author. Same as All Quiet on The Western Front.

“Remarque.”

“Eric Maria Remarque,” Midoriya said. “Yeah, I like him. He’s – he’s important to me.”

“Why don’t you marry him, then.”

“Are you jealous of a dead author?”

“This another war book?”

Midoriya’s eyes always said the most, and this time they were openly curious, face open and risen to Katsuki’s.

“Not so much. It’s in the background, the far background. This is more about… Well, Remarche has a way with, I don’t know. Humanity. He makes you see into peoples’ bones. Like he looked at you with an x-ray once.”

Katsuki frowned thoughtfully as he flicked through the pages.

“The way you say the authors’ names and shit. Your accent is weird. You secretly foreign or something?”

Midoriya carded a hand through his mass of curls, fingers catching on them as his apple cheeks colored, bitable as any other part of him.

“I’m – no. I actually, uh, before this, I was like a translator? I mean, I worked within the American Embassy in Tokyo. You have to be pretty fluent for the position. I double-majored in Japanese Literature and English Language.”

A sliver of jealousy splintered through the surprise. The majority of heroes never reached university. It wasn’t within their career path. Although the thought didn’t often arise, there were still times Katsuki wondered how much smarter he could have been if he’d made the time for it.

Being a hero doesn’t work like that, though. Tough shit, move on.

“Translator? Impressive, considering you can barely get out one fuckin’ sentence without mumbling.”

Midoriya’s gaze glinted, that familiar flash of lightning, the challenge which zinged through Katsuki’s blood. The hairs on the back of his neck stood on end before Midoriya could even open his mouth.

“And your profession is profoundly astounding, considering your vocabulary never reached past that of a prepubescent thug.”

Katsuki rolled his eyes, cocky smile at the sharp edges of his grin.

“First of all, nerd, I am a certified genius. Second –“

“Second.” Midoriya’s stubborn chin jutted forth, his face bright and hot with the fight, a finger jabbing into Katsuki’s chest. “Just because I choose a more peaceful life than I once had doesn’t mean I don’t remember how to stand up for myself when I need to. So maybe watch how you talk to me.”

Katsuki looked down to where the single fingertip remained burrowed in the meat of his pectoral. He swallowed at the drool pooling at the back of his tongue and drank up the way Midoriya’s expression melted from incensed to muted embarrassment. Midoriya chewed at his bottom lip, pulling it into his mouth. His fingers fanned out, now a warm hand closed over Katsuki’s heart.

Katsuki’s voice scratched out heavy and hungry.

“Shit, you’re sexy.”

Midoriya looked at Katsuki like he’d grown a second head.

“L–let’s ring up that book.”

Then Midoriya was off like a shot, his frame vibrating with tension. Katsuki followed, a dark shroud pulled over his features.

“Oiy. Are we not talking about this shit or what, ‘cause I don’t work like that.”

Midoriya spun from behind the relative safety of the front desk, placed his hands flat atop the surface for some kind of balance, and kept his gaze lowered. Someone else might mistake it for a subservient Omega, but Katsuki knew by now that he was hiding his emotions.

“Maybe I do. Maybe I want to pretend it never happened. Maybe I was just drunk.”

Katsuki placed the book between them on the counter and slowly slid it across.

“I don’t think you do very much that you don’t wanna do. Ever.”

Midoriya snatched the book up and flipped it around to check the price, his risen face stern and closed, his voice clipped.

“Then you don’t know me very well.”

A flash was all Katsuki needed to snap a hand across the space between them, ball a fist in Midoriya’s scarf and haul him in. Midoriya’s flinched and went still, eyes huge, flickering between Katsuki’s bared teeth and his blazing gaze.

“Bullshit, I don’t! I ain’t forgot what you told me through the door that night. Ain’t forgot anything you’ve told me so far. Everything I know isn’t everything I say. But one thing I do know is… All that you been through was before. This is now. And the you now, the you I’m startin’ to know, hasn’t failed to at least try to put my ass in line whenever I’ve been out of it. And you kissin’ me – that was you shovin’ that line well outta the way.”

Midoriya eyes were wet and wide, his lips glossy from biting down and tonguing them. His breath smelled like hot chocolate and marshmallows, his cheeks rosy and chapped from the endless winter hammering them for the past months. He gulped, his gaze lowering to Katsuki’s bared teeth, and Katsuki noticed he had a single freckle on his left eyelid.

“Bakugou.” Midoriya’s voice wavered. He smelled like desire and dread entwined, coiled and knotted and tart enough at the back of Katsuki’s tongue to make his mouth water. “The –  the line is still there.”

“Blurred, if nothing else.”

Midoriya’s throat worked, his jaw stiff as he tentatively wrapped a hand around Bakugou’s wrist. He didn’t squeeze or push or pull. His palms were large and his fingers easily clasped all the way around Bakugou’s bones. His hands were so big – feet, too. So unlike petite Omegas. His gaze grew stronger, in tandem with his tone.

“Not blurred.”

“You sure?” Katsuki said, unexpectedly hoarse.

What was it about this person? He was so desperate not to give in, so scared, and yet – Katsuki felt that tug between them, like his chest were on a string, growing shorter by the day. Midoriya didn’t not feel it. He wasn’t not interested, dammit.

Midoriya’s plush lips quirked, his eyes crinkling in faint humor.

“I have perfect eyesight.”

Neither of them had moved. The edge of the counter was digging into Katsuki’s hips with increasing discomfort. He didn’t dare move. Katsuki rubbed the soft knit of Midoriya’s scarf between his fingers, but kept his hold fast. His tilted his head like he’d learned to the other day – to accommodate, to compromise his position. If nothing else, Katsuki was a dog who could learn some new tricks.

“Guess that means you could end this if you wanted to.”

Midoriya’s grip abruptly clenched. Katsuki’s knuckles brushed across Midoriya’s throat by accident, and the fog in Midoriya’s gaze rolled over, thick and lush.  Breathless, he whispered.

“Bakugou.”

“Remember what I said?” Katsuki murmured, the warmth of Midoriya’s lips radiating so close to his. The aroma of wet forest and damp earth rose up like the first rain of a lifetime. “Not gonna stop you from breathin’.”

Midoriya startled back, as if the words struck a raw, bared nerve. His gasp of breath was like coming up for air as he jerked back and out of Katsuki’s loosened hold. He groaned, and stumbled a step back, his shoulders bumped against a wall as he scrubbed his hands over his face and spoke into them in a rush.

“I’m – I’m sorry. I feel like I’m leading you on. I don’t – I don’t mean to. The other night.” Midoriya pinched the bridge of his nose, his voice a rasp. “It’s true that I knew what I was doing, but it was based on instinct, not, you know. Practical decision making.”

Katsuki’s brows flung up.

“There’s a time for practical decision making. I’m not expert, but pretty sure it ain’t when you’re kissin’.”

Midoriya flopped his hands to his sides and regarded Katsuki with some exasperation. At least the fear or whatever that all was had released Midoriya’s previously tightened features.

“That’s one school of thought, yes.”

Katsuki snorted derisively.

“The only good one.”

Midoriya wrinkled his nose and approached now, his movements at ease as he snatched up the book from the counter and punched the amount into the ancient register.
“I’d say mine also bears some respect.”

Katsuki rolled his eyes and waved a hand.

“Yeah, yeah, you got mine already, don’t you? I’m goddamn bleeding respect right about now –” Midoriya hiccupped a laugh and Katsuki narrowed his eyes, hands slapping to the counter once more as he loomed in. “You want a sonnet? You want a novel? I ain’t got time for that shit. Words – they don’t mean a whole lot when your actions speak louder.”

“I – yes. I mean.” Midoriya pressed his lips together, the twitch of his mouth belying his hidden smile. “You’re right. I guess I’m not used to you coming out with such well-thought arguments.”

Katsuki gaped and quickly regrouped.

“You’re a shithead, aren’t you?” he said sourly. “Just been hidin’ it behind those pretty eyes.”

“My…” Midoriya blinked, then bloomed into a smile that scented the room of springtime rain and freshly cut grass. The dimple in his right cheek was absolutely bitable. “You’re funny, sometimes. In a way I probably shouldn’t find funny.”

Katsuki scowled.

“Is that a backhanded compliment? Is that even a version of a compliment?”

“I’m sure your genius intellect will puzzle it out. Can you pay now?”

Katsuki grumbled under his breath as he yanked his wallet from his back pocket and thrust the credit card into Midoriya’s outstretched hand.

“Why did you really kiss me? Just instinct and nothin’ else?”

Midoriya fumbled the card as he swiped it through his register, the bridge of his nose going red as his cheeks.

“We don’t always do what’s right,” he said lowly. “Sometimes the whole charm in life is making the wrong choices.”

Katsuki eyed him suspiciously.

“What’s that?”

“First chapter of this book.” Midoriya shrugged, returning the card and ducking his head to retrieve a bag from beneath the counter. “I used to think that way. Sometimes it sneaks up on me all over again.”

Midoriya held out the bag, his eyes candid, a genuine clear, green lake just begging for a dive.

“You make me feel a little too young, Bakugou. There’s two main characters in this. The racecar driver and the dying woman. I think I used to be one, and now I’m the other.”

Katsuki took the bag, lingering where their fingers brushed.

“Which is which?”

Midoriya’s slow, close-mouthed smile was just another thing to add to his list of mysteries. Little fucker.

Katsuki lingered at the register, middle finger tapping an impatient rhythm on the scarred surface as he considered the small, secretive package before him.

“Translator, huh? A double major? How smart are you?”

Midoriya’s laugh was short and self deprecating.

“Who knows? I don’t use my brain for much these days. Just memorizing books by accident.”

“You don’t miss what you were doing before, then? Probably made more money.”

“I actually worked both jobs for a time. Two years of this place on weekends. The previous owner offered me a job nearly on the spot.” Midoriya reached for a water bottle on the counter and took a long drink, his throat working distractingly. He licked his lips, fumbling the bottle from one hand to the other as he spoke without really looking at Katsuki. “Turns out we knew each other from a long time ago. He was someone who’d helped me out before. When I was at my worst, or uh, something like that. I’m not sure I could necessarily pinpoint the worst when it came to me.”

“You make it sound like you were some kinda criminal. Give your martyr complex a fuckin’ break.”

“My –” Midoriya went electric in a split second, his voice like individual cracks of distant thunder. “You don’t know everything. Not by half. Not a quarter of it. And no, that’s not an invitation to ask, or a foreshadowing of the future. But heck, maybe I was some kind of criminal. Maybe I was a bad kid. Maybe even bad adult for a little while. Don’t think I didn’t hear about you through Hitoshi back when him and I were slumming it. You weren’t a role model during our early teens, either.”

Katsuki grinned on automatic, that bloodthirsty smile reserved for a fight.

“Fuck, you’re defensive. Turned that one around on me real fast, huh? Definitely smarter than you look.”

Midoriya crunched the plastic bottle in one fist, his chin angled, daring him to throw a punch.

“Oh, really? And what do I look like?”

He was beautiful like this. Not cute or sweet or harmless, but absolutely snapping with power, with a tenacity and fearlessness that shook Katsuki to the bone. He wondered if Midoriya would be the same beneath him, or hell, above him. A livewire, sparking and burning in the wake of passion.

Katsuki leaned his elbows on the counter, his own face now tilting up to Midoriya’s. The beast within quickly cringed at being put at a lower level than the Omega now looking down at him. Katsuki’s mouth thinned, his back muscles bunching from the effort not to lunge across the space between.

“Distracting. Your eyes are more a book than any bound one in this room. Just have to learn to read your language. And I’m shitty at languages.”

The tension in Midoriya’s frame drained in a single breath, his expression lax with wonder.

“That was… an attempt at poetry.” His smile was brief and almost shy as he glanced at his feet and mumbled, “Gold star.”

Katsuki shot up, his face hot as he realized what traitorous words had snuck from him. For lack of anything better, he glared.

“Liar. That was shit. Your degrees have been revoked.”

Midoriya’s laugh was a bright, sunshine tenor that reverberated through Katsuki’s chest, clearing the soot and ash from the cavity.

“Go on a date with me,” Katsuki said firmly.

Midoriya clamped his mouth shut, one hand coming up to rub the opposite arm as he distinctly looked over Katsuki’s shoulder.

“That… I can’t. I’m just, I wasn’t lying before. I’m not good at that whole –“ Midoriya gestured between them. “Thing. And if I’m being totally honest, the fact that you are my type is warning for me enough that I’m making all the wrong decisions right now.”

Katsuki stared.

“That doesn’t make any fucking sense.”

Midoriya mirrored him, only unreasonably more obstinate.

“That’s not my problem. I’m not asking you to figure me out. I’m not asking you to fix what I’ve got going on. I’m happy like this. I have friends, a job I love, a home for myself that I enjoy. The rest is –“

“You’re still going to ignore this because of what some other fuckers did?” Katsuki scowled. “In case you haven’t noticed, I ain’t them. And for fuck’s sake, I’m a hero! What the hell am I gonna do to you? You really think I’m gonna hurt you or –“

“This isn’t the place to discuss it,” Midoriya cut him off, that high tower rebuilt. Even when they stood at their full heights, Midoriya remained somehow looking down at him. “Or ever. You’re nice, Bakugou – or, you’re something, anyway. But I’ve made mistakes before and I don’t intend to make them again. I don’t intend to owe my body or companionship to anyone again. I’m sorry I kissed you, but –“

“Oiy.” Katsuki snapped in front of Midoriya’s face, watching the darkness clear in favor of surprise. “Already told you I don’t regret that shit. And I sure as hell don’t regret you. Wanna throw you off a fuckin’ building right now, but I’ll damn well catch you before you hit the bottom.”

Midoriya looked blank.

“I – that’s,” he managed hollowly. “I think you have more a way with words than you might realize.”

Katsuki rolled his eyes and sneered.

“Oh goody.” He eyed Midoriya critically. He looked a little dazed, a little confused. That was fine enough. Better than that rock hard wall. “Well. I’ll go.”

“Oh.” Midoriya seemed to shake himself from a thought. He seemed to get lost up in that head of hair a hell of a lot. “Right, yes. I’ll see you – I mean. Goodbye. Have a good evening?”

Katsuki had already turned away, holding up his bag.

“I’ll let you know if I like it or not.”

“Tell me which one of them you like best,” Midoriya called after him.

Katsuki yanked open the door and peered over his shoulder, the wind cutting at his face and whirling his hair into a wild crown as he glanced at Midoriya.

He stood there, hands balled on the counter, face flushed.

Katsuki’s smile was quick and sharp.

“I’m sure I’ll like ‘em both equally.”

Chapter 16

Summary:

Find out what I’m made of. I will get back up again. I will always get back up again.

Notes:

WARNINGS: This is an Izuku flashback. Yes, groan and get over it - everything is important to the story, or else I wouldn't put it there. Anyway, warnings. The narrative has suggested a lot of things about Izuku's past, but starting now, each flashback is going to be intensely about what made Izuku the way he is now.

Izuku has depression, we know this. Izuku discovers hallucinogens in this chapter - it doesn't mean I condone the use. Izuku doesn't self-harm, but he allows another person to harm him as a kind of form of self-harm. It doesn't mean I encourage self-harm. Izuku, a teenager, loses his virginity to someone who is not a teenager. It doesn't mean I condone this.

This story is many peoples' story. I'm not pulling this stuff out of my ass, nor am I here to coddle those who don't want to heed the warnings. Not really. It's here because you, you who are reading it, know someone who has gone through these kinds of sufferings and pains. Or you yourself have. This story isn't just a pairing story, it is a healing story.

If the things I've mentioned just now might be a trigger for you, I encourage you to simply skip the chapter and go to the very bottom notes. I will write a brief summary of what occurred, but not in detail, so you can still understand what happened in the chapter, as it's all intrinsic to the plot and personal growth of the story.

Thank you for your patience! Remember to take care of yourself, love yourself, find your safe space or safe person, and I hope that the journey of this fic becomes something meaningful to you by the end of it.

PS: No, this fic is not in any way being abandoned. Not AT ALL. This month is NaNoWriMo, and I am working on my personal to-be-published novel.
PPS: The next chapter will also be Izuku POV, but in the current timeline. Don't worry, you'll get his side of things soon!

Izuku needed to celebrate, and by celebrate, he meant forget.

Oblivion would be nice. But failing to find that, at the very least, he could sniff out – ha ha, hilarious – some distraction.

With second year stuffed in his back pocket, exams aced, and his place forged at the top of the class twice over now, Izuku was free from school for the summer. He’d find himself a job, of course – hand over half the check to his mother, even when she claimed they didn’t need it as they ate rice and leftovers for the fourth night in a row.

One day he’d be able to take care of her better than this. One day he’d make them both proud. He’d find a way. Eventually. His brain had to be good for something.

But not today.

Tonight, Izuku wanted to fry his intellect to a smattering of brain cells. Just enough to feel good, but not enough to make him feel guilty for doing so.

More than a year later and it still made Izuku’s skin slither and crawl when bystanders wrinkled their nose at him or, worse, devoured his frame with a hot hunter’s gaze. He was on the cusp of seventeen and already he’d dealt with a year of predatory looks, almost entirely from Alpha males. Females from time to time grabbed at his ass or slid their unwelcome fingertips down the small of his back as they stood in line or on the train – even played off their animalistic desire by fluffing his curls and complimenting his face.

But mainly it was men. Men who knew what bodies like Izuku’s were made for. A wet, welcoming Omega body that couldn’t get pregnant, but stayed slick and ready under the weight of an Alpha’s domineering scent.

Izuku was just weeks from seventeen, but his innocence had bled out along with the blood from his nose. That day had turned the tides, and the now the dark side of the moon was the only light Izuku had to lead him.

Izuku shrugged into a worn pair of jeans, threadbare enough to strain nearly white at the knees and thighs. The rip beneath the curve of one ass cheek and at the other knee told a story of jeans that had seen a lot, and none of it good. Izuku skipped the underwear altogether, mostly because he didn’t want to dig through his drawers in the middle of the night and alert his mom with the noise. The night was sweltering, prickling the back of his neck and knees with sweat as he shrugged on a black tank top and tied his red high tops.

Straining for sight in the dark, Izuku eyed himself in the full length mirror. He didn’t much look at himself, but he’d been changing over the months. Bulking up in ways he hadn’t known his body could – growing quicker, more clever on his feet. More confident in his mind. His arms and legs weren’t just subtle. Clear hills and contours of muscle defined his limbs, his broadening waist.

Izuku squinted at his reflection. The doctors still hemmed and hawed over his medications, over suppressants. The market for anything resembling a fix-it for heterozygous alpha was nonexistent. But the side effects of the condition were –

Well, this.

This muscle definition, these thoughts, this rampant, underlying aggression, the oversized scent glands, the big feet and hands.

How much could Izuku trick himself into believing himself to be an Alpha at heart? How much could he trick others into playing along? Why did it have to be a trick when he was as much Alpha as he was simpering Omega?

Izuku frowned, and his reflection replied in turn.

He hated himself.

Scraping palms over his face, Izuku turned and made for his door. He’d long mastered the art of slipping out of the apartment unnoticed. His mother was either sleeping like the dead or working her second job, deep into the night.

On my way, Izuku texted to Hitoshi as he headed toward the train station. The ride was a good thirty-five minutes to the UA area stop, and Izuku took that time to doze. At at this time of night and with so little people in the train car, the majority of strangers shifted to and stuck with the seating at the far end.

Izuku stank.

He heard it enough. Without the use of his nose, he couldn’t gauge how much scent he gave off, or even if he was giving away emotional ‘tells’ in reference to being able to hide if he was nervous, scared, angry. Horny.

Suppressant-level deodorants were popular in most societies across the globe, including masking perfumes, but who had the money? Not Izuku’s family.

He was a raw, open book, and because he was, Izuku had long learned that he was safer staying suspicious and a little angry if it meant his fragrance put the fear in anyone near him. Building up that fury and distrust had been difficult in the beginning. He wanted to smile at people. He wanted to talk to them, connect with them.

Turns out, when you smell like a buffet, just smiling at someone – or, heck, being polite, was some kind of open invitation for… for things that made it easier for Izuku to learn how to be angry and distant. For his own protection.

Feeling his stop nearing, Izuku cracked his eyes open and found himself under the scrutiny of a wide-mouthed bear of a man, eyes black and hard as marbles. He’d sat directly across from Izuku, his smile two parts vicious and one part delighted.

Izuku no longer needed to smell to know a self-important Alpha when he saw one. Only Alphas made direct eye contact like no one would dare challenge them. Only Alphas walked through darkened streets with their backs and shoulders straight and proud. Only Alphas rubbed a hand over their crotch as they watched Izuku’s mute horror dawn.

Fear always came first. Frozen stiff with a sick pit of ice dropping out his stomach. Izuku swallowed hard and watched the man silently touch himself through his jeans before Izuku quickly looked away, ignoring, desperately ignoring.

The doctors had told him it might be like this, but it never got any easier. They’d told him how an Omega’s scent, if powerful enough, could trigger a rut or simply spring an Alpha into an unnatural reaction. How he was a walking sinfest.

Not that they used the words. Hitoshi had coined that one.

Izuku was sixteen. No one should be reacting to him at all, scent or not, instinct or not. It was Izuku’s instinct to curl up in a ball and hide instead of leaving the house – and did he fall into that old habit?

No. He didn’t.

He was teaching himself to work past those Omega compulsions as best as he was able. He forced himself through heat after irregular heat without the help of an Alpha – because he damn well could.

And if he could live his life like a half-decent human being, so could an adult Alpha.

“Buzz off, creep,” Izuku said, his voice warbling too much for his own liking. His hands fisted upon his lap. His eyes narrowed as the Alpha’s smile only grew, his ministrations unending, steady and vile. A trickle of fear tracked cold down Izuku’s spine, even as his face felt aflame with fury, indignation, futility. “I said fuck off, if you want to keep your dick intact.”

The Alpha grunted into a groan, his eyes glazing over until –

The train shuddered to a halt, a sweet, robotic female voice announcing Izuku’s destination.

Izuku didn’t wait. He shot off that car like the devil was on his hightops.

He didn’t stop running. Fear raised his heels, forever prey at heart, never the predator or the hunter or the hero. He didn’t stop running until he was out of the station and slamming into Hitoshi’s familiar figure.

“Hi!” Izuku gasped out, building up the best smile, despite breathing so hard.

Hitoshi scrubbed Izuku’s hair with a slim hand in greeting, his pale, periwinkle eyes widening.

“What’re you running from?”

What rather than who. Funny how that was. Hitoshi always saw more than necessary.

“What?” Izuku parroted, his cheer easier to churn out when he was safe at Hitoshi’s side. “Nothing! I was excited to go.”

“Alright,” Hitoshi conceded with crooked quirk of lips. He slung an arm over Izuku’s shoulders, then cursed when he realized how sticky they both were from the evening heat, and kept Izuku a good foot away as they strolled in the direction Deku led. “So where are we going again? Where do you keep finding these weirdos, Izuku?”

“You mean like you?” Izuku said, smiling in earnest now, brushing off the incident as he did with the mountain of others. He could move on, he could do that, at least. “I told you. Chisaki had my back when these two Alphas cornered me in the ice cream store, of all places. You know how I do the – the –“

“The come hither scent of a hundred horny Omegas? Yes. It’s difficult to ignore.”

“Right,” Izuku said with a sigh, waving his hand in a move-it-along gesture as he continue. “So he just, I don’t know. Tore them apart. I mean, not literally, but he looked like he wanted to. Maybe he would have if I hadn’t stopped him at the last minute. He’s small, but he feels… bigger. Than everybody else. Better. And he’s a Beta – can you believe it? He hates Alphas, like it’s a thing with him or something. He organizes rallies and stuff against mistreatment of Betas and Omegas. He’s got this Quirk where –“

“Are you the head of his fanclub or something?” Hitoshi chimed in, not unkind, just humming with lowkey humor as he ever did. “Or is it more than that?”

“More?” Izuku gaped. “No! He’s like, mid-twenties or something.”

“I can handle mid-twenties if you can handle mid-twenties,” Hitoshi said, laughing in full now as Izuku rolled into his own incredulous laughter and playfully roughed him up with shoulder bashes and silly slaps.

“Anyway,” Izuku said with a telling, lingering look at Hitoshi’s smiling profile. “What about Endeavor’s son – I thought you felt about him, you know…”

“I know,” Hitoshi said, his face shutting down at the subject.
Nothing more was spoken on the matter.

They flitted between conversation in high spirits, both of them looking for something more than what was going on their lives to feed the little pockets of emptiness hidden within their body parts.

Izuku knew by now that Hitoshi looked to forget and fill the memory of his villainous father’s ever-looming presence, and the foster families who never accepted him, the schoolmates who expected him to turn out sour and rotten inside. And, in turn, Hitoshi knew Izuku fought tooth and nail to forget the fact that he didn’t have a father who wanted him in the first place – didn’t have a society that wanted him, either, or a partner that would keep him safe and whole.

But tonight. Tonight.

“Are you serious right now?” Hitoshi said, monotone, as he craned his head back to eye the abandoned factory on a bad road industrial drive. “This is party central?”

“It’s not so bad inside,” Izuku assured him with a gleeful grin. His skin was already buzzing with anticipation. “It’s fun and there’s weed and drink and music and Chisaki has his friends who are all kind of scary, but they never do anything to me, so they won’t do anything to you.”

“Too bad I didn’t take a shower in antiseptic beforehand,” Hitoshi muttered as he followed Izuku around the side of the building.

They didn’t have trouble entering. The ambiguously gendered person with hair like arrows let them in upon nodding to Izuku, and for once in his life he felt kind of necessary somewhere, maybe even a little important. It was nice. New.

And Izuku couldn’t help but swell with a sense of belonging when Chisaki saw him from across the warehouse and walked away from someone, mid-conversation and without a word of goodbye, to come and greet him.

“Midoriya, you came.”

“Hey,” Izuku offered a shy smile, unsure still of his placement here. “Chisaki, this is Shinsou – Shinsou, Chisaki. He’s a –“

“I recognize him,” Chisaki said flatly, his voice going dead. “What’re you doing bringing a hero wannabe in here? He’s the next enemy in training.”

“A good evening to you, too,” Hitoshi said, mirroring Chisaki’s tone to a tee. “A pleasure, I know. I’m an honor to be here and so on and so forth. Where is the alcohol?”

Izuku looked between the two and heaved a sigh as he pointed. Hitoshi aimed an arch look Chisaki’s way, looking right down his nose at the shorter man as he passed. Omega be damned, Hitoshi knew how to shut a lesser man down with a single glance.

Chisaki would never be anyone’s lesser man.

“Midoriya. Really.”

“He’s my best friend,” Izuku stressed. “My only friend.”

The weight of Chisaki’s stare did not relent.

“If he causes any trouble –“

“If anyone causes trouble with him, I’d wager it would be you, so let’s all just be good, okay?”

“Good,” Chisaki repeated, his serious mouth twitching. “When you put it that way, how could I be otherwise to your very dear friend?”

“The way you say that terrifies me.”

“Then I’ve still got it. What are you frowning at?”

Izuku peered around Chisaki’s shoulder to where a tall, lanky man leaned against a large stack of wooden crates, far from some of the mingling guests and music. His hair splayed out in an halo of thorny, black spikes, his jacket and pants just shy of ragged and over-worn. His face was shadowed, but Izuku could tell he was looking this way.

“Oh. Dabi.” If Chisaki’s voice could get any more brittle, he’d disintegrate the same as his Quirk. “Don’t bother.”

“Why not?”

Before Chisaki could reply, Hitoshi had returned with a beer in hand and a blank, droll expression he only employed when he was on guard and didn’t want to a soul to read his thoughts. He really was extraordinary.

“Some chick already forcibly showed me her tattooed nipples,” he said. “This is going to be a night, isn’t it.”

“You’re welcome to leave at any time,” Chisaki said.

Hitoshi smiled thinly.

“Aren’t you just the most gracious host?”

Chisaki was sniping something in return, but Izuku was already walking away.

Why? He had no idea – nothing logical, anyway. He just wanted to meet the man who chose to stand away from the rest.

“Hi.” The smile Izuku had revved up faltered, his eyes going too large as he took in the sight of a young man with what looked like scarred, almost necrotic purple skin stapled to his own face. “Oh. You’re, uh -”

“You were watching me,” Dabi said in a voice like burnt out cigarettes and rough leather. His crooked grin stretched the stitches along his cheek. His eye color reminded Izuku of Bunsen burner flame, too hot to touch, while his expression remained somehow approachable.

Charming. He was what people called ‘charming’, right? Izuku wasn’t sure. He just knew that Dabi wasn’t just fascinating to look out – he had a draw to him. A magnetism.

Izuku ignored the heat in his cheeks and hoped his face wasn’t as red as it felt.

“I guess. Um. You’re – you’re Dabi, right? Chisaki’s friend?”

Dabi’s dark eyebrows rose high.

“Friend is a word for it. Inaccurate, but a word all the same. And you? What’s little red riding shoes doing with the big bad wolves?”

“I’m n-not that little,” Izuku said. He was a man here too, wasn’t he? Just because he didn’t look like he’d had his share of fights didn’t mean he hadn’t had them. He just happened to come out on top more often than not these days. “A-and I’m stronger than I look.”

Dabi cocked his head, the slash of his teeth quite white for someone who seemed to have a pack of cigarettes rolled in the t-shirt sleeve against his upper arm.

“Since you look like a privileged schoolboy, I’d say it wouldn’t be very difficult to be stronger than you look.”

Privileged – him? Izuku boggled, then recovered, determined not to show his hand in full around people like this. Weak just wouldn’t do anymore. People who hung out in abandoned warehouses would smell the vulnerability on him more than they ever would his overwhelming scent. Packs like this fed off straggling loners like him.

“I guess you’re pretty strong, then.” Izuku eyed Dabi’s arms, shoulders. Alpha? Beta? He couldn’t tell yet.

Dabi hummed, stubby lashes lowered as he dug the crumpled cigarette pack from his sleeve and brought it to his mouth. His lower lip, gnarled and scarred purple, caught one slim smoke. His movements were all smooth, careless elegance as he pocketed the pack and brought his thumb and forefinger to the cigarette’s tip.

Their eyes held then, blue blue burning blue, and Dabi snapped his fingers. A sapphire flame shot up, lit the tip, and flickered out. Izuku’s breath caught in his throat, oxygen evacuated, his heart stumbling, his gut glowing with the same cherry flame on which Dabi sucked.

Izuku coughed when Dabi blew smoke in his face, and Izuku found that he didn’t even care.

“What’re you looking for, Little Red?”

“Me?” Someone had suddenly cranked the music in the warehouse, a pounding at the back of his skull, at the base of his spine, a deep, insistent thrum between his thighs. Izuku licked his lips, surveying Dabi’s knowing smirk. “What do you mean? I’m not looking for anything.”

Dabi’s laugh was more a dry cough, his cigarette caught in the slender vee of his fingers. They looked long, capable. Capable of things Izuku was sure he didn’t want to know about – and others of which he was extremely… curious.

“Kid. People don’t hang out here ‘less they’re looking for something.”

Izuku bristled at the nickname, face scrunched as his shoulders turned in on himself, made him smaller than he already was.

“I-I wouldn’t know what –“

“Chisaki said you’re a scrappy one,” Dabi murmured, as if Izuku hadn’t spoken. Grey smoke flared from his nostrils like a dragon, a thin veil that couldn’t quite mask the cutting turquoise of those lazy eyes. “He wouldn’t mention it for no reason. Am I supposed to be careful of you, I wonder, or challenge you a little? Test those –“ Lazy eyes swept the length of Izuku’s body, lingered at the jut of his hipbones, swept up to linger on his frowning mouth, “boundaries.”

He must be an Alpha. The knowledge liquefied like thick, hot syrup dripping down between Izuku’s thighs.

“I –“ Izuku averted his eyes, his body delighting in this inherent mating dance as he looked to his feet, flicked a glance back up. “I don’t know what Chisaki’s saying about me, but – he didn’t have to save me. I can take a beating just as well as I can take a win. I’m not – I’m not soft.”

“Oh?” Dabi cocked his head, considering. “Aren’t you, though?”

Too quickly, Dabi had Izuku’s wrist in his hold, spider blue veins upward between them, Izuku’s hand curled into an instinctive fist. Realization and horror dawning, Izuku watched with huge eyes as Dabi held the almost extinguished stub end of his cigarette just shy of his pale, exposed skin.

Neither of them moved. Izuku’s heart swelled in his throat, choking him off. His skin vibrated with – with what? Fear, anxiety, desire, the dare.

Find out what I’m made of. I will get back up again. I will always get back up again.

The acrid scent of searing skin came before the pain seized up his arm like a white-hot flare. Izuku gasped like a punch to the gut, gritting his teeth to dust on his tongue, lips curled back against the burn. Neither of them looked away.

Something shifted in Dabi’s expression, dull ambivalence to keen curiosity.

“Well,” Dabi crooned, dropping the stub and guiding Izuku’s open injury to his mouth. He pressed a wet kiss there, blew on it with surprisingly cool, soothing breath, their eyes holding. Scalding waves rolled up Izuku’s arm. “Aren’t you something, Little Red.”

Izuku shuddered a breath, mouth lax as his lashes fluttered, absorbing the pain, the electricity of being alive. He opened his eyes, felt fuzzy, licked his lips.

“Was that a test?”

Dabi smile beatifically, the staples at his cheeks threatening to split.

“And you passed so beautifully. Come here, pretty Omega. You get a prize.”

“Don’t call me that,” Izuku mumbled, still not confident with the request. People saw and smelled what they saw and smelled. I didn’t matter if he asked people to ignore the identifier. Most people never paid attention, anyway.

“Omega?” Dabi said, digging through a pocket of his jacket. He emerged with a plastic baggy, filled with tiny sapphire squares that looked like paper. “Fine. Your kind usually like it. Coddling and shit.”

“Not me,” Izuku said, finding his voice now, riding the charred pain running rampant up his wrist.

“Smart kid.”

“Not a kid, either.” Izuku narrowed his eyes as Dabi placed a singular square on his forefinger, bright blue as his eyes.

“How old are you, anyway?”

Izuku licked his lips slow enough to watch Dabi watch them.

“What is that?”

“What you’ve been looking for.”

Izuku had never encountered anything past occasional weed, when he could find it. He liked the high and heaviness to his limbs, the thrum of peace like his head was cradled against his mother’s chest.

Sometimes that wasn’t enough. Lately, never enough.

Izuku licked a long, flat line up Dabi’s finger, tasted skin and salt and smoke. Heart like a sledgehammer, Izuku kept Dabi’s smirk in his sights and sucked down the digit between his lips in an invitation he’d never given to another.

Dabi curled his knuckle, hooked Izuku’s lip like a caught fish, and pulled him in a breath away.

“You know, Little Red, I think you might be what I’ve been looking for, too.”

 

The walls were breathing. Izuku didn’t know if his eyes were open or not, but he was sure the warehouse ceiling was heaving towards him, great grey pipes reaching out for him like a hundred cradling arms.

Beaming, his smile cutting his face in half all the way around the back of his head, Izuku reached out, out, out, and oh my goodness, did his hand stretch into eternity and grip the fiery stars. They felt like spikes, black and blue shards, vibrating in his hands, which weren’t hands anymore but huge things that held entire galaxies, sparking spirals, constellations shaped like battering rams and swans.

“I’m holding stars,” Izuku whispered, whispered so loudly his ears spilled sparkling moonshine.

“You’re pulling my hair,” Dabi said with a jagged laugh that felt like blue flames licking scars into his skin. Izuku blinked up at him in awe, marveling at the shifting eyes all over his face, his shoulders, his arms. How did it feel to see everything about a person, in every direction, in past, present, future with those orbital eyes?

“Oh.” Izuku touched them, sharp eyelashes that could cut. “Oh, you’re beautiful.”

“Red,” was all Dabi huffed, the kanji searing into the air, lingering black and hot. Izuku waved his hand, dispelled the smoke and laughed like shooting stars as Dabi brought his ankles up to rest on those all-seeing shoulders. “Shit.”

Izuku’s body bloomed like the big bang, organic, orgasmic, an ovation from the universe as his core swelled and filled with Dabi, with the dragon man who blew smoke and made words come to life in the air and guarded his hoard of blue eyes and bluer slips of magic confetti.

Dabi licked into his mouth, breathing curses into Izuku’s lungs, omens that opened up behind Izuku’s eyelids and looked out through his eyes, made him someone new, someone different who was just wearing this deceitful skin. Izuku cried out, saw his soul in orange, and dug his nails into the dragon’s back, and prayed in poetry and prose that when he next opened his eyes, he’d be the person everyone was supposed to see.

 

Splayed out on a bare mattress in the backroom of a warehouse, Izuku woke up thirteen hours later, if his two-percent battery told him accurately. He’d missed nineteen phone calls from his mother and eight voicemails. Ignoring them for the time being – or, entirely, because it wasn’t as if he didn’t know what was on them – Izuku groaned and rolled onto his stomach to investigate series of texts from Hitoshi.

He winced at the wide ache bruising from between his thighs to the back of his neck. What had he sucked off of Dabi’s finger last night? Or, heck, had he sucked more than his finger? Almost… almost definitely.

Izuku yelped as his hands went limp and sloppy with exhaustion and his mobile knocked him flat on the face. He sputtered it away and frowned, eyes narrow and gritty, at the seething circle of spreading red in the center of his wrist.

A zing of recognition crackled at his frayed nerves. Izuku bit his lip, angled his arm in the watered down sunshine and afternoon dust motes, inspecting the scabbing wound with a dull, mental distance that didn’t feel at all like his overly anxious skull noise.

Nice.

Remembering the texts, Izuku rolled to his side, screwing up his face at the wake of dried cum and Omega slick crusting the soft hairs along his thighs. Flashes of the night were like a distorted dream, difficult to piece together, but nothing that Izuku necessarily had a desire to compose.

23:43 Hey, where did you go? I’m stuck talking to your “”””FRIEND”””” Chisaki and boy is he a laugh riot. Save me.

24:16 When did this place get so packed? I didn’t know we were going to rave. I’d have worn hotpants. Just kidding. Or am I? But seriously, where are you?

1:04 I may have made out with your “”””FRIEND””””. This is what you get for leaving me alone. I hope you’re having fun, asshole. (The asshole part was not serious, if you dwell on it I will murder you dead.)

1:05 Do not be dead. I don’t trust 99% of the people here. You are the 1%

1:39 If you’re even reading these and I doubt you are by the state of what I just saw, Chisaki helped me find you where you were dancing in the middle of the crowd with no shirt and a guy who looks like he wears other peoples’ skin for fun so ENJOY??? I GUESS??? LIVE YOUR LIFE.

2:07 You’d better be wearing a condom.

2:07 I only say this because I forgot mine and thankfully certain “”””PEOPLE”””” had them on hand in our time of need.

2:08 Am I disappointment of a hero? I feel like this is the last reason why I would be, at least.

3:31 I’ve been waiting around for you, but Skin For Hire showed me you were passed out cold. Chisaki said he’d get you home safe when you woke up. I’m trying to trust that guy. I think he has a soft spot for you. In the creepy platonic way. Is no one immune to the Midoriya charms?

4:17 At the dorms. Text me when you return to the land of the living, you party animal you. Didn't know you had it in you. Not sure if that worries me or what.

“Midoriya,” Chisaki’s smooth voice sounded from the doorway, and Izuku bolted upright, expression aghast as he sat splayed on the mattress without a stitch of clothing to his person.

“Ch-Chisaki, what! Are you! Hello! I’m naked!”

“It’s been known to happen,” Chisaki replied with an arched brow. Those strange gloves and the white flu mask donned his face again, the same as when they’d met, but those feline eyes were expression enough. “Are you – Get dressed so I can get you back to the train in one piece.”

“Yes!” Izuku yelped, jumping to a stand, going red as he realized what he was doing, and awkwardly covered his crotch. “Um.”

“I’ll be out here,” Chisaki said, utterly unfazed as he turned and disappeared.

With a shaky breath and even shakier legs, Izuku dressed, checked his now-dead phone with a sigh, and tied his shoes.

Little Red, that smoked-out voice hovered at the periphery of Izuku’s memory.

The way he’d felt last night. The freedom, the forgetting, the pain, this morning’s ache. Izuku had felt alive, a part of something, desired, even somehow safe, now that he knew the feel of strong arms and body enveloping him.

Last night had been everything he didn’t experience on an everyday basis. Acceptance, excitement, joy, pleasure, acknowledgement, safety. The essence of danger remained, but Izuku lived danger every day that he walked around smelling the way he did. He was growing accustomed to feel of never being relazed.

Wobbling into the main area of the wide-open warehouse, Izuku canted his wrist and glanced at the angry, red wound.

Yeah. He’d be back.

“He did that to you?” Chisaki said, suddenly right beside him – or, not so suddenly, and Izuku had lost himself in a daze. “Piece of shit. You let him?”

Izuku blinked up into those ferocious feline eyes.

“I – I mean, I guess I did. I don’t – it wasn’t bad.”

“You’re going to have that forever, you know.” Chisaki’s voice was low and cool.

Izuku cracked a crooked smile as a familiar dread settled in his stomach.

“It’s okay. I’m fine.”

Notes:

CHAPTER SUMMARY: Izuku, sixteen (a few weeks from seventeen) sneaks out of the house at night. On the train, an Alpha pleasures himself in public while looking at Izuku - something that Izuku is growing used to as a reaction to his overpowering Omega scent. He is angry and terrified and manages to get off the train at his stop. He takes Hitoshi to a warehouse, where he introduces Chisaki as a Beta who saved him from two Alphas a couple of weeks ago. Hitoshi & Chisaki do not particularly get along, especially as Chisaki is noted to hate most heroes. Izuku meets Dabi for the first time. In some kind of silent dare, Dabi mimes as if to burn Izuku's wrist with the end of the cigarette. Izuku let's it happen - he wants that release of pain. Dabi offers him LSD and, without knowing what it is or what it does, Izuku takes it, while also propositioning Dabi for something more. During his LSD trip, he has sex with Dabi, and though he is technically willing, he is barely conscious of the actual act of sex itself. He wakes up to find he has not used a condom, his mother has called over a dozen times, and Hitoshi's texts through the night. Izuku thinks back to the way he felt so alive and embraced and safe - both from the pain and drugs and the act of sex. He knows he will return. Chisaki helps bring Izuku back to the train station, and he's not happy that Izuku allowed Dabi to scar him.

Songs For This Chapter (this is a new thing):
Come Over To My House - Herizen, Lunice | Spotify | YouTube
Week - 7751 | Spotify | YouTube
BURN IT - FEVER 333 | Spotify | YouTube

Chapter 17

Summary:

“Has it occurred to you that it is perhaps not the world that you no longer trust, but yourself?”

Notes:

Thank you everyone for your continued support! Because of you, this fic that I wasn't expecting anything of, as far as how well it would be received, is now the #1 most Kudos BkDk fic, and after this chapter releases, will pass 100,000 Hits. I appreciate everyone who has immersed themselves in this fic along with me, and I hope you stick with me for the ~40 chapter ride!

PS: Music that inspired my chapter is at the bottom once more!

“I’m finally happy where I am in life.”

Izuku’s therapist crossed her legs, her face neutral, watchful. Ms Hayate was forever the epitome of bland, in the most comforting, objective kind of way. She’d disappear into a crowd and Izuku kind of liked that about her. Probably due to her utterly non-threatening Beta aura, she’d come highly recommended for trauma victims.

Emerging from the hospital at twenty-one, reeling from the direction his personal life had dived, and determined to change it, Izuku had been pointed to this very office.

Five years later, here he remained.

At Ms Hayate’s lingering silence, Izuku twisted his bottom lip with his thumb and forefinger, gaze focused on the ocean watercolor on the wall. He didn’t like large bodies of water. Unstable, too easy to drown.

“I am,” Izuku repeated, a little stronger. “It’s like I told him, already. I’ve worked hard for a quiet, boring life. I like boring, I want boring. Quiet bookstore, money enough to just get by and save a little, friends who support me, a routine that doesn’t involve random sexual encounters or drugs or fights or flirting with viciously handsome heroes with cocky smiles and sex appeal like a fucking flamethrower or –“

“Mr Midoriya.”

Izuku stopped, eyes large.

“I – yes?”

“Is it safe to say that your life up until the incident with your ex-boyfriend was exciting?”

“Um.” Unsure of where this was leading, Izuku nodded cautiously. “Yes. Exciting is one word for it, I guess.”

“And how did you feel when your life was exciting?”

Izuku frowned.

“Aside from miserable?”

“Miserable was the emotion you were trying to forget or cover up. What did exciting feel to you?”

“Alive,” Izuku said, instantly, the word coming out of some deep, open grave inside. “Exhilarated. I was so angry with how I was treated by the world, but there was also something about taking everyone on every single day that made me feel like, like good and strong and brave and –“ Izuku wrinkled his nose, the curve of his lips sad, “and something like a hero for myself. Or something. I don’t know. It doesn’t make sense. I hurt myself – invited myself get hurt, get in fights, everything. But in the end, waking up every day knowing the world didn’t care about me and I could do whatever I wanted without giving a shit what anyone thought… I loved that.”

They were both silent for a while, Ms Hayate giving Izuku the time she’d long realized Izuku needed to process when certain realizations arose.

Quietly, measured, she spoke.

“Do you believe that a person’s life can only be exciting or boring? That there is no safe middle ground?”

“Of course not,” Izuku said with a hollow laugh, the nail of his forefinger scraping at the dead skin of his bottom lip. “That’s silly. Life is made up of a little of everything. It’s just that –“

I don’t deserve it.

I’m scared of it.

I’m afraid I’ll backslide again.

I don’t want to fuck it up when I finally start to get it right.

“It’s just that there’s no… no way of telling how much is too much, is there? What’s the right or wrong amount of – of excitement or sex or pain and pleasure.”

At this, Ms Hayate raised her brows, tucked her short, graying bob behind a small ear.

“Mr Midoriya. The self-control you’ve built within yourself over the years is solid. You are no longer the boy pretending to be strong – you are strong.”

Izuku let the assurance coddle him, warm and soft and sweet. He swallowed against the rising swell of emotion in his chest.

Ms Hayate breathed a soft sigh through her nose.

“Has it occurred to you that it is perhaps not the world that you no longer trust, but yourself?”

 

The deep night wind screeched sharp, icy fingers at Izuku’s face as he ducked further into the nest of his thick scarf and cursed himself for leaving his hat at the shop. Double cursed himself for the way his bimonthly session had ended, his evacuation from the room punctuated with stutters and staccato sentences.

He had a lot to unpack, and a much of it old and musty and unpleasant from his past.

But Izuku had principles, okay?

A vast array of them. Maybe too many, he was beginning to think.

Admittedly, they’d previously grown muddled and mixed during the years in which he’d felt the world had thrown him to the dogs as life’s chew toy. His ideals had been a little gnawed on, his confidence put through the meat grinder, his self-worth left out in the rain and sun-bleached too long.

Regardless. He’d rebuilt. Higher walls, greater fortitude. Ammo.

And his principles – well, they’d been replaced with new, better ones.

Sex or dating or otherwise with Tokyo’s notoriously savage top hero absolutely did not fit within those sturdy, unwavering ideals by which Izuku currently lived.

But then, there was more to it than that. More to them than that. Izuku couldn’t pretend there wasn’t, anymore.

He couldn’t pretend the blame was all on Bakugou, anymore, either. They might not know each other well, but Izuku knew enough to see a man who was throwing a great amount of effort onto the table while Izuku was busy hiding beneath it.

For the hundredth time in his life, Izuku reminded himself that just because a man put effort into him, or showed interest in him, didn’t mean he was obligated out of kindness or fear to reciprocate.

And for the first time, on this lonely street with his face scraped raw with January’s merciless punch and his heart bigger and warmer than it had been in a long time, Izuku realized that what Bakugou had set upon the table might be something to which Izuku could sit down and consider.

Cheeks flushed and not from the cold, Izuku quickly ducked into the glass door of Parchment, cutting off the weather’s howls behind him. Shaking off the cold and shuddering with it, Izuku unzipped his obnoxiously oversized puffer jacket and wandered toward the front desk.

“How many times am I going to have to tell you to keep your shoes off the counter?” Izuku said with the resignation of a battle lost years ago.

Chisaki peered up from his magazine with disinterested, dull gold eyes.  His gaze flicked to his tastefully pristine boots before he wordlessly dropped them down and tossed the aside his reading material.

“I sold some knocked up Omega seven books on pregnancy and raising children. You’re welcome. Too bad she doesn’t know the secret to raising kids is there is none, and she just wasted a shit ton of money she could be saving to divorce the Alpha I smelled on her.”

“Is that all you think about?” Izuku said with a half smile as she shrugged from his coat and playfully threw it across the register to smack Chisaki in the face.

“It’s all this society thinks about, so it’s inevitably on my mind. Used to be on yours, too.”

Izuku flicked a brow at the barb but chose not to rise. Chisaki had his own life experiences and reasons for his opinions. Once upon a time, their ideals had matched. That, or Izuku suspected he’d grown to copy Chisaki’s out of some sense of brotherhood.

Didn’t matter now.

“Eri still here?”

“Manga,” Chisaki said, offhand, frowning down at something on his cellphone.

“Alright. I’ll grab her and you guys can pack up and go before I close up. It’s bitter out there tonight. Be safe.”

“Ditto.”

“Thanks for the help.”

“Always.”

The high, cluttered shelves and stacks warmed Izuku’s bones as he passed between them and their soft gold lighting. Coddled him like the softly beating chambers of a heart, all tender pulse and lifeblood to him. This was a fine home away from the world, and there wasn’t a day Izuku wasn’t thankful to Mr Yagi and his will to pass this store on to him.

“Hey,” Izuku’s voice cracked a little from the lingering cold his chest as he approached.

Splayed out on a pile of beanbag chairs all mashed together into one amorphous blob of comfort, Eri blinked up from a manga she held close to her nose and bloomed into a smile. Her hair was a white waterfall around her, waves and waves over everything and much too long to reasonably handle. Chisaki had grown extremely talented at braiding over the years. He’d watched a lot of tutorials on the internet.

“Uncle Izuku, you’re back!”

“I am back,” Izuku agreed, smiling wide and goofy as he flopped back into one of the bags and dropped his head to Eri’s shoulder to peer into the book. “Nice art. I haven’t read this one yet. This is the female Omega knight, right?”

“Yup! I like it so far. I’ve only had time to read the last five volumes since you left, though.”

“Only five?” Izuku ruffled the top of her head and gave a sheepish grin of apology when she puffed up her cheeks in sweet, baby-faced exasperation. “Sorry, I know, I know. You finish your homework for the night?”

“Yeeeah,” Eri groaned, dropping her head back to the beanbag to stare at the ceiling. “Dad always makes me.”

“Well he’s a fine father like that.”

Eri rolled her eyes in true teen fashion and shut the manga with a snap.

“He doesn’t let me go into town with my friends, though. To hang out and shop and stuff. I’m almost fifteen! What did your parents let you do when you were fifteen?”

“Uh.” Izuku patted her knee and lurched up, struggling to stand. “I’ll talk to him for you. Your dad is – he’s very protective of you. He loves you more than most people love anything.”

“The world isn’t out to steal me away, anymore, though,” Eri said under her breath as she stood and collected the stack of manga she’d ploughed through. Her sweet, round face was losing some of its chubbiness, and her eyes were a bright, cracking spark of red that reminded Izuku of someone else who didn’t appreciate being tamed. “And I haven’t even presented. It’s not like he can say he’s protecting me from Alphas or whatever. I just want to be normal. With my friends. They already think he shoves people in the ocean with cement feet for a living!”

Izuku choked at that, sputtering out a coughing laugh as he took the manga from Eri’s hold and briskly began to walk toward the front.

“Thank goodness we both know that’s not true, eh!”

“Uncle.”

“I’ll talk to him, I will, I promise!”

Amid the stacks, Eri tackled him from behind, her embrace tight around his waist as she rested her cheek on his back. Izuku’s chest puffed up with happy clouds.

Eri had been six and Izuku had been seventeen when Chisaki had finally revealed her to him. Izuku had been on the outside of what Chisaki had done with the majority of his private time back then, mainly because Izuku had been busy with school during many months. He’d paid attention to the news enough, but that hero stuff had always triggered him into a bad mood back into his teens, and so his knowledge of what had happened back then was limited.

He did know that the Eri he’d met on her sixth birthday – which Chisaki had asked him to attend at his, well, his yakuza compound that equaled a home – that Eri had been timid and shy and traumatized from a life of being passed between the true, evil underworld of Tokyo.

Kidnapped from four, from under the nose of her grandfather, the yakuza head at the time, Eri had disappeared into the ether. Chisaki, while not directly related to her as a father, but more a cousin, had gone on a personal vendetta for her return.

Years and years had passed before Chisaki had commented on those shady warehouse parties full of goons. The entire time, he’d created a name for himself in that seedy community to gain the trust of the people lurking beneath. The raves, the drugs, the crime – Chisaki had concocted it all to draw out those who had taken her.

And he’d gotten Eri back. Part of a city had fallen to its knees for her, crumbled to foundations at the hands beneath Chisaki’s pristine gloves.

And now Eri was here. And she was Izuku’s as much as she was anyone else’s.

“Thank you,” Eri said into Izuku’s sweater.

“Of course,” Izuku murmured, peering down at the brave knight on the cover, wielding her sword. “Always.”

Once Chisaki and Eri had been bundled and shooed out into the night, Izuku locked the doors, put on easy, acoustic instrumentals, and wandered about the shop, tidying and humming as he travelled. Each aisle folded memories in its pages, and it was when Izuku was alone that he was able to revisit them like old friends.

A nineteen year old Izuku, running like the wind from a fight he may have picked himself, bursting through the door of Parchment with a bloody eyebrow and electricity in his eyes. The tall, emaciated man with the kind smile and booming voice handing him a book that would turn the tides of his life. A twenty-one year old fool fumbling into a familiar shop, eyes wide when he recognized the same man behind the desk looking worse for wear, but unchanged in sunshine demeanor and Apollo aura.

Two years of weekends spent here instead of getting into trouble all over again. Small talk, deep talk, books, books, books. Mr Yagi’s funeral – one Izuku hadn’t attended or known about because Mr Yagi was his only connection to the man’s life, and when he’d died, Izuku had only known something was wrong when he came to the shop and it hadn’t yet opened.

Eri running wild through the aisles on an empty Wednesday afternoon, pigtails like silver shooting stars. Eating dozens of tasteless dinners alone in the backroom, content and nested away from the world. Shinsou’s laugh from floor to ceiling. Inasa knocking over the end caps, his shoulders too wide for his own good. The night they spent here one New Year, drunk as fish, and Izuku caught the way Chisaki allowed Inasa to kiss to top of his head when the month turned over into midnight.

Bakugou. Flashes of red and gold and black, setting fire to every comfort and carefully crafted wall Izuku had managed to build over the years. Bakugou, embracing him with a guttural growl of ownership. Bakugou, marking him without permission. Bakugou, asking for more books. Bakugou, canting his chin up as he kept his powerful Alpha body low and prone for Izuku’s appraisal. Bakugou, demanding, asking, pleading.

With a coat to block against the cold, Izuku kicked open the back door, both hands full of recycling and garbage as he stomped into the unlit alley.

Izuku’s Alpha-sensitive ears caught the gargled scream before he could see a thing.

He took off at a sprint, thick thighs shooting him down the side street, jaw clenched against the cold, heart clattering with panic and the raw instinct to save. Bursting from the alley and straight into traffic, Izuku lofted over the hood of a honking car, ear cocked just so to catch another wretched screech cut off quickly. Swerved, dove down another alley and startled when he saw a distant figure crouched over a struggling body, face jammed into the length of their throat.

“HEY!” Strength and power revved through Izuku’s legs as he kicked into high gear and rocketed through the dark. “STOP!”

Horror and confused dawned as, right before Izuku’s eyes, the figure popped out of existence. Izuku stumbled in shock, tripped over his foot, and face planted into the pavement before scrambling to his knees and quickly crawling to the squirming, whimpering victim.

“Shhh,” Izuku crooned, eyes bulging as he focused on the young man’s neck wound, his chewed-up wrists. He yanked off his sweater and bunched it, firmly pushing it to the open wound on the guy’s weeping, bloodied neck. “It’s okay, it’s okay, I’m here. I’m here. Gonna call for –“

“What’s going on here?”

Izuku whipped a frantic look over his shoulder, his shoulders sagging with relief at the sight of a police officer.

“I saw you run in here like your ass was on fire and – shit. Shit, alright. I’m calling this in. You see anyone? Anyone on the run?”

“I –“ Izuku shook his head, unable to describe what he’d seen while his hands were holding the life into a human. “No. No one’s running. Just – just get an ambulance!”

Izuku ignored the officer from then on, curled around the body of the young man – hell, he could barely be sixteen, if that. Dark, sharp eyes wide and wet with terror, Izuku refused to look away. All he could say, over and over, was –

I’m here, I’m here, I’m here.

 

Yawning, Izuku fought against the weight of his eyelids as he dropped his head back against the wall, the old precinct chair doing no favors for his ass, spine, or comfort. At least it was keeping him awake. Mostly.

He’d given his statement in detail, including his report of the strange, disappearing attacker. The perpetrator had clearly used a Quirk, but what and how would remain a mystery, at least to Deku. Unsurprisingly, the police had firmly refused to discuss anything past his statement.

However, they had allowed him to sit around and wait on a call from the hospital to report the victim’s stability, or otherwise. Izuku knew he’d interrupted the attack, and luck had been on that boy’s side tonight, in at least the sense that he’d get to live.

Izuku hoped, anyway.

So he sat and watched the clock and waited.

“Oiy!”

“WAH!” Izuku shot up from his unintentional sleep, flailing, looking around. “What – what? Where am – oh.”

Izuku blinked up with goopy sleep eyes at a towering visage in black from head to toe, raging red eyes and slash of serious mouth.

“Bakugou?”

“No shit.” Bakugou folded his arms across his barrel chest and rocked back on his heels, face drawn tight with displeasure as he peered around the precinct. “Hello? I’m fuckin’ here, already. I’m taking this guy home. HELLO?”

Izuku frowned, brain farting as he attempted to keep up with what was happening on this day. Or, night. The clock on the wall marked just past two in the morning.

“I’m – I didn’t call you. I don’t even know your phone number.”

“Yeah, well.” Bakugou cast a long, lingering look over the length of Izuku’s body, not just head to toe, but seemingly inside and out with a single, searing stare. Izuku’s cheeks burned beneath the scrutiny. “I know your name, and when I’m on night shift and hear another Omega attack came up and the one and only witness and rescuer is you -”

With nothing to say in reply, Izuku merely met Bakugou’s gaze with his own bleary one.  They watched each other for a moment before Bakugou’s frame seemed to deflate, arms dropping to his sides, frown softening as he leaned in and reached out.

Izuku went still, alert, attention rapt on Bakugou’s outstretched fingers, and flinched in shock when Bakugou lightly thumbed at the bridge of Izuku’s nose, his chin. Gentle, despite the disgruntled scrunch of his brows.

“You’re all scraped up,” Bakugou rasped. “Looks like you fell in the playground.”

The pad of his thumb grazed Izuku’s lower lip, the touch a shock that sparked heat straight between Izuku’s thighs.

Izuku gasped, tongue flicking out to lick at fizzle along his bottom lip, the tip accidentally catching at Bakugou’s finger before he could remove it.

The reaction was instant.

Bakugou’s pupils blew out, eyes gone dark, hungry, predatory. His tan cheeks flushed, his grip shifting to hold Izuku’s chin tight.

Dizzy, Izuku’s lashes fluttered, too heavy, drugged by something more than simple attraction or fascination. A delicate sigh slipped from his mouth as he leaned in, sliding into Bakugou’s gravity.

A door beyond the front desk opened and they split with a start, Deku knocking his head against the wall as he jerked away, back of his hand over his mouth as Bakugou strode away to the officer. Bakugou’s swagger seemed unaffected, the set of his shoulders calm as he folded his arms upon the front desk and spoke in low tones to the woman on the other side.

Izuku fisted his hands upon his lap and stared straight ahead at the far wall, an aged poster about stranger danger in his sights. He inhaled sharply, nostrils flaring in a failed attempt to catch Bakugou’s scent – to catch his own and gauge how desperate he might have smelled. Impossible, of course. All he could do was shut his eyes and work the calm back into his blood, trust his body to relax and retract whatever desire he was no doubt singing like some siren’s call.

That desire in Bakugou’s eyes.

It hadn’t scared him at all. Not this time.

“I’m not leaving until I find out that boy is stable,” Izuku found himself saying into the nothing.

Of course, Bakugou always seemed to be listening. He looked over his shoulder, eyebrows high.

“You ain’t sleepin’ here all night, nerd.”

“I won’t sleep,” Izuku replied, stubborn set to his jaw as he evenly met Bakugou’s eyes. “I’ll wait.”

Again, they stared each other down. Less like some game of chicken and more like two people learning to read each other’s expressions for the first time.

With a restrained, high noise of frustration behind is clamped teeth, Bakugou whirled back to the officer. He reached back behind the desk, grabbed a scrap of paper and pen, scribbled something down and shoved it in the woman’s face.

“Have someone call me when the victim is stable. Immediately. I’ll know if you don’t.”

He turned back to a perplexed Izuku and gesture in a shooing motion toward the front double doors.

“Happy? Let’s fuckin’ go already.”

Izuku didn’t move.

“But if they call you how will I know if –“

Bakugou scoffed, sauntering over with hands tucked in the pockets of his parka, his expression lofty.

“You think I’m lettin’ you back in your house tonight after an Omega attack happened literal blocks away from your store? After the perpetrator might have seen your pretty little face? I know you ain’t stupid, so maybe you’re just really fuckin’ tired or a lot delusional.”

Izuku stood slowly, head cocked as he considered Bakugou’s demeanor with his own hardening one.

“Letting me? Mr Zero, you’re not letting me do anything. I think it’s more than clear I can take care of myself.” Izuku turned and collected his jacket, shifted it onto on arm and the other as he spoke clear and concise. “You have my appreciation for coming to check on me, or collect me, or whatever this is. Your concern, while unnecessary, is thoughtful, but –“

Then Bakugou’s body was pressed against the length of Izuku’s chest to back, crotch to bottom, Bakugou’s mouth brushing Izuku’s ear.

“Let me rephrase in a way you won’t turn to fuckin’ stone over. You’ve just experienced a traumatic incident, you have no one to go home to, and you look half way between passing out and coming out of an adrenaline shock. I’m not… I don’t even know what the hell you think of me half the time, but this isn’t about anything except my need to – let me just –“

With a snarl, Bakugou spun away and Izuku mirrored him just in time to see Bakugou stalk to the opposite side of the room, pulling at his hair for a second before taking a series of sharp breaths. He turned, face taut with something Izuku didn’t recognize in any Alpha he’d previously dated, but knew to be… concern, worry.

“Let me take you home, Izuku. I’ll – I’m not gonna do any- for fuck’s sake, I’ll sleep on the couch! I just… need to know you’re safe tonight.”

Izuku blanked out, his body and brain fizzing and popping light bright, gold champagne bubbles from head to toe, lifting him up, lightening him, buoying his heart with Bakugou’s unfamiliar words.

“Um.”

Bakugou’s scowl deepened.

“Um, what? What the crap comes after that?”

“Um.” Izuku flailed his hands a little, looking everywhere but Bakugou as he attempting to collect himself. His tentative gaze found Bakugou’s waiting one. “Okay?”

“Okay,” Bakugou repeated, cautious.

“Okay.” Izuku swallowed, looking down as he zipped up his coat. “But you’re definitely sleeping on the couch.”

“I don’t say shit I don’t mean,” Bakugou grumbled as he held open the glass door for Izuku. “You’ll figure that out if you know what’s good for you.”

Izuku couldn’t help the slow curve of his lips as he passed through, his shoulder brushing Bakugou as he stepped into the cold.

“How you always manage to make assurances sound like threats remains a mystery to me.”

“Yeah, yeah,” Bakugou drawled as he followed. He paused, took a deep breath of the winter air and looked to the smoggy night sky, exhaled through his nostrils like an angry bull. “Let’s go home, already.”

Izuku didn’t like how good those words sounded in his ear, but he followed Bakugou to his car, anyway, and remained silent for the rest of the ride.

 

In possibly the most surreal experience of Izuku’s life – and he’d taken way too much acid and mushrooms in his teen years – he found himself walking into the apartment of a number one pro-hero to spend the night. Said hero who, by all perplexing accounts, was determined to clumsily court him.

Stranger things might happen in the future, but at this point, Izuku had reached his pinnacle.

“Wow,” Izuku managed as he shrugged off his shoes and coat at the entrance. “Your living room is as big as my apartment.”

Sleek, black leather furniture, warm grey walls, a dominant area rug in sharp geometric shapes in shades of fire, pops of orange pillows and throws here and there. Something about the cohesiveness made Izuku think it had something to do with a very persuasive friend or interior designer. Izuku might not know Bakugou deeply, but he was fairly certain the man never actively bought a throw pillow in his life.

Bakugou grunted, hanging his and Izuku’s coats on the pegs beside the door.

“Like your place better.”

Frowning at that, Izuku kept close to Bakugou’s heels, following him into a tidy kitchen with very few appliances on display.

“Why?”

“Why what?” Bakugou filled his sleek, metallic kettle with water at the sink and flicked the switch to boil. “Tea?”

“Why do you like my place better? Yours is huge and, I don’t know. Fancy.” Izuku’s eyes grew large as Bakugou opened a high cabinet stocked from top to bottom with an array of teas. “That’s a lot of tea. You don’t drink coffee?”

“Coffee makes me –“ Bakugou rolled his eyes. “I mean, I don’t need it. Makes me crazy.”

“I’m shocked.”

“Aren’t we fuckin’ hilarious tonight. Do you want the tea or not?”

Izuku shoved in beside Bakugou, his shoulder warm against Bakugou’s as he rose to his toes to frown at the selection. He plucked a box from the center of a stack.

“This onewoah!” Izuku yelped, sending the tea flying.

A hot, calloused hand slid over Izuku’s hip, sneaking beneath the hem of his t-shirt to settle on skin. For the second time tonight, Bakugou’s low, velvet voice sounded in Izuku’s burning ear.

“And since you asked – I like your place because it’s like you. Small, warm, smells like home.”

A long breath shuddered from Izuku’s lungs as he leaned into the touch, lashes fluttering shut as he gave way to the weight of his desire, if just for a moment.

“Bakugou…”

Bakugou hummed in question, mouth skimming the exposed gland at Izuku’s neck, one no doubt beating in time with his pulse and sopping with scent.

“M’not –“ Izuku reached a hand up and back, carded his fingers in Bakugou’s fine hair. “Not small.”

“Could throw you over my shoulder ‘n carry you wherever I damn well wanted,” Bakugou murmured, the flat of his tongue gliding once over Izuku’s gland.

Izuku gasped, breath hitching in his throat, eyes wide and unseeing as a long-forgotten fire flared to life, euphoric and maddening in turn.

“I –“ Izuku keened, both arms up now, fingers linking back at the nape of Bakugou’s neck, welcoming the pair of work-roughened hands rasping both soft and gritty up his waist, down his stomach. “I imagine you could – oh – could do that with anyone.”

“No,” Bakugou nipped at Izuku’s gland, licked at blissful sting. “Only you. Only you, idiot.”

Izuku’s knees went weak, would have collapsed with the power of Bakugou’s words, his hands, his body, had Izuku not been holding onto him for dear life, leaning against him in full delirium of whatever the hell this was between them. He’d never – never – felt this physically reactive to another without some kind of drug or drink or stimulant. This was outrageous, unheard of, utterly –

“Wait,” Izuku breathed out, hips arching into Bakugou’s touch, those dangerous fingers halting at the button of his jeans. Izuku spun in Bakugou’s hold, found himself embraced, his palms flat upon that wide, muscular chest as he thudded his forehead lightly against Bakugou’s shoulder. “Wait wait wait.”

A guttural groan ripped from Bakugou’s throat, a ferocity that shook Izuku to the bone, left him trembling and rapt as Bakugou nosed at Izuku’s temple, cheek, chin, and finally claimed his mouth in a sloppy, savage kiss.

The world fell away.

A full, welcoming moan swelled from Izuku’s mouth as he circled his arms around Bakugou’s neck and sunk into him, lavish laps of tongue and five years’ loneliness spilling over and out. Bakugou was so reactive against him, hungry, insatiable, a spark shivering up a length of bright red dynamite. Overwhelming.

Izuku pulled back with a deep wheeze of breath, reeling and holding tight to Bakugou’s shoulders for balance. Bakugou’s arms were like a vice around him, his face burrowed against Izuku’s neck, lips hot and humid against Izuku’s pulsing, sensitive gland.

“’Zuku, Izuku,” Bakugou grated out, muffled by Izuku’s sweaty skin, Bakugou gasping for breath, body practically vibrating beneath Izuku’s touch. “You have no fucking idea how much I –“

He cut himself off, nuzzling at Izuku’s ear in a tender way Izuku couldn’t imagine was possible for an Alpha. Or, well, Bakugou – ever.

“Bakugou, this is, uh,” Izuku swallowed hard, attempted to pull back, and huffed a laugh of surprise when he found Bakugou wasn’t letting go any time soon. “This is, well, yes, okay, I admit that this is really really –“

“Talk too much, say too little,” Bakugou mumbled, notably sniffing and nosing at Izuku’s throat, the side of his face, his hair. “You smell nothing like all those gross, candy-coated Omegas. You smell like, like – I don’t – what are you?”

Izuku stilled, heart quieting beneath the roar in his head.

“Bakugou,” he said softly, gently. Careful, both for Bakugou and for himself, who knew how badly things could turn when an Omega turned down an Alpha. “I should probably, you know. Sleep. On the couch, specifically.”

Bakugou’s hands tightened on Izuku’s bare hips, t-shirt long scrunched up and rumpled. A slither of panic coiled in Izuku’s stomach and he held his breath, waiting for the explosion.

“Right,” Bakugou bit off, clearly unhappy but not saying otherwise. He stepped back, ran a hand through his hair, and raked Izuku with a hungry sweep of blackened coal eyes. “Right. Yeah. I’m – lemme get a pillow and shit. Make yourself tea.”

Floored by Bakugou’s reaction, Izuku sure as hell didn’t make tea. He stood there, staring at the spot where Bakugou had been, listening to him muttering under his breath as he rummaged through a closet in the distance.

Never, never had a rejection, or whatever this was, turned out so smoothly, so reasonably.

Never had Izuku been left so absolutely raw, either. The past version of himself would have jumped Bakugou’s bones at the first taste of him, then had to backtrack trying to get to know him, failed spectacularly at it because he didn’t trust him in the first place and only wanted him for sex, and let the entire situation blow up in his face.

This was altogether different.

“Oiy.” Bakugou popped his head in, frowning hard. “You didn’t make yourself anything? Useless. Well, I got a call from the precinct. The kid’s stable. Don’t know any more than that, and you wouldn’t be privy to that info, anyway. But at least you can sleep now.”

Izuku pressed a hand to his weak heart, the other grappling for the counter for stability.

“Oh, thank goodness. Thank you.” Izuku bit at his bottom lip, considered Bakugou in the doorway, a safe distance away. “Really, thank you. For all of this.”

Bakugou raised an eyebrow, his signature sharp smirk cutting across his handsome face.

“All of it?”

Izuku gaped, laughed incredulously as he headed for Bakugou and ducked past him, their hips bumping.

“Unbearable. Absolutely unbearable Alpha.”

“Yeah?”

Something in the crack in Bakugou’s question had Izuku stopping in his tracks, carefully looking over his shoulder. Bakugou remained in the doorway, leaning there like he’d leaned in Izuku’s, always waiting for that invitation, that approval from him. Izuku was beginning to think Bakugou didn’t flagrantly not give a fuck, after all.

“No,” Izuku said, shaking his head once before approaching the neatly made couch. Briefly, Izuku wondered if the pillow smelled like Bakugou, and sighed.

“Izuku.”

Izuku looked up, squinted a bit in the shadows as Bakugou had turned off the lights. Bakugou looked big and sturdy and still. Izuku knew what his raging heart felt like beneath his hands.

“Yes?”

“Sleep. If I feel you worrying from the other room, you’re gettin’ your ass kicked.”

Izuku broke into a smile.

“I’ll try. Goodnight, Bakugou.”

Bakugou paused, face unreadable in the dark, his voice softer than Izuku imagined would be possible for him.

“Goodnight.”

Notes:

Songs For This Chapter:
[Un]Lost - The Maine | Spotify | YouTube
Connect - Elohim | Spotify | YouTube
Between You & Me - Betty Who | Spotify | YouTube

Chapter 18

Summary:

“I’m just relieved to see someone finally turn your world on its head. It’s about time.”
“Sounds pretty shitty to me.”
“It’s shitty until upside down becomes your new right side up.”
“You write this crap in your diary or something?”

Notes:

Well, the holidays are over and I can get back into some semblance of a schedule with this here writing. I'm sorry it took so long, but, well, LIFE. I hope you enjoy this chapter's rollercoaster. If you want to interact, I'm most often on Twitter @ Lala_Zee these days!

Some people have requested that I share the chapter's music in the beginning notes so y'all can have them on hand as you read. That being said, here they are!

Songs For This Chapter:
Come On Mess Me Up - Cub Sport | Spotify | YouTube
You Needed Love, I Needed You - Angelo De Augustine | Spotify | YouTube
All I Know - The Mailboxes | Spotify | YouTube

A snarl on his lips, Katsuki shot up in the dead of night when a sturdy weight shifted at the foot of the bed.

“Woah, oiy!” He gaped, hands up in both defense and to maintain a distance as Midoriya crawled up the bed and between his skewed legs. Despite being enveloped in shadow, the lines of Midoriya’s stocky body were clearly bare, naked from head to toe. Katsuki’s heart jolted in shock while his cock betrayed him with spring of interest. “Oiy, the fuck’re you –”

“Shhh.” Midoriya crawled up his lap, those sweet, full lips faintly curved in the dark as he approached on all fours, eyes depthless, voice husky. “Hey, it’s okay. It’s okay, my Alpha. I just wanna –”

Big hands steadying on Katsuki’s shoulders, Midoriya sat himself on Katsuki’s lap, only the blanket and Katsuki’s boxers separating the two of them. Gaping, Katsuki gazed up as Midoriya tipped his head back, pale length of his neck and swollen glands exposed as he whined a little and shifted his ass to settle the hot line of Katsuki’s cock up with the groove of that tight, naked ass.

“Yeah. Yeah, just like that. Shit, why’ve I been waiting?”

“Ah – uh!”

Brain backfiring spectacularly, hands totally unsure what to do but hold onto that thick, surprisingly muscular waist, Katsuki blatantly stared down at the sizeable cock between them, dripping in the dark. Omegas didn’t have dicks like that – did they? No way in hell.

Stop thinking about dicks, dammit!

Katsuki jerked his attention up, mouth flooding with saliva as a waft of humid, sticky arousal drowned his nose, down his throat. Midoriya watched him with the eyes of a predator, even as he ground and humped his hips down on Katsuki’s cock through the bedding and whimpered like a beast in heat.

“Midoriya –” Katsuki inhaled sharply, his voice a rasp, fingers digging into flesh. “Midoriya, you – this isn’t – why’re you –”

“Katsuki,” Midoriya murmured at his ear, wet lips dragging to his temple as on hand worked the blanket away from between them. “Katsuki, don’t worry, don’t worry, handsome. You can fuck me – fuck me, okay?”

The length of Katsuki’s cock bumped up against Midoriya’s ass and instantly felt slick and sloppy with the way Midoriya’s exposed hole dripped for him. Katsuki hissed, palming his hands back over each asscheek to knead and spread, one long finger dipping lightly in to check –

“Awfuck!” Midoriya shot up with a cry, nails cutting into Katsuki’s upper arms as he rose up with eyes squeezed shut.  As if on instinct, his hips canted back to sway side to side against the pulsing head of Katsuki’s erection until Katsuki got the message, held his cock still, and nearly wept as Midoriya dropped down onto it in one long, smooth slide.

Seated in full, Midoriya opened his eyes, and tears overflowed past his pink cheeks. His smile delirious, hands rising up to dive into his own hair, his body a pinnacle of everything Katsuki ever desired, right there on display, he began to slowly rock his hips.

Heart bursting more than his body ever could, Katsuki looked on in awe, hands reaching out to cup Midoriya’s face into a kiss.

Katsuki woke when their lips touched, his thighs and tangled sheets sticky with cum and sweaty desperation.

Chest heaving, vision wavering and unfocused on the ceiling, Katsuki fisted his hands in a pillow, smacked himself in the face with it, smothered himself hard, and screamed.

Breathing hard into the cotton, body still and mind spinning, he waited, waited until he could trust himself to get up, take a shower, and absolutely not mount the mouth-watering Midoriya waiting in the other room.

“Fuck,” Katsuki whispered into the pillow one last time, before he set it aside and glowered into the nothing.

Then, like the dutiful person he was, Katsuki checked the clock, noted six minutes until his alarm, and got up to begin his morning rituals.

Refusing to think of anything but viciously scrubbing himself down, Katsuki showered, fast and efficient. Dressed himself and edged into the kitchen without making a sound to grab a quick breakfast and decidedly not open the incriminating tea cabinet.

And then, because he was a complete and utter fuckhead these days, Katsuki slowly approached the space where soft snores sounded.

Midoriya looked much smaller curled up on the couch than when going toe to toe with him. He couldn’t be more than five and a half feet to Katsuki’s near six, but when he was standing up for himself Katsuki always had the impression that Midoriya filled a room. From the moment Katsuki had walked into Parchment, Midoriya had become larger than anyone in his life.

Was that normal? Was this how bonded fools walked around, day in and out? The fanged, drooling beast in Katsuki left little room to doubt that he was made to mate this man, but he himself as an intelligent, independent person teetered on some tight rope between skepticism and surrender.

Frowning, Katsuki rounded the sofa and without a thought, dropped to his knees before Midoriya’s soft face in repose.

Head cocked, Katsuki’s eyes alone traced the blue dawn blurred lines of Midoriya’s features.  To touch, to kiss, would be both too much and not enough, and all of it wrong where Midoriya’s boundaries were currently concerned.

One day. And when that day did come, Katsuki would consume him. Completely.

What had Midoriya been through? In the beginning, Katsuki hadn’t cared – hadn’t believed the past could pull someone under simply because he’d never experienced it himself. But when he looked at Midoriya, he indeed saw a drowning man, dragged below by the weight onto which he held on.

What would it take to pull him out and breathe new life into those lungs?

Midoriya sighed and shifted, his curls a disarray of deep lake green.

In sleep, Midoriya seemed painfully young. Perhaps it was the exhaustion, but his freckles stood starker on his pale face than usual, the pronounced curve of his cheek squished into the couch cushion where he seemed to have thrown the pillow to the floor during the night. His lips were squished like a fish, parted and pink, muted mauve eyelids flickering in dreams.

One limp hand had shrugged from the sofa to the floor, scarred fingers skimming the carpet. Katsuki lifted it slowly, encouraged Midoriya’s arm to bend, and lay his hand beside his face, palm up. A ghostly, puckered scar in the center of Midoriya’s wrist caught his attention, the defined circle a familiar kind of shape Katsuki couldn’t quite place.

Brow bunched, he leaned in to inspect, took a sniff and found this particular gland to be barely scenting the air, damaged as it was.

Recoiling sharply, nostrils flared in fury, Katsuki stared down the scar like an evil doer. Had Midoriya done that to himself in the past? Because of how he smelled?

A hollow pain sounded in Katsuki’s heart like a wailing howl.

Teeth gritted against the snapping jaws snarling to shake his Omega awake and demand he let Katsuki keep him safe for eternity, Katsuki got to his feet and made for the door, purposefully busying himself with his winter boots.

Bundled for the bitter winter sunrise, Katsuki cast a single longing glance through the crack of his front door. The couch faced away, toward the television and wide set of frost-crusted windows, but he stared at the sofa all the same.

When he came home, Midoriya would not be there. When he came home, that distinctive spring rain scent would be the only thing left to drive him mad.

Pathetic fucker that he knew he was now, Katsuki hadn’t a doubt that he’d spend tonight where Midoriya currently lay. He couldn’t sleep with the man, but he sure as hell could pretend.

Katsuki wasn’t in the mood to interact with the world today. Last night’s fray of frantically rushing to the police station after hearing Midoriya’s name, coupled with the his crumbling control and the first real taste of his spunky little Omega, had all taken their toll.

For the first time in a long time, Katsuki didn’t even want to go into work. Not when Midoriya was filling up his home like a jungle overgrown up the walls, curling over furniture with his humid greenhouse aroma.

Standing on the bleak pavement, assaulted with grey wind and old slush, Katsuki called a damn cab.

With a temple pressed against the icy window, his breath fogging up any view of the sleepy city, Katsuki only saw the inviting line of Midoriya’s pale throat as he reached up for a box of tea, the hem of his shirt riding up to expose a freckled hip. His demeanor had been more at ease around Katsuki than ever before, and that was more intoxicating than Midoriya’s presence. The comfort of sharing a space with one another – the way Midoriya had accepted the invitation to Katsuki’s home, had allowed himself to be rescued, for once.

The simple, quiet banter in the kitchen had suddenly overwhelmed Katsuki more than any scent could. The stress of the evening splintered apart, revealing Katsuki’s raw, ravenous desire to hold on to Midoriya and never let go.

Midoriya sparking off like flint to stone had been another shock to the system. The fire had caught between them faster than he’d imagined in his limited knowledge of these things. He certainly hadn’t expected to go feral so fiercely, so instantly consumed with stripping Midoriya down to his baser instincts.

Katsuki had wanted to drag him to the floor and strip him down to straining muscle and dripping thighs.

Fuck.

When had he become such a pathetic animal?

Since those evergreen eyes and that damp pine scent. Since that smartass mouth and strong, stubborn jaw. Since that sweet, vulnerable side and easy smile revealed themselves.

Double fuck.

When the elevator doors opened to the floor occupied by the agency, it was of little surprise to Katsuki that the area was bustling with the sounds of the recent assault.

Head ducked – he knew they’d smell him out eventually, but he could at least have a few moments to himself – Katsuki edged between the cubicles to find his own, and quickly sat with a silent sigh. He rolled his shoulders, his neck, grimacing as tension cracked and popped down his spine like goddamn crispy rice.

He’d barely finished unwrapping himself from winter layers and draping them over his chair before Kirishima’s obnoxious red head popped up from the cubicle next door. His grin was especially punchable today.

“How ‘d it go?”

Katsuki didn’t rise to it. Rather, he booted his computer up and tapped in a password.

“How did what go?”

He hadn’t been on duty with Kirishima when he’d heard of the attack, but news travelled fast in his hellhole and he had no doubt that every nosy bastard on the floor knew that Ground fucking Zero, of all people, ran to the aid of some guy who didn’t need aid at all. Embarrassing.

“You know.” Katsuki didn’t need to look to see Kirishima’s meager eyebrows waggle. “Our resident rescue agent, Midoriya Izuku. He saved that kid’s life, you know! And then –“ A dreamy sigh. “You saved him.”

“I gave him a ride home, hair for brains,” Katsuki managed between clenched teeth as he pulled up the recently emailed file on the new kid’s case. He skimmed, finding that the fifteen year-old, Izumi Kouta, had been identified, by as yet wasn’t able to speak, due to the damage done on his neck. He was stable, but not in any shape to share any additional information or leads with the police.

“What’re we talking about?” Camie said as she invaded Katsuki’s cubicle and leaned against the flimsy wall with arms folded beneath her breasts, chewing gum. She was already in uniform, probably on first shift, just about to begin. She blew a big pink bubble and popped it with a lashing of tongue, grinning around her full chipmunk cheek. 

“Noth-“

“Bakugou’s sweet on that guy who saved the Kouta kid.” Bakugou whipped around with a death glare in time to see Kirishima wink like the dipshit he was. The guy could barely wink without blinking both eyes. “I heard he rushed to Midoriya’s side the second he heard of the incident. We might finally get him a mate, after all.”
Camie blinked, looking between Bakugou and Kirishima, then back, her cheeks pink.

“Wait, you’re gay?”

“I’m not anything!” Katsuki snapped, slamming both hands on the desk as he stood. “Everyone in this place is like a wild pack of starving mongrels! I gave him a ride home –“ my home, “and nothing else! Nothing happened. Nothing. I don’t even know why I gotta explain this shit to you, like it’s your business for some shit.”

“We just care about you,” Camie said, ruffling Bakugou’s hair and laughing when he snapped at her like a rabid dog. “And for what it’s worth, I believe you. I can’t imagine you of all people getting into it with some low-level, book store owning Omega with a criminal record and no Quirk.”

The world sucked into a pinprick, piercing straight through Katsuki’s chest. A sharp chill snapped through him, a ice-pick to the heart.

“A what?” Katsuki heard his voice echo, hollow in his head.

“It’s all in the attached file,” Camie said with a shrug, blowing another bubble and popping it, loud and abrupt in Katsuki’s ears as a gunshot. “They weren’t going to let him go without checking out that it wasn’t him who did it in the first place, duh.  Look for yourself.”

“Bakugou.” Kirishima, from the other side of the wall, voice soft. He spoke only when Bakugou turned and looked up to him, eyes wide and dry. Kirishima frown, concern deep in his cadence. “It’s nothing. Just a run of the mill check. And hey.” Kirishima’s voice strengthened, his attention on Camie, now. “What’s low level about him? I met him and he’s kind of awesome. He’s a manly Omega, I can tell.”

“Manly and strong are totally different things.” Camie inspected her nails as she spoke. “A strong Omega worthy of a top pro hero is, like, one a million. You – me, Tamaki. Heroes need to stick with heroes, you know? Of course nothing happened between Bakugou and that Omega. He’s a nothing in our world.”

“How can you be an Omega and say that kind of stuff all the time, Camie?” Kirishima was practically climbing over his own cubicle wall, the structure shuddering as he probably stood on his chair from the other side and leaned over it to point over Bakugou’s head. “You of all people should know what it’s like to be us! Omegas need our protection more than most in this society. We’re already born with a stigma we have to escape.”

Camie looked on, unimpressed. Another bubble snapped.

Bakugou couldn’t say a word. His brain was reeling with ‘a criminal record and no quirk’, over and over, his hands shaking on his lap, beneath the desk.

And anyway, Katsuki knew what formed Camie into this. They’d been friends for a long damn time. Longer than she and Kirishima, who had only really begun to know each other in their years within the agency.

Camie was a victim of, what she considered, a weak Omega. From what she’d divulged to him on more than one drunken night out, as a child she’d been extremely close with her Omega mother. Her Alpha father had knocked them both around on his whims, which had been often. One day, the violence had gone too far, and her mother had been murdered while in a weakened state of heat.

According to Camie, they’d had numerous chances to escape, to free themselves of the tyranny of her father’s fist, but her mother never took it. She’d been too meek, too soft and dependent on her Alpha. And instead of throwing her hate toward Alphas, Camie had bludgeoned the blame over her dead mother’s head. On Omegas, too, and their inherently weak wills, and how their nature turned on them to their own detriment.

The bias had only strengthened as her work as a hero exposed her to the abuse Omegas suffered in society, time and again. They were the ‘weaker’ gender, and didn’t fight back as much as she felt they ‘should’.

Camie’s was just one more story in a million across the world.

There was nothing unusual about her view. That didn’t make it correct, but for her and many others, their experiences validated their beliefs, and Bakugou knew he’d never be in a place to convince Camie otherwise.

Kirishima, on the other hand.

“We’re supposed to be saving those people, not begrudging them their safety! They’re our kind and –“

“Okay, one,” Camie held up a manicured finger, her slim eyebrows raised, “I will save anyone who needs saving. That’s what we do here. And two, they’re not our kind. They might be yours, but they’re certainly not mine. I’m like my own breed of Omega, and I’m proud of that. It’s also not my responsibility to convince you of what’s right in front of your nose day in and out.”

“And what’s that?” Kirishima said, an edge to his voice rarely heard. He too had a childhood of wondering what he was supposed to make of himself, scared and without confidence for what he could become.

Camie shrugged a toned, strong shoulder.

“That Omegas have always needed more protecting than anyone, and because of that, they’ve come to expect that someone else will fight their battles for them.”

Kirishima’s face went the color of his hair.

“That is –“

“Alright, alright, you fuckers!” Katsuki stood, his frame bulking up with pheromones, aggressive and dominant as he glared at them both. “I’m calling bullshit on this conversation. As long as we’re all doing our jobs, this ain’t the time or place to get into shit like this. Now get outta my sight and smell.”

“No skin off my back,” Camie said, voice unaffected and cheerful as ever as she flashed a smile and flounced away. “Stay warm on patrol, boys! You’ll freeze your dick off out there.”

Kirishima seemed to instantly deflate as he sunk down behind his wall.

Pausing with a sigh, Katsuki tamped his temper and rounded the cubicle. He frowned down at Kirishima, who avoided his eyes in favor of his lap.

“I’m sorry,” Kirishima murmured. “I got too heated and that wasn’t cool. I’m so embarrassed.”

“The fuck?” Katsuki rested a hand on Kirishima’s head. “What’s not cool is being ashamed of standing up for your side. Camie is always gonna be Camie, but that doesn’t mean you need to stand down to her. Fuck that. You do you.”

Kirishima peered up with wet eyes, lips faintly curved.

“Bakugou –“

“Bakugou?” Tamaki’s timid voice interrupted as he popped his head around the corner. “M-may I speak to you, please?”

Katsuki grimaced as he lightly pushed his palm off Kirishima’s forehead and followed Tamaki’s retreating back. Without words, he followed Tamaki into his office with a rising sense of something’s off.

“Um,” Tamaki began, turning around as soon as the door shut at Katsuki’s back. He looked everywhere but Katsuki. “I need to, well, about the recent Omega incident.”
“What about it?”

“Do you – do you want to sit?”

“I’ll stand.” Katsuki folded his arms and inclined his chin. “What about the Izumi kid?”

“Midoriya Izuku, a-actually,” Tamaki said softly, though his voice had reigned in to something steadier. Different from the days of UA. “The man who saved him. It’s not the first time I’ve heard that name, nor the first time in which his uh, file, ended up in my possession.”

Triple fuck.

Katsuki didn’t shift, but rather maintained a steady eye contact with his superior. He knew it put the pressure on the Omega – didn’t much care.

“Yeah?” Katsuki said blandly.

“I – yes.” Tamaki nodded and scooted around his desk to life a manila folder and flicked through it. “Midoriya Izuku. Age twenty five, no siblings, father unknown, grew up in a low income apartment complex. Top of his class through grammar school, middle school, and accepted into a top ranking high school on grades alone, once again top of his class.”

Katsuki’s inner beast hummed with pride at his mate, but his face remained stoic with a scrape of a scowl across.

“He excelled in college as well.” Tamaki cleared his throat, a heavy pause as he flicked a look up and quickly back down. “And then, there is his record.”

“Is this seriously pertinent to anything revolving around the Omega killer, because if it’s not –“

“Please,” Tamaki said with that silent steel of his. This time, he held Katsuki fiery gaze. “H-hold on. There’s – there’s this. Several instances of aggravated assault, dating back from age fifteen until eighteen or so. Charges pressed against, um, well – a now well-known villain, some seven years back. And a restraining order pressed against one Bubaigawara Jin, after the man in question sent Midoriya to the hospital with what seems to be attempted murder upon him. Bubaigawara ultimately disappeared and has never been found. Midoriya’s record is clear from that point onward.”

Tamaki cleared his throat, and the oppressive silence that built up within Katsuki was like the aftermath of a sonic boom. Ringing echoed in his ears.

“What the fuck,” Katsuki scraped out, his voice distant in the drum of his blood. “What the fuck, Tamaki? Are you – the hell does this have to do with me?”

“Well, I –“ Tamaki finally met Katsuki’s intense stare, his mouth a thin line and the papers in his hands faintly shaking. “In theory, Midoriya is the one who saved that boy. He is also the one I remember you calling me about out of nowhere, looking for information while off duty. I’d thought you were on to something at the time. And now my question remains: After your previous inquiry and now the connection between Midoriya and Izumi, do you have reason to believe he may be somehow connected to these murders?”

Katsuki gaped.

“WHAT?” He harsh, high laugh squeaked out of him as he placed his hands on his hips and looked to the ceiling with a second hysterical laugh. “I’m sorry, what the fuck did you just say to me? Midoriya? Midoriya Izuku involved in the fucking Omega murders?”

Hackles rising along with the flames in his eyes, Katsuki closed in on Tamaki with a crazed, sharp smile.

“Are you fucking joking, Tamaki – are you? Because you sound off your goddamn rocker right now. That guy is a goddamn advocate of freedom for Omegas. He’s a nerd and a bookstore owner who has been bullied his entire life for being an Omega and wants nothing more than to be left alone. Even from me.”

Tamaki doubled back, the forms between them held up to his chest like a shield until he ran into the ledge of his desk. His eyes were huge, scrambling over Katsuki’s features as his hormones screamed distress.

“Stay away from him,” Katsuki rumbled, a deep, low, Alpha’s command. He’d never used this influence on a coworker before, but the beast inside was snapping at the bone cage of his ribs to protect his mate at all costs.

Suddenly, Katsuki held his hands up and took a step back, releasing a shaky breath as his head spun. His voice released gruff and tired.

“The connection is zero. There is no connection except for the one between him and me. I called that night to learn where he lived and how to find him – that’s it. That’s all there ever was. The rest is coincidence.”

Then tension sapped from the room and left Katsuki drained as he watched Tamaki’s pale jaw clench and his head cock to the side. While his voice never rose, the weight the carried could sunk straight through Katsuki’s stomach.

“Bakugou, I – I’m not sure where to begin right now. But I will end it with this. I feel it’s time you take a break from the agency.”

Katsuki blinked, his gut dropping out. His short laugh was hoarse and lifeless.

“Sorry, what?”

Tamaki licked is lips quickly, gaze averting to the floor and back as he seemed to arrange his thoughts.

“That is – you’ve um, this is the second time you’ve been hostile towards me in a work environment. You, a hero who should know better and, well, be a paragon of an Alpha. And – and second. This whole thing with – well,” he gestured to the papers in his no longer shivering hand, “if what you’re saying is true – and I can tell that it is – then… Then you abused company policy by using our private database for your personal needs. And that’s just –“

Tamaki paused, the tender expression in his eyes entirely welled up with pity, and boiling Katsuki  with mortification.

“I humbly insist that you take a month’s leave of absence, enforced from today onward. The information will not reach the press, nor will it ever leave this floor. Only those on a need to know basis will be informed and –“

“Fuck you,” Katsuki whispered, throat choked and dry. His fists tightened. “Fuck you. I’m the best you’ve got.”

Tamaki glanced over Katsuki’s shoulder.

Katsuki snapped a look around to see Mirio passing by the office window and smiling cheerfully with a big wave.

“I don’t think so,” Tamaki finally said, somber. “You may go. Please don’t make a scene – it’ll be worse for you in the long run. I don’t… I don’t want this to be difficult for you, Bakugou. What I want – we want, as a team – is for you to find some peace and steadiness within yourself. Is that – does that make sense?”

This time it was Katsuki who couldn’t look him in the eye. Head bowed to prevent his burning face to be seen by all, he exited the office without a word, collected his things, and left.

It wasn’t until he was standing in the middle of the slushy sidewalk, his jacket unzipped and flinging in the harsh wind, that Katsuki realized he didn’t know what to do with his life if it wasn’t this. Or who he was, if it wasn’t that.

And so he called the only person who already knew that he’d fucked up in spades.

“Buh?” the drowsy voice answered.

“It’s me,” Katsuki rasped. “I fucked up.”

Shinsou’s voice instantly cleared.

“At least bring me a coffee.”

“Yeah,” Katsuki croaked. “See you soon.”

 

Twenty minutes later, Katsuki was frowning at a Shinsou draped in the doorway like the frame was the only thing holding him up at this hour.

“You could at least put on some fucking pants,” Katsuki said as he pushed past Shinsou in boxers and an oversized t-shirt.

“Who is doing who a favor here?” Shinsou replied crispy as he nipped the coffee from Katsuki’s fingers and slumped toward the living room while Katsuki removed his shoes and jacket. He called out, “Shouto’s not home, so whatever’s going on, it’s safe with me.”

“Yeah yeah,” Katsuki said under his breath, finally following.

He flopped onto the other end of the couch from where Shinsou stretched his lanky legs out to cross his ankles atop the coffee table. He took a quiet sip of coffee, his eyes falling closed for a moment.

“What’s going on?” he mumbled into his cup.

Katsuki bit back any number of instinctive retorts and distractions. Instead, he propped his feet on the table, too, and stared at his black socks.

“You know the – the thing when Midoriya –“

“Specify on an exponentially smaller level.”

“I’m fucking getting there! Shit, man. When I found out where he lived that one time.”

Shinsou hummed in agreement and nursed his coffee.

Katsuki cast a sidelong glance his way and lowly spoke.

“They suspended me for a month.”

Shinsou stilled, mouth on his cup, eyes straight ahead.

And then his shoulders sagged as he sunk back into the couch, long hands curved around his drink. When he looked at Katsuki, his eyes were infuriatingly unreadable as ever.

“That’s not unreasonable.”

Katsuki fumed.

“But –“

“But it’s the first dark mark on the history of your record, and that’s sucks, even if you deserve it.” Shinsou shrugged and returned to his coffee. He swallowed and sighed. “What’re you going to tell Izuku?”

Katsuki balked.

“Uh. I’m not.”

“That’ll go over well,” Shinsou muttered into his drink.

“That’s fuckin’ rich when Midoriya hasn’t told me shit about himself. Nothing that matters, anyway. Had to find out from a goddamn email attachment and my coworkers. Sick of it.”

Shinsou perked up at that, lavender eyes sharpening to greyer steel.

“What do you mean by that? Find out what?”

“Uh.” Katsuki violently gestured with great, encompassing sweeps of his arms. “Everything? That he’s Quirkless, that he’s got a criminal record – that he was almost murdered? Nothing – I’ve heard none of this shit! And here I am, practically on my fucking knees for him, prostrating myself like some – some –“

“Omega?” Shinsou supplied, voice brittle and sharp.

Katsuki whirled on him.

“Don’t start puttin’ words in my mouth or it’ll be my fist stuffed in there next.”

“Your dirty talk is so on point,” Shinsou said in a monotone. “But seriously, Bakugou. Don’t you think there was a reason he hasn’t told you yet?”

“What the fuck reason would that be!”

“I don’t know – maybe what he’s been impressing on you all along? That you two need to get to know each other on a vastly deeper level than just your base instincts and interests.”

Katsuki opened his mouth and snapped it shut again, his shoulders coming up to his chin defensively as he crossed his arms and slumped into the couch.

“Shit,” was all Katsuki had to say to that.

Shinsou wasn’t wrong. And neither was Midoriya, not really. Heavy stuff like that was his to tell, including the reasons and stories behind it all. It took everything inside of him not to rush back home in case Midoriya was still on the couch, and demand answers.

As Shinsou had said, that would go over well.

Katsuki’s heart hung low as it dawned on him how far the two of them needed to go.

If Midoriya would allow it.

“Your mood is blacker than my coffee,” Shinsou said after a long, comfortable silence borne out of ten years of blood, brotherhood, and battle.

“Don’t sound so happy about it and die already.”

“I’m just relieved to see someone finally turn your world on its head. It’s about time.”

“Sounds pretty shitty to me.”

“It’s shitty until upside down becomes your new right side up.”

Katsuki flashed a glare.

“You write this crap in your diary or something?”

“I’m merely a natural talent with prose,” Shinsou said with lofty eyebrows and a wide, thin smirk.

“I’d love to punch you right now,” Katsuki deadpanned.

“It’s a gift.” The humor in Shinsou’s eyes faded toward the indecipherable as he glanced at Katsuki. “You’re really not going to tell him about the suspension?”

“If I tell him, then he'll realize the severity of what I did, it'll bring that shit back up, and we’re back at square one.”

Shinsou considered him.

“If you say so.”

Katsuki rolled his eyes.

“Now I remember when I stopped hangin’ out with you.”

“Because I’m all knowing and you’re a simpleton?”

It was lucky for Shinsou that he had time to set aside his coffee because Katsuki launched at him.

 

Katsuki knocked on the window of Parchment’s darkened front door, squinting through the glass at the half-light glowing from within. Someone was still home.

He grinned when Midoriya approached from the stacks, wrapped in some kind of giant, chunky knit cardigan of deep, brick red. Midoriya gaped as soon as he made out Katsuki’s face and rushed to the door, dropping his keys twice before he managed to get it unlocked and opened.

“B-Bakugou? What the heck are you – get in already, it’s cold!” All maternal fussiness, Midoriya shooed him inside and locked the door behind. Midoriya was still fumbling for his keys, faced away, when Katsuki approached him from behind, crotch to the strong swell of Midoriya’s ass, nose to the top of his curls to inhale that deep forest aura.

“Mmm, missed you,” Katsuki mumbled into thick hair that smelled as green as it looked.

Midoriya froze before he turned, both hands slapping to Katsuki’s chest to push.

“Oh no, we’re not going there again,” Midoriya said firmly, the wrinkle of his brow so damn cute.

Katsuki whimpered once and Midoriya startled, taking a step back with a puzzled half-smile.

“Wait. Are you drunk? Did you just come from work?”

“Shinsou’s.” Katsuki scowled. “He kept me there all day. Lonely bastard. Then the alcohol. I didn’t see it coming.”

Midoriya’s eyebrow quirked, his posture easing as he took a relaxed step into Katsuki’s space, his smile widening.

“And you call him a friend. That guy’ll drink anyone under the table. I don’t know where it all goes.”

“Fucker,” Katsuki said emphatically, reaching out to brush the curls from one of Midoriya’s bright eyes. “You’re real pretty.”

“Thanks,” Midoriya replied without inflection, unimpressed.

“Not like girl pretty,” Katsuki said, getting up close to frown at Midoriya’s features. “You’re just – I dunno. You. You turn my upside down into right side up.”

Midoriya sputtered a laugh and shook his head as he took a step in retreat.

“Your what? I’m what? Bakugou, as nice as it is to see you since last night –“

“Last night,” Bakugou spat, suddenly infuriated. “You saved that kid. You’re amazing. Everyone should recognize that.”

“I’d rather not be recognized for anything at all.” Midoriya chuckled in good natural, a large, soothing hand rubbing up and down Bakugou’s arm. Despite the parka between them, Bakugou still shivered. “Relax. I’m just glad the boy is stable and healing up. I hope he’ll be okay in the long run. Attempted murder –“ Something dark flashed in Midoriya’s eyes. “Attempted murder is not something you just wake up and get over.”

Katsuki bit off a number of telling things he could say.

“If he’s anywhere as strong an Omega as you, he’ll be fine.”

Midoriya’s smile was puzzled, eyes curious.

“Am I missing something here? I know you’re tipsy, but why the compliments? I don’t – that’s not really, um, my thing.”

“You’ll take them and like them,” Katsuki snapped, yanking at Midoriya’s arms to haul him in. To his dulled sense of shock, Midoriya yelped but did not push back, only rested his forehead on Katsuki’s heart. “I’m – I just – I’m just pissed off you probably think you can’t trust me with yourself when I’m here promisin’ that you can.”

Midoriya didn’t reply to that, but turned his head so his cheek rested flat on Katsuki’s coat. Without a word, he slipped his hands in Katsuki’s jacket pockets and rocked into him, just a little. Katsuki’s felt his cheeks flush as he tentatively put his arms around that strong, stocky frame, and linked his fingers at the small of Midoriy’s back.

“That’s a nice thing to say,” Midoriya finally whispered. His back rumbled with a silent, shaking laugh. “You’re awfully nice for a jackass.”

“Say that to my face, short stack,” Katsuki said, not letting go.

They remained like that for a time, rocking slightly, Midoriya’s breathing slow, his scent more mellow, early morning dew and fog.

“Bakugou,” Midoriya murmured.

Katsuki hummed, cheek pillowed atop Midoriya’s warm head, almost drifting while standing.

“Thank you for taking me home last night. And thank you for stepping away when I asked you to.”

Katsuki grunted.

“And…” Midoriya inhaled, deep and slow. “I think you may be someone I can trust in the future. But it’ll take… time. I’m not – I’m not brave like I used to be.”

“No,” Katsuki said, pulling back enough to meet Midoriya’s clouded eyes in the soft lowlight glow of a shop closed. “You’re brave like you are now. And there’s no one else I’ve met who’s brave to the point that it pisses me to the fuck off.”

Midoriya cracked a grin at that, hands rising to wedge between them, fingers spread across Katsuki’s chest.

“Alright. Well, now I’m going to bravely ask you to go home before I start something I can’t finish.”

Smoke signaling a fire filled up Katsuki’s lungs, mouth instantly watering as his gaze sharpened on the delicious curve of Midoriya’s mouth.

“Can’t finish,” Katsuki rasped, “or won’t?”

“A little bit of both,” Midoriya said with a hint of something dark around the edges. He backed off, hand trailing down on of Katsuki’s arms until their palms met, fingers linked. “It's been a long day. This morning feels like forever ago. Yesterday, even longer.”

Katsuki nodded, refusing to release Midoriya’s hand.

“Can I walk you home?”

Midoriya opened his mouth, then shut it and paused before he solemnly nodded.

In the end, they walked hand in hand to Midoriya’s apartment, chins ducked into their coats against the wind and cold. There had been no kiss goodnight, and Katsuki hadn’t pressed for it. The way Midoriya held his gaze on the doorstep had been enough to warm him through and fill him up.

And that – that was something altogether upside down.

Chapter 19

Summary:

"For the first time in my life, through all the therapy and drugs and bullshit, I’m here, finally staring my demons in face and saying – let me take you on until you no longer own me.”

Notes:

Relatively short chapter today, but I promise you longer goods in the near future. Reminder that you can best find me on Twitter at Lala_Zee, but my Tumblr also has open Asks for anons and whoever else!

“You encourage a dog to keep sniffing at your door, eventually he’s going to think he has a right to walk in.”

Chisaki sliced open a cardboard box with concise precision.

Eyebrow raised, Izuku leaned back in his ancient, creaky office chair, hands folded on his lap as he considered his friend.

“Is my asshole a door in this analogy?”

Chisaki’s pause was minute before he dug through the box, checking off orders on a clipboard.

“I’m saying that your judgment is clearly becoming clouded for another one of your Alpha bad boys.”

Izuku’s lips twitched in humor, even as his heart clenched.

“He’s a hero, Kai.”

Chisaki’s eyes glinted with razor sharp warning when he looked up.

“And up until recently, you were just as aware as I am that they are an overall menace to our society. So few of them do good, while the others abuse their power and privilege, destroy buildings in the wakes of their battles, leave citizens homeless – hell, the majority of them don’t even patrol the most crime riddled neighborhoods of the city because they know they can’t do shit for the area. That’s where my people run the joint – that’s where you used to walk the streets with me as a disenchanted kid who’d been crushed by the very same society that you’re now wanting to fuck with.”

Chisaki stabbed the box opener into an unopened parcel beside him and met Izuku’s livid gaze dead on.

“Or get fucked by.”

A dozen replies shocked through Izuku in an instant, all of them products forged from a lifetime of self defense and futile fury. As a teenager, Izuku might have lashed out with too much passion, even cried. Now, his brain snapped into overdrive faster than his fists. Their gazes clashed in a silence screaming with shared history.

Izuku chewed on the inside of his cheek before he allowed himself to speak.

“Are you saying this because you feel like you’re going to lose me or because you wish you were brave enough to get out of your own head and let Inasa in for once?”

Izuku swore he could see his own breath for the chill dropping in the room.

“I’m saying this,” Chisaki said, clipped and concise, “because the last guy you dated raped you and tried to stomp your skull in half, Izu-“

“Do you think I’ve forgotten?” Izuku’s words cracked as he abruptly stood, face hot, his innards writhing as he loomed over Chisaki. “You think I need you to remind m-“

Chisaki went to his feet just as quickly, pale face cold as stone and words pelting just as hard.

“I think you need to be reminded who you are and why you are this way.”

“And what way am I?” Izuku spat, stepping into Chisaki’s preciously guarded space, their chests bumping. “Since you know me so much better than I do, why don’t you enlighten me, Kai? Because –“

“You aren’t safe from yourself!” Chisaki’s voice broke as he reached out, gloved hands gripping Izuku’s face like he wanted to physically shake some sense into him. He looked manic, the same as when Eri had gone missing and he wouldn’t sleep for searching her out. “Why can’t you find someone who’s not an Alpha, Izuku? You’re not Omega – you’re not Alpha, either – you’re your own fucking person in this world and I can’t watch you go for another savage, self-important piece shit of who will use you up like some bitch in heat!”

“Fuck you!” Throat wrecked and raw, Izuku shoved Chisaki toward the door, stopping forward for another shove and a third, teeth bared. “Fuck you, Chisaki Kai! You’re scared. You’re scared I’ll leave you behind and you’ll be the only one in group stewing in misery and judgment. Have you ever taken a good look at yourself in your life? When was the moment when you decided you’d never let anyone in, huh? When was the moment you decided Alphas were the root of your every problem? Because I remember my moments – clearly, like they were yesterday. And I’m battling them now. For the first time in my life, through all the therapy and drugs and bullshit, I’m here, finally staring my demons in face and saying – let me take you on until you no longer own me.”

Panting, hands fisted, face balled into a twisted flesh of fury, Izuku reached past the frozen statue of Chisaki and turned the doorknob at his side, creating a space for Chisaki to escape.

“What owns you?” Izuku said, hoarse and hollow, limbs vibrating with arrested tension. “You talk about freedom. You throw marches for it, for the rights and equalization of other presentations alongside Alphas. You and your thugs track down Alpha criminals in the night and throw them to sea for a long dive like you have a right to take a life because you have something to be angry about. And –“

Izuku shoved Chisaki out the office doorway, leaving them on either side of the entry, eyes locked. Shocked, lightning gold to volatile, poison ivy green.

“And you let all of that get in the way of someone I have seen moon over you for years. The most kind, gentle, honorable Alpha you’ll ever meet. You’d rather be lonely and let that thing inside own you instead of letting someone into your heart.”

Storming steps thundered down the aisles, Inasa’s great and powerful strides approaching.

Chisaki was already looking away toward the noise, color high in his cheeks when Izuku strode past, his mouth near to one pale, porcelain ear.

“Who’s really getting fucked? Me or you? Because I’m finally learning to take the lead with my life and you’re still letting old problems drag you by a leash.”

“What’s going on here?” Inasa boomed, his hulking figure coming into view, his face a mask of concern. His nostrils flared and he stopped dead in his tracks, eyes trained and dark on Izuku. His features went stern and stormy, quick as a change of wind. “You’re fighting. You smell like aggression. Aggression on my –“

“Wait.” Chisaki’s voice was quiet and sharp like a knife-cut through the tension. His slim hand slapped on Inasa’s barrel chest, fingers splayed. His slight figure stood before Inasa’s towering one, and though Izuku couldn’t see Chisaki’s face, he could tell there was something different in the way he carried his normally stiff, formal stature. “This is between us. It’s fine, it’s –“

“I know you can take care of yourself but you can let me –“

“Thank you.”

Inasa went still, eyes widening as color instantly swept across his cheeks.

“I – wh – no! Don’t thank me, I care about you and what’s going on over h-“

“Yoarashi,” Chisaki said, cool and collected, his hand unmoving. “Let’s talk.”

Inasa gaped, speechless.

Despite the electricity still buzzing in Izuku’s blood from the confrontation, his lips couldn’t help but curve as he snuck back into the office and shut the door behind him. He didn’t want to intrude on the conversation, and by the sound of things, perhaps progress was on the horizon.

Faced with a cluttered office, the fight instantly drained from Izuku’s limbs. Eyes falling shut, back against the door, he slid down to the cold, tiled floor and brought his brow to his bent knees.

Izuku hadn’t missed this clouded exhaustion and adrenaline drop of his temper. Hadn’t wanted to lose his temper in the first place.

But Chisaki had touched something within him, or perhaps rebuilt for him a past with which Izuku had been struggling to leave behind for a long time. The realization had begun to rise that Izuku couldn’t move on with his life without recognizing those occurrences which ran his life on a daily basis. The anger, the confusion, the abandonment, the ostracization – they all stemmed from fear.

Fear of being alone, of vulnerability, of honesty, of being present to his life now instead of holding onto his past and shoving it at people like it would prove why he was the way he was.

Being around Bakugou, a man who lived so wholly in the now, and was so unapologetically himself, for better or worse, and even more honest with the desire and effort he put forth toward Izuku – it was opening his eyes. The world looked clearer, brighter, less drab and pointless. Izuku didn’t like to consider himself depressed – he was thankful for a lot of the things for which he’d worked over the years. He had friends who made him laugh, and a lifestyle that didn’t enhance his anxiety.

But monotony and tedium and safety had run Izuku’s life for five years. Being around Bakugou had made him realize that, too.

Izuku released a long, shuddering breath, but did not cry, his eyes pressed hard into his bony knees as he worked through slow breaths.

He was tired of being scared. Tired of being angry and pretending he wasn’t. Tired of being tired. Tired of being so safe that nothing new could ever burst through the walls he’d built around his lifestyle.

Chisaki wasn’t wrong in his worries. But when it came to verbalizing his concerns, Chisaki was bottom of the barrel. He went for the kill rather than the capture, and Izuku didn’t take well to being dominated on any level.

Well, most levels.

Deciding there was nothing to be done about it, Izuku got to his feet and dusted off his corduroys, his mouth grim. This fight wasn’t his and Chisaki’s first, and likely wouldn’t be their last. There was something of a brotherhood there, of family. In the beginning, it hadn’t been as such. After Dabi… things had changed. Izuku knew that Chisaki blamed himself being so distracted with finding Eri, with entrenching himself in circles of shady people, that he’d left a young and impressionable Izuku to the wolves.

Izuku didn’t blame him. Never had. He preferred to take responsibility for his actions.

Which was why Izuku had instantly flared into fight mode at Chisaki’s insinuation that Izuku was letting himself get fucked around by another poisonous Alpha.

Because he wasn’t.

He didn’t have to prove it to anyone else, but it would be nice if one of his best friends believed in him, anyway.

With a deep breath, Izuku regarded the stack of boxed books and went back to his work, alone.

Knowing Eri was at the front desk – Izuku had kept his promise to get her hired somewhere, albeit it ended up here – Izuku wasn’t concerned that Inasa and Chisaki were feasibly somewhere else, having a private conversation. Or making out. Knowing Chisaki, though, almost undoubtedly not making out.

The last time Izuku could even remember Chisaki showing sexual interest in another person was Hitoshi, and that was a weird point in life for the both of them. Hitoshi had been beaten down by literal years of pining over Todoroki, and looking for someone to get him through heats. Chisaki had found Eri and seemed somehow directionless and unmotivated at the time, so Hitoshi had been a distraction. Emotionally, nothing had ever come of their short year of mutual benefits.

Inasa was different. He’d stormed in at Todoroki’s side somewhere around Izuku’s freshman year at university, larger than life and bursting with boundless energy. He’d met Chisaki at Izuku’s birthday night out, and the hearts in his eyes had been instantaneous. Chisaki’s cold nature had been like Inasa sticking his hot tongue to the frozen flagpole.

Inasa had been and remained fascinated with Chisaki’s causes. Hadn’t taken offence to Chisaki’s biased nature toward Alphas, and had never hesitant to stick up for his fellow Alphas, as well as sing his own praises and good character when necessary. He believed in Chisaki’s goals to life up the lower class, to spend his days following the wake of battles and using his Quirk to piece together damaged homes, family businesses in streets. He cheered on Chisaki with an enthusiasm that rarely wavered.

Chisaki didn’t know what to do with that. The tenacity and optimism with which Inasa lived his life was unfathomable to Chisaki, and yet, Izuku got the distinct feeling that Chisaki was increasingly warming to him as the years passed. Even, perhaps, intrigued by what made Inasa tick.

 So, let them talk. If anything good could come of Izuku’s explosion, he hoped it would be something to the benefit of his close friends. That would be enough.

A heavy knock jolted Izuku from his wandering thoughts and his repetitive box opening.

“Midoriya!” Inasa might have been standing a foot from his ear for how loud he spoke. “I have consulted with Chisaki, and while your argument remains a mystery to me due to Chisaki’s impressively honorable nature, I can only conclude that you are upset with something regarding my dear friend Bakugou Katsuki and –“

Izuku opened the door, unable to hold back his chuckle as he eyed Inasa’s flushed face with amusement.

“You two really are friends, huh?”

“We are!” Inasa nodded vehemently, his dark eyes sincere. “We have fought alongside each other many times. I would die for him!”
Imagining Bakugou standing beside him, red-faced and denying every word of this conversation only made Izuku smile wider.

“You’d die for a dog running across the street, Inasa.”

“Well.” Inasa sputtered, struggling with that one. “So would you!”

“Got me there.” Izuku jerked his head to reference the office. “Come on in and we can talk, if you’d like.”

“I would, very much, thank you!”

Izuku flopped back into his seat, chest warm and full just watching Inasa frown at the corkboard pinned with photos of the lot of them, plus Izuku’s mother, and the errant article featuring his bookstore.

“I’m sorry we fought,” Izuku said soberly, referencing him and Chisaki. “He’s… worried about me. I think he thinks I’m desperate enough to go back to living how I did before. Or maybe that I’m just blind to my weaknesses like I was when I was young.”

Inasa’s features drooped.

“Midoriya –“

“But I’m not blind,” Izuku said, steel beneath his soft tone. His hands clenched on his lap as he met Inasa’s sympathetic gaze. “I think I’m seeing properly for the first time in a long time. And it makes me want to run headlong into life. Is that… do you think I’m being rash?”

“Rash?” Inasa sat himself down on box and frowned, running a massive palm over the shaved curve of his skull. “No. Rash feels somehow irresponsible, doesn’t it? You’re one of the most trustworthy people I know. No, Midoriya, you are transforming into a more powerful version of yourself – yes, that’s it!”

Inasa stood as quickly as he’d sat, sparkling with his own revelation. He stomped forward, both hands on either armrest of the chair, caging Izuku in with rising exuberance.

“Like a breeze on one side of the world encountering turmoil, rain, and drastic weather in its travels, becomes a mighty whirlwind on the opposite end of its journey! You have been changing every time I’ve seen you, Midoriya!”

Izuku beamed, heart warm and big in his chest.

“You really think so? I’ve been so confused. I still am. I feel like something about Bakugou pulls me to a place within me that I’m both scared of and what to take head-on, but –“

“Bakugou Katsuki is as honorable and trustworthy as you, Midoriya!” Inasa nodded, the weight of his frame pushing Izuku’s chair back through the small office space. “Perhaps you’ve finally met someone of your own caliber. I myself have never met someone so impassioned by their life’s work as Chisaki, despite our being on opposite ends of the spectrum with our personalities. Isn’t that wildly exciting? Don’t you hear your blood rush in your veins when you’re around him? Doesn’t he make you want to be better and better and better?”

Gaping, Izuku nodded and nodded some more as Inasa’s speech rose with fervor.

“Yes!” Izuku managed, leaning in to Inasa’s space, their faces aligned. “Yes to all of that, I do! I’m just – he’s terrifying, isn’t he? Not as an Alpha, even, but as a person and –“

“He’s a fearsome adversary, to be sure.” Inasa said, dropping his hands to straighten and node with faux sobriety. “Yes, of course. But think of it this way. Bakugou is not your adversary. He’s on your team. And when that ferocity and passion is backing you up – I will tell you from personal experience – he will make you feel like you can accomplish anything by his side.”

Floored, Izuku could only slump back in his seat and stare into the nothing, the power of Inasa’s words flowing through his blood like new life.

Of course. Of course.

Izuku had every right to be frightened and wary. He had every right to assume the man perusing him might turn on him for the worst. He’d never had an intimate relationship that proved otherwise to him.

And it was terrifying to turn his past upside down and give life an entirely new perspective.

Maybe that was what Bakugou had meant, several nights ago. Making his upside down his right side up. Maybe –

“May I have your phone?”

Izuku blinked at Inasa’s offered hand. The guy could be a professional shovel, hands alone. Huge.

“Um, yes, but also why?” Izuku asked as unearthed it from his pocket.

“I think you need his phone number,” Inasa said, only after he’d nipped the phone from Izuku’s hand.

Izuku’s eye bulged as he popped up from his seat.

“Wait, what? No, I – no, you can’t! He’ll – he’ll think I asked for it or I’m desperate or –“

“Midoriya.” For once, Inasa looked fed up with him, his expression that of a parent looking at their obnoxious, naughty child in the candy aisle. “No one who knows you thinks you’re desperate for anything.”

“Uh.” Izuku chewed on that one, not sure if that was an accidental insult or a compliment. “I mean, I guess?”

“Here.”

Izuku snatched up the phone like Inasa was going to call him or something. He frowned at the contact name.

“Ka… Kacchan? What – why Kacchan?”

“It’s cute, isn’t it?” Inasa looked delighted. “That’s what the children and young people call him. I always wanted to call him that so familiarly, but I know –“

“He would set your clothes on fire,” Izuku said, deadpan. “We both know this.”

“Y-yes.”

“So, why?”

Inasa’s smile was something altogether more imposing than anyone else Izuku knew.

“Maybe Bakugou could do with feeling a little cute around you. And maybe it’s a breakthrough in familiarity you need to feel comfortable.”

Izuku nearly snorted aloud, but stopped himself with a frown as he considered that night a half a week ago. The way Bakugou had called him pretty, and blushed, and held him in the strong, surprisingly quiet link of his arms, the warm cocoon of the bookstore breathing slow and soothing around them.

Maybe he was a little cute. Sometimes.

“Maybe,” Izuku repeated, staring at the name in phone and marveling at the trajectory of his life.

A breeze turned to a whirlwind, huh?

“Anyway!” Inasa smacked Izuku on the shoulder hard enough to stumble him forward a step, then went in for his signature bone-crushing hug. “This was a good talk. I love you.”

Izuku couldn’t help but laugh as he patted Inasa’s back.

“I love you, too.”

 

It wasn’t until two days later, six days since their last interaction, that Izuku lay upon the snarl of lush blankets and downy pillows of his bed that Izuku decided to stop frowning at his damn phone like it had reached out and stolen his nose between two fingers.

He was naked, skin too flushed and sensitive for clothes from the moment he’d stepped through the door at the end of his day. Heat was coming once more, and Izuku couldn’t stop wiggling his toes and chewing on his lips, a rising swell of sensory overload building pressure beneath his skin. Tomorrow would probably be trouble, but he reckoned he could eke out one more day of work before he was wild with it.

Didn’t help that he couldn’t stop thinking about the dream he’d had on Bakugou’s couch, the night of the Omega attack. The entire experience had been surreal, like Izuku had somehow been in control of his actions. He’d heard of lucid dream, but had never put it into practice.

He blamed his body for being affected by the hormones no doubt pulsing from the very walls of that apartment. As much as Izuku believed in autonomy of the body and mind – there was only so much he could mitigate when he passed out.

“Kacchan,” Izuku mumbled, putting the sound on for size as he stared at the numbers on his screen. “Kacchan? Way too cute. Gross, I’m gross. Ugh!”

He rolled, muffling his groans in a pillow, drifting as the day’s exhaustion and anxieties whittled away at his energy.

Having Bakugou’s number turned the tables of their relationship, or whatever this was. This new dance. Before, Bakugou had been the one to pursue, to take the next step and the next within the course of their dance. Now, Izuku had a level of communication Bakugou did not yet have.

To text him would be to open up a new layer of connection. To text him would be admitting not just to wanting him, like he’d wanted Bakugou in the kitchen or in the bookstore, but was interested him on an entirely different level.

“Coward,” Izuku mumbled into the pillow, unconsciously rubbing his cheek against the clean, brushed cotton.

Propping up to his elbows and blowing an errant curl from his eye – haircut direly needed – Izuku thumbed through his meager contacts and selected Kacchan.

Hi, Izuku wrote while he held his breath, Read any good books lately? –M

The reply came so quickly that Izuku startled, so sure Bakugou would be too busy for something like texting.

>> Midoriya?

>> Inasa gave me your number. I hope that’s okay.

>> Sure. What’s wrong?

Izuku didn’t know why he was smiling at the screen, but he couldn’t yield to any other expression.

>> Nothing! Wanted to say hi, I guess. Didn’t seem fair that I knew your number and you not know mine.

>> I’m shit at texting.

>> So am I.

>> Great. We have a singular thing in common and it’s crappy communication.

>> Must be why we get along so famously.

>> I want to see you.

Izuku bit his lip, considering. Tomorrow would be risky – for the both of them. At work, on the cusp of heat? Bad idea.

>> Come at your own risk.

Izuku was an absolute dumbass.

>> Ominous motherfucker. And everyone thinks you’re so cheerful.

Izuku pressed his face into the comforter and laughed, almost giddy with it.

>> No, I mean heat soon.

Bakugou didn’t reply for so long that Izuku started to nod off, phone cradled in his palm. When the shallow vibration had him fluttering his lashes, Izuku squinted at the screen and smiled.

>> I’ll see you tomorrow.

Chapter 20

Summary:

The entire fucking world was testing him.

Notes:

Welcome back! Sorry it's been almost two months. I got shingles and they destroyed my life lol. Remember, you can find me on Twitter @ Lala_Zee. I hope you guys enjoy! As always, thank you for your comments - I read them, treasure them, and read them again. I love hearing from you.

“I ain’t a fuckin’ charity case,” was the first thing Katsuki said when he answered the phone to Sero. At this point, he was just answering calls for lack of anything better to do, and that in itself was a horrifying realization. Three days of nothing could do shit to a person.

“How crazy are you going right now?” Sero said, without missing a beat.

“I’m fine,” Katsuki snapped. “Some time off ain’t nothin’ to me.”

“I think you’re going to have to work on your character’s motivations if you’re going to be putting on such a poor act.”

Katsuki flopped back in the couch and stared blandly at the skyline. He should be roof-hopping right now, hot on the heels of some douchebag with a mediocre Quirk.

“Fuck you.”

“Yeah, yeah. You found anything to do with yourself?”

Katsuki sat up in his seat, eyes narrowed at Sero’s tone.

“What you got?”

Going to the gym for three days straight could only take so much time out of the day and Katsuki was mad with it.

“Heard talk Uraraka is doing some kinda basic hand-to-hand combat classes for kids in local schools. Maybe give her a call and see if you can partner up. Despite your situation not being public, it would do you good to be seen helping kids instead of blowing holes in buildings and causing third degree burns to baddies.”

“You’re just jealous because all you can do is a little light bondage to them and hope for the best.”

“Wow, you caught me,” Sero deadpanned. “Anyway, give her a call. Unless marinating in your own self pity is your new thing. And in that case, I totally support an endeavor you’re so clearly excelling –“

“Fuck off, I’ll call if I wanna call!” Katsuki barked in the phone as he hung up.

Resisting the urge to throw the phone across the wall, he grit his teeth and stood, walking up to the wall-encompassing window. The world was a free fall at his feet, an eerie fog cast across the city, separating his high-rise floor from the world below. Being a hero often entailed separating one’s self from the bigger picture, from the rest of humanity.

Hell, more than once they’d been drilled on the awareness of a medical condition known as ‘compassion fatigue’. Heroes, firemen, the police, nurses, doctors, first responders. The horrors they faced, day in and out – the pain and suffering they witnessed in men, women, and children – it could sap them of empathy, of feeling. Could numb the heart and even cauterize a person from the human condition with lengthened exposure to trauma.

Katsuki had been living this life for eight years. Three years in UA, five years in Tokyo as a professional.

The things he’d seen –

“Little brats, huh,” Katsuki mumbled to himself as he stared at the phone. With a sigh, he scrolled through his contacts and hit the call button.

“Bakugou?” Ochako answered on the fifth ring, sounded breathless. “What’s the matter, what –“

“Why’s there anything the matter, for fuck’s sake! S’the matter with you ?”

“I have an alligator man thrown over my shoulder now and a car just exploded.” Ochako didn’t even sound out of breath, just concerned. “It’s not like you call to catch up on a gossip, so I answered. What’s wrong?”

“Nothing!” Katsuki snapped on automatic, pressing his brow to the icy glass and frowning at the greasy stain his forehead left when he pulled back. “Sero told you’re doin’ a thing. At schools or whatever – self-defense.”

Ochako grunted and something unearthly snarled at her.

“This really isn’t a good time.”

“Just – I wanna do some shit for the kids too or whatever,” Katsuki tumbled out in a mess, his brain scrambling. “For publicity, y’know. Apparently I need more a’that shit.”

Ochako laughed, sounding almost hysterical, and Katsuki held the phone from his ear as metal grated on metal.

“This must have an amazing backstory,” Ochako said, the steady clap of feet in a run. “I’ll bite. What do I get out of it?”

Katsuki sputtered.

“You? My company !”

“That’s never been a prize to me,” Ochako replied breathlessly. She was whispering now. “Which is especially why I require compensation.”

“You’re a fuckin’ miser is what you are!”

Katsuki paused, teeth clamped down like a trap, his tongue refusing to relent to favors or pity.

Well, if there was one thing he and Ochako had never given each other, it was pity. So there was that.

“Gift card to that confectionery you like, the one by the big fountain.”

“How much?”

Something crunched, wet and unpleasant on the other end and Katsuki rolled his eyes.

“Ten-thousand yen, alright? Fuck me, it’s not like you can’t afford this sh-“

“Deal.”

A mighty roar rose up and Katsuki’s fingers itched to join in. Instead, he grunted when Ochako made a quick goodbye with a promise to text him details.

And then he was alone in his hollow apartment once more.

Katsuki swiped a hand down his cheek, grimacing at the prickly shadow beneath his palm. At least he’d have reason to get up tomorrow. Watching television at home sucked .

He stared at the phone in his hand, fancy as fuck and rarely used unless someone called him first or he had to check the weather and set an alarm. A dark swell expanded within the chambers of his heart, filling previous empty spaces with something heavy and lead, a black ache of pure longing that wished for Midoriya’s phone number. Just to call. To check in and see how he was faring some days after the incident with the omega killer, to gauge the ground on which Katsuki stood with him after the scene in his kitchen and then in the book shop.

Katsuki missed that little fucker.

What the hell was this? To be enveloped in such an uncomfortable feeling for which he had no escape or solution. When had he ever felt the desire to check in with another person? When had he ever cared deeply enough to step out of his own world in an attempt to step into another’s?

Since Midoirya Izuku and his infallible goodness.

Katsuki, too, knew himself to be a good, but on a different level. He was a lawful good of spitting in the face of villains and protecting the world at large, while giving very little thought to individual people affected by the broad scope of his heroism.

Midoriya – he was something altogether different. Some kind of chaotic good that inspired and pushed and dared others to match up with his raw honesty and emotion. Midoriya fed feelings into the atmosphere like some kind of minor god, intoxicating everyone around him into being their truest, best self.

Katsuki didn’t have that. Never looked to have it, either. But seeing it play before him – well. Katsuki was half-drunk on it.

Instead of flopping face-down on the sofa and hoping to catch the lingering musk of Midoriya in the material, Katsuki tossed his phone to the coffee table and made for the gym bag eternally at his front door.

If he couldn’t fuck out the frustration, he’d continue to punch it out. Patience wasn’t Katsuki’s expertise, but nor was it his weakness. He would wait.

 

“You haven’t been to the office in six days,” Camie’s voice startled Katsuki as he exited the agency building where the gym was located on another floor. He looked over his shoulder, expression collected in a grimace as he eyed his friend leaned up against the building. Her large, hooded eyes scanned Katsuki as she took a drag of the cigarette caught in the vee of her slim fingers. “Sneaking in and out of the gym, though. What’s the deal, babe?”

Katsuki rolled his eyes and slunk over, plucked the cigarette from her mouth and flicked it into the night.

“That shit’s gonna kill you before anything else, blonde for brains.”

“ Hmmm .” Camie smiled, slow and sure. “I doubt it. Where have you been?”

“Undercover,” Katsuki replied without slipping up in the slightest. “The fuck’s it t’you? I don’t run this place, Tweedle-Dee and Dum do.”

“I hadn’t heard anything, is all.” Camie pushed off the wall and cocked her head to meet Katsuki’s eyes. Her thick hair blew in the wind, blonde strands catching on her candy lip gloss. “We miss you. Who else is going to, like, break up the fights that are totally not my fault?”

“Or you could just not start them,” Katsuki said shortly, dropping his hands into his pockets. His eyes narrowed as he caught Camie’s syrupy honeycomb scent waft over to him, warm and sweet and gold. His nose wrinkled but he said nothing, accustomed to the smell if not personally fond of it. “The fuck’re you doin’ out here, anyway?”

“Catching a break between paperwork,” Camie replied with a shrug, taking another step in as she looked up and chewed on her bottom lip. “You look tired, babe. Come get a drink with me – or three.”

“A drink’s gonna make me less tired?” Katsuki scoffed, but the beast inside him had risen its head in curiosity, roused by the thick, dripping scent coming off of Camie in unusual waves. A chill crept down his spine, one that set his body on subtle alert. “I’ll pass. Get some sleep or whatever.”

“Hey.” A hand on Katsuki’s forearm, another familiar touch over the years. Katsuki frowned down at Camie’s pouted expression. “Like, seriously. I miss you. When was the last time we hung out?”

Probably not since Katsuki had met Midoriya. Months and months. He hadn’t really noticed. Where work was involved, friendships had always taken a back seat with him. And, as for Midoriya, well - this was something altogether more consuming. A part of Katsuki now registered why Mina and Kirishima had always been distracted with each other during high school.

“Sorry,” Katsuki bit off, the word uncomfortable on his tongue. “Another time. Got a lot of shit goin’ on. I’m heading home.”

“Bakugou,” Camie murmured, hand reaching out and smelling of honeysuckle and sugared lemonade. “Come home with me instead. I can help you relax.”

Katsuki paused, eyes growing slowly wider as realization set in.

“What the fuck?” He took a step back, nose scrunching at the too-sweet scent threatening to overwhelm his sense. “Are you joking right now? What the - hell no, Cam. I’m -”

“We’ve been together a lot of years, B.” Camie’s expression of confident determination didn’t waver at Katsuki’s initial rejection. She moved in but bowed her head in an Omega gesture of subservience, one hand reaching forth to loosely link her fingers in Katsuki’s shock-limp hand. “You never considered how good we’d be together?”

“As a team , sure.” Katsuki replied carefully. He’d had dozens and dozens of propositions over the years, but never one from someone he knew intimately, a friend. And entirely out of the blue, by his reckoning. Maybe Camie’s heat was coming up, but it sure didn’t smell that way. “But no, there ain’t any way I could - with you. And there’s already… someone.”

Camie squeezed Katsuki’s hand a little too hard and released. She still looked down, but her shoulders had gone stiff, her stance still.

“That puny Omega guy who saved the kid.”

“Don’t  matter who,” Katsuki said, taking another step back as he readjusted the strap of his gym bag and looked to escape. “Forget about this shit now. I don’t wanna hear about it again.”

“Wait, Ba-”

Eyes firmly ahead, Bakugou retreated in a way he’d never walk away from a fight or challenge. But this was neither, and truth be told, he was actually uncomfortable in his skin for just about the first time ever. When in doubt, address the situation head on and leave no room for discussion.

It always worked for him.

So why did he feel so fucking guilty?

Katsuki sighed as his phone buzzed and checked the message. His soul soared.

>> Hi. Read any good books lately? -M

Would walking into Parchment ever get easier?

With his mouth watering, hands growing sweaty, Katsuki inhaled deep of the soaking, green hothouse aroma practically dripping from the walls. As he hung up his coat on a handy rack standing at the entrance, his skin prickled, the hairs on his arms standing on end. His body immediately set on edge.

Fuck. Midoriya near his heat was an understatement. By the smell of him, he was more than halfway to the plunge.

What the fuck had Katsuki been thinking in coming here?

Right. He was desperate and pathetic.

Katsuki considered Camie from the other day, how she’d offered herself to him. How much different was he from that, these days? Maybe he should have gone easier on her. Not that Midoriya had been gentle with him in those early weeks.

Not that Katsuki hadn’t deserved it, either.

And then, like a shock of dark clouds parting for the shy sunshine, Midoriya was approaching from the far aisle in a boxy sweater of thick, bold yellow and cream stripes. His jeans were something slim and faded to pale sky blue, his hulking hiking boots still very much like Katsuki’s own.

But holy hell, when those pouted lips of sober curiosity freed a wide, welcoming smile of recognition, Katsuki had to — had to glance away from the cheerful, blinding vision before him.

“Bakugou, you came!”

“Say that shit like I wouldn’t,” Katsuki muttered as he brought a hand up to brutally clasp at his nape, almost a self-scruff to calm himself. Midoriya’s approach only brought that inviting jungle scent in tow, succulent and pumping with delectable, accumulating heat. “Told yer ass before, I’m a man of my word.”

Midoriya paused mere feet away, his lips glossy and eyes lush as the greenery of which he smelled.

“I guess I didn’t know when you’d come and I thought it was too desperate to ask. It’s almost closing time and - and I’m talking a lot. How are you?”

There was something a little loose about his gait, even his stance and the way he linked his fingers at the small of his back to peer up at Katsuki all lacked Midoriya’s characteristic anxiety and keenness of senses. He seemed open and even a little drunk in the way he smiled dreamily up with half-mast bedroom eyes and that dimple in his right cheek.

Katsuki boggled down in mounting horror, his hands clawing their way into his pockets by way of self control.

What the fuck had he been thinking ? Everything he’d read of Omegas in their pre-heat state illustrated them as bursting with welcoming scent. Even more evident was the chemical shift in their bodies that made them more attractive - shinier hair, brighter eyes, clearer skin.

Fuck, even the shadowy eyebags and pale complexion had cheered up.

“Y-you’re, ah—“ Midoriya flicked a look to his booted feet and back up, all long kohl eyelashes and creamy moon cheeks. “You’re staring. Is there something weird on m—“

“You look and smell like the first day of spring and I want to pluck every single one of your flowers until you beg me to stop.”

Midoriya’s gaze snapped to meet Katsuki’s, a crack of lightning between them signaling a summer storm. The smile was gone but the lingering burn from that strike of intensity sizzled between them.

“You do have a surprising way with words sometimes,” Midoriya rasped, voice like sandpaper, eyes glistening with a dare that couldn’t be farther from classic Omega posturing. “This wasn’t a good idea, was it? I’m a little dangerous right now.”

Katsuki blinked. A grin caught at his lips.

“You? Right now ? Freckles, I think I can handle a hormonal shortstack like you —“

He saw the teeth first.

A gasp hooked Katsuki’s throat as Midoriya hauled him in by the hoodie and bit down on Katsuki’s bottom lip. Pain sang through the sensitive flesh as Midoriya used it to drag Katsuki down to his level, fingers fisting in Katsuki’s hair, a helpless little moan shining a bright shock through Katsuki’s body as Midoriya devoured his mouth into a feral, dizzying kiss.

Midoriya was merciless, gulping for air and thrusting his tongue into Katsuki’s mouth with skills Katsuki had never encountered or gained, and so could only allow himself to be swept up in the storm. One hand held on for dear life in the thick curls at Midoriya’s nape, the other banding tightly around Midoriya’s waist to keep him close, Katsuki bowed in as much as he could to comply with his Omega’s demands.

But the predatory, toothy Alpha inside him snarled for freedom.

“‘Zuku,” Katsuki muffled against Midoriya’s aggressive, moaning mouth. “Lock the door.”

“Huh?”

Midoriya looked up, face pink, lips wet, eyes a fogged over forest, scent dewy and damp. With his hands linked at the back of Katsuki’s neck, and the slow, drugged blinks of heavy lids, Katsuki’s heart leapt with the realization that his Omega was lost in him. Power pulled hot and long in Katsuki’s gut, his crotch bulging against Midoriya’s thigh between his legs.

Vicious Alpha claws ripping at Katsuki’s ribcage, he took a calming breath and leaned in, his mouth a whisper over the corner of Midoriya’s. He tasted raw, like unadulterated skin and salt and sweat, no artifice or tricks. And when Midoriya hummed and angled his chin to press a small, quiet kiss to Katsuki’s lips in return, Katsuki’s heart splattered at Midoriya’s feet with firm finality.

Mine.

Everything in his sinew and bones and teeth and toes wanted to say it out loud. The part of him separate from his body - that corner of his mind not clouded with the pliant, willing Omega in his arms - told at him not to. Not now, not yet.

“ Fuck the door,” Katsuki rasped, legs tangling with Midoriya’s much shorter ones as he walked Midoriya back, back into the stacks, snug between the haven of books and love notes and war stories. Midoriya was already laughing into his mouth and pressing himself into the science fiction section, one leg hiking up Katsuki’s hip as Katsuki’s large hand gripped the muscular underside of Midoriya’s thigh. “Fuck it.”

“ Bad dog,” Midoriya murmured breathlessly against Katsuki’s jaw before he hauled him in to claim once more. The words seeped through Katsuki’s system like a drug, loosening his throat as he growled against Midoriya’s mouth, both hands coming around to grip that high, firm ass and loft him up against the shelving.

That compact, powerhouse body felt like home against his own. Finally, finally a willing, volatile Midoriya was pressed into him, other leg wrapped around Katsuki’s waist as two hands fisted in Katsuki’s hair to hold him tight in a series of frantic, sloppy kisses. The aggression, uncharacteristic of any Omega ever , seeped from Midoriya’s pores, his throat musky with rising wet dirt smell and a roaring thunderstorm.

And Katsuki was drowning, fast.

Touch , he needed to touch this little livewire, to hold on and mark him until everyone knew this one was his .

Starved and desperate, Katsuki’s hands found the smooth, quivering skin beneath the sweater, Midoriya’s flesh feverish to the touch, and so fucking responsive when Katsuki’s grip rounded to his ass and yanked him in tighter. Midoriya’s legs clamped around Katsuki’s waist, his back digging into falling books, a high whimper sounding from Midoriya’s throat as he rubbed his face over the pulsing gland at Katsuki’s neck, smearing that potent Alpha scent all over his lips and cheeks. Their tangled smells rose in waves, like heat off black, searing asphalt, a fire that choked and made Katsuki dizzy as he dove in to catch that vocal mouth in a delirious kiss.

More whimpers and cries swallowed up as the air of urgency grew, Midoriya rolling his hips in a quick, jerky rut against Katsuki’s stomach, driving Katsuki to distraction while he was damn well busy yanking Midoriya’s sweater up to his armpits. It caught there, bunched up where Midoriya refused to release his hold around Katsuki’s neck, nor drag his mouth away from the feast of Katsuki’s lips, teeth, tongue.

“ Off ,” Katsuki snapped, jerking at the offending article again as he nipped at Midoriya’s lip, his longer, sharper canine catching on the plump, supple pink. An answering shudder ran through Midoriya’s shivering form and he was releasing, tearing his sweater from freckled shoulders and tossing it into the abyss. Books hailed down, merciless and ignored.

Katsuki paused to marvel, breathing hard, his lungs burning, eyes raking every contour and plane of Midoriya’s frame. Strong, such strong shoulders hiding beneath those dumpy clothes. Freckles fanned a heaving chest, dotting down faintly defined abdominals. A thick perfume of deep pine and raging river swamped Katsuki’s senses, his skin burning. Swallowing hard, blood a drum in his ears, Katsuki met Midoriya’s eyes.

What he saw had his mouth thinning.

Heavy eyes, cheeks red as his parted lips, curls stuck to his brow in a sweat, Midoriya reached up and behind him, scarred fingers gripping the ledge of shelf above his head. His body presented itself with the natural arch of his spine, his cock a brand through Katsuki’s clothes. Eyes in a clash, the tip of Midoriya’s tongue snuck out to trail his swollen top lip.

Katsuki bit the inside of his cheek and tasted iron.

“Wanna fuck me?” Midoriya mumbled, his words nearly a slur, voice dropping an octave. “‘S been a few years but, um -” Using the shelf for leverage, his arm muscles bulging as he used it to hold him a little, Midoriya writhed his hips in long, easy rolls. “I still know what t’do.”

Katsuki’s dick brushed Midoriya’s welcoming ass with each movement and Katsuki ground his back teeth hard enough for his jaw to ache.

The entire fucking world was testing him.

“Mid-” Katsuki hissed as Midoriya released the shelf and slumped forward to mouth at his ear. “‘Zuku, Izuku , hey - fuck . You - you’re - this isn’t the way we should be -”

“ Hmmm ?” Without warning, Midoriya wiggled from Katsuki’s hold and dropped to his knees, doe eyes wide and practically sightless when he peered up. Busy hands skimmed up Katsuki’s sweatpants to knead at his weakening thighs. “Bakugou?”

“Fuck.” Katsuki’s traitorous hands brushed through those curls once, twice, before he stole them away and took a step back. The beast inside bared its teeth and tore at his innards, a very real pain sharp in Katsuki’s gut as he resisted the animal call within. “Izuku, we can’t. You’re - not when you’re like this. Or, shit, not the first time anyway. You’d fuckin’ hate me, and I ain’t gonna take advantage of you when you’re practically gagging for -”

“Well, fuck you .” Midoriya was on his feet in a snap movement, faster than Katsuki expected every single time. The shove came before Katsuki could register and he stumbled back into the stacks, a livid and wild-eyed Midoriya coming at him with a snarl. “You want me, you don’t want me, you want me - make up your mind , Alpha! Who d’you think you are , huh? Think I can’t get myself another one like you to satisfy me? Because I could walk out onto the street and have three Alpha’s on me in -”

“STOP.” Katsuki’s arms crushed around Midoriya in a steel hold, face buried in a bizarre scent of attraction and aggression all at once. Something wasn’t right here. Omegas in heat didn’t just fly into furies. Omegas in heat didn’t bite or growl or - “Stop, Izuku. You ain’t right, y’know? Think. Think .”

A struggle ensued, but Katsuki was stronger, his Alpha will to protect his mate overriding everything else. He’d never experienced an instinct like this in his life, not for any bystander or victim he’d ever saved. Midoriya forged steel in his bones and brain, everything built to keep Katsuki’s Omega from doing something careless and stupid.

When Midoriya finally stilled, it was to nose at Katsuki’s throat once more, tongue lapping long, flat stripes with his raspy tongue.

“No!” Frantic, eyes a little wild, voice thin with barely restrained control, Katsuki pushed Midoriya at arm’s length, grip tight on Midoriya’s shoulders.

“Hey!” The rage had drained from Midoriya’s expression, his features lax and seductive as he pouted at Katsuki, straight brows scrunched and adorable. “Don’t you want me?”

“NO. I mean, fuck yes , hell, every day , but - not, not like this right now. Shit .”

What the fuck was he meant to do ? Why were they not trained for this shit? Confident in his skills as a hero as he was, how could Katsuki get Midoriya home safely without the entire world, including himself, wanting to jump the most delicious Omega to ever walk the planet?

Who the hell was safe from Midoriya in this kind of situation?

Katsuki’s expression soured.

“I need to use your phone.”

“What? No.” Midoriya frowned and folded his arms across his bare chest, the muscles in his biceps slightly bulging.

Katsuki released Midoriya’s shoulders like they were on fire, not trusting even that level of contact now. His cock had barely calmed, still hung heavy and half-full between his legs as he scowled at the stubborn Omega before him. It didn’t help that Midoriya’s scent had only strengthened, greenhouse thick and wet. Katsuki raked his hands through his hair and growled, frustrated and brief.

“Much as I don’t wanna say it, I don’t trust me to take you home. But you’re in heat now. You need that gloved asshole to come get you.”

Midoriya frowned, considering him. The color was still high in his cheeks, but his gaze appeared more focussed, his pupils no longer blown-out black lakes. Everything in Katsuki screamed to throw him over his shoulder and fuck him until he couldn’t think a single thought but for his Alpha.

“Shit,” Midoriya said quietly. “Yeah, ‘kay. Phone. Come on.”

Keeping a safe distance, Katsuki followed Midoriya to the office. His back was just as freckled as his shoulders, the movement of his muscle and sinew making Katsuki’s salivate, desperate to touch, to sink his teeth into the flushed flesh. Every inch of Midoriya was taut and fit and compact enough to carry away to -

“I’ll just call him,” Midoriya murmured before slipping into the room.

Katsuki didn’t follow. He needed a moment. They both did.

Some part of him had anticipated this. A large part of him. What he hadn’t anticipated was the the utter wrongness that coursed through him like warning when he saw Midoriya out of his mind and high on biology. While Katsuki wasn’t humble enough to think Midoriya wasn’t attracted to him - they wanted each other as much as the other, dammit - Katsuki wanted Midoriya to look at him and want him without the influence of a mating drive behind him.

He wanted the passionate, stubborn, intelligent, and kind Midoriya to look at him exactly as he was, shitty flaws and ego and all, and still want him .

And up until a few minutes ago, Katsuki hadn’t realized he’d needed that at all . Hadn’t known he’d even cared like that, on that level. The knowledge had been instantly sobering, even when Midoriya had been wrapped around him and ready to ride.

“He’s coming.”

Midoriya’s voice startled Katsuki, who’d been leaning against the wall, glaring, unseeing, at the cookbooks.

“Ah...” Katsuki’s gaze lingered on Midoriya’s collarbones, drifting to secure on the subtle curve of Midoriya’s scent gland on his throat. He wanted to bite. His mouth watered. “That’s -”

“Bakugou.” Midoriya approached him with those large, wary animal eyes, slow and careful until their toes nearly touched. That tight little body literally radiated heat, the sun and Katsuki the vulnerable planets caught by its gravity. Large hands skimmed at Bakugou’s waistband, Midoriya’s gaze flicking down when Bakugou’s inhaled sharply. Midoriya cleared his throat, his voice husky as he continued to watch his fingers play at the hem of Bakugou’s shirt. “Won’t you take me home? Isn’t that what we both want?”

“I don’t think it is,” Katsuki found himself saying, inwardly outraged at his own fucking noble mouth.

Midoriya’s attention shot up, the ferocity of earlier returning, searing into Katsuki’s own stubborn stare.

“What the hell do you want from me, then?” Midoriya snapped, sounding choked and somehow near tears.

Katsuki frowned and reached out, palming the burning curve of Midoriya’s cheek. He grit his teeth when Midoriya instantly murmured nonsense, eyes falling shut as he angled his face, lips mouthing against the pounding pulse at Katsuki’s wrist.

“I want you ,” Katsuki said quietly. “Idiot. Just you, as you are.”

Midoriya’s lashes fluttered and lifted, revealing a question in that expressive face which Katsuki couldn’t begin to decipher or answer.

“Who are you really, Bakugou Katsuki?” Midoriya murmured into the thin skin and veins connected to Katsuki’s heart. “You surprise me at every turn.”

“Believe me,” Katsuki said dryly, his voice cracking with the effort it took not to move an inch, “the feeling’s fuckin’ mutual.”

“I want you,” Midoriya whispered fiercely, those doe eyes going dark and direct again.

The words cut through Katsuki like an arrow to the heart, the sting palpable and real as he held his breath and watched Midoriya skim his teeth over the blue veins and slick gland  at his wrist. This wasn’t part of any Omega mating ritual, was it? Katsuki knew enough to know he was staring in the face of someone utterly unique. His heart pounded with exhilaration, his thighs trembling with the effort to keep from pouncing.

“You damn well know I want you,” Katsuki breathed out in a rush, his hand fisting when Midoriya attempted to lick up the center of his palm. “ Fuck . You’re not making this easy, are you, freckles.”

“I’d be your first.” Midoriya guided Katsuki’s wrist along Midoriya’s jaw, tucked it beneath to slick over the gland at his throat, combining their scents, soft-marking each other for days upon days to come. The knowledge that Midoriya would spend his heat absolutely stinking of Katsuki had him unconsciously baring his fangs, silent and salivating to sink his teeth into flesh.

“I’ll make it good f’you,” Midoriya slurred, his breath shuddering out as his body shivered with each caress over his neck. His eyes were barely open, but still trained on Katsuki all the same. “Kacchan.”

Katsuki’s eyes bulged, his frame freezing in mingled horror and hot, bright shocks of arousal flashing straight to his cock.

“W- what .”

“Isn’ that what your fans call you?” Midoriya had crept into his space somehow, both hands riding up Katsuki’s shirt, playful fingers splayed across his skin as Midoriya went to his tiptoes to lick at Katsuki’s throat. “I think I’m becoming a fan, too.”

“ Holy fuck , okay -” Resolutely, Katsuki held Midoriya at arm's length, gaze frantic as he turned Midoriya and walked him backward into the office. “Okay, shit, I don’t - no. No . You’re staying the hell in there until that shitbag shows up and I’m - I’m staying out here .”

Midoriya gaped.

“But -”

Katsuki shut the door in his face and promptly slammed his forehead against the wood, hands fisted on either side as he breathed through the raging erection in his sweats and the howling in his chest.

Stuck on the other side of the fucking door again .

The only difference was Katsuki knowing it was for the best this time. But he needed to turn Midoriya and take him against the wall. How easy it would be to part those thick thighs and shove right in to a hole that would no doubt be luscious and wet for him, to pound that electric body until Midoriya’s legs dripped and ran with his cum. He needed -

“Kacch-”

“YOU’RE GONNA REGRET SAYING ONE MORE FUCKIN’ WORD.” Katsuki slammed a fist against the wood, the door frame cracking beneath the weight of his desire. “Just try me right now, dumbass! Try me . I’m doin’ the right thing here and you’re about as helpful as a sledgehammer to the balls!”

The resounding silence was better for the both of them all around.

Ten minutes felt like an eternity before Chisaki strolled in looking like some fashion model reject, the black flu mask across his nose and mouth only highlighting those piercing amber eyes. Katsuki continued to lean against the door, arms folded, shoulders stiff and body on guard. Despite the Beta being the furthest thing from a threat, the idea of another person touching his Omega suddenly made his stomach drop with nausea.

Katsuki curled a lip in disgust  upon Chisaki’s approach.

“He’s in there.”

A thin, sharp brow quirked up. Chisaki’s hands were in his pockets, but his stance was ramrod straight and on edge.

“What did you do to him?”

“Didn’t do shit to him,” Katsuki snapped, keeping his voice low and even as he could. He wasn’t here to start a fight, for once. Midoriya was his main concern. “He went all heat crazy the second I got here and shoved him in the room to keep him from doin’ something stupid.”

Chisaki’s long, considering gaze held weight. Katsuki refused to look away from their stare-off.

“I told him to call you,” Katsuki said, finally.

Chisaki cocked his head.

“Thank you,” he replied. “I’ll take it from here. You can go.”

Katsuki hesitated, considering saying goodbye to Midoriya. Realistically, though, he didn’t know how much longer he could stay in a place so drenched with siren Omega scent without losing his mind entirely. He wasn’t even annoyed to be dismissed so quickly by Chisaki - he just wanted to get out of here before he physically could no longer leave.

“Take care of him,” Katsuki mumbled as he passed by Chisaki, bumping his shoulder hard on purpose.

“There’s no one better to do it,” Chisaki replied airily, the inherent intimacy of his and Midoriya’s relationship clear in a single sentence.

Katsuki gritted his teeth and saw himself out. If he paused to pick up the sunshine striped sweater and breathe it in deep before he tossed it on the counter, how could anyone blame him for that?

Out on the frigid night’s street, Katsuki fumbled with his phone and tapped out a quick message.

>> When this is over, go on a date with me.

Six strenuous days passed before he received a reply.

>> Okay.

Chapter 21

Summary:

“The me I am with you is the me I wish I was more often.”

Notes:

Well, look at me! I managed to update within the month, haha. Anyway, thank you everyone for your support and for your enthusiasm from the last chapter! You're all such a wonderful BkDk family!

To those of you who have been reading from day one, you have officially been waiting EIGHTEEN MONTHS for these stubborn guys' first official date. So, here it is. Almost 10k long. I hope you enjoy it! This ends Arc 2, and now we will be heading into further drama and adventures in Arc 3!

Songs For This Chapter:
Vertigo - Khalid | Spotify | YouTube
Sweet Dreams, TN - The Last Shadow Puppets | Spotify | YouTube
Favorite Sound - Audien & Echosmith | Spotify | YouTube

The ground rose up to meet Katsuki, his world upending as his back slammed into the practice mat. Gritting his teeth, Katsuki stared at the gymnasium ceiling while a dozen shitty middle-schoolers exclaimed in glee. When he’d offered himself up to Ochako in self-defense training, being her official punching bag hadn’t been what he had in mind.

Yet, here he was, rolling from the floor to his feet to scowl at the wide, glittering eyes of the future.

Why the hell did people want to actually have these things, anyway?

Well, it had been something to do over the past weeks. His ego wasn’t so huge that he couldn’t take a fake beating for the sake of kids learning safety measures for the future. Their world wasn’t a kind or benevolent one. These children couldn’t know when the next villain would crush their school by accident as part of a larger battle, nor could they know if the shopping outing in the heart of Tokyo would lead to Red Riot and Ground Zero being thrown through the window of mannequins as they picked an outfit for a birthday party.

Uncertainty was the only certain part of this existence. Over the days at Ochako’s side, the reality of her goals with these children became more real to him.

Didn’t mean he had to love getting thrown over her shoulder twenty times a session.

As the two of them spread the kids into rows and walked along to correct form and footing, Katsuki allowed his mind to drift toward the rest of his day.

He’d told Midoriya to wear something comfortable. Of course, the nosy little shit had poked and prodded through text as to why and what for and what kind of shoes should I wear , and a dozen other niggles that apparently anxious fuckers like him actually worried about.

No wonder the guy’s big, gorgeous eyes carried shadow beneath the delicate, pale skin beneath. Did Midoriya even sleep through a night for all the worry he brought into his own life? There were simpler ways to live, but Katsuki was growing to accept that Midoriya’s insecurities had been scarred into his soul much longer than Katsuki’s short presence in his life could just go ahead and heal or save.

Katsuki was no expert in mitigating distress, but for Midoriya he would damn well try.

Anyway, he got the impression that Midoriya was more anxious about seeing Katsuki for the first time since his heat than simply their official first date. They hadn’t been face to face since Midoriya had literally dropped to his knees to suck his cock in the middle of his unlocked work place.

The memory, already over a week old, still spiked Katsuki’s pulse. Those thick thighs wrapped around his waist had been heaven, the thick, overwhelming hothouse scent of his mate dewy on his own skin like sweat. Breathing and thinking had been near impossible, then, the Alpha in him driven to claim, to simply rail Midoriya’s willing ass right through the book shelves until they’d fucked on a heap of sharp, angular books and pages smelling of parchment and Midoriya.

But Katsuki hadn’t, and they didn’t, and Katsuki was okay with that on a mental level, while his body still reacted with instant lust and fury at his personal betrayal. Katsuki was fairly certain he’d never experienced self-loathing until now. There were a lot of feelings he hadn’t encountered up until Midoriya. Whether that was good or bad remained in the air.

“You’ve been off your game for days,” Ochako said as she literally hurled a water bottle at his head from close range. Katsuki caught it inches before it collided with his face and didn’t miss Ochako’s rosy smile. Somehow, their relationship had grown into a game of chicken in which they one-upped each other in strength until one of them got annoyed enough to call the other out. Sometimes it would be years before one of them snapped.

“What game?” Katsuki drank, eyeing the kids who’d begun to file from the gym. “Don’t need no game to let your ass step on my foot and knee me in the crotch in front of a bunch of eleven year-olds. What a need is a restraining order.”

Ochako pouted a little.

“Jerk. Your distracted, though. You go from scowling like a murderer to smiling like a shark in the span of minutes, and I think you’re legitimately scaring the children.”

“They should be scared,” Katsuki mumbled, turning away to pick up his duffel and hopefully hide the concern crossing his expression. Had he really been that obvious? At least Ochako’s Beta nose wouldn’t pick up -

“Just tell me one thing,” Ochako said, suddenly right behind him and close enough to physically startle Katsuki as he whirled with a snarl.

“ What ? What is it? Fuck, why do you c-”

“Is it a guy?”

Katsuki stilled, his ears going hot. He and Ochako had never, not once in all the years, talked about relationship shit together. They just weren’t those kind of friends. Let alone a friend who would know he was gay or not or whatever.

“A guy?” Katsuki croaked, brain frantically attempting to catch up with the line of questioning.

“I mean.” Ochako shrugged a little as he unpinned her bangs from atop her head and smoothed them out, her gaze averted and her voice soft. “I think almost every girl in the class had a crush on you at some point during those three years. Especially when your mouth was shut.”

“Well, excuse the fuck outta me for -”

“But you were never interested, were you?”

“It wasn’t not interested, I just didn’t give a shit about dating, period ,” Katsuki hedged. He didn’t want to get into this here, or anywhere , with anyone . “It’s obnoxious and messy and -” Katsuki clenched his teeth in time with his conflicted heart. “Complicated.”

Very complicated.

Something in Ochako’s face lightened, her eyebrows climbing in time with her slow, sweet smile.

“I knew they would be a guy.”

With that, she turned and picked up her bag, a flounce in her step as she made for the double doors to the parking lot.

Sputtering, Katsuki frantically followed, his shoulder ramming into hers without delicacy.

“I haven’t - I haven’t said there’s a guy! I never have! How the fuck -”

“Okay, okay.” Ochako chirped cheerfully as she smacked him none too gently on the back, shocking a rush of air from Katsuki’s poor lungs. “There’s no guy. You just uncharacteristically vacillate between grumpy and dreamy multiple times in an hour because of other deep, personal issues.”

“I don’t have issues , you goddamn witch!” Katsuki held the door for Ochako and stomped after her, the February wind cold and damp and refreshing on his burning face. “I’m balanced as fuck. And if there was a guy, I wouldn’t been mooning over him like some oxytocin-high Omega with a hard-on!”

“Gosh, that’s a lot of information about something you’re not , Bakugou,” Ochako replied happily as she approached her car. She turned, her round face bright and cheerful against the grey sky. “Well, forget I said anything. I’ll see you next week?”

“I’ll see you in hell !” Katsuki snapped as he turned and skulked away.

He swore he heard Ochako’s wind chime laughter carry on the breeze. Damn it all.

 

Was he really that obviously in… in a state of total fucking goneness for Midoriya that even Betas noticed the change in him? Was he really so different now?

“Bullshit,” Katsuki muttered as he shouldered through the rush hour crowd, his fists bunched into the pockets of a leather jacket he’d finally been able to free from his closet. He’d layered a hoodie beneath due to the undeniable chill in the air, but he’d just missed his worn, black leather, and would pull it out at the soonest instance of melting snow.

And maybe Midoriya would like it on him. There was that.

Shifting from one orange sneaker to the other in the cold, Katsuki buzzed at Midoriya’s apartment and waited. Through the intercom, there was a quick, breathless, “Coming!”

The short word, the sound of his mate’s voice after more than a week, ticked Katsuki’s breathing up a notch, his blood running just that bit faster, his lips parting as he instinctively scented the doorway and inhaled the lingering aroma of Midoriya’s summer warmth. The taste of him pooled on Katsuki’s tongue, a memory unfurling with Midoriya’s scent.

The door flew open and Midoriya stood there, cheeks flushed, hair a soft cloud that framed a tight, anxious smile and the worry in his eyes.

“Hi,” Midoriya whispered, his deep green puffer coat zipped right up to his stubborn chin. That clever tongue wet his bottom lip before he chewed down on it.

Fuck, he was cute .

Katsuki already knew it wouldn’t do to share that particular piece of opinion with his Omega.

“Hi,” Katsuki rasped, his nails cutting into the palms of his fists he kept firmly in his pockets. If he touched Midoriya now, he didn’t know if he could stop himself from hauling his mate over his shoulder and dashing right up the stairs to his apartment. “You’re nervous.”

Midoroya’s gaze widened just a little before he glanced at the ground and huffed out a short laugh. He swept by Katsuki as he spoke in a mollified tone.

“I think mortified is the word you’re looking for. The last time I saw you I basically threatened you to have sex with me or else I’d run into the street and find someone who would.”

Katsuki fell into step with Midoriya, a deep frown pulling at his mouth.

“That was the heat. That ain’t you.”

Midoriya stopped on the empty sidewalk, his face unexpectedly hard and guarded, like those first weeks he’d circled Katsuki with caution.

“And what if it were?”

“If it were what?” Katsuki looked around, saw no one, and hunched in to bring their faces closer. “Midor- can I call you Izuku yet?”

Midoriya blinked in obvious surprise.

“I - yes? Okay.”

“Izuku,” Katsuki said, relishing each syllable on his tongue, watching the way Midoriya’s pupils swelled in reaction. “I ain’t one for pretty words and shit -”

“Sometimes you are,” Midoriya said with the barest hint of a smile.

“Fuck off, just listen.” Katsuki allowed himself a hand on Midoriya’s shoulder, feeling only the downy softness of the puffy coat and hating that he could meet skin.

“I don’t care what kinda stuff you got into before we knew each other, alright? I don’t know why the hell that needs to be said, but apparently it does, so here it is. Some real hard shit went down in your life. I’m gettin’ that. But I think you seriously underestimate the amount of fucks I do not give about your past. Did you screw like twenty dudes in the past?” Midoriya made a face and opened his mouth, but Katsuki placed his thumb over Midoroya’s top lip and forced it down and closed, his finger lingering there as he spoke quick and harsh. “Trick question - I don’t care. I mean, I want to rip out every single one of their throats, but I don’t care that you did it. You’re mine now. You’re mine .”

Katsuki’s fingers unfurled, his palm cupping the line of Midoriya’s jaw as he took in Midoriya’s slack, speechless expression. Despite himself, Katsuki cracked a smile.

“Fuck, if you killed a guy tomorrow I’d probably help you hide the body.”

With eyes the size of dinner plates, Midoriya gawked, utterly still and barely breathing.

“I - um.”

Katsuki waited, his features stiff and stern as he watched Midoriya tangle with too many emotions to unravel. He was learning how to be better at waiting.

Midoriya’s mouth worked around words that didn’t come yet, and when he did spoke, his voice sounded like he’d been screaming for an hour.

“Bakugou.” Midoriya gazed off to the side, thought it did nothing to release the tension coiled between them. “You realize you just professed your ownership over me before our first date, right?”

Katsuki didn’t react at first, because frankly, he didn’t think he’d heard the little bastard right. But the silence extended and the words sunk in like the knife Midoriya apparently had ready at a moment’s notice to jam into his fucking chest.

A swell of possessive fury slapped Katsuki in the face and washed over his head, drowning him in the rejection. Alpha fangs bared on instinct, Katsuki swooped in, his teeth grazing Midoriya’s ear as he felt the man jump with the sudden intimacy.

“I -” Katsuki stopped dead and yanked back with an expression of disgust. He was holding Midoriya by the arms, though he couldn’t recall having grabbed him, and while Midoriya’s eyes looked fogged over and heavy with lust instead of fury, Katsuki was distracted by something else altogether. “Izuku. Why the fuck can’t I smell you?”

Midoriya didn’t reply as he tipped into Katsuki’s frame, his face tilted up to gaze at Katsuki’s with eyes only half-cleared. He shook his head a little, as if trying to shake some sense into himself, his voice husky and summer night hot.

“What? I - oh, the blockers. I wore the blockers, y’know. S’expensive stuff, but I didn’t want - didn’t want someone interrupting our -”

“Blockers?” Katsuki top lip curled at the very thought.

“Yeah.” Midoriya closed his eyes for a moment, took a breath, and when he opened them, his expression was keener. He rubbed his hands over his face as he took a step back. “I can’t afford to wear them every day like I did in university, when the government gives you that stuff for free just for being a poor student. But I thought today would be worth it. Why?”

“I don’t like it,” Katsuki said, suddenly bringing his arm around Midoriya’s and tugging him along down the sidewalk. They’d be late for their reservation now. “I hate it. Don’t do that.”

“Uh, well, first of all,” Midoriya began, the familiar lightning snap returning to his voice as he walked in double time to keep up with Katsuki’s loping strides, “Fuck you very much if you think I’m going to wear or not wear anything you do or don’t approve of. I’ve done that and regardless of whatever romantic proclamations you insist on making in the middle of the street - which, by the way, is totally unfair, because how could any person turn you down when you’re so, you’re so -”

“Perfect?” Katsuki said as he dragged Midoriya across the street.

“Infuriating!” Midoriya was keeping up now, his cheeks red from indignation or something else, his arm tight around Katsuki’s as they hurried along. “You’re cocky and infuriating and so damn sure I’m just going to fall for you and -”

“The last thing you breed in me lately is confidence,” Katsuki said flatly. “You’re about as predictable as typhoon season.”

“Well, stop being so damn convincing, then!” Midoriya huffed out a breath and Katsuki didn’t bother to hide his smirk as they shoved between a couple who weren’t holding hands tight enough. “How can you say you don’t care about my past? You should care. It made me into this mess you’re apparently set on - on -”

“Courting,” Katsuki supplied simply.

“Why do you want this ?” Midoriya sounded frantic now, his free hand waving as he ranted in a quickly rising voice. “Why me? Wow, I smell nice, great. Now you don’t want me to wear the blockers or else you’re not as attracted to me because I don’t smell -”

Katsuki stopped so short that his hold on Midoriya’s arm nearly sent Midoriya flying back to the ground in his near sprinting walk. Midoriya whipped around, eyes hard and jeweled with emotions Katsuki couldn’t begin to understand. The little shit had two dozen too many of them.

“Come here,” Katsuki hissed, banding an arm around Midoriya’s waist to haul him in tight. People passed around them, seemingly unconcerned with the scene. Or perhaps it was the stench of fury rising up around them. Midoriya glared up, but his gaze kept falling to Katsuki’s sneering mouth, and that told Katsuki enough. “ You can’t smell me . That mean you’re not attracted to me?”

Midoriya’s attention whipped away from Katsuki’s lips, those pupils eclipsing big and black.

“No,” he whispered. “I’m, I’m very - you’re - how could I not be?”

“Then how the fuck do you think I wouldn’t be attracted to you ?” Katsuki bit off, tamping down his temper as best he could. “Are you stupid or has everyone in your life just fucked you up that much? I hate those blockers because I can’t smell my mate and I should be able to have at least that if I can’t - if I can’t -”

Katsuki released Midoriya from his hold, his face sober with the thought that Midoriya’s past really was one of the things dragging them down. Bits and pieces of knowledge, plus police reports and personal files didn’t tell the story that Midoriya obviously had to tell. If he couldn’t get through to this man, how could they ever be more than this endless push and pull?

“Think whatever you want, then,” Katsuki snapped. He jammed a finger in Midoriya’s chest, who was looking at him like he was a damn alien. “Think whatever you want about me or you or us. I’m still gonna be here. Idiot . Now let’s go, we’re late.”

To Katsuki’s pleasure, Midoriya remained silent the rest of their walk. They didn’t link arms or hold hands, but Midoriya kept close, their arms brushing as they travelled the bustling pavement.

Every time Katsuki was with Midoriya, he ended up simultaneously more sure of his attraction to the soft and strong, volatile Omega, as well as more perplexed by the complexity of this person. Midoriya Izuku was both exhausting, a challenge, and utterly worth it, all in one.

“We’re here,” Katsuki said gruffly as he held the door for Midoriya to enter.

Frowning as he unzipped his jacket, Midoriya approached the counter alongside Katsuki. Then, just as if they never argued at all, his face lit up. Whipping around to face Katsuki, Midoriya beamed, surprise written clear across his features.

“Are we wall climbing ?”

“I hope you dressed like I told you,” Katsuki said by way of reply as he critically eyed Midoriya’s red high tops and the simple, dark grey sweats that tapered to the ankle.

Midoriya was already shedding his coat to reveal an equally red, long sleeved shirt that actually clung to his taut waist and thick shoulders rather than draping loosely from it. Katsuki’s blood surged in reaction to the color, and the way that it traced the shape of Midoriya’s body. There was something deep and dark in Katsuki’s primal belly that coiled tight with the knowledge that an Omega so clearly relished the lurid color red.

Stores catering to Omegas were seas of pretty pastels or calming coastal colors of grey, misty purples, or deep ocean blues. More daring or shy Omegas might tend toward black.

But red . There was something about his Omega in red.

“I’m ready!” Midoriya declared, rocking on the balls of his feet with a building abundance of energy. Katsuki briefly wished he could smell his happiness.

“You ever done this before?” Katsuki asked as he waved with a scowl at a worker who hadn’t yet come up to help them.

“Nope,” Midoriya cheerfully replied as he rolled his sleeves up strong forearms. “But I’ve always wanted to. Why’d you pick a place like this for a date? For me, anyway. I’m basically the poor man’s librarian.”

Katsuki allowed himself a slow, considering sweep of Midoriya’s body, making sure to linger at Midoriya’s slowly blushing face. His voice emerged lower than he’d anticipated.

“Nerd or not, ain’t nothin’ weak about you, is there?”

Midoriya looked away quickly, then back, his teeth briefly chewing at his bottom lip again.

“M-most people don’t see me that way anymore.”

“Well.” Katsuki flicked a brow, face stern as he slipped from his leather jacket and watched Midoriya follow the stripping motion. “Guess I’m the only one lookin’ hard enough.”

A current of something thrilling and tense jolted between them, and for a split second Katsuki caught Midoriya’s scent. Just a high, sharp ping at the back of his teeth, like electricity in the air.

Once they were properly greeted by an employee and directed to the lockers to stow their belongings, the two of them were shown around the different difficulty levels of climbing. The main arena, the one in which they’d walked into, held majority of levels one through three, which, while Katsuki was plenty familiar with this shit, Midoriya was soaking up everything like a schoolboy.

“We can’t allow you to go right into the level four or five area,” the employe said, almost a little sheepish as he quickly deferred his glance away from Katsuki and toward Midoriya. Katsuki could only assume the guy recognized him and had a hard time telling a top hero that he couldn’t do something. “If you can demonstrate your ability to successfully climb the level three, then we can move into the expert ranges.”

Midoriya didn’t appear offended in the slightest, whereas Katsuki boiled under the skin at the insinuation that his mate would be anything less than a stellar example of a man.

“Those, right?” Midoriya said, gesturing to a set of four tall options. Two of them jutted forth at an angle toward the top, a climber not simply picking boulders to haul themselves upward, but having to enable enough balance to adjust for tilting back, too. Katsuki cocked his head, fascinated with the keen, steely look that took over Midoriya’s demeanor as he scanned the walls from bottom to top.

Midoroya took a breath and aimed a smile at the employee - Katsuki cut back his possessive growl before it went full blown, but earned wide eyes of terror from the guy and a quelling, parental look from Midoriya.

“Ignore him,” Midoriya said breezily. “I’m ready.”

“Uh.” The employee looked between them both. “Okay. Let me set you up with a harness.”

Midoriya wrinkled his nose.

“I don’t want a harness.”

“You’ll take the harness,” Katsuki said.

Midoriya slowly inclined his chin, his expression utterly unamused.

“I don’t want the harness,” he said lowly, his voice carrying a command element that set off goosebumps along Katsuki’s skin.

There wasn’t anything Omega about the way Midoriya carried himself now, and with the blockers sprayed firmly into his pores, it was impossible to tell his was anything but - but what? Anything but an Alpha? The very idea trembled Katsuki’s knees with something warm and jelly-soft.

Katsuki cleared his throat and glanced at the employee.

“He doesn’t need the harness.” Katsuki looked to Midoriya, one hand protectively wrapping around a sturdy, totally not-delicate or Omega-like wrist. “Don’t hurt yourself.”

Midoriya grinned.

“I have a very high pain threshold.”

Katsuki’s nostrils flared in instant response, instinctively checking the air for invitation or seduction, his teeth baring in a dead silent snarl when he found nothing.

“I hate the blockers.”

Midoriya’s smile only widened, something akin to glee lighting those expressive eyes.

“Maybe I should wear them more often, then.”

Katsuki literally fucking whined . And hated himself.

“C-come on over when you’re ready,” the employee mumbled from their periphery. Katsuki had entirely forgotten about the guy.

With a sulking slouch to Midoriya’s bouncing step, they made their way to the seemingly most difficult wall. Multi-colored boulders stretched to the high ceiling - it was a long way up, and many of the foot and hand-holds were smaller and more erratically shaped and spread out than with easier walls.

Indoor rock climbing wasn’t simply a test of strength, but a challenge of the mind and body. Katsuki loved it, and had long ago graduated to outdoor rock climbing as a rarely-indulged hobby.

He’d taken Midoriya here for more than one reason. He already knew his Omega was a bundle of physical, crackling energy and power - that much had been evident from day one, and the knowledge continued to arouse every nerve in Katsuki’s body the longer he saw Midoriya in action. In addition, a part of Katsuki - the competitive, winning Alpha within - wanted to measure Midoriya’s mettle.

Just how daring was he? Could he match up to a power Alpha like the almighty Ground Zero?

Of course he couldn’t. But Katsuki had the feeling Midoriya would give him a damn good run, and that was better than most.

“Don’t let those short little legs get the best of you,” Katsuki said with a cocky smirk, his hands on his hips and chest puffed out as Midoriya approached the wall up close.

Midoriya cast an arch glance over his shoulder.

“Oh!” Katsuki called out, grinning wider. “And don’t you dare use a Quirk or you’re done for.”

Midoriya’s eyebrows jumped near to his hairline, something off-balance flashing across his expression before he was offering one of his tight, anxious smiles of which Katsuki wasn’t a fan.

“I wouldn’t dream of it,” Midoriya said softly.

Midoriya was already shimmying up the wall while the shock of what Katsuki said settled into his bones. What the fuck had he run his off for? Camie’s words from the very day he’d been suspended from work smacked him clear across the face. .

“I can’t imagine you of all people getting into it with some low-level, book store owning Omega with a criminal record and no Quirk.”

That entire day had been such a devastating fucknado of shit that the initial shock of her words, of Midoriya’s file, had never had the chance to properly sink in. As soon as Katsuki had been reeling with the new knowledge, Tamaki had called him into the office to question Midoriya's possible involvement in the crimes.

Had Midoriya’s lack of Quirk ever been brought up in the last three-ish months they’d known each other? Katsuki thought he recalled asking once, but the topic had been bowled over by something else of greater importance at the time.

While it was true that society frowned on open, nosy discussion of peoples’ Quirks - it was like asking what underwear someone was wearing - it was odd that even now, Midoriya hadn’t brought it up.

Then again, when was a good time for that? When was a good time for any of the shit Katsuki surreptitiously knew about Midoriya to air out in the open? Maybe it was up to him to create some kind of comfortable, safe environment for that.

Shit. When the hell had he started to sound like such love-struck loser ?

The victory bell jangled, and Katsuki blinked back to attention in time to see Midoriya wave from the top, one hand holding tight to the ledge as he stuck his tongue out at Katsuki and pulled at his bottom eyelid with a finger. Katsuki’s own laugh surprised him as he flicked the guy off and watched him proceed to climb down the wall with quick, nimble steps that spoke of experience that he apparently did not have. Midoriya was a natural athletic talent.

Katsuki wanted to claim him so fucking badly.

“I told you he didn’t need a harness,” Katsuki smugly said as he swept past the employee waiting at the base. Midoriya hopped to the ground and turned, biting down on a wide smile that failed to hide anything at all. “You did good.”

“High praise,” Midoriya said, his face like absolute fucking sunshine, and Katsuki wanted to tear into him and watch him fall apart beneath his body. “What’s next?”

“Level four,” Katsuki said tightly, diving his hands into his sweatpants pockets, which had quickly become his best coping method for not hauling Midoriya into his arms and onto his cock at any given moment. He himself might not know the first thing about properly fucking, but the Alpha animal in him sure as hell did, and that was giving him all kinds of trouble lately. Especially when he knew how Midoriya’s body felt against him, those hips writhing against him in delirious desire.

Shaking his head, Katsuki trailed behind Midoriya and the employee, who was taking him through safety measures and talks of the harness as they went into another room. There were more people in here than in the low level area - all of them Alphas or Betas, from Katsukis quick evaluation of the room.

Suddenly, Katsuki was really glad for those blockers. If anyone so much as took a sniff of his mate, he’d tear their balls off and skewer them atop Tokyo Tower.

“Hey.” Midoriya bounded up to him, his cheeks practically glowing, his hands linked at the small of his back as he presented himself and his tilted chin up to Katsuki in the first Omega posture since they’d arrived. Something about it had Katsuki repressing a fond smile, his fingers twitching to run through those curls. Midoriya looked happy. “So, are we going to race?”

Instantly, the tender swell in Katsuki’s chest popped into confetti, excitement sparkling in his belly as he offered a toothy, merciless smile.

“You can try, shortstack.”

The next level of climbing was dramatically more difficult from the wall Midoriya on which had just excelled. As the employee hooked them up to their harnesses, Katsuki watched Midoriya scan the wall with a fearless glint in his eye. The wall was far from flat - it jutted forth at random intervals, and the rainbow boulders with erratic and far apart. This time, Midoriya’s legs genuinely would put him at a disadvantage.

Somehow, Katsuki had a feeling it wouldn’t wholly deter his stocky little Omega.

“Ready to weep?” Katsuki said with a feral grin. To his surprise, Midoriya mirrored the smile with his own bared teeth.

“I’d never cry over you , Mr Zero.”

And then the first of way too many races leapt from the starting line.

Katsuki won the first by a landslide. He was able to use the furthest rocks to his advantage with his longer reach, but the challenge remained because he wasn’t familiar with the wall’s terrain, and he had to concentrate on what was coming. Midoriya was a pressure from below, his shoulder muscles visibly bunching beneath his shirt, and doing a good job of distracting Katsuki when he’d glanced down.

Midoriya didn’t say a word upon his loss. But as they repelled back to the floor, Midoriya held up a single finger. Katsuk didn’t have to guess what he meant.

Again .

Midoriya was faster this time. Much faster. Katsuki found he had to launch himself from one step the other, his hand slipping more than once on a boulder he pushed himself toward without knowing that he could actually snag it. The force of Midoriya’s determination crept up behind him like a heatwave, his short, quick breaths growing louder in Katsuki’s ears the closer he crept.

Katsuki rang his bell first, but Midoriya was barely seconds behind him. They paused at the top, both of them a little out of breath now, considering each other with twin manic grins. Midoriya lifted his shirt, exposing the hard, fit lines of his stomach as he wiped at his brow with the hem.

Again .

They went twice more, and by that time, Katsuki was not only feeling the burn of Midoriya’s determination to win, but the blockers were very evidently sweating off of Midoriya’s skin with each pass of the wall. With a mouthful of Midoriya’s hot, damp greenhouse scent, Katsuki had the hardest time yet on the fourth go around.

It didn’t help that Midoriya seemed to have devised his own way dominate the wall to the will of his shorter frame. From what Katsuki could make out from the corner of his eye, Midoriya was practically bounding like a bunny off the boulders, using the sheer force of his powerful calves and thighs to launch himself up, his large, strong hands clamping down on the highest boulder he could reach. He’d then swing his body to the left or right to catch a boulder with one foot, and rocket himself up all over again.

Katsuki may have one round four by a hair, but his muscles were clenching and his blood pulsing erratically in response not just to the released scent of hard, earthy determination - but the pure willpower Midoriya was exerting to go up against one of Tokyo’s top heroes was utterly fucking intoxicating. Distracting .

“Hey,” Midoriya panted, his exhausted grin painted in place. One would think he’d been winning all this time. “Let’s switch sides.”

“ Hah ?” Katsuki boggled. “You just got the hang of your side.”

“And so have you. It’s boring like that, so let’s switch.”

“B-” Katsuki gawked as he mindlessly followed orders. “Boring? You’re bored ?”

“Not bored,” Midoriya said, smiling up at the new wall that Katsuki had been previously running. “It’s just more fun this way. Come on, don’t be a stick in the mud.”

“ Me ?” Katsuki heard his voice crack and hated himself. “ I’m not -”

“Let’s go!”

Midoriya shot off like lightning, his smaller frame and muscular limbs doing well to jump, push, and pull himself up with nimble accuracy. Katsuki followed almost as quickly, stumbling a little because he hadn’t yet eyed up this track. He’d been so concentrated on his own - but what if Midoriya hadn’t been? What if he’d been taking notes every time Katsuki had been forging ahead of him.

“You little shit !” Katsuki screamed up at him, his blood only boiling with further fury and - and rampant desire, as he watched Midoriya power up the boulders like he’d been doing it his entire life. “You tricked me!”

Laughing all the way up, Midoriya was the first to ring his victory bell by a three second discrepancy. He sat at the top, legs dangling over the side, beaming like he’d won the Olympics.

“Fucked you good, didn’t I?” Midoriya rasped out, his voice a little wheezy from exertion. His temples dripped sweat down to the damp line of his throat, and Katsuki followed every wet trail, his own scent steaming off of him with unchecked lust.

“You wanna fuck me that much, huh?” Katsuki met Midoriya’s darkened eyes and smirked. Their mingled scents smelled like a wildfire together, and the smoke making him punch drunk. “You’re really pushin’ your luck with me, y’know.”

“How.” Midoriya leaned in over the edge of the wall on which he sat, the ground far beneath them, ignoring the employe who yelled up at them to please for the love of god, come down now .

“Tease,” Katsuki bit off, still holding the line of his rope tight as he precariously stood on two tiny boulders.

“You’re easy to tease,” Midoriya said, his smile predatory and, once more, wholly unlike an Omega’s style of flirting. He was fucking delicious . No Omega had ever been attractive to Katsuki, and now he understood why. No average Omega could beat him in a test of athleticism, nor could they look him in the eye and dare him to pounce.

“Think so?” Katsuki said conversationally, his tongue tracing the sharp point of his canine. “Wait ‘til the next time I get you alone, Omega.”

Midoriya hummed and leaned in, their faces close, the employee now screaming from the ground.

“We’ll see about that.”

The unmistakable crack of a punch sounded from the ground, and they both whipped their attention to a far wall where two Alphas seemed to have jumped each other in a rage.

“You two need to leave!” The employee hollered from the ground, his tone genuinely angry now. “That Omega’s scent is driving our clients crazy!”

Katsuki looked to Midoriya, who was gaping, despite his eyes lit bright with humor.

“Wh- what ?” Midoriya squeaked, a laugh eking out before he smacked a hand over his mouth.

One of the Alpha’s picked up the other and launched him into the wall, then threw himself atop the guy’s prone figure.

“Oh my god!” Midoriya spurted another disbelieving laugh. “Oh no! This hasn’t happened to me in so long, I’m sorry!”

“YOU TWO REALLY NEED TO LEAVE,” came from below.

Equally shocked and delighted by the mayhem at their feet, Katsuki shared Midoriya’s grin.

“Guess we’ve outstayed our welcome.”

Short minutes later, they burst from the front doors laughing, Midoriya’s face buried in Katsuki’s shoulder, both arms wrapped around one of Katsuki’s as they dragged each other down the sidewalk in hysterics.

“That’s awful!” Midoriya managed around a wheeze. “I feel so bad - I did that to them!”

“ We did that - and who cares?” Katsuki sucked in a shallow breath, his face aching from  smiling more than he could ever remember. “Let ‘em have some excitement in their lives.”

“A fist fight broke out because we wanted to fuck!” Midoriya blurted out, his entire face red with both mortification and silliness, his shoulders still shaking as he clamped his lips together to keep from bursting into another laugh.

Katsuki only need share a long look with him before Midoriya’s eyes watered up and he blew up into another fit of laughter. He stumbled back, slouching  against a shop window, his hands dropping to his knees as he caught his breath.

Hands on his hips, Katsuki tilted all the way to the side, until his face was coming up to MIdoriya’s lowered, tearful one.

“What’s so funny about wanting to fuck me, haaah ?”

Midoriya sputtered as he straightened, his hands gesturing vaguely at Katsuki’s everything.

“You’re you and I’m - I’m just me . That’s the biggest joke of this century!”

“Hey.” Katsuki caught both of Midoriya’s wrists, their faces near enough that Katsuki could see the mossy crown of softer green that haloed Midoriya’s pupils. “Ain’t nothin’ funny about you and me, got it? Don’t let anyone make you think otherwise. I’ll bust their skull in.”

Midoriya licked his lips and swallowed, gaze gone suddenly quiet and watchful. He cracked a smile, something just shy of weak and vulnerable.

“I’m not sure who’s more a reformed hoodlum between us - you or me.”

“Definitely you,” Katsuki said, the corner of his lips quirked.

“ Now you’re getting to know me.”

Katsuki hesitated, the slightly sweat-off blockers carrying the a distinctive come-hither scent, a crooked finger from a thick, lush bed of grass and flowers. Midoriya probably didn’t even know he was inviting Katsuki in right now. Or maybe he did, by the way he brought his hands up to cup Katsuki’s face.

“Your ears are cold,” Midoriya said softly, expression tender and somehow sleepy, or perhaps that was relaxed. This warm hands cupped around Katsuki’s ears, and Katsuki felt something so unfamiliar and soothing radiate through him. This wasn’t the licking flame of lust, nor the sharp, metallic tang of blood at the back of his mouth that howled to claim. This was something altogether more… wholesome . For lack of a better word.

Katsuki didn’t know what the fuck do with that.

“S’cold,” Katsuki said.

“And yet you wore only a leather jacket and a hoodie.” Midoriya’s chapped lips curved, his fingers curling around Katsuki’s ears, almost as if holding onto him by them. “It’s meant to snow again next week.”

“You like this jacket.”

“How do you know?”

“I’m never not looking at you,” Katsuki rasped, unsure of where his voice had gone as he lost himself in a scent that made him think of fireflies and singing cicadas, tall green grass whispering in a breeze calling for rain. “I know when you see something you like.”

Midoriya’s eyes widened, his hands falling to his sides, his smile going tight as he glanced away with blushing cheeks.

“I told you before. Don’t be so nice to me.”

Katsuki raised a brow.

“Then shut up already and take my compliments. I’m fuckin’ wooing you over here.”

“Sorry,” Midoriya mumbled, still looking away.

Katsuki bit back a snarl in favor of a sigh as he ruffled Midoriya’s hair and giving him a shove.

“Whatever. Come on, let’s find some food.”

“Ah.” Midoriya scrambled to catch up with Katsuki’s legs, dutifully zipping up his jacket as they went. “Don’t waste your money on anything expensive. I don’t have any opinions on food.”

“Who the hell doesn’t have opinions on food?” Katsuki asked incredulously, then he remembered. “Oh. Right. You can’t taste much, can you?”

Midoriya shrugged, keeping up with Katsuki’s stride now.

“I can’t taste anything, really. It’s fine. After ten years, I’m pretty much used to it.”

“And you really can’t smell anything?” Katsuki ventured, hoping for even a shred of a chance.

Midoriya shook his head.

“Sometimes I think I can smell you, for a split second or something. But it’s almost like my brain is trying to trick me by inventing a scent in my head from something a smelled a long time ago. I can’t actually smell you, no. I think I can’t even remember what things smell like, anymore.”

Katsuki didn’t allow his shoulders to slump, didn’t need to add to Midoriya’s situation.

“That sucks.”

Midoriya huffed a soft laugh.

“Yeah, I guess. I try not to think about it.”

“How do you stay so fit, then?” Katsuki grabbed Midoriya’s hand, their fingers interlocking. “You don’t look like any Omega I know. What kind of sports did you do?”

Midoriya snorted.

“Sports? None. I was scrawny and useless, up until I presented. Afterward, my orientation made me even more vulnerable than before, and I started going to the gym, trying out my strength on people, getting into fights and whatever. I was bullied pretty badly.”

“That makes sense,” Katsuki conceded, because it did. He certainly knew he’d taken a few - or many - ignorant potshots at both Shinsou and Kirishima over their years in UA. “Omegas usually can’t build up muscle like you, though. Not without enhancers. Kirishima is ‘roided up to high hell just to keep his physique.”

Midoriya hummed without comment for a moment.

“Well, I’m definitely not on enhancers. I pretty much live on heavy duty protein drinks to keep up my strength, and I don’t miss out on eating, like… naughty food, because I can’t taste it anyway.”

Katsuki frowned, his hand unconsciously squeezing Midoriya’s.

“That sounds fuckin’ miserable, dude.”

Midoriya’s shoulders tightened and his smile was thin.

“Yeah, well. I’ve got the depression to prove it, I guess. But what can I realistically do?”

“I’d pay to get your nose fixed,” Katsuki said casually, tilting his head to watch Midoriya’s face as they walked.

Midoriya outright laughed at that, his eyes large and a little panicked as he attempted to tug his hand from Katsuki’s and failed.

“Uh, um, that’s - no . That’s nice, but - but no, I couldn’t have you just do that for me and - no.”

“What?” Katsuki asked, dead serious. “You afraid of living your life or some shit? If you could smell again, what would happen? You wouldn’t be as depressed. You’d know that I’m your mate. Your life would be a hundred times better. Almost like a new start.”

The more Katsuki spoke, the more terrified Midoriya looked by the prospect.

“I - I -”

“Are you so scared of leaving your safe little bubble of nothing happening that you wouldn’t even take a helping hand out, hah ?”

Midoriya’s expression shut down as he yanked his hand from Katsuki’s and thrust them into his pockets, his profile gone stony.

“Safe is the best thing that’s ever happened to me” he mumbled.

“The guy who climbed a rock wall without a harness sure don’t believe that bullshit.”

Midoriya whipped around to say something, but a screech of high-pitched, female voices resounded from across the busy street.

“OH EM GEE, IS THAT GROUND ZERO?”

“Ah fuck ,” Katsuki sighed, eyeing the girls waiting at the crosswalk to get to their side of the street. He looked at Midoriya. “Run.”

The fact that Midoriya shot off like a bolt, his laughter trailing behind, only furthered the freefall of Katsuki’s heart as he followed behind. They were approaching Midoriya’s neighborhood now, and he let Midoriya take the lead, ducking into an alley to emerge onto another busy shopping street.

Midoriya spun, his smile once more the sun as he jokingly jogged backward now that they were in the clear, his posture loose and easy and free of the darkness he seemed so often to carry.

He bumped into a woman and flailed his arms out, apologizing as he steadied himself and blushed deeply, his expression sheepish as Katsuki approached him with a laugh.

“You fuckin’ nerd.” He flicked Midoriya’s forehead and smirked when he got a glare in return. “Nice evasive maneuver. That come from years of delinquency, too?”

“I have a lot of unnecessary talents honed by years of poor choices,” Midoriya said with a stink face.

Katsuki knew he shouldn’t find this knowledge as arousing as he did.

“Look.” Midoriya gestured at the 7-11 across the street. “Let’s get food.”

Katsuki’s brows shot up.

“I know I ain’t practiced in this whole dating thing, but I’m pretty I can do better than a convenience store for you.”

“ Psh .” Midoriya patted his arm and led him toward a crosswalk. “It’s not about the money. I told you that kind of food is wasted on me. I can at least enjoy spicy noodles burning my tongue.”

“You like spicy?”

“Love spicy.”

“Me too.”

Midoriya bumped his shoulder against Katsuki’s as they walked, a small curve to his lips.

“Maybe one day I’ll cook my death curry for you.”

“I’ll wait for that.” Katsuki said as casually as possible, hoping not to sound desperate.

Midoriya held the door open for Katsuki and they ducked inside.

“Oh, here,” Midoriya said with a note of what Katsuki now knew to be mischief. Katsuki followed him into another aisle and glowered when a black and red snapback landed on his head. He slouched there with a growing scowl as Midoriya snickered and brought a pair of sunglasses to his face, as well.

“There.” Midoriya was biting back a smile, that little shit. “No one will recognize you now.”

“The fuck is this?” Katsuki whipped the hat off, took one look at it, and sent Midoriya a withering stare. “I’m not wearing that damn shark teeth’s merch, you little -”

“Alright alright, we can compromise.” Midoriya dug through the hat rack and came out with a hot pink one with a purple leopard print bill.

“Not that alien bitch’s either!” Katsuki sputtered. He did, however, keep the sunglasses on. Maybe they would help.

“What about for me?” Midoriya asked, his eyes playful as he found a Ground Zero hat and fitted it over his curls. “ Kacchan .”

Katsuki was suddenly extremely grateful for the sunglasses, as they hopefully hid the majority of his lust while the blood from his head flooded straight to his cock. Gritting his back teeth, Katsuki reached out and flicked the hat down so it tipped over Midoriya’s eyes.

“Be careful with that,” Katsuki rasped as he swept past and around the corner. He took off the glasses and set them on a random shelf.

“W-wait!” Midoriya’s sneakers squeaked on the tile as he spun to follow. A yelp rang out, and before Katsuki could fully turn, the sound of a crash and scatter filled the store.

“Oh, no no no!” Midoriya dropped to his knees, his face red as he began to collect and re-stack what was once a pyramid of neatly patterned ramen cups.

“Oiy.” Katsuki crouched across from him and picked up a cup, considered it, and set it on the toppled tower. “You’re a mess, ain’t ya?”

“Sorry,” Midoriya mumbled, eyes lowered as he erratically stacked more cups. “Sorry sorr-”

Hidden behind the half pyramid, Katsuki cupped a hand around Midoriya’s nape and pulled him in to claim those soft, worry-bitten lips. Midoriya startled, but almost instantly relented, the tension in his neck smoothing out, his mouth angling against Katsuki’s with a soft puff of breath from his nose. He seemed to melt, his tongue just sweeping across Katsuki’s top lip, the scrape of teeth that followed jangling Katsuki’s nerves and taunting the thing he kept chained inside.

The kiss broke slowly, Midoriya’s scent soaking wet, dripping and dewy as his heavy eyelids just barely lifted. He licked his lips, seeming to savor the flavor they created together, despite being unable to taste.

“Why -” Midoriya swallowed, his voice gravelly as he remained still, one hand balanced and hot on Katsuki’s knee. “Why do you really like me? I’m a mess.”

Katsuki couldn’t breathe, his lungs too full, the desire licking across his skin from that saturated scent.

“I like -” Katsuki broke the tension, looking down to pick up two ramen cups, stacking them as he spoke quietly, his face heating. “Uh. I like who I am with you or whatever. I like who you are with me, too. Better than when we first met, even.”

Midoriya stared at him, face unreadable. When he spoke, his voice cracked.

“The me I am with you is the me I wish I was more often.”

Katsuki caught his eye, held the gaze with a fire of intensity that burned hot and primal within his gut.

“So, be with me more often.”

Midoriya returned his gaze steadily, but never actually replied. They continued to stack the pyramid together until it was complete, and went about gathering food and eating at the counters against the window, watching the masses pass. The air between them was oddly calm, that comfortable kind of stillness Katsuki normally felt with his family or his pack, lounging a day away without having to speak too much.

“This is a game me and Shinsou used to play together,” Midoriya said suddenly, tapping his chopsticks against his bottom lip as he watched the bystanders hustle past. “You look at everyone and pick the person you’d be if you could choose.”

“Whaddaya mean?” Katsuki bit aggressively into an onigiri and chewed. “Why would I want to be any of those extras?”

Midoriya snorted a laugh and shook his head.

“It’s not about that. Whoever is in front of you are your options - you have no choice. You’ve got to pick someone to be.”

“That’s easy. I’d be none of them and they’d all want to be me.”

Midoriya sputtered, his smile perplexed, his scent closer to floral than usual.

“You’re unbearable, you know that? Fine, I’ll go first.” Midoriya stared out the window, eyes a little narrowed, lips pursed in thought. “That kid.”

Katsuki followed Midoriya’s line of sight and raised his eyebrows at the little boy, no older than five. He looked average, totally unremarkable. His mother and father each held on of his hands, and the string of a cheerful blue balloon was tied around his wrist. His parents would loft him up from time to time on their journey, swinging him back and forth to his joy and laughter.

“You’d be a baby,” Katsuki said flatly. He grunted when Midoriya smacked his hand with his chopsticks.

“Asshole!” Midoriya said, humor high and bright in his voice. “It’s not about being a baby. Look how happy and simple his life is. He’s probably more thrilled about that balloon than an adult would be getting a new car. Everything gets numb and less special the older you get. He’s got both parents and they clearly love him. His clothes look warm and clean, his haircut is new. His life is just -” Midoriya shrugged, his scent growing heavier, soft night rain at the cold windows. “Simple.”

Katsuki ate his food without replying, his brow marred in thought as he watched the little boy disappear down the road. What kind of life did it take to be jealous of something so… ordinary? Two parents, a warm coat in winter, a haircut. Katsuki’s heart clenched.

“What’re your parents like, then?” Katsuki found himself asking. He was one-hundred percent positive he’d never asked such an inane but personal question in his entire existence.

“My mom’s an amazing, hardworking woman,” Midoriya replied, the tug of his lips fond before he took a sip from his straw. When he didn’t say anything else after a good thirty seconds, Katsuki got the picture.

“Must have been hard to raise a little shit like you.”

“Tell that to your parents,” Midoriya said with a short laugh. He didn’t look sad anymore, though. “I mean, yeah. I didn’t make it easy on her sometimes. Picking your sixteen year old up from the police station while he’s high and petting the walls is not the ideal situation.”

Katsuki wouldn’t know the first thing. He’d never been in a lick of trouble in his life, aside from the shit villains got him into. Something about Midoriya’s sweet soul, steel bones, and sunshine smile paired with a past wild enough to have its own police file was… provocative. Sexy.

Who the hell had replaced Katsuki with the mooning loser he’d become?

“When’d you straighten out?” Katsuki asked, unwrapping a sandwich.

“When I started working at Parchment, I guess. I was getting chased down by a couple Alphas who I’d mouthed off to and hid inside the shop. I guess I was barely eighteen, something like that. I hadn’t started university, anyway. The owner kind of…” Midoriya’s lips quirked. “Adopted me or something. Nicest man I ever met. He was the one who first gave me All Quiet on the Western Front. ”

“I remember you mentioning that the first day we met.”

“That’s not creepy at all,” Midoriya teased.

“Fuck you,” Katsuki muffled around a mouthful of food.

“Anyway, after I read it felt a less bitter about… a lot of things going on in my life. Finally let go of the anger that I couldn’t be a hero -”

“Why couldn’t you be -” Katsuki’s eyes widened a fraction when Midoriya shot him an indecipherable look. 

“I’m Quirkless,” Midoriya said simply, but his eyes betrayed him. They were hard and poised for a battle.

Katsuki nodded slowly, careful of his mouth.

“Well. That’ll do it.”

Midoriya’s expression turned questioning, his straight, serious brow low and scrunched as he obviously attempted to read into Katsuki’s words.

“Yeah,” he said finally, turning away and back to his food. “It will. So, anyway, I ended up working there part time while going to university. Even after I became a translator, I worked there on weekends. Not even for the money, just for Mr Yagi’s company and influence.”

“Mister -” Katsuki cut himself off. There was a lot of Yagis in the world. Okay, there weren’t , but - that couldn’t be possible. He brushed the thought away. “Well. I guess ‘cause of that guy it’s how we ended up meeting.”

“I suppose so.” Midoriya got a far away look, lips soft and curved once more. Through this date alone, it was becoming clearer to Katsuki that Midoriya’s default truly was something much more accessible and enthusiastic than how he’d been acting with Katsuki during a great majority of their initial meetings. He was affectionate and playful and bounced back from pessimism remarkably quick.

“Well, here’s to Mr Yagi,” Midoriya said wryly, clinking his cheap cup against Katsuki’s, “And the luck that Shinsou never introduced us when I was an even hotter mess than I am now.”

“You’d have hated me even more back then, anyway,” Katsuki said with a wolfish grin.

“I don’t know about that,” Midoriya said, his voice dropping an octave to that unexpected sex voice he reserved for times when he looked at Katsuki as if he’d devour him in one big bite. “I was a lot more… liberal… with my desires back then.”

“ Fuck .” Katsuki’s hand fisted on his thigh beneath the counter, his back teeth biting down against a flood of saliva as he pierced Midoriya in place with a sharp, hungry stare. “Be careful with that mouth, Izuku.”

Midoriya’s hand slid over Katsuki’s upon his leg, the rough pads of Midoriya’s fingertips tracing the mountains of his straining knuckles as he held Katsuki’s fierce glare.

“You make me forget to be.”

Every nerve in Katsuki’s hand was apparently connected directly to his cock, because he could feel his sweatpants shift and rise as he lengthened and thickened in instant response. Katsuki’s free hand gripped the edge of the counter like a lifeline as he desperately attempted to quell the fuck-me scent radiating off him in technicolor Alpha waves.

He was not doing well.

“We need to leave,” Katsuki said tightly, his voice taut and stressed. “Unless you want me to fuck you against the damn window.”

Katsuki got a front row seat to Midoriya’s pupils blowing black, his lips flushing plump and pink, his scent soaking through his clothes in record time.

“Not the worst thing that could happen,” Midoriya murmured, husky and unholy.

“Come back to my place,” Katsuki said in a rush, the hand beneath the counter snatching Midoriya’s wrist, his thumb swirling the quickened pulse, massaging the swelling gland there and releasing a fresh wave of scent.

“Izu -”

Katsuki’s phone rang so loudly that they both jumped in their seats, eyes huge and rapt on each other.

“Ignore that,” Katsuki managed. “Let’s g-”

The phone rang again. And again.

With a warning growl, Katsuki checked the caller ID, his face falling. Exchanging a quick look with a concerned Midoriya, Katsuki stood and stepped away as he answered.

“I’m gonna feed you your own cock for dinner if this isn’t important,” he snapped.

“Good afternoon to you, too!” Mirio greeted cheerfully. “How’s your date going? I hope I didn’t interrupt anything heated.”

Katsuki spun in a circle, literally looking for that bag of dicks to be sticking his punchable face out from a rack of chips or something.

“The fuck’re you talkin’ about?”

“Bakugou,” Mirio said, his friendly tone unchanged. “Have you checked the internet in the past few hours?”

Chapter 22

Summary:

There were parts of Izuku’s bleeding heart that empathized and cried for Jin, wanted to be that safe haven for him where they could both lick each other’s wounds. And other, darker parts of Izuku that leaned into the familiar rough edges and sharp corners of Jin’s personality, no matter how they cut or scarred him.

What was a relationship without the inevitable pain, anyway? This was the nature of human connection.

Notes:

Dissosiative Identity Disorder: ...a split or fragmented understanding of a person’s sense of themselves.

Dissociative identity disorder is really more about fragmented identities than many different personalities that develop on their own. Most people see different parts of their being as part of the whole person. For people who experience DID, identity fragments may have very different characteristics, including their own history, identity, and mannerisms. A key part of DID is dissociation—feeling detached to the world around you. People who experience DID may have many unexplainable gaps in their memory, forget information they’re already learned, or have difficulties recalling things they’ve said or done.

Songs For This Chapter:
Haunted House - Florence + The Machine | Spotify | YouTube
it’s not u it’s me - Bea Miller | Spotify | YouTube
Beginners - Sjowgren | Spotify | YouTube

Another emptied aerosol of Plus Ultra Scent Suppressant Spray clanked into the garbage as Izuku sighed and despondently stared at the pile of three in the bin. Frowning, he crouched to open the cabinet beneath the bathroom sink and pulled out a fresh can. Thank goodness his healthcare covered the sprays as long as he remained a student.

Meeting his tired eyes in the mirror, Izuku inclined his chin and coated his neck in the odorless spray. Then he sprayed again for good measure. Armpits, crotch, wrists. Every day, three times a day. Most Omegas did it in the morning or before bed and were good to go. Izuku needed to keep a can in his backpack.

Clad in underwear alone, Izuku padded quietly from the tiny bathroom of the dorm apartment to his equally minuscule bedroom. His Omega roommates were still asleep, and Izuku liked it that way. He took the earliest morning classes possible because less people attended those courses, and by lunch, he was often finished with his day when the majority of students began to flood onto campus.

The less people around, the less harassed him, and the less Izuku’s temper roused. He hadn’t been born with the disposition, but sometimes a person had to cultivate it to survive.

But after his chance meeting with Mr Yagi as he escaped some Alpha pursuit by way of a tiny, cluttered bookshop, life had taken a turn. Dabi’s battle with Endeavor a year ago, resulting in his exile to some kind of mental health facility up north, had done wonders for Izuku, too.

He and Chisaki had taken to the streets to rebuild the burnt-out husks of buildings themselves and provide support for families and business owners in ruins. Izuku didn’t have to, but there was a part of him that still shouldered the blame for not being something more to Dabi than a fuck buddy. Someone who could have listened to the guy, or maybe even helped him so that his downfall hadn’t involved trying to literally murder his father on the streets of Tokyo.

Well, Izuku couldn’t win every battle. Or any of them.

Anyway, the temper and tough act weren’t often required. Izuku was working on that.

Tugging on bland jeans and a t-shirt, Izuku sat at his bedside and tugged on his socks, wincing at the subtle tang of pain from his throat. Frowning, he rubbed at the side of his neck and winced at the ache that bloomed with the touch. A quick glance in his full length mirror sobered his expression.

The bruises banding around his neck lingered from two days ago, faded to a vile array of purple blended into green.

Izuku sighed and stripped the shirt. Dug out a grey turtleneck and struggled to get it over his head.

It wasn’t the first time. He didn’t feel much of anything about it. He’d had worse from Dabi, that was for sure. The burn marks were still stark, circular, and white along his inner thighs, his one wrist.

At least bruises faded. Izuku carried no animosity toward them or the man who caused them. There were consequences to being attracted to strong Alphas with big, beautiful hands.

The wardrobe change and unintentional moping made set Izuku off schedule from his usual departure time. Seven minutes later than he’d prefer, he was racing from student housing and down the street.

The psychology building was in Izuku’s sights when his phone buzzed in his back pocket. Slowing into a swift walk, he checked his phone and quirked a smile before he answered.

“What’s up?” Izuku said by way of greeting, a little breathless from his run across the quad.

“You sound rushed,” Hitoshi said with an undeniable smirk in his voice. “Are you late?”

“You’re saying this as you call me , knowing very well when my classes start.”

They talked nearly every day, and Hitoshi knew every class Izuku attended.

“Then I guess you should be walking faster.” Hitoshi laughed at Izuku’s replying curse. “So, listen. Let’s meet tonight. You, me, Todoroki, and his friend Inasa.”

Izuku stopped on the vast, wide staircase of the building’s entrance and promptly sat on a step. He’d been waiting for this invitation, but his stomach still sank at the idea. Todoroki Shouto? Top Three of UA, famous pro-hero, and flawless brother of Dabi - Izuku’s very own ex-boyfriend, and a guy who had been way too old to have any business going around with a sixteen through eighteen year old?

There was no way that meeting could go in any direction but south.

“Ahh… No, thanks.”

“I’m sorry,” Hitoshi said, sounding dry as sand. “I forgot to frame my request as a question. Let me try again. Let’s meet tonight.”

Izuku snorted.

“You’re an asshole.”

“It’s my winning formula. But seriously - when are you going to meet my boyfriend? Who’s the asshole here?”

Izuku winced and didn’t argue the point.

“I feel like I’ve had enough experience with the Todorokis. For a lifetime, possibly.”

“Uh, excuse me. Scarface the Sadist Boyfriend was not an accurate Todoroki family experience.”

“I haven’t heard great things about Endeavor, either.”

“He’s a pussycat. You should see him with Hawks. The guy is whipped. Probably literally.”

Izuku rubbed vigorously at his closed eyes with thumb and forefinger.

“There’s something inherently wrong with everything that just came out of your mouth.”

“You’re one to talk. How much older than you was Dabi? Hell, Jin?”

“Not that much older! Hawks is like Endeavor’s kid’s age. He’s Dabi’s age!”

“The man is a genius. He has the number two hero under his thumb and runs his own agency. He’s teaching me so much.”

Izuku grinned and picked at the frayed edge of his ripped jeans.

“About manipulating Todoroki family members?”

“How do you think I finally snagged him?”

“Not with your winning formula, that’s for sure.”

“Did I hear something? Sounds like a baby whining in the wind. Anyway, are you coming tonight? Don’t tell me you’re not curious. I’ve been talking about the guy for -”

“Five grueling years.”

“Yeah, and you were fucking his brother for two of those years.”

“On and off! Not consistently!” Izuku squawked as he stood up and traversed the stairs. He really was going to be late.

“Inconsistent fuckery. I’m sure that makes all the difference. I had to deal with that shit, though. You owe me. Come meet my boyfriend.”

Izuku sighed as he shouldered through those entering and leaving the building.

“You don’t think he’ll have a problem with me ?”

“Aside from what I’ve told him about you, I doubt he even knows who you are. It’s not like Dabi was attending family dinners and showing them pictures of you two at an amusement park.”

“Gee, thanks.”

Hitoshi sighed.

“Stop being bitter and come meet him, already.”

Izuku chewed at his bottom lip, nodding quickly to an Omega he recognized from another class. He was being an awful friend, especially considering all that Hitoshi had been dragged into during their high school years. Izuku was turning a new leaf, wasn’t he?

“I - fine. Fine.”

“There we go,” Hitoshi said, that smug smile of his shining through his words. “I already made reservations, anyway. I’ll text you the details.”

“Oh good,” Izuku mumbled. “Can’t wait.”

“Just don’t wear those jeans with the slutty ass-cheek rips.”

“W-what!” Izuku yelped, fumbling with the phone, nearly chucking it down the hallway in horror at the mention of those things. He’d thrown them out long ago.

“I know that’s what you used to get all the guys.”

Hitoshi was cackling like a loon when Izuku promptly hung up on him, his face tomato red.

“That guy,” Izuku muttered, pocketing his phone as he trudged down the corridor.

“Hey, shorty!”

Before Izuku could react, strong arms banded around his waist from behind. His feet rose from the ground, the hallway spinning as his breath caught in a gasp and a laugh.

“Stop, stop!” Izuku sputtered and smiled as he attempted and failed to wiggle from Jin’s hold. Apparently his boyfriend was in a good mood, and a good mood for Jin meant a good day for Izuku. A tight knot in Izuku’s chest went a little lax as his feet found the ground and he turned to meet Jin’s wild grin. “Hey you.”

Jin’s windswept blonde hair spiked out in all directions, his pale eyebrows almost imperceptible as they lowered, those storm-cloud eyes taking Izuku in from head to toe, a look of appreciation and downright adoration clear on his expressive face. He wasn’t more than half a head taller than Izuku, but his frame was big and bulky, muscular and imposing.

From the moment they had met, Izuku had been intrigued by the man with a murderer’s aura and an exuberant clown’s personality. He certainly kept Izuku on his toes. Their relationship was anything but boring.

“You look cute, real cute.” Jin placed a loud, theatrical kiss atop Izuku’s head, then ruffled Izuku’s curls, and slung an arm around his shoulder, dragging him in the direction of their joint class. “What’s with the turtleneck, though? Ain’t cold enough for that shit.”

Izuku’s smile flinched and tightened as he stared straight ahead, concentrating on keeping up with Jin’s strides.

“Uh.”

Izuku had long stopped pointing out the deep bruises Jin left on him from time to time. He always denied being the cause of them, anyway - or he simply didn’t remember doing it.

Izuku couldn’t blame him. Jin was a passionate Alpha, and on top of it, also had a tenuous hold on his emotions. The medication he took to regulate his mood swings and dissociative identity disorder were unreliable at best... ineffective and detrimental at worst.

In the past nine months, Izuku had been at the brunt of both ends of the spectrum.

Izuku wouldn’t blame him.

“You study for today’s quiz?” Jin asked as they rounded a corner. Someone who looked suspiciously like a trout bumped into Izuku’s shoulder and Jin snarled at them loud enough to make Izuku flinch. “Watch where you’re goin’, fish face! You got eyes on either side of yer head - how’d you not see him? I ate salmon for breakfast, but you can bet yer ass I’m still hungry! I’ll get my grill - you want me to get my -”

Izuku yanked on Jin’s wrist and dragged him away.

“Leave him alone,” Izuku said with an exasperated laugh, his cheeks red with embarrassment and resigned amusement. “You’re ridiculous. And yes, of course I studied. Why, did you make the quiz extra hard?”

“Nah.” Incident already forgotten, Jin scratched at his nose vigorously, an anxious movement Izuku had long learned to ignore. “Made it extra easy, just for you.”

“I hope you didn’t!” Izuku said, torn between believing Jin and not. He wouldn’t put it past him.

Jin had been a teacher’s aid in Izuku’s general psychology course last semester, and again in his current abnormal psychology course - some of the only electives in which Izuku had been invested, outside of pursuing his language degree. To look at Jin - heck, to hear him even speak - wouldn’t tip a person off to Jin’s intelligence. From what Izuku had pulled out of Jin over the course of less than a year, Jin had grown up in hard times. Poverty, the foster care system, abuse, loneliness, unchecked mental illness.

There were parts of Izuku’s bleeding heart that empathized and cried for Jin, wanted to be that safe haven for him where they could both lick each other’s wounds. And other, darker parts of Izuku that leaned into the familiar rough edges and sharp corners of Jin’s personality, no matter how they cut or scarred him.

What was a relationship without the inevitable pain, anyway? This was the nature of human connection.

“Come to dinner with me tonight,” Jin said suddenly, ignoring Izuku’s concern over the quiz. Selective hearing was certainly a talent of his.

“Tonight?” Izuku parroted, eyebrows scrunching as he bumped into Jin’s side to avoid a flock of students. “I can’t.”

Jin turned with Alpha speed, one hand flat beside Izuku’s ear, Izuku’s back suddenly pressed against the cold brickwork.

“Why?” Jin frowned, eyes flickering dark as he loomed in further, inhaling deep of Izuku’s throat but likely coming up with nothing due to the blockers. There was something about the spike of Izuku’s scent in alarm that turned Jin feral in seconds, and the Alpha had always seemed somehow addicted to it. “What’re you doing - with who? I wanna treat you, dammit. Lemme do something nice for you.”

Body stiff and on alert, Izuku eyed his boyfriend critically.

“Something nice? Why?”

Jin’s gazed flicked almost imperceptibly to Izuku’s covered throat, and the hand bruises he apparently did recall lay imprinted beneath.

“I can’t do something nice for my cute little boyfriend? What am I, a thug? I ain’t poor. I can afford it. You don’t wanna go out with me? It’ll be fun. You know we always have fun. I -”

“Jin.” Izuku laid a hand on Jin’s chest, his voice firm as he met eyes getting wider a more manic by the second. “I’m just meeting Shinsou and some friends tonight. It’s no big deal. We can go out on the weekend, maybe.”

“Maybe is the pussy’s no.” Jin leaned in further, his shoulder muscles bunching brilliantly and so damn distracting as he skimmed his lips just behind Izuku’s ear, where the skin was paper thin and delicate, nerves singing with the barest touch. “I wanna see you every day, y’know? I need you.”

Without warning, Jin’s teeth pinched at that very flesh; a sharp, brutal nip that burned and drew blood. A spot shy a few inches of Izuku’s gland - not quite a marking, but enough to surge a fresh wave of liquid heat and drowsy decadence through Izuku’s body as he sagged against the wall and sighed, his head lolling for better access.

If anyone looked beneath the curls, they’d see half a dozen of these drugging little marks behind both ears. Jin knew just the spot to bring Izuku to a high, to keep them linked just enough that Izuku never wanted to leave.

“My Omega,” Jin murmured into Izuku’s throat, the flat of his hot tongue lapping at the slowly seeping blood. “I’ll let you go to your thing tonight. Come home to me, though.”

“Hmmm?” Izuku blinked heavy eyes, unable to register Jin’s words. Surely he didn’t mean going to Jin’s place after dinner. Jin lived far from campus and Izuku’s housing unit. If Izuku were to make his classes the next morning, he’d have to wake up at the crack of dawn just to get to his earliest one.

“My place. We’ll play.” A big, strong hand clasped at Izuku’s hip bone, bruising force along with the smile Jin pressed into Izuku’s temple. “I’ll make it worth your while. All the good stuff, y’know? Jenga. Shogi.”

“‘Kay,” Izuku managed with a huff of laughter, his body reacting in all the ways he fucking hated about himself. His nerves and hormones were a bundle of betrayal. Why couldn’t he say no when it mattered?

“Now.” Jin pulled back, his winning smile always one to coax out other peoples’ smiles in reaction. Mischief glinted in his eyes. “You’re gonna be late for class.”

Izuku stared for a moment, foggy and knees wobbly. Then Jin’s words cut through the haze and he yelped, jumping to panic as he sputtered, pushed and jostled at Jin’s chest.

“Asshole, you’re late too! Let’s go, let’s go!”

Jin’s laughter follow Izuku’s rush down the hall.

No, they were never boring.

 

Izuku’s anxiety was shot so high through the roof that it was probably taking down airplanes.

Standing in front of the glowing sign of the bar, he self-consciously adjusted his turtleneck and leather jacket. The jacket was a remnant of his earlier days, but tonight it gave him a sense of security and power that he’d carried as a rowdy, much angier teen. A part of him felt he needed that armor to meet a man who was undoubtedly better than him on every level.

Count on Shinsou to have the highest standards and unrelenting tenacity to not only single out one of the most promising Alphas in Tokyo, but wait on them for five years until said Alpha came around. Shinsou was nothing if not patient, clever, and convincing.

A small, admittedly bitter, part of him also niggled at the back of his throat, like something disgusting and dark he couldn’t quite cough up. Being best friends with Hitoshi was one thing. They’d met long ago, and Hitoshi had been a support system for him, a sounding board, a place of emotional safety and even empathy as a fellow male Omega. Befriending him had always made sense.

But Izuku wasn’t cut out for hanging out with heros, as if he was one. If anything, Izuku was positive that sitting at a table with three freshly graduated, thriving heroes in their second year of success in the outside world, was enough to make Izuku feel as big as an ant and about as useful.

If he’d had a Quirk, he’d have been one of them. He’d have shared their experiences, their lives, their joys and failures.

He’d have been important.

As of now, Izuku was a nobody, and that wasn’t likely to change at any point in his life.

Izuku might have worked his way through his anger at not being a hero. Mr Yagi had helped him along that path. And he even might have been finding some level of peace in the realization that perhaps the lifestyle wouldn’t have been a place where he could excel. He couldn’t know.

What he did know was that the last thing he needed were two more friends who so wholly outshined his very existence. Izuku was so tired of being dull.

Pushing through the doors with a steadying breath, Izuku reminded himself he’d come out of far worse situations unscathed, and that meeting a hero boyfriend fell far down the list of things he needed to worry about.

He wished he was better at believing the stuff he told himself, though.

Hearing his name called through the clash and chatter of voices and music, Izuku spotted Hitoshi waving through the crowd. He wiggled through patrons that were annoyingly taller than him, smiling and muttering his apologies as he went, until he arrived at the small, tall table and four stools. One of them was free, one occupied by Hitoshi, and the other two taken up by a guy who was the definition of a mountain, and the other radiating a jaded, sleepy energy of someone who had no right to be a top pro-hero.

Well, at least Hitoshi and his boyfriend had that in common.

Of course, Izuku would recognize Inasa and Todoroki anywhere. So would most of Japan.

“You came,” Hitoshi said with a slow grin, patting the table where a drink for Izuku was already waiting. “I was half sure you’d chicken out.”

“I don’t chicken out on anything,” Izuku mumbled without conviction, then offered the two strangers at the table a nervous smile. “Um. Hi. I’m, uh, Midoriya Izuku. It’s a pleasure to meet you both.”

“My greatest pleasure to meet you!” Inasa boomed from beside him. Before Izuku could dodge, a massive palm flung out to smack him jovially on the back. Izuku felt his lungs rearrange in his body. “Our dear Shinsou has told us so many wonderful things about you! You are much smaller than I envisioned!”

“Ah.” Izuku quickly looked between Hitoshi and Inasa and shrugged, his smile going shy. “I think anyone must look small to you.”

“Of course not!” Inasa looked affronted. “I see peoples’ spirit, and yours I’d say is magnificently large!”

“At least something about you is magnificently large,” Hitoshi said with a snicker, earning a dirty look. “Hey, you have to go easy on me today. My boyfriend is here.”

As if showing off a prize on a game show, Hitoshi gestured at Todoroki’s figure with an arm, sweeping his hand up and down to gesture to all of him. Izuku couldn’t help but relax and smile at Hitoshi’s obvious joy. The guy wasn’t exactly known for exuberance.

“Hi,” Izuku said a little too quietly, his arms breaking into goosebumps at just how familiar the turquoise of one eye was to him. Something about the severity of Todoroki’s mouth, too, and the strength in of his shoulders, the way he held himself.

Dabi.

“Hello,” Todoroki said, perfectly polite but giving away nothing. He waved, almost like a little kid instructed by his parents. “Nice to meet you.”

“You too!” Izuku said, voice cracking a little from the strain of being polite. He quickly took a sip from his waiting drink and coughing, wheezing around the strength of the alcohol. Eyes watering, Izuku turned an incredulous look to Hitoshi. “ Why .”

“Just getting you loosened up,” Hitoshi said, smiling into his own glass.

“Like, on the floor loosened up or socializing on an average level with others loosened up?” Izuku managed, taking a second bracing drink despite himself and hissing through his teeth.

“If you end up on the floor I shall lift you up!” Inasa declared, holding out his drink to the center of the table. “Cheers to new friendships!”

Izuku weakly clinked glasses with everyone and wished for the release of death.

“So,” Izuku began, making eye contact with Todoroki and wondering if the guy was going to fall asleep any moment. He didn’t have the eyebags Hitoshi sported, but he looked bored as hell. “You guys have all known each other for five years now, I guess.”

“I didn’t meet our charming Shinsou until third year,” Inasa said, more than half way through his pint of very dark beer. “He refused to speak to me even then, because I was the opposition in a mock battle. He proceeded to use my voice to convince me I was hearing things in the midst of battle until I punched myself in the ear until I lost consciousness - but he was a daringly clever opponent!”

Todoroki might have huffed a laugh into his own glass as he looked down and away with a long drink, Hitoshi only smirking and scratching at the short stubble of his jaw.

“You need to stop introducing me as the guy who made you punch yourself unconscious. It’s not good for either of our images.”

“An honorable loss carries no shame!” Inasa announced before finishing off his pint.

“Mercy is not one of Hitoshi’s strengths,” Izuku added with a more natural curve of lips as he nursed his drink.

“It’s so much easier to be malevolent,” Hitoshi said with a shrug, meet Todoroki’s eyes with a glimmer of humor.

Izuku’s demeanor relaxed a little more as he amiably considered Todoroki’s silence.

“And what are you , Todoroki?”

Todoroki frowned a little and shrugged.

“I don’t know. Efficient? I don’t think about it, I just do what needs to be done.”

“I think you mean ruthless precision,” Hitoshi interjected with a smirk.

“As expected of a top hero!” Inasa exuberantly waved at a waitress and gestured for more drinks all around.

Todoroki didn’t seem to argue with his boyfriend’s assessment. Instead, his eyes found Izuku’s from across the tiny table, and Izuku found himself unable to hold the gaze for reasons he didn’t want to explore.

“And you, Midoriya?”

“And me what?” Izuku smiled, gesturing to himself with chagrin. “I’m just Midoriya.”

“There’s nothing just about you,” Hitoshi said, his brow marred with something like annoyance or maybe disappointment. He eyed Izuku with that hard, searching stare of his as he sipped his drink. He swallowed and carefully said, “Izuku could outsmart and out-heart any of us on our best day.”

Izuku stilled, eyes large, and felt himself got hot and red from neck to hairline. He sputtered a laugh and waved off everyone’s attention, his voice too loud and strained.

“What are you saying? Knock it off. Are you trying to brainwash them into liking me, huh? Where’s that second round?”

Hitoshi’s eyes narrowed.

“Izu -”

“You’re an Omega, too, aren’t you?” Todoroki asked, no inflection of judgement in his voice. Of course he wouldn't. He’d chosen Hitoshi, after all.

“Yeah,” Izuku croaked. “Something like that.”

“You smell different, though.”

Izuku stilled. Flicked a look to Hitoshi, who gave a subtle shrug and looked just as surprised as Izuku. Very few people on this planet knew of Izuku’s condition, and even less of them could smell him out as not entirely Omega. And for fuck’s sake, Izuku was wearing his blockers! Or, hours ago he’d put them on, anyway. Maybe they’d begun to wear off.

“What do I smell like?” Izuku said slowly.

Todorki’s mouth down-turned, his nostrils flaring.

“An odd Omega. Is it part of your Quirk? Is it scent-related?”

“I - no.”

Again, Izuku looked to Hitoshi with a SAVE ME written across his face. Hitoshi caught the message and reached out, petting a palm down Todoroki’s neck, his pale, unnerving eyes warming to his boyfriend.

“Hey, who’s hungry?”

“ Me ,” Todoroki and Inasa said in surprising unison.

Izuku laughed despite himself.

“And you two are best friends, right?”

“Something like that,” Todoroki said as Inasa gave an enthusiastic, “YES!”

“And then there’s Bakugou,” Hitoshi added, wiggling his eyebrows at Todoroki.

“Bakugou is barely a friend,” Todoroki said with a flat look.

“That’s Ground Zero, right?” Izuku asked, smiling when the waitress returned with a fresh round of drinks. They all paused to make appetizer orders to snack on, and once the woman had whisked away, Inasa was the one to jump back in.

“Bakugou is difficult to befriend, but worth the patience.”

“He seems like a jerk,” Izuku said with a shrug, sipping on his second strong drink. It didn’t knock the wind out of him this time, though.

“Does that make him your type?” Hitoshi shot back.

Izuku rolled his eyes.

“I only date nice guys now.”

“Is that what you’re calling them?”

“He is a jerk,” Todoroki said, back on Bakugou as sipped his drink from a straw, looking a little cross and a lot perplexed. Apparently this Bakugou guy had it in him to cause Todoroki a serious conniption at the mere mention. “Worse now, with all the publicity he gets.”

“I don’t know,” Hitoshi said, leaning back in his chair to idly swirl his drink. “He certainly doesn’t appreciate his fans. He just wants that label of number one.”

“He’ll never get it,” Todoroki said dismissively. “Not enough people go for brutes like him.”

“Now he really sounds like your type, Izuku.”

Hitoshi earned a none-too-gentle punch in the arm for that one and wheezed comically.

“How do you handle being surrounded by so many Alphas?” Izuku asked Hitoshi while grinning at his evident pain. He deserved it.

“My patience is the ultimate virtue,” Hitoshi said with a put-upon sigh.

“Virtuous is the last way I’d describe you,” Todoroki mumbled, and this time Izuku outright snorted with laughter, earning a softer, more accessible look from Todoroki.

“It’s like becoming a part of a pack,” Inasa said, taking his second pint a bit slower as he mused with gentleness in his eyes. “You begin to see your classmates less as their orientation and more as a family group. The Alphas become your protection rather than your threat.”

Izuku wouldn’t know the first thing about that. Alphas had been nothing but threatening to him. The only reason he’d agreed to meet with these two were because of his blockers, and at the insistence from Hitoshi time and again that they were good people.

“More like siblings,” Todoroki said.

“You’d know better than us,” Hitoshi said, and Inasa nodded. Clearly, everyone else here was an only child.

“Are all four of you Alphas?” Izuku asked, his blood warming nicely as he drank.

“No. My sister is a Beta and the rest of us are -” Todoroki narrowed his eyes, his straw pausing halfway to his suddenly thin mouth.

Izuku frowned, head cocked curiously.

“What’s wrong?” Izuku asked.

“Nothing,” Todoroki replied swiftly, taking a long sip from his drink, his gaze shifting to the bar, where the bartender was exhibiting some kind of trick that involved spinning bottles and fire.

Confused, Izuku shrugged it off.

Food arrived quickly after and the conversation flowed. Inasa and Izuku kept up the majority, with Hitoshi as the peanut gallery, of course, and Todoroki quiet and watchful. Izuku seemed to catch Todoroki’s eyes on him more often than not, and the way his gaze drilled into him sent Izuku’s instincts on blast.

Their table was eventually abandoned in favor of the dance floor, and an Izuku three strong drinks to the wind had plenty moves to show off. Breathless with laughter and way too hot in his jacket and turtleneck, Izuku stumbled to a side wall and stripped his coat, leaning against the blessed surface to rest his feet a little. He hadn’t danced in maybe a year or more - possible since his days clubbing with Dabi.

Izuku waved with both hands, grinning ear to ear as Inasa and Hitoshi gestured they would bring back drinks. When he turned to face Todoroki, his smile fell right off his face at the expression he met.

“How do you know about my brother?” Todoroki’s voice was almost conversational except for the ice that italicized his every word.

“You’re -” Izuku sputtered, his eyes huge as he looked around like the devil in question were going to come out and threaten him not to say a word. “You’re who? Brother? I don’t - I mean, I don’t know any of your -”

“You’re a crappy liar.” Todoroki’s mismatched eyes speared him like sharp twin blades. “Earlier. You asked if all four of us were Alphas. There are very few people who know of four, and you sure as hell wouldn’t be one of them. Did Shinsou tell you? If he did -”

Izuku’s laugh was a little hysterical as he crossed his arms and gripped his own elbows. Todoroki was a tower above him, a glittering splinter of ice and fury, barely banked.

“No, no of course he didn’t! Hitoshi isn’t like that, and if you knew him even a little, you’d know -”

“Don’t even begin to tell me what I know about him.” Izuku swore he felt the air around them heat, the oxygen in the room thin out. “I’m trying to figure out what you know and why, and what you plan on doing with that information.”

Izuku’s shoulders went tight, his face hard and stubborn as he evenly met Todoroki’s glare. The viciously loyal undercurrent in his blood roared to life, some aspect of him protective of Dabi despite everything they’d inflicted upon each other. On top of that, Dabi had been notoriously closed-mouthed about his family. He’d only ever gone off about them on two occasions, when monumentally drunk and fucked up, mired in misery.

“Just how much of your brother’s business is really yours, Todoroki? He stayed out of your life for the exact reason that he didn’t want you to become involved in the life imposed upon him. Now he’s holed up somewhere, secreted away from society more than he’d already been before, and -”

“How do you know him?” Todoroki’s eyes looked wild, the veneer of control splintering, the bleed-out of desperation and something deeply sad resonating in Todoroki’s dark voice. “ Tell me . I want - I need to - to know just what the hell he did with his life up until - until -”

Their stares held, Izuku’s hackles settling as the depth of Todoroki’s emotion washed over him. He fought back a shiver, the intensity of Todoroki’s aura all to familiar in it’s own way.

The two might have been some kind of Cain and Abel, but they were still brothers of the same blood. And Izuku had seen behind Dabi’s scars once or twice. His and Todoroki’s looked the same.

“He was your big brother just like anybody else, huh,” Izuku murmured, looking down to his feet.

“How do you know him,” Todoroki said again, this time so quietly that Izuku could barely make it out beneath the booming music. “You don’t look like someone who would have associated with Touya.”

Izuku looked up with a frown. Touya?

Of course. Dabi had never mentioned his own name.

“We - I -” Izuku’s face went up in flame, his gaze scattering away from Todoroki’s searching expression.

“I see,” Todoroki bit off.

“So what?” Izuku fired back, squaring his shoulders. “So what if we did?”

“So, nothing.” Todoroki shrugged, his control seeming to slip back like a coat he donned before leaving the house. “That part is none of my business.”

Izuku chewed on his lip, looking over his shoulder to note Inasa and Hitoshi paying for their drinks. They’d be back in moments.

“Listen,” Izuku said, leaning in closer. Todoroki imitated Izuku with a frown. “I can’t - there’s not much I could tell you. We weren’t close in the ways that you might think we were close. We might not even have gotten along. When I look back, I’m not even sure.”

Todoroki’s mouth quirked very faintly. Izuku found himself shocked by the barest hint of levity.

“That sounds like him with anybody , Midoriya. Even when he was young.”

Izuku blinked and huffed a short laugh, his hand ruffling the back of his head as he looked away, cheeks flushed.

“Yeah, well, regardless. We weren’t close. But if you really want to know, or if you have questions, I’m sure we can, you know, get together or -”

“Thank you,” Todoroki said, looked stern and sincere and somehow soft all at once. “I’d like that.”

Izuku balked a little at the immediate acceptance. He hadn’t expected that.

“Okay, well. Sure. Can I - can I ask you one thing, though?” Todoroki said nothing, which Izuku took as an allowance. Izuku licked his lips quickly. “Ah. Do you - do you know how he’s doing?”

Todoroki’s eyes darkened.

“I haven’t been allowed to see him.”

Izuku opened his mouth but shut it again, thinking better of it. It had been more than a year, hadn’t it? How could his own brother not be allowed to visit?

“But I hear he is healing,” Todoroki finished quietly.

Once more, their gazes locked, and Izuku saw someone less than the perfect pro-hero he’d imagined he’d butt heads with.

“Oh,” Izuku breathed. “In what ways?”

Todoroki’s lips curved.

“You are a very kind person, aren’t you Midoriya?”

“Uh.” Izuku knew his eyes were like saucers. “I don’t - know? Am I?”

Todoroki never had time to answer. Inasa pounced on them both with the force of a whirlwind, his giant arms wrapping them both in chokeholds as Hitoshi approached with drinks and laughter. The night raged longer and harder than expected, and it wasn’t until Izuku flopped face-down on his own bed in a drowsy, drunken stupor, that he remembered he was meant to meet Jin at the end of the night.

Ah, well. He could handle a few more bruises.

Notes:

We passed 100,000 words, WOOHOO! Thank you all for keeping up with me! And if you don't follow my Twitter, I just wanted to make mention that Quiet Rapture has becoming the 8th (almost 7th) most Kudos'd ABO-tagged fic on all of AO3. Thank you AGAIN for your support and kindness!

On a serious note: I don't take DID as a joke, or as something where the 'villain' of the story has a mental illness and that's why he's a villain. I actually don't consider Jin to necessarily be a villain. We know that canonically he suffers from DID, and what is exhibited in these early chapters are before the breakdown we know he canonically experiences. His breakdown, and the scar down the center of his face etc, WILL be included as part of this story. Just know that I respect Jin's struggle and his suffering, and so does Izuku. Jin being abusive or whatever else isn't directly linked to him having any kind of mental illness, it's linked to other parts of his actual personality and his past history, which formed him. I adore Jin, but he's definitely not the guy anyone should be dating. Just in general, haha.

Chapter 23

Summary:

“You don’t know anything,” Izuku mumbled lowly, both a warning and a lament.

Bakugou was silent for a long time. When he did eventually speak, his timber of his voice was almost unrecognizable, uncharacteristically gentle.

“You’ll tell me when you’re ready.”

Notes:

GOSH, hello all! Welcome back! I have TWO things to mention before I begin:

1. Jin = Twice. I realize now that this would have confused a lot of people who had no idea who Jin is, but Jin wouldn't have gone by Twice yet, because this is pre-villain years. This is his fall towards villain life. I hope it clears something up for you, and if you still don't know who he is, please do utilize Google.

2. I CAN SEE YOUR BOOKMARK COMMENTS AND TAGS. So if you badmouth my characters or work in your bookmarks, I can see it. I just... thought you should know. Since I've been seeing troubling things. If you don't care, that's fine too. Just know I see you and I'm judging your negative assessment of my fic, while also wondering why you're bookmarking it in the first place if you don't even like it.

That being said, please enjoy the chapter and heed my usual fic warnings!

“You went on an official date with one of Tokyo’s top heroes and I had to find out through Twitter? The next day?”

Despite the tinny speakerphone reception, Hitoshi sounded just shy of genuinely vexed by Izuku’s behavior, like a parent attempting to chastise a child despite their own amusement. Izuku could barely roll his eyes as he remained on the floor, struggling through simultaneous bicycle crunches, well into his fourth rep of fifty. He’d learned long ago that burning off energy through exercise kept his more aggressive Alpha instincts exhausted and in control. His Sunday routine was especially vigorous, and sweat glistened across the firm rise of his pectorals, the hollow of his throat gleaming and pooled with beading damp.

Entirely comfortable with Izuku’s lack of response and rhythmic grunts of effort, Hitoshi plowed forward.

“Bakugou must be really hung up on you, really stupid, or a terrifying mix of both right now for him to have taken you out so publicly. Who goes on dates in the middle of the day? Nights - nights are for dates. No one takes someone to their apartment at three in the afternoon for first time sex. You want your body hidden and mysterious so that when they wake up the morning after the deed and look at you naked in earnest, they’re already stuck with you.”

Izuku flopped out and allowed himself thirty seconds of rest before he went into his final fifty. His core burned pleasantly, the endorphin high of his workout truly settling into his bones with fissures of sunshine and spark.

“Remind me why you spent so many years of your life criticizing my sex life when this is your enlightening view on romance.”

“Hey. For once in your life, you’re lucky you’re a nobody and no one has recognized your face, yet . And I say yet with a very meaningful, lingering gaze.”

“Oh, lingering.”

“Yes, lingering. I linger on the yet because now that your pretty face has been plastered across the internet, television, and gossip mags for the past three days, some asshole is going to walk into your quaint little haven, recognize you, and your life is never going to be the same.”

Izuku finished his reps and went into a languid stretch, pulling one knee flush to his chest, relaxing into the pull in his thigh. He frowned at the once-white, now yellowed ceiling.

“I can handle myself.”

“I know it. Can you handle the entire public, though?”

“I guess I’ll find out if or when it comes to that,” Izuku said simply, switching to his other leg. Maybe it was the workout keeping his mind focused and calm, or he was simply resigned to the mayhem to come after Bakugou evacuated the 7-11, but Izuku wasn’t necessarily worried.

How bad could it really be? He was totally uninteresting. No one would have much to say about him, even if they did learn his identity. Which they probably wouldn't.

Hitoshi was silent for a moment, the depth of his thought process louder than the heavy thrum of Izuku’s heart as he rolled over and arched into a cat stretch, his spine and core practically sighing into the movement.

“Was it really that good of a date? You two went to the convenience store to eat. I know that shit was your doing.”

“Hey, 7-11 single handedly fed me through university,” Izuku shot back, moving to a slow stand, his arms rising above his head as he groaned. “Don’t act like you don’t love it, too.”

“Bakugou’s loaded. If you’re going to date the guy, at least drain him while you’re at it.”

“You know that’s not me.”

“Yeah, I know. Probably why he likes you so much. That and your ass.”

In the privacy of his home, Izuku peered over his shoulder to check out said behind, his pout thoughtful. Bakugou wouldn’t be the first Alpha to be after one thing, but the date and their experiences over the past month or so had begun to turn the tides of Izuku’s conviction that Bakugou was nothing but heat-chaser.

“So…” Hitoshi sounded entirely untrustworthy in that moment. “You two are a thing now?”

Izuku grabbed a cold, tasteless protein drink from his fridge, cracked and turned the top. His heart did a little trip and fumble that had nothing to do with the cool down from his exercise.

“Uh. I don’t… I mean.”

“For someone who reads so many books, you sure do lack a decent vocabulary for an average conversation.”

“There’s nothing average about any conversation with you or about this,” Izuku said, drinking deep from the plastic bottle by way of not having to answer.

“Hey.”

Alerted by the drop in Hitoshi’s tone, Izuku looked to the phone on his counter in curiosity.

“What?”

“Are you scared?”

Izuku stiffened, licking his lips as he waded through the depth of the seemingly simple question. He knew to what Hitoshi referred. The fear of an Alpha taking the lead, of one taking advantage - hell, of even being touched by one.

After his hospital release over five years ago, there had been no reaching him. No sexual desire or need for company could overpower the fear embedded in Izuku’s bones. No Alpha would ever touch him again.

Izuku had resolutely decided to live alone forever.

“No,” Izuku found himself saying, surprised by the ease of which he could deny it. “No, I’m not scared of him. There’s - sometimes his intensity is -”

“Yeah.”

“And he comes on, uh, strong,” Izuku said with a half-laugh, shaking his head to himself. “But he does - he does respect my boundaries, when I even remember I have them. He makes me forget a lot of things, Hitoshi. I don’t… I don’t know whether that’s good for me or not. The last thing I want is to forget where I came from, or how I got here.”

They both knew, in sickening technicolor violence, how Izuku had gotten here. For how long he’d laid in a pool of his own blood on the floor of his dorm room,  the wide, motionless eyes of an all too familiar dead man staring at him as Izuku lost consciousness.

“I don’t think you could ever forget, Izuku.” Hitoshi’s voice was gruff and low with concern and his own emotions, ones he rarely released. Izuku had never seen his best friend cry. “Listen, I’ve made a lot of mistakes in the past -”

“Nothing was ever on you,” Izuku interjected, his voice clipped and severe. They’d never had the conversation, but he knew all the same. Hitoshi had never had to say it. “I was on a path before you even met me. You can’t shoulder the weight of everything I did to myself.”

“That night at the warehouse,” Hitoshi said, voice cracking to Izuku’s absolute shock. “I shouldn’t have let you out of my sight. But I was seventeen and pissed off, unrecognized by a lot of my peers in UA, but most of all by Shouto. I know now that he was going through his own shit at the time, but it never made me any less pissy about it. I wanted to let go, same as you. Chisaki was my first try at that kind of distraction that night, and all the while, you -”

“ I was making my own stupid decisions, yes. You weren’t my guardian,” Izuku stressed, forgetting his barely-started shake as he set it aside and paced to the window, looking out across the street at another apartment. An old lady was sweeping freshly fallen snow off her little balcony. Izuku sighed. “You’ve always had my back, Hitoshi. The warehouse wasn’t on you, and the way my life fell into a pattern afterward wasn’t on you, either.”

“I should have known with Jin -”

“There was nothing you could have known.” Izuku’s lips thinned, the small of his back sticky and cold and uncomfortable with drying sweat beneath his skimpy tank top. “There was so much I’d purposefully kept from you, back then. You were happy with Todoroki, and a hero like you deserved to be, and I - I was just treading water. Jin was funny and exciting and challenging and so nice when he was nice… and not when he was not. No one had ever shown him how selfless love or kindness or patience worked in the long run, and I hadn’t been the person to teach him back then, either. I tried to stitch him -” Izuku’s breath caught in his throat despite himself, but he trudged forward, his chest tight. “I tried to stitch him back together, but I hadn’t really seen all the places he’d been falling apart. Hadn’t seen all the places where I was still torn up, too.”

Izuku inhaled deeply, an onslaught of memory threatening beneath the unsteady, building waves rising up his throat.

Jin in hysterics, sitting on the edge of Izuku’s bed, hands quaking as he sucked on a fifth of cheap whiskey. He’d drunk down so much of his own blood in the process, the slice down the center of his forehead streaming down his clothes like he’d been eviscerated in half, flooding his quivering mouth whenever he opened it to breathe or to drink.

Izuku had never told anyone, not even Hitoshi or the police, that he’d very literally stitched Jin up before the man and his double had closed in on him in some twin high of mania, rampant desire, and Alpha ownership. Never told a soul how his fingers had shook, the hooked needle piercing holes in Jin’s blood-sloppy brow, Jin sobbing through the ordeal as the uninjured Jin slouched in the corner, sneering and laughing and berating him for his weakness.

Despite all that Jin had done to him - and escaped, on top of it - there had been something so rawly personal and painful in the man in that moment. Izuku would never have the heart to give that piece of Jin away to another.

“Anyway.” Izuku exhaled, shaky and slow as he managed a small smile for no one but himself. “How did this turn into something other than a bitch session about Ground Zero and his mediocre mystery date?”

“You’re a pain,” Hitoshi said, but his voice sounded off. “But I’m happy for you two. Wouldn’t have seen it coming a mile away, but then again, I’m no Nighteye.”

“I don’t even understand that reference.”

“Nevermind. Are you -”

Izuku’s door buzzed and he jumped near out of his skin, eyes huge, anxiety trembling in his veins in an instant.

“Hold on,” Izuku said as he climbed onto his kitchen counter and peered out the window. He never liked to answer his intercom first. What if it was someone he didn’t want to know he was home? “Someone’s at the door.”

“Paparazzi?”

Izuku softly gasped, his smile blooming without his control over it as he recognized the wild array of blonde standing on the stone stairs.

“No,” Izuku said breathlessly. “Definitely not. Hitoshi, I’ll talk to you later.”

“Wait, is it -”

Izuku stabbed randomly at his phone until it hung up, his bare feet squeaking on the hard wood as he raced across his apartment to thumb down the buzzer with too much force. Whipping open his own door, Izuku shivered at the gust of winter cold air that assaulted him from the corridor, his skin breaking out in goosebumps. It was then that it dawned on him how scantily he was dressed.

At the gym, it wouldn’t have been a big deal. Thin, breathable black sport shorts and an ancient tank top with the sleeves cut out down to the sides, his muscles and ribs exposed from beneath his arm.

And he probably stank. Not even in the “good” way.

“Shit,” Izuku whispered between clenched teeth as he pawed at the plain, unadorned hair clips that kept back his sweaty bangs.

Wait. Izuku dropped his hands to his hips, pouting without realizing it. Why did he even care? This was his home and Bakugou was definitely intruding without a text or a call.

But this was the first time they’d see each other since their date had been ripped apart by the media shitstorm, and Izuku was gross and unattractive as he could get without having just crawled out of a dumpster. With a sigh, he despondently let it go and listened to Bakugou round the concrete stairs before appearing at his door.

“Oh,” Izuku murmured, instantly dazed.

Izuku ate up the vision of Bakugou before him, rocking back on his heels for a moment as if suddenly struck across the face by the impact of the Alpha’s handsome magnetism.

Why did this feel different from all the times before? Was it because Izuku had grown more attracted to Bakugou’s actual personality and power than before? Now that it was much more than a physical, biological attraction, it made Bakugou all the more captivating to him?

“You look nice,” Izuku managed, because Bakugou hadn’t actually said a word. His hands were bunched in his pockets, his parka hiding his hunched form, but the clear jut of his jaw was stiff and the tendons in his next stood stark against his tan skin.

“Nice?” Bakugou croaked, his voice unusually dry, his eyes a scalding red as his gaze traced Izuku in that slow, hungry way he had. Izuku’s spine fizzled and popped like bright sparks. “I look the same as every day.”

“I guess,” Izuku said, wondering why he didn’t just ask Bakugou inside already. There was something about the way Bakugou was already looking at him that perked his senses, left him licking his lips and trying to scent the air with flared nostrils. “Do you… What’re you doing here?”

“My PR firm told me I shouldn’t see you if I didn’t want this to snowball into something bigger,” Bakugou said tightly, his stare now intentionally lingering at Izuku’s damp collarbones. He swallowed, his voice scratchy. “So I told them to fuck off. And here I am.”

Izuku’s pulse spiked, his stomach growing hot and effervescent, like fireworks. No Alpha had ever, ever , put themselves out for him. No one had altered their lifestyle or risked something important for him. And certainly no Alpha had so boldly risked the gossip of an entire country as a solid ‘fuck you’ to anyone who might find Izuku’s existence distasteful.

And Bakugou was standing there so casually, saying just that. All of it, because of him, for him.

“Are you…” Izuku fidgeted from one foot to the other. “Isn’t this too much of a big deal just for one date caught on camera?”

One pale eyebrow shot up, Bakugou’s grin finally claiming the sharp, rugged lines of his face.

“You don’t realize how big a deal I am, do you? Did you even go on Twitter yourself? The news? This is the first time I’ve been romantically linked with someone since I was noticed at the Sports Festival at fifteen. As much as it pisses me off, people are invested in me and what I do.”

Bakugou leaned into the doorway, his dusky lashes lowered as he lingered on Izuku’s parted lips.

“And now I’m doing you.”

Izuku very nearly swayed into Bakugou’s allure, so tempting was that wide slash of mouth, so prone to feral smiles and sharp-toothed snarls.

“Oh, really?” Izuku murmured, the beginnings of a liquid pull arrowing down between his legs. He met Bakugou’s stare and found it dark, hungry. Izuku rubbed his lips together before he spoke, his voice husky. “Are you sure you know how to achieve that, Mr Zero? To do me, I mean. Because you’re not exactly there, yet.” Izuku did angle his chin now, his lips a whisper over Bakugou’s jaw. Some sane part of him wondered what he was doing right now. “Do you need… guidance? Alpha.”

The blush slammed so hard into Bakugou’s cheeks that Izuku’s field of vision flooded red. The low, thunderous growl that crescendoed from the deep center of Bakugou’s chest had Izuku’s eyes wide and wary while his heart betrayed him, eking out some meager howl it hadn’t released in years.

“Midoriya Izuku,” Bakugou rasped, without touching, without crossing the threshold of Izuku’s sacred, safe doorway. “Let me in .”

Izuku’s arms banded around Bakugou’s neck without a coherent thought, hauling him in with ravenous moan as he dragged Bakugou down to his height and took that hot, delectable mouth.

The door slammed behind them with a force that clattered the photo frames on the walls.

A gasp caught in Izuku’s throat as his world spun, Bakugou side stepping, reversing their positions until Izuku’s back met the door. One powerful hand clasped Izuku’s wrists together, nimble fingers cuffing them above his head like a prisoner awaiting torture.

Izuku parted his damp, bruised lips, lids shut as he waited for the onslaught of Bakugou's mouth. When it didn’t come, his eyes popped open, the question on his tongue drying up when met with the concentrated ferocity of Bakugou's stare.

“There you are,” Bakugou whispered hoarsely, pupils like a bloody eclipse.

Izuku shuddered, exhale unsteady.

“What -“

“You weren’t really here last time,” Bakugou said quietly, a simmering heat on his voice and unwavering gaze. His fingers tightened around Izuku’s wrists his hips flexing taut against Izuku’s thin gym shorts. “Out of control. But now you’re under mine.”

Izuku’s eyes flashed with insolence as he jerked his arms to no avail.

“I’m not under anyone’s control.”

But Bakugou was barely listening. He loomed in, nosing at the line of Izuku’s throat, a low, inhuman rumble rising from the deep.

Izuku felt dizzy, dazed with the hot, heavy proximity of Bakugou’s body in a way he’d been too distracted for back during his heat. He’d been dripping then, an almost instant reaction to Bakugou’s presence in his bookshop. Now, with Bakugou’s lengthy canines scraping across the pulsing swell of one gland, Izuku felt his knees weaken, a swell of heat dripping a damp, growing stickiness between his legs.

Again, Izuku inhaled on instinct, the animal brain of him jolting with some phantom scent. It hadn’t been the first time Izuku had experienced this ghosting of something fierce and fiery lingering at the back of his throat, only for it to dissipate like so much smoke. A wish, a false memory, a dream of something that wasn’t.

Still, the result melted Izuku’s bones, his frame slumping against Bakugou’s as wet, open-mouthed kisses smeared into messy bites. Only vaguely did he register Bakugou’s mouth venturing lower, lower past his shoulder until his nose nestled into Izuku’s post-workout sweaty armpit, nuzzling at the fuzz there before inhaling deep and long, with the hard edge of a growl.

Izuku’s eyes popped open, his breath catching, chest stuttering as he darted a glance over. Only one of Bakugou’s hands linked Izuku’s wrists above his head, the other dragging down Izuku’s side, ducking into the large gap of what barely constituted as an armhole. That hot, calloused palm scraped down the dips of his ribs, squeezed at the small of his hip and held fast, as if to steady Izuku from moving as Bakugou buried his face deeper in Izuku’s armpit, nose pressed flushed with his skin.

The unbridled, loud, hoarse groan Bakugou released was further gone than Izuku had ever heard from him, and despite himself, the very idea of it spiked his blood straight to his thickening cock.

“Wh-what-”

“Oh, fuck.” Bakugou inhaled again, his hot, humid breath panting over the thin, sensitive skin of Izuku’s armpit before the wide, wet stripe of Bakugou’s tongue licked at him once, twice, the third time longer and broader and slower. Shock railed through Izuku’s frame, stilling him utterly as he gawked, his face aflame, his erection absolutely wretched with want, obscenely tenting his shorts.

But Bakugou barely seemed to notice . With chin inclined to lengthen his throat, lips parted with a mindless moan as he smeared the now-glistening, slick gland flush to Izuku’s armpit. Izuku’s thighs quivered in response, his balls high and tight with the knowledge that their scents together like this must be absolutely torrential  with bare-toothed, white-knuckled desire.

“Shit.” Bakugou’s hold loosened on Izuku’s wrists above their heads, but Izuku couldn’t do more than let his hands fall into his hair and grip tight. Another ravenous, appreciative slide of tongue and Bakugou was burying his face in the damp hair there and inhaling like a man intoxicated.

“Want you,” Bakugou murmured into Izuku’s skin, his hands trailing Izuku’s body in reverence until they nipped at his waist, thumbs bruising at Izuku’s hip bones. “Want you now.”

“Kat-” Izuku slammed his head back against the door when Bakugou shifted his attention to a nipple barely covered by his workout shirt, Bakugou’s hot mouth closing over the peaked nub right through his clothes and sucking hard. “Ohfu --Kacchan!”

Bakugou’s entirely body startled for the briefest, sweatiest second before a thunderous growl rose from his chest, his hands scooping up to great handfuls of Izuku’s ass and lifting him high. Izuku didn’t even have the chance to wrap his legs around Bakugou’s waist before he’d turned them both and physically thrown Izuku onto the couch.

Had Izuku been any less blinded and deafened by lust, he would have laughed at the entire desperation of the moment. As it was, his arms splayed over his head, his chest heaving, legs parting like melted butter and Bakugou the hottest knife as he forged his place between the vee of Izuku’s thighs.

“Holy shit.” Awe colored Bakugou’s voice, his eyes large and blown out as his calloused palms caressed the thick, stocky length of Izuku’s legs, from knee to the strained erection leaking dark against his shorts. “Holy - I love them. They’re mine.”

“Them?” Izuku couldn’t manage the slipperiest handle on what they were talking about. His hips flexed up in blind need, unattended by a man in over five years, his body snarling and whimpering and begging to be fucked and filled until he all but flooded the couch.

“Legs,” Bakugou snapped, as if it should be obvious, his hungry gaze eating up every inch of Izuku’s thighs, along with his travelling hands.

Izuku blinked heavy eyelids, dazed and somehow delighted all at once as he smiled.

“Sorry, I only put them out on loan.”

Izuku barely had time to register the flare in Bakugou’s severe gaze before that hard, burning body laid flush atop his own, pressing him hard into the cushions. A tight, knotted scar of something old and battle-formed pulsed painfully in the dead center of Izuku’s chest, catching his breath as he gaped at the man above, the one looming over him with an Alpha’s frenetic, fervid desire.

Izuku knew how an Alpha’s want played out, how it ran rampant once released.

Swallowing against the sudden gnarl in his throat, Izuku reached up with open arms, a short gasp skipping between them when Bakugou brought his cheek to Izuku’s palm, an almost tender gesture were it not for the way their hips had begun to grin in tandem. Bakugou’s thick sweatpants did little to hide the bulge between them, either.

“Baku-”

“Liked the other one better,” Bakugou murmured, his lips and teeth at Izuku’s wrist, the scarred one. Izuku suddenly wanted to snatch it back, didn’t want Bakugou to be reminded of just how fucked up he was, or have to explain why.

Izuku huffed out an anxious laugh despite himself. A strange tension was building in his ribcage, like Bakugou’s weight above him was something altogether more stifling, crushing. The last time a body had pinned him prone like this had ended in blood and -

“Kacchan,” Izuku murmured, feeling his face flush as he lowered his gaze. His tongue was starting to feel clumsy, his breathing shallow, the knot above his heart multiplying and building like a thickening film around his lungs, climbing up his windpipe the longer the Alpha’s frame kept him pinned. “I-”

“I dream about you,” Bakugou rasped against Izuku’s exposed collarbones, Bakugou’s mountainous chest and shoulders anchoring Izuku deeper into the couch where it was harder to breathe, harder to think. “Can’t stop. Pisses me off, but I - nothing like my dreams are like this. Like you smell, like you feel. You drive me fuckin’ crazy.”

Izuku licked his dry lips, both arms banding around Bakugou’s neck, fingernails digging into Bakugou’s back like a lifeline, a raft, a rope.

He was not drowning, dammit. This wasn’t drowning and there was no blood or pain.

Dead dead eyes not-staring into Izuku’s own before the darkness had claimed him. Bakugou nipped at Izuku’s ear, and the pain that rocketed through the thick, cavernous scar hidden in his curls screamed.

Izuku choked off a short noise, squeezed his eyes shut as he held on tighter to Bakugou’s warmth instead of scrambling out of his embrace like he fucking wanted to .

“I-I-”

You want this.You want this.

Don’t you want this?

Bakugou pulled up short, the overwhelming heat of his body all but gone as he sat back between Izuku’s legs, entire frame on grave alert. If it weren’t for the situation, he might have looked cute for how harried his hair and clothes were.

“Izuku?” he said sharply. “Izuku, what? What the fuck’s -”

“Off,” Izuku wheezed, his heartbeat like slamming fists on a door he’d never wanted to open again. Had kept safe from everyone, including himself, for five years. He wrenched up, nearly knocking heads with Bakugou, looking around wildly. “Off, get off!”

“Wait, wait , I’m sorry, what’s happ-”

Couldn’t breathe, Izuku couldn’t breathe. Both feet found the blessed floor, solid, dependable. Grounded. Izuku could hear his heart and his lungs and his blood in his ears, could see his nails caked in blood and flesh and as he shut his eyes, rested his brow against his knees.

“Shit.” Bakugou’s voice was out the door and down the stairs, far far away, where he should have been all along. Izuku flinched when the unexpected palm painted warmth down his curved, curled in spine. “Shit, okay. It’s okay. I’m gonna find you some sugar or caffeine or something. Just - just don’t move.”

“Don’t plan on it,” Izuku said in a choked off, tiny voice, his eyes squeezed shut.

You wanted this, you idiot. You were supposed to want this by now!

Izuku’s laugh was short and hysterical, high and cut off by a half-broken sob, retched from his guts like vomit.

Who the hell would ever take on a job like him? When he led someone on like this, only to surprise them both with a reaction he hadn’t anticipated in the slightest.

Hands wracked with tremors dropped off the couch and reached down at either side of his feet, fingertips also touching the floor, also grounding. He tapped his nails on the hardwood, again and again, an SOS for - for -

The burly meow of Natsume stormed into the room, a chorus of familiar, comforting sounds in a chattering path toward him. The couch cushion sank beside him and a warm, furry weight with a calm heartbeat and thrumming purr settled on Izuku’s back.

Natsume was heavy, but in a good way. Safe, a part of him. One of the only good parts of him.

Izuku inhaled. Exhaled.

Footsteps neared.

“Hey - ah, shit, you little fucker.”

Izuku didn’t have to look to know that Bakugou and Natsume considered each other in distaste. The gargantuan, ginger-blonde cat and his rival had too much in common to really get along.

Despite himself, Izuku felt his lips curve. His fingertips continued to brush the cool surface of the floor, his body tuning in to the hum and whir of Natsume’s purring. They’d been through this many times before, but it had been a while. And Izuku had certainly never been through this, specifically.

“Can I - I’m sitting by you,” Bakugou firmly corrected himself before he sat on the couch. His body did not touch Izuku’s. “I got you a soda. Your fridge is pretty fuckin’ empty. I know you don’t cook and survive off that protein drink shit, but at least consider your damn health.”

Izuku brought his arms up to wrap around his head, forehead still to his knees, his breathing slowed as he spoke into his clammy skin.

“Pretty sure I have other aspects of my health to be more worried about.”

“Yeah, well.” Izuku could feel Bakugou shift on the couch. It was so odd to sense hesitancy in the Alpha. “Some shit can’t be helped. Think I haven’t seen this a dozen or more times in my line of work? Hell, they force us into quarterly psych evals for a reason. I barely passed one of my own, back when I was younger.”

When Izuku didn’t reply, only continued to breathe, Bakugou actually sighed, flopping back into the cushions.

“Told you this before, but apparently I gotta say it again. I ain’t stupid, ‘Zuku. I know you're not like this for no good reason, even if you’re maybe givin’ yourself a hard time over it.”

“You don’t know anything,” Izuku mumbled lowly, both a warning and a lament.

Bakugou was silent for a long time. When he did eventually speak, his timber of his voice was almost unrecognizable, uncharacteristically gentle.

“You’ll tell me when you’re ready.”

Despite himself, Izuku snorted a laugh into his arms. A real one. Carefully, his body somehow tender and skin thin from head to toe, he turned his face, cheek pillowed upon his arms as he considered Bakugou with one open eye.

Bakugou looked tired and gaunt, somehow. Like the incident had affected him, too. He didn’t seem to realize Izuku was watching him now, as he was busy frowning at the soda and turning the sweating can in his hands.

“What if I’m never ready?” Izuku said hoarsely, startling just a bit when Bakugou looked up sharply and met Izuku’s eyes with keen intelligence and stubbornness.

“I ain’t stupid and I ain’t goin’ anywhere.” Bakugou raised an eyebrow and offered out the can. “How’s that for fuckin’ your world view right up the ass?”

Izuku blushed instantly, but didn’t understand why. Maybe it was Bakugou’s honesty, so raw and ripped open for Izuku to see the innards of him and how his heart worked.

When would Izuku be brave enough to do the same?

With a sigh, Izuku sat up carefully, allowing time for a grumbling Natsume to alight from his back and settle on the arm of the couch. Gingerly plucking the soda from Bakugou’s hand, careful not to touch yet, Izuku cracked the top and took a long drink. The sugar helped his nerves and the adrenaline come-down, the sparkling, cold, carbonation perking his drowsy, trauma-induced senses.

The only sound between them was Natsume’s purring and the distant cars outside. Bakugou didn’t seem to push any further discussion, content to sit back and wait. Izuku would have never pegged Bakugou in a hundred years as the type who was good at waiting, but it seemed to be all he did in reference to Izuku. Or was that just an allowance for him, specifically?

“Bakugou,” Izuku murmured, staring down at his legs, where he cupped the chilly can in both hands atop his thighs.

Bakugou grunted.

“I’m -” Izuku took a breath. “I’m sorry. About all of this, and me, from the beginning to now. I really am. There’s - there’s a lot you don’t know about me, and I lot that I don’t know if I could ever share with you and -”

“For fuck’s sake, this ain’t a goddamn drama show!” To Izuku’s shock and but not displeasure, Bakugou ruffled Izuku’s hair, letting his hand travel down Izuku’s back with a gentleness contradicted by his voice. “Save the speeches and fuck yer sorries. I’m real damn tired of them. Just let me - let me be here, alright? Asshole.”

Izuku felt his heart subtly unknot and loosen, the pressure in his chest easing as he peered over his shoulder with a lopsided smile.

“Me, an asshole? That’s rich.”

“I am fuckin’ rich,” Bakugou said with a gloating grin full of teeth and sharp canines. “Which is a good reason to let me take you on a real proper date next time.”

Instantly wary, Izuku eyed him with overt suspicion.

“What does a proper date entail? I told you, no fancy food. It’s a waste.”

“Nah, not like that. Gimme your time on Valentine’s Day, though.”

Izuku scoffed before he could hold it in, now leaning back into the couch cushions and accepting the arm Bakugou slung around his shoulders.

“Valentine’s Day? I didn’t peg you for one of those-”

“Oiy, like hell I am! I’m just sayin’ it’s a day that would make sense to take your ungrateful ass out -”

“I’m grateful,” Izuku murmured, tilting his chin to earnestly look up into Bakugou’s eyes. “I’m very grateful. For you, for this. Even if I might not deserve it.”

Bakugou’s pale eyebrows bunched, his face screwing up ugly in the way he got when he was thinking very un-ugly, almost beautiful thoughts that he couldn’t put to words.

“I’ll decide what you deserve.”

Izuku’s brow climbed.

“Big words for a guy who’s never dated anyone before.”

“Trust me,” Bakugou said, leaning in to press his brow to Izuku’s. “I fuckin’ set the learning curve.”

Izuku allowed his gaze to drop, let himself lean in for a slow, savoring kiss of tender lips alone.

“I bet you do.”

Bakugou kept his word and stayed, despite the fact that he and Natsume continued a stare-off through an entire movie on television. Izuku fell asleep somewhere around the beginning of the second one, his cheek flat against Bakugou’s chest, and maybe Bakugou’s breathing and heartbeat really could be as nice as his cat’s. Time would tell.

Somewhere in the early evening, Bakugou slipped away. A vague memory of lips to Izuku’s temple and the cloud of a thick comforter draping over his body the only signs that Bakugou had been and gone.

It wasn’t until the next day, after all thoughts and hearts had settled, that Izuku realized he might be the more inexperienced of the two when it came to a real relationship. And didn’t that just turn his upside down into right side up.

Notes:

The past couple of days I also posted my EndHawks fic from the Scarlet Aphrodisia Zine, plus a Shinsou/Todoroki canon-compliant fic, so if you're interested in either, go and check that out!

Thank you to everyone for your support, your kindness and comments and encouragement are always treasured and appreciated!

Chapter 24

Summary:

“Izuku.”
“Yes?”
“Thanks for not forgetting me.”

Notes:

HELLO, my wonderful, kind, generous readers! The reception for last chapter was absolutely mindblowing, and I continue to be floored by your constant support. I'm always overwhelmed by everyone's supportive spirit, and I hope you stick with me through to the end. We've already passed the half way mark, after all!

If you'd like to support support me, please do check out the first pinned message on my Twitter to learn more.

Other than that, PLEASE ENJOY SOME MOMS!

“Hello Katsuki, this is your mother. You know, the one who carried you for almost ten months? That’s right, I haven’t forgotten what a lazy little shit you were. I’ve got the stretch marks to prove it. Those oils don’t work at all. I should write a complaint. Sue them. Can I sue them for false advertising? I’ve got goddamn tiger stripes! Anyway, call your mother.”

 

“Katsuki, it’s your mother. I fucking raised you up and I will bring you the fuck down if you don’t call me.”

 

“I haven’t seen you since Christmas and this is the way you treat me? You’d better buy me a fuckin’ cruise for my birthday, ungrateful son of mine. Call - your - mother.”

 

“Ah, shit. I butt-dialed you, I guess. You should still call me, though. Hate that texting shit. What the fuck is wrong with your generation? Send me back into the womb.”

 

“This is just a call to remind you that I wiped your ass for over four years and you damn well owe me some fuckin’ respect.”

 

“Bakugou Katsuki, why the fuck is my phone blowing up with people messaging me links to photos of you with some little green twerp? What the hell have you been up to and when did you get so stupid you forgot what privacy was? I mean, he’s cute or whatever if you like twinks and you look happy enough that it’s giving me to goddamn creeps, but really? Really ? Who is he? You’d better not be his sugar daddy. I’ve heard about that stuff. I know what goes on. Call me.”

 

“OH SHIT, I KNEW I RECOGNIZED HIM. GET YOUR ASS OVER HERE RIGHT NOW OR I’M COMING FOR YOU.”

 

“Hey buddy, it’s dad. Um, could you come home, please? I’m so tired.”

 

Katsuki didn’t understand the first thing about flowers. Why people wanted them, gave them, put them in vases to die. At the very least, a potted plant was logical. It made oxygen and didn’t actively die in front of you. 

But Mom liked flowers. Gaudy ones.

Back in his hometown, Katsuki stood in an overwhelmingly scented flower shop and glared at the variety of choices. 

“Picking something for a special someone?” asked the man with a slightly affected, effeminate accent. He was an Omega, probably in his early thirties, and reminded him a little of Izuku, in the way that he had big eyes and a mess of hair. Nowhere near as captivating, though. 

Katsuki didn’t spare a glance over his shoulder and waved a vague hand of dismissal.

“S’fine. Just some old hag.”

“Uh…”

“I want the double amount of the obnoxious red ones, some of those little yellow bitches, the long purple things, and those tiny white ones. Make it pretty or whatever.”

“Excellent choice, sir,” the man mumbled, sounding some kind of sulky. Katsuki never bothered to figure Omega’s out. Their emotions were like tides and dangerous undercurrents, erratic and ever-flowing. 

Frowning, Katsuki watched the guy arrange the flowers across a wide, creamy span of paper. Izuku wasn’t like that, was he? Tumultuous, unpredictable. Sure, he had his moments here and there, but they were almost always in direct reaction to something Katsuki had done or said. Otherwise, while Izuku was passionate about his opinions, empathetic to an obnoxious degree, and had a mouth that could cut him off at the knees, he was somehow… dependable. Sunny, kind, hardworking. 

Katsuki liked him. A stupid thing to think, at this point, but true all the same. Katsuki genuinely liked him.

And, if his mother’s recent, most foreboding message was true - she knew of Midoriya Izuku without any help from Katsuki himself. 

The mere concept of this dawned more horror upon his person than any villain.

He’d caught the voicemail in the late evening, the night Izuku had fallen asleep, cheek upon his chest like a child, his fingers lightly fisted in Katsuki’s shirt. 

That - that had been unpredictable. Everything about that afternoon. When Izuku had opened the door, he’d instantly looked upon Katsuki like a meal, and Izuku the glutton. Did all Omegas do that? Izuku’s scent had been predatory, his eyes dark and scanning, as if searching for the weakest point to bite down. He’d been sweating, throat gleaming, complexion aglow with exertion, his hair pinned back to reveal those serious, expressive brows. 

Katsuki had wanted to tear him apart, but for a split second an unfamiliar tremor of doubt had carried electric across his skin. In that brief half a breath, he hadn’t known if Izuku was going to pounce first. 

And that couldn’t be normal. Could it? Was anything about his little Omega normal?

Did Katsuki even want normal?

Looking at the florist wrap up his lively spray of flowers, the answer was a definitive no . Izuku was his own breed - and so was Katsuki, in a way. 

Katsuki scowled to himself as he unearthed his wallet, his thoughts snapping back to the moment Izuku had gone corpse stiff in his arms, his entire demeanor going hypothermic and shivering at once. Like a bucket of ice water over his head, Katsuki had snapped from desperate lover to concerned friend in an instant. Izuku wasn’t the first person to have a panic attack in front of him.

He was, however, the first person to have a panic attack under him.

Also, the first person to be under him at all.

Fuck, they were a set of disasters. Katsuki would never say it out loud, but he was damn well floundering. He’d long come to terms with being Izuku’s anchor in times of need - but who was his?

The shop doors jingled and a gasp sounded.

“Oh my!”

Katsuki slowly turned, his face a practiced blank slate that people said was unnervingly aggressive all the same. But it was his Public Face, the one he’d acclimated over years of dealing with fans meddling with his personal life on days off.

Or, you know, days suspended.

Katsuki’s demeanor collapsed as quickly as he brought it up as he found himself gawking at Chubby Lady Izuku. 

“I recognize you!” Chubby Lady Izuku said, her rosy cheeks coloring with delight as she scurried into the shop, clinging to her purse with small hands.

Despite the surreal vision before him, Katsuki braced for the fan freak out.

“You’re Mitsuki’s son, aren’t you? I haven’t seen you since you were just past my knee! Oh my, how time does fly, doesn’t it? What are you doing here, then? Getting flowers for your mother? Won’t she just be tickled!”

CLI sure talked as much as his own Izuku, Katsuki thought, staring down at her silently, a sense of true foreboding overcoming him. This lady knew his mother? And his mother recognized Izuku from the paparazzi photos? What the hell was going on her?

“I… yes,” Katsuki finished lamely. “She likes flowers.”

“Sir, you need to pay.”

“Shut -” Katsuki bit off his verbal assault, every goosebump on his body threatening him into silence, like this was not the person you wanted to swear in front of. Katsuki spoke through clenched teeth and malicious smile as he took out his card. “Thanks. Yeah, of course.”

“Oh dear, I’m so sorry!” CLI said, fluttering a tiny hand that looked nothing like Izuku’s awkwardly large ones. “I didn’t even introduce myself and here I am talking your ear off. My name is Midoriya Inko, I’m a friend of Mitsuki’s. We went to school together all the way through high school. We were on the same volleyball team, though I wasn’t particularly good. Your mother, though, she was a star. I’m sure that’s no surprise to you, of course. Look at you and how you’ve grown! I finally get to meet the Ground Zero who used to tug at my skirt and ask for sneaky lemon drops! You always did like the sour candies. So darling. Oh, and here I am, going on again - I’m so embarrassed!”

Katsuki blinked, his brain buzzing with white noise. 

“Nice to meet you,” was all he said, an absolute fucking idiot of the highest degree. “I don’t remember you.”

Another truly brilliant statement. If this lady - and Katsuki couldn’t fathom that this was anyone but Izuku’s mother - knew Katsuki as a small kid, of course he wouldn’t remember her. Just what the hell was going on? Was this fucking flower shop some kind of surreal portal to his own personal hell?

“Of course you don’t! That was so long ago, before my son and I moved. He only managed to move me back to the area in recent years, and Mitsuki and I reconnected instantly. Such a good boy, my son is. You two were thick as thieves, you know. I do miss those days.” Izuku’s mother giggled, absolutely girlish. She even had those damn freckles. How could another Izuku be walking around on this planet being unbearably adorable as this auntie? Un-fucking-fair. “I was a lot slimmer then, too. Another reason to miss the past!”

“Your… son,” Katsuki said, wondering if he’d received some kind of head injury in the past thirty minutes or so. “His name is?”

“Izuku.” The woman practically glowed as she spoke his name.

Oh god. OH FUCK. Katsuki was going to have a nervous breakdown, he was sure of it. What the actual hell was going on here?

“Oh!” Izuku’s mother beamed, placing a soft hand on his forearm in her excitement. “I really should introduce you two again. Wouldn’t that be a delight? He was such a fan of the heroes as a child. Poor thing never made it, of course. That’s how it goes. But you two - you two should absolutely meet again!”

“Ah…” Katsuki shifted from one foot to the other, looking for something to do that wasn’t run out of the store screaming. Give him a guy with knives for teeth or burning, acidic piss whipping his dick at him down the alley. Not Midoriya Izuku’s mother . “I thought you looked familiar. That is, I know the guy. Your son. Already.”

I was licking his armpit this time yesterday and I’m still not sure what the fuck was happening. He smelled really fucking good, okay? Gimme a goddamn break.

Big, familiar green eyes blinked at him, and Katsuki was reminded of when birds looked at you with their heads turned almost upside down. Then she lit up like festival lights, all bright and cheerful and absolutely a Midoriya.

“You’re kidding me. You’re joking! Izuku would have told - oh. Well. Perhaps not. I’m never sure with that boy. He’s so very secretive sometimes. Does he do that with you? He lives in his own world, that one. Oh, well, I’m not even sure in what capacity you know my son! How someone like him would even know someone as exciting as you -”

“He’s a pretty exciting guy in his own right,” Katsuki snapped, unable to bite back even the most mild admonishment of his mate. He hadn’t missed the other references to Izuku as a poor thing or of course he hadn’t made it as a hero. That shit didn’t sit right with him. Not one bit.

“He does have his moments,” Izuku’s mother said with a rueful smile that might have hinted at knowledge only a mother could have of their child. 

Katsuki had to wonder if this person knew what Izuku’s life had been up until now. Or had Izuku kept his cards as close as he did within his and Katsuki’s relationship. How much did his mother know? And how much would Katsuki continue to accidentally learn about his mate before the man in question actually opened his own damn mouth and told him in his own words?

“Hey,” Katsuki said, grabbing his gaudy bouquet from the counter, which the florist had long abandoned in favor of tidying something that didn’t need tidying in the corner. “I’m going to go see my mom right now. Do you want to come? We could talk, then. My mom will probably smack me less if you’re around, too.”

“Why, I’d be delighted!” Izuku’s mother said, all but wiggling like a puppy.

How happy would Izuku have to be to act the same way? Katsuki filed the personal goal away for future attempts.

Turned out, Auntie Inko wanted to be called Auntie Inko, and she demanded this as she walked to Katsuki’s home at his side, one arm cradling a cheerful, green potted plant that Katsuki had no name for. At least someone else was logical about their home plant choices.

That was, until Auntie Inko told him she was buying a new plant because she had a bad habit of murdering them through neglect.

Katuski had to wonder about Izuku’s damn childhood.

The door opened to the familiar face of his childhood, somehow ageless in time. Maybe uncontrollable rage kept the body young. Mom flicked a glare Katsuki’s way before gasping and opening her arms to embrace Auntie Inko with a squeal.

“Inko! You brought my idiot son!”

Katsuki wedged past the hugging women and came in from the blustery cold, stomping his boots and shrugging out of his coat.

“I thought you wanted to see me, old hag.”

A slim hand ruffled Katsuki’s hair and gave him an infuriating pat on the cheek before she smiled and took his coat to hang.

“Want and need are vastly different, kid. Are those for me?”

“I guess,” Katsuki snapped, shoving the flowers at his mother. “What did you ever do to deserve them?”

Ignoring her own damn son completely, she smiled winningly at her flowers, red eyes lighting up before they settled on her friend. 

“By the way, Inko, have you heard what my shitty son has been up to? Since your face doesn’t look like a tomato, I’d say not.”

Auntie Inko had barely finished unwrapping her muted cream scarf, her eyes large and clueless and so very Midoriya as she seemed to look around the living room for answers.

“What? What are you -”

“Nevermind, nevermind. Let me get a vase for these beauties and make the tea. Oiy, shithead, take her things and make her comfortable.” She loped into the kitchen, all easy grace and effortless posture as she yelled from the kitchen. “Where did you find her anyway?”

Katsuki rolled his eyes and took Auntie Inko’s scarf and peacoat, neatly hanging them as his mother would want them. He gestured toward the couches, which she clearly was already familiar with, if their greeting illustrated anything.

“Flower shop.”

“He was a very polite young man!” Auntie Inko called out in a sweet, small voice as she took a seat at the far end of the couch. “Gave me quite a shock to see him in person, though. You didn’t tell me he’d gotten so tall, Mitsuki.”

“He’s practically a monster -”

“Haaah?” Katsuki sat beside Auntie Inko. “You made me! What’s wrong with me? I’m perfect.”

“A perfect idiot,” Mom said, but her smile was cheerful as she came in carrying a tray with tea and cookies. “I had to find out from the damn neighbors about you and - and - well. Hold on, let me get something.”

A flurry of motion as ever, she dashed from the room and has Katsuki and Auntie Inko staring at each other in a daze. Auntie Inko pressed her lips together, her straight brows bowing in concern. 

“What on earth is she worked up about?”

“Um. Well.” Katsuki was blessedly interrupted when his mother stomped into the living room with a shoebox the size of Katsuki’s childhood shoes. “What’s in the box, hag?”

“Your dick if I don’t chop it off and store it away for causing so much trouble.”

“Oiy, oiy - too far, you crazy b-”

“Ah, yes!” Auntie Inko cut in with a curious smile, though she didn’t touch the box Mom set on the table beside the tea. “Anyway! What are you getting your phone out for?”

Mom only snorted and thumbed through her photos until she brought up exactly what Katsuki knew was coming. She plopped down beside Katsuki, sandwiching him in between to moms, forcing him to lean back as she thrust the phone across him and toward Auntie Inko.

“Look at this shit.”

“What is - oh.” Auntie Inko squinted, took the phone and gawked, her free hand to her mouth. “Oh my goodness, this is Izuku! And he’s with - Katsuki? Wait, are you two -”

“You’d better not be his sugar daddy,” Mitsuki interrupted, her gaze a pointed burn.

“What?” Without thinking, Katsuki yanked the phone from Auntie Inko’s hand and promptly shoved it under his thigh, never to be seeing again. “No! I - fuck, can’t you do anything like a normal person? Why’s everything gotta be like an episode of a drama? You’re pissin’ me off!”

“And you’re banging my best friends son!”

Inko gasped.

“Mitsuki!”

“Hah ?” Mom jabbed a finger against Katsuki’s chest, her eyes all crazytown. “Aren’t you? If you lie you’ll be shitting out my fist.”

“It’s not your business, you Beta bitch! But no . No we haven’t, uh.” The overwhelming stillness to his left had Katsuki clamping his mouth shut and slowly glancing aside. Auntie Inko had that face Izuku got when he was so overwhelmed he stopped making a face at all. Katsuki released a calming breath, loosened his fists into open palms upon his knees, and made an effort to soften his voice. “Shit. I mean. I like your son very much, Auntie.”

Auntie Inko blinked once, then twice before her entire face went up in flame.

“Oh my,” she said softly.

Katsuki bit back the urge to take off running. He never ran from anything, but up until now he’d never had to confess to a mother about her son.

“We’re - he’s a good person, but I’m sure you know it. I don’t like many people. And not like I like him, so - there’s that. Or whatever.” Katsuki flicked a withering look to Mom’s smug expression. “Sorry, I guess. That this is so fuckin’ weird thanks to someone.”

Mom took this time to sip her tea like she hadn’t done a thing.

“You brought this on yourself, kid.”

Katsuki gawked. 

“Not in any shape or form did I ever! What the fuck? And - and what’s with this - this crap about us being friends Auntie was tellin’ me about? I don’t remember a goddamn thing.”

“Obviously you don’t or you’d have been more likely to say something about him earlier,” Mom said with an eye roll as she set aside her tea in favor of addressing the shoebox. She brought it to her lap and set aside the lid. She was sharp - sharper than the credit people already gave her. “Let’s see, I’m sure there’s some in - here we go. Look.”

With a deep frown, Katsuki accepted the small jumble of photographs she offered. There were only seven, but the first one stopped and restarted his heart like a faltering engine. He held his breath and scraped his thumb across the image.

They couldn’t have been more than three, just chubby toddlers in yellow nursery smocks and navy shorts. Each smiling mother held their son, and Katsuki was reaching out for Izuku’s wild head of curls. Izuku was all eyes and angelic smile, while Katsuki’s pale brow was scrunched in concentration as he tried to get closer to the other. 

“First day of nursery,” Mom supplied. “You were obsessed with Izuku’s hair. They had to split you up constantly for pulling it.”

“I don’t remember,” Katsuki found himself saying again.

“That’s not unusual,” Auntie Inko said soothingly. “Go on. It’s been so long since I’ve seen these. It warms the heart, doesn’t it?”

Mom snorted a laugh when Katsuki flipped to a photo of the two boys actively fighting over an All Might action figure. Katsuki was openly weeping and Izuku looked murderous. To anyone who thought they knew the two of them, the photo would appear incongruous with their personalities. However, people didn’t often realize how emotional Katsuki was, nor did the world as a whole seem to recognize how fucking stubborn Izuku was. 

“Heart-warming, sure.”

Katsuki lingered on the picture, a faintly illuminated memory flickering to consciousness at the shadowed reaches of his childhood. There was no sound, a silent film.

“This was his,” he murmured, pointing at All Might. Katsuki’s bedroom had been decked out in All Might, but he’d still wanted what Izuku had. 

He couldn’t remember much more. Auntie Inko slipped the photo from his hold, her presence a sweet warmth on the couch beside him as she cooed over the photo of her little boy. 

The third photo made him smile despite himself, a vivid memory jumping into focus. Mud-splashed and grinning from ear to ear, the two of them each held out a fat, green frog for the camera. Katsuki had a bandaid on his cheek printed with smiling suns and Izuku’s nails, out on display as he presented his unhappy frog, were black and caked with dirt. The sun was bright above them, washing Katsuki’s hair out to white and catching Izuku’s big eyes aglow.

Katsuki could remember being this happy. He didn’t know why he hadn’t remembered before. This or Izuku or the frogs or All Might. How could he have let all this fall to the wayside.

Mom must have caught the drop in his expression, because she plucked the picture from his hold and jostled him with her sharp shoulder. 

“I was probably too hard on you. Kids have a million best friends in a lifetime. They move on, they forget, whatever.”

Katsuki closed his mouth around the words:

I didn’t. I didn’t have a million best friends. I didn’t have any until high school, until Kirishima.

Instead, he repeated his mother.

“Yeah. It’s whatever.”

The next photo was clearly taken in secret, the boys tuckered out inside a children’s tent, the photographer sticking their hand in the entryway to capture a quick picture. A nightlight rotating with blue stars cast an entire sky across their sleeping faces, the thin, green nylon walls. Katsuki’s arms were splayed out, his hand resting on Izuku’s tiny chest. The kid had been scrawny at that age, no doubt. His bony knees and stick legs stuck out from All Might pajama shorts.

“Cute,” Katsuki said to himself, once again forgetting his audience. 

There were more photos of them at age five. Katsuki chasing a screaming Izuku through a sprinkler, Izuku’s hair haloed in sun. The two of them bundled in ugly Christmas sweaters, Izuku reading an oversized picture book to a frowning Katsuki on an ugly orange couch. The final photo was the most unremarkable of them all. Simply the two of them standing in front of Katsuki’s house, their faces close and intent as they spoke.

“That’s from the day the Midoriyas moved,” Mom said, tapping a red, lacquered nail upon the photo. “You were both spitfire smart at that age and we didn’t want to tell you guys it was happening until the last minute.”

“Izuku cried the entire drive to our new home,” Auntie Inko said, her shoulder leaning against Katsuki’s as her expressive eyes lingered on the photo, regret painted in deep, dark greens. “It was a horrible apartment. So small. But it was all I could afford, even with two jobs.”

“You cried too.” Mom patted his thigh. “You always cried about that kid. Maybe it’s why you forgot. You were torn up about it for months. More than any five year old with a short term memory should.”

Katsuki grunted, still intent on the final photo. There was an intimate quality about it, like the two of them existed in their own world together, standing far away from anyone else who might interrupt their conversation, their connection. His heart stirred with an unfamiliar emotion, one he simply could not place. Some kind of longing, though not sadness. Not necessarily nostalgia, but perhaps a kind of wish that things had grown differently from the twisted, convoluted thing it was today. 

Well. Katsuki wasn’t one for regrets, and certainly not over that which he had no control. They’d found each other again, and if that wasn’t a sign of mates or something even deeper, nothing would convince him otherwise.

“You’re in love with him, aren’t you?” Mom said, her voice sober. Auntie Inko eked a small sound of distress.

“Mitsuki! Don’t rush the boy -”

“I am.” Katsuki said. He stood, still holding that one picture. “Can I keep this?”

“Knock yourself out, kid. Have ‘em all.” Mom stood too, a great sigh filling the quiet room as she propped her hands upon her slim hips and grinned. “I’m going to make dinner. A big one. Your father went out on a fishing trip today. I think I exhausted him with all my ranting, so I was planning on cooking something small. But I think today deserves something special. Inko, you wanna come to the shop with me? Let’s leave Katsuki here to sulk and moon over your cute little son, hah?”

“Oh!” Auntie Inko set the extra photo she held onto the coffee table and stood, clapping her hands in childish delight. “I would love that!”

The two mothers bustled and chattered, very clearly comfortable with each other in a way that Katsuki distantly recognized as the manner in which he and Izuku also communicated. 

It was fucking weird. No doubt about it.

But there were differences. Mom made a point to brighten the mood when things got heavy, even if it was with her larger than life antics. And Inko wasn’t nearly as… downtrodden… or secretive as Izuku, who almost always seemed to be thinking seventy-five percent more than what he was saying. Even so, Katsuki wasn’t blind. He saw the similarities and, on some level, the two moms’ long-term, thriving relationship give him hope for his own.

He hadn’t seen them out the door and into the brisk winter cold for more than three minutes before he was dialing a familiar number. Izuku answered on the last ring and he sounded wary.

“Bakugou?”

Katsuki rolled his eyes.

“You act like you ain’t got my number saved. Wait, you do have it saved, don't you? I swear to god I’ll shove that phone so far up your -”

“That’s the last thing I want in my ass,” Izuku said, already more at ease. Katsuki couldn’t begin to guess what had made the guy anxious this time around, but he was learning to roll with the punches. “What’s going on? Is everything alright? Was there more publicity about -”

“I’m at my ma’s house,” Katsuki said, flopping back onto the couch to glare at the ceiling. “Nosy old bitch that she is. But she ain’t really the reason I’m calling. Met your mom in town today, too.”

“My mom?” Izuku repeated in such a high, unstable pitch that Katsuki winced, his sensitive hearing startling from the tone. “H-how - how did you -”

“Well, that’s the real shitter of the thing. You know our moms live in the same area? Like, walking distance close.”

“Uh.” Izuku’s dumbass response and silence told Katsuki he’d been just as clueless. 

“Yeah,” Katsuki dragged a hand down his suddenly tired face, wishing for the warmth and odd comfort of his Omega’s cheek upon his chest. His voice was muffled and quiet as he added, “I guess we were friends back when we were brats or something.”

“What?” Izuku’s voice cracked, high and broken again. “Ch-child hood fr-”

“Stop screamin’ in my ear, for fuck’s sake.” Katsuki sat up, attention sweeping the abandoned photos across the table. “But yeah, they got pictures of us and everything. My ma recognized you in the paparazzi photos from the other day and called me with an earful. Running into your mom was a coincidence. You two really are the same. Creeped me out.”

“I don’t remember,” Izuku whispered, his voice thick. “I don’t remember you.”

“We barely made it to five together. S’not a big deal. I didn’t remember shit ‘til I saw the photos and even then it’s far away. There’s nothing wrong with not remembering.”

“But I -” Izuku paused for too damn long, but Katsuki was learning to keep his mouth shut when Izuku did this because he was usually processing some shit Katsuki couldn’t begin to understand. “You know… Sometimes, sometimes I think I can smell you. But it’s like a memory.”

“You told me that before, I think.”

“Right. I just wonder, now. If it isn’t - well, if it actually is a memory. Maybe part of me remembered you all along. Maybe a part of me could never forget.”

Katsuki’s chest expanded and popped like an iridescent, summertime bubble blown away by a child’s clumsy lips and breath. A flash of a dopey, lovesick grin betrayed him briefly before Katsuki controlled his face, his heart still fluttering dozens upon dozens of giddy bubbles up his throat to continue encouraging a smile.

“Bakugou?” Izuku said after a time. “Are you there? Are you -”

“Izuku.”

Izuku made a little noise, almost a chirp of reply before he spoke.

“Yes?”

“Thanks for not forgetting me.”

Izuku’s huffed an unsteady laugh.

“I-I can’t be sure if -”

“I’m sure,” Katsuki said, his voice strong. “I’m sure of it. Aren’t you? Tell the damn truth, already.”

“I’m sure,” Izuku whispered in quick reply, his voice raw and real. “You’re right. I’m sure.”

They didn’t talk much longer. Katsuki promised to bring the pictures to their date on Valentine’s Day, and since he didn’t want to get caught out by both mothers while talking to his boyfriend on the phone, he cut the call off before they arrived.

Dinner was not something he ever wanted to repeat again, but knew they would be inevitable over the course of his and Izuku’s relationship going forward. Maybe it would be easier with a second person to field the barrage of questions.

Katsuki could only stay as close-mouthed as possible. Even interrogation training hadn’t prepared him for this. He needed some tips from Shinsou’s expertise. 

“Thank you for having me,” Katsuki grumbled at the end of the day as he shrugged into his parka and pulled up the fur hood. 

“Ungrateful brat,” Mom said, and yanked on both hood strings to tighten them around his face like a child, tying a neat bow beneath his chin and rage-red face. “Be good.”

“You be good!”

“I don’t have to be good, I’m an adult!”

Katsuki sputtered, batting her hands away from him.

“I’m an adult!”

“You’re a hero and -”

“It was lovely to reunite with you, dear Katsuki,” Auntie Inko cut in, effectively stepping before Mom with apparent balls of steel when it came to her. Must be a Midoriya-Bakugou effect. “And under such wonderful circumstances and news! Please don’t be a stranger. And do try to convince my son to visit me soon. He’s so hard to get a hold of when he falls into his moods. You know, sometimes the doctors call me to check in on his condition and he just doesn’t return my messages. I sometimes wonder if he wants to be fixed at all.”

Katsuki stilled, his hand going stiff around the doorknob as he’d moved to exit. He looked over his shoulder, eyes narrowed.

Just what the fuck was this?

“Sure,” Katsuki said, his sharp mind making a quick, executive decision not to ask. “I’ll speak to him.”

He was through with learning about his mate through other people. Izuku needed to start speaking for himself, and soon, if they were going to take any steps forward to the future. 

They said their goodbyes and Katsuki stepped out to find it snowing once more. They’d been getting a lot of precipitation this winter, but it was perfect weather for the upcoming date around the corner. 

Face set in grim lines, Katsuki headed for the train station, and wondered just what level of wooing it would take to get Midoriya Izuku to finally open up.

Notes:

Brace yourself for next chapter! We will certainly be seeing a date upwards of 10k. I can't wait to share it with you!

EDIT: Just after I released this chapter, a friend & reader got to talking with me about Inko. If she seems a little... less than supportive of Izuku in this, it's because she is. And it's because I canonically also believe that, while she was LOVING and Izuku was LOVED as a child growing up, he wasn't necessarily supported in his dreams. That comes into play here, as well. Inko definitely sees Izuku has lacking or broken in a lot of ways - this is, again, playing into the theme of societal expectations, inherent biases toward a gender or type of people, plus just familial history muddling the waters of a relationship. They love each other, but Inko doesn't understand Izuku's depression, or his condition, or the fighting or a lot else. She's not a bad mom, but she's not the mom that Izuku is going to open up to and show her his guts. I hope this helps clear things up!

Chapter 25

Notes:

I... this chapter is 13,800 words. I really hope you enjoy it, because the carpal tunnel in my left hand says that I'm not going to be typing anything for a while LOL.

My intention was to post a huge list of all the QR fanart I've been accruing lately, but I am truly so burnt out from this chapter and I beg your forgiveness, and will pass on the goods to you next chapter!

Please enjoy this and remember: Healing Is Not Linear.

“It’s so early,” was the muffled greeting Katsuki received as Izuku approached him at the train station in a bundle of winter clothes. His pert, freckled nose peeked over a purple scarf, his eyelids heavy with sleep, his voice still rough with it.

“Hi,” Katsuki said, grinning widely beneath the black flu mask he’d worn as a precaution this time around. The clock had barely passed six in the morning, but early hours weren’t anything to a hero. Shift work was their hell to bear. 

Izuku hummed some kind of unintelligible noise and tipped toward Katsuki, face smashed against the chest of Katsuki’s parka. Caught by surprise, Katsuki forgot to move his hands from his pockets and just stood there, staring down with no small swell of wonder.

Willing back the unsteady emotion with which he’d been newly grappling, Katsuki cleared his throat and patted Izuku’s equally purple hat. 

“You’re shit with mornings, ain’t ya?”

Without reply, Izuku inhaled deeply, and Katsuki flashed to their phone conversation two days ago, and what Izuku had said about remembering the phantom of his scent. His heart squeezed as he trailed a hand down to tuck inside the collar of Izuku’s puffy green coat, his bare palm cupping the nape of Izuku’s neck. 

“That’s nice,” Izuku murmured against him, bearing his weight fully against Katsuki’s frame.

Katsuki swallowed hard and took half a step back before he lost his mind.

Control.

He really wasn’t good with that shit.

“Oiy. Let’s get to our platform, then you can sleep all you damn well want.”

“I won’t fall asleep,” Izuku said, the unmistakable husk of exhaustion in his voice. Katsuki rolled his eyes and bumped Izuku’s shoulder as they walked.

“Sure. You look tired as hell.”

“I’m always tired as hell. It’s called depression.”

“Yeah yeah, let’s go smartass.”

They waited at the tracks in silence, Izuku shielding himself behind Katsuki’s larger frame whenever a loud train came through. Some entirely undeserved sense of pride glowed from his Alpha’s heart at the small protection. 

As Izuku began to get his wits about him, Katsuki noticed him squinting at the train line. His eyes widened as he whipped a shocked look toward him.

“Joetsu Line? You’re not taking me skiing, are you? Bakugou, that’s too m-”

“I pegged you more for snowboarding,” Katsuki said easily, smirking from beneath his mask as Izuku waved his hands in a tizzy. “But if you wanna ski, sure. Either way, we’re damn well going and you’re gonna let me do this. Otherwise, you go home and you woke up early for jack shit.”

Izuku gawked, his scarf falling beneath his chin, his arms lax at his sides.

“You really are a pushy asshole.”

Katsuki shrugged.

“Hasn’t been a deal-breaker so far.”

Izuku shut his mouth, his jaw working as he clearly chewed over his words. Katsuki waited, smug. Izuku huffed.

“I mean. I guess. You’re just so, so -”

“Thoughtful? Amazing? Geniu-”

“You like taking care of me,” Izuku said in a rush, his cheeks coloring as he glanced away, one gloved hand wringing his wrist. “Or something.”

Katsuki snorted a laugh and threw an arm around Izuku’s stiff shoulders.

“Yeah. That’s how it’s supposed to go. Or something.”

Izuku remained silent, his profile thoughtful and withdrawn as Katsuki stayed close and watched. Finally, Izuku sighed.

“I mean, I do like snowboarding.”

“That’s the spirit, you stubborn lil’ shit.”

Beating the majority of rush hour, their early morning bullet train was near empty as they stripped from bulky outerwear and sat side by side. Katsuki spread his legs in search of comfort and Izuku did the same, their knees bumping companionably. Once again, Katsuki found himself distracted by the remarkable thickness of Izuku’s thighs.

What on earth was his little Omega’s workout regime? When did he do it? The other day, Katsuki had clearly interrupted one of them. 

Izuku had been a dripping, delicious mess, emitting the strongest, most lush Omega jungle scent he’d ever been bashed over the nose with. There was no way he only exercised at home, though - not for those muscles on an Omega. An Alpha, maybe. Someone whose body was predispositioned toward strength training. 

“You work out?” Katsuki found himself asking at a respectful whisper. It sounded like a cheap pick up line, but he was genuinely curious.

Izuku had comfortably slouched himself in the window seat, quietly gazing out at the flashes of grey city and gloomy slush. His posture was relaxed, though Katsuki realized with frustration that he gave off no telling scent, the blockers once more in place for their date. While he understood their necessity, it irked Katsuki’s inner Alpha, had his skin prickling to shove his nose in the soft, warm haven of Izuku’s throat or armpit or inner thigh to search out that mouthwatering scent again. 

“Yeah,” Izuku said, sounding distracted, his head somewhere else.

“You on ‘roids?”

Izuku shot a sharp look over his shoulder, his brows scrunched, attention on Katsuki in full.

“What? No. I can barely afford blockers.”

“Then how’re you so ripped?” Katsuki said, eyeing Izuku’s legs again. He’d seen them up close now; had dug his fingertips into the firm flesh, watching the muscles bunch and flex beneath his palms as Izuku had spread out beneath him. 

“Good genetics,” Izuku said with an oddly wry expression. “Seriously. I live off those tasteless protein shakes and rice, noodles or whatever. Meat, if someone else is paying and forcing me. And I exercise a lot at home to, I don’t know, work off my aggression.”

“You are pretty aggressive for an Omega.”

At the shadowed look storming over Izuku’s eyes, Katsuki groaned and knocked his head back against the seat.

“I didn’t mean - fuck. I’m just saying. I’m agreein’ with you. It’s just, y’know, unusual. I didn’t say it was bad. I’m here, ain’t I? You’re not boring like all them other Omegas and that’s good.”

“Yeah, well.” Izuku folded his arms across his chest and stared out the window anew. “I wish I wasn’t like this.”

“Don’t.”

“Don’t what?”

“Wish for shit like that. Own it. You’re - there’s only one guy like you. I’d know, I meet a shitload of people every damn day of my life. You think you’re aggressive? You should hear the shit my PR says about me.”

Izuku cracked a smile at that, sliding a playful look over.

“You do have an awful reputation. Even for an Alpha.”

“Oiy!” Katsuki winced as he quickly quieted himself in the train car. “I get shit done, don’t I? Everybody loves me.”

“Alright alright,” Izuku said with a short laugh, his hands up in surrender. “Whatever you say. I admit I did have a little crush on you when I first saw you in Plus Ultra magazine for the Sports Festival feature.”

“That wasn’t the first time you saw me, though,” Katsuki said, voice dropping low, his attention fixed on the way Izuku’s pupils burst black when they met his. For a split second they glanced up and away, like Izuku was digging for a memory.

“R-right,” he whispered in return. “That’s - that sure is something. And it explains the whole - the smell thing. And you.”

“And me,” Katsuki murmured, watching Izuku’s mouth move. “Do you think we…”

“What?” Izuku said, even softer, his entire body facing Katsuki now, one warm hand upon his thigh. 

“We might have, I don’t know. Connected then. Imprinted or -”

Izuku sucked in a sharp breath, eyes huge as he nodded a little.

“Maybe. It - it came to mind, but there’s no way to know. I mean, d-do you - did you bring -”

“Yeah,” Katsuki breathed, patting at his chest, only to realize he’d tucked the photos into the inner pocket of his jacket. “Wait, hold on. Don’t move.”

“Not moving,” Izuku said with a soft, fond smile.

After wrestling with his jacket and several muffled swears, Katsuki flopped back into the seat and presented Izuku with the pictures and a still-covered grin of triumph. He badly wanted to remove the flu mask, but it wasn’t worth the risk. The last thing they needed was to get mauled at a snowed-in mountain resort where there was nowhere to run. Or ski. 

“Oh my god!” Izuku blurted out, expressive eyes instantly full of wonder and light as he clamped a hand over his mouth and muffled a laugh. “That’s - that’s us! That’s you .”

Katsuki leaned in, lips curved as he looked at their preschool photo. 

“And you.”

“When did you stop being cute?”

“When did you start being a smartass?”

Izuku flipped to the photo of himself raging and Katsuki crying.

“Somewhere around here, I’d guess.”

“Nah, you were a wuss. I remember. Kinda.”

“I really was,” Izukus said, still appearing pleased as he flipped through the photos, laughing and commenting as he went. He, too, paused at the final photo of them standing before Katsuki’s house, seemingly intent on their conversation.

Izuku’s brow furrowed, his thumb brushing over their heads, his mouth a soft pout as he fell into that quiet daze to which he seemed prone. 

“I feel like - I don’t know. I remember this or something. That day, crying in the car.”

Katsuki nodded.

“Your mom said you did. That you cried. Me too, I guess. I don’t remember that. My mom said I was all fucked up over it.”

With a bracing exhale, Izuku settled the photos on his lap, cupped preciously in his hands as he met Katsuki’s gaze. 

“So, my mom. How was… that.”

Katsuki flicked a brow.

“She was alright. Nice, ditzy, kinda like you but worse. Didn’t like how she talked about you, though. Like you had some kinda defect.”

“Well, she’s had to deal with me longer than you have,” Izuku said with a humorless laugh, his gaze falling to his hands.

“Didn’t like that shit,” Katsuki repeated firmly.

Following a moments silence, Izuku’s smile was small but true as he continued to gaze at their photos.

“Her and I both went through a lot. She worked two jobs, day and night, just to support us. I graduated at the top of my class all through high school, but that doesn’t put food on the table or clothes on my bac. And then there were the - the people. The drugs and the drinking. Picking me up from overnight holding at the police station. My hormones -”

Izuku cut himself off and offered a kind, tired expression Katsuki had seen in his line of work, time and again. The downtrodden, the exhausted, the resigned. Those emotions hadn’t affected him as much as they perhaps should have in the past, but seeing them in someone he now knew intimately made it more infuriating, made him feel even more helpless and angry for it.

Katsuki clenched his jaw against any number of things he could say. 

He reached out and placed a hand atop Izuku’s, threading their fingers. 

“You really do have freakishly large hands. What’s the deal?”

Izuku sputtered a laugh and aimed another secretive look his way.

“I told you. Genetics.”

“You’re a laugh fuckin’ riot, you know that?” Katsuki shot out with his free hand and grabbed at Izuku’s side with a fierce tickle, grinning wider when Izuku’s yelp sounded way too loud in the train car. His face blew up red and he began to scrabble at Katsuki’s hold on his ribs, photos flying.

“Oh no no no - Bak- don’t you dare!”

“Shhh! You’re too damn loud for the car,” Katsuki whispered, unrelenting with unholy glee.

“The pic-” Tears streamed down Izuku’s face as he writhed away from the double-handed onslaught, curling into himself as his entire frame shook with silent, choked giggles. “The pictures, Bakugou, the pictures!”

“Wuss,” Katsuki said with a smile as he stopped and folded forward to gather the photos. Caught up in his rare good mood, Katsuki stilled in surprise when a cheek rested between his shoulder blades, two arms encompassing the flat of his back in a soft, partial embrace. “Izu-”

“This is the first time someone has taken me out for Valentine’s Day,” Izuku murmured into Katsuki’s shirt, his breathing slow and easy. “Or White Day or anything at all like this. Sorry if I’m weird about it. Everything about us feels so fast and frightening, but frightening like exciting, and what scares me most is that I’m not scared of you at all anymore.”

Katsuki stared at his snow boots with a frown, feeling the way Izuku’s heart beat against his back, right through his ribcage and into his own. 

“I really am defective, you know,” Izuku said quietly. He rubbed his cheek into Katsuki’s shoulder, like one would a beloved pet. “You just haven’t figured it out yet.”

“Told you before,” Katsuki said, his voice raspy and raw. “Don’t underestimate me. I’m the smarter one.”

Izuku’s frame subtly shook with unshed laughter.

“Sure.”

“So.” Katsuki sat up and slipped the pictures in his back pocket. “How good are you at snowboarding?”

Izuku blinked at him, that beautiful misty green fog he sometimes acquired clearing from his vision. He smiled.

“Are you hoping I don’t beat you at your own sport again?”

“There’s no way you’ll beat me at this,” Katsuki said, waving him off and slouching back into his seat. “Speed is my jam.”

“I thought you were more boom boom, less zoom zoom.”

Katsuki gaped.

“And you think you’re smarter than me?”

“I’m sorry, was that the voice of a man who has no college degree?” Izuku looked around with a frown, squinting into the distance beyond a groaning Katsuki. “H-hello? Are you out there? Do you fluently speak two languages, because I could say it in English if that would h-”

Katsuki clamped a hand over Izuku’s laughing mouth and growled.

“Where the fuck you get a mouth like that? You really are Shinsou’s goddamn best friend, ain’t ya?”

Izuku licked Katsuki’s hand and he recoiled in shock.

“What the fuck, you are a twenty-five year old man! Who does that anymore?”

“Maybe I’m making up for lost childhood,” Izuku shot back, sunshine smile in full force for the first time today. “You were my best friend before Hitoshi, weren’t you?”

An overwhelming surge of warmth and light burst in Katsuki’s chest, his heart shining gold right up his throat. 

“I - yeah,” Katsuki choked out, struggling to remain unaffected as he swallowed and glanced out the window. “Yeah, I guess so.”

Izuku’s smile faded, his brow scrunching as he cocked his head.

“Are you okay?”

“Yeah.” Katsuki rubbed his lips together, a fish out of water in the unending wash of emotions Izuku drowned him in every damn time. “Yeah, sure, I’m - it’s just. You know. Fast. Exciting. Or whatever dumb shit.” 

Izuku’s smile bloomed anew, his freckled cheeks rosy.

“Yeah. All that dumb shit.”

“Speakin’ a dumb shit.” Katsuki reached out and tugged at the purple scarf Izuku still wore. “You never wear this color.”

“Is that your way of telling me it’s awful?” Izuku said, lips curved as he tucked his chin and mouth into the scarf. 

“Nah. S’fine on you. Nice and stuff. But I’d bet anything that purple bastard gave it to you.”

Izuku sputtered a laugh and shrugged.

“Yeah, for Christmas. Is it that obvious?”

“Only because I know the same people you know.”

“That is weird, isn’t it?” Izuku said, settling in comfortably now. Bringing one foot onto the seat, he tucked his leg close to his body and wrapped his arms around a knee. Only someone that short could pull it off on a fucking train, of all places. But his eyes shone with curiosity and Katsuki was already blinded. “I guess we’ve never discussed it. How we know the same people. Don’t you think that’s weird?”

“Nah, man. What’s weird is that you are friends with so many fuckin’ heroes, but when we first met you all but took a dump on the entire profession.”

“Not -” Izuku cut himself off with a scowl, his hands moving ineffectually as he sighed. “Not - not like - I don’t hate the profession. I just - I wanted to be a hero, before. When I was a kid. Kind of an obsessive amount. My old bedroom still has all my All Might stuff and - ugh. I guess once all that blew up in my face I turned my back on it, and once I got out of my… darker… years, I embraced a kind of no violence policy?”

Katsuki snorted.

“So you went from one end of the spectrum to the other with no account for any type of middle ground.”

Izuku winced.

“That does sound like me.”

“And did your no violence policy include the solid palm strike you landed on my fuckin’ nose that first day?”

Izuku gave him a flat look.

“You basically accosted me.”

Katsuki shrugged.

“Fine. But you were givin’ off all kinds of fuck me scents. Never smelled -”

“Anything like it, I know, I know. Everyone says that.” Izuku rolled eyes, but then paused, lips pressed tightly together as he considered Katsuki. “I think you might have been the first person to mean it, though. Like, really mean it. If we did - and I’m not saying we did - but if we’d imprinted before our presentations showed up, it’s almost like -”

“It wouldn’t have mattered what you presented as or what I did,” Katsuki finished, tailing off at the thick, mounting intensity between them. “I know.”

“I know,” Izuku repeated at a whisper, gaze flicking to Katsuki’s covered mouth.

Katsuki thrummed his fingertips upon his thigh.

“It was really hot when you punched me in the nose.”

Izuku blinked and yelped a sharp, startled laugh.

“I - what? Did you just -”

“People don’t catch me off guard,” Katsuki said with the surety of someone speaking the entire truth. “It doesn’t happen. And definitely not a civilian.”

“Well.” Izuku leaned in, his eyes going playful and sparkling in way that made Katsuki remember their scene in the doorway not long ago. “You were distracted.”

“You’re real damn distracting,” Katsuki murmured. “Specially then. Nevermind how you smelled. You were all small and bossy and smart and you quoted a fuckin’ book at me like it was goddamn sex.”

The corner of Izuku’s lips quirked, his eyelids gone heavy, the timber of his voice dropping.

“I forgot. I did, didn’t I?”

“I want that quiet rapture again, you said.” Katsuki leaned in, his nose, infuriatingly covered in the black mask, brushing Izuku’s as he spoke. “I want to feel the same powerful, nameless urge that I used to feel.”

“That breath of that, then arose, shall fill me again,” Izuku murmured, his lips sweeping over Katsuki’s through the mask, electric. “Melt the heavy, dead lump of lead that lies somewhere in me and waken again the impatience of the future, the quick joy in the world of thought, it shall bring back again the lost eagerness of my youth.”

“I sit.” Katsuki’s hand travelled Izuku’s thigh, rested too high and near a heat he could feel pulsing near his thumb. He brought his mouth to Izuku’s ear and rumbled, “And wait.” 

“Oh hell,” Izuku said in a fierce whisper, reaching between them to yank the mask down from Katsuki’s mouth and lean -

“D’you remember what I said after?” Katsuki rasped, riding a bullet train through the snow at two-hundred miles per hour with the man who had torn him right out of his reality and thrust him into a new one. 

Izuku paused, eyes dark, the faint scent of damp earth and pine in the humid air.

“What?” He barely said it, maybe didn’t say it at all.

“After that I said, I think I’m in love with you.”

“Oh.” 

The word might as well have been a sound punched right from Izuku’s gut, all breath with an edge of surprise. Izuku exhaled, shivery and unsteady against Katsuki’s bare lips as Izuku at licked his own, his gaze searching and scanning Katsuki’s expression for fuck knew what.

“Oh,” he said again, maybe in awe. “I’m - I’m going to kiss you now.”

“Sounds good,” Katsuki croaked, amazed he could speak at all.

Izuku brought himself to Katsuki with a sigh at the back of his throat that melted into a murmur of peace or pleasure or both as he parted his lips for Katsuki and swept in a faint flicker of tongue. The noise might as well have been a mating call for all it affected Katsuki, bolstering his posture as he thundered a low from his chest and leaned in across the seat, hands gripped tight on both of Izuku’s thighs. 

A plaintive keen in reply and the frisky bite Izuku landed on Katsuki’s tongue fired up his blood more than it had any business doing in a goddamn train car of all places. But Izuku’s arms hand linked around his neck, and Izuku’s back was planted against the cold, hard window, the world racing by as Katsuki wedged a knee up between Izuku’s thighs and licked into that clever mouth like a man mapping the lay of his land. 

Madness. 

This fucking Omega would drive Katsuki to madness and he wouldn’t give it a moments thought if it meant finally sinking himself deep into that slick, wanting, waiting heat, so welcoming and readily offered to him. To hold his mate still for once and fuck him until he shook around Katsuki like the goddamn apocalypse personified.

Izuku was all of that. His mate, his world, his end of the world. Izuku might not get it. Didn’t get it. But Katsuki knew and, just as Izuku had said of himself earlier, he just hadn’t figured it out yet. 

With one final red thread of control, Katsuki yanked himself back with a silent snarl, baring his teeth in an instinctive show for his Omega, lengthened canines on display. The longer the teeth, the deeper the mating mark. 

Eyes blackened and burning hot, Izuku’s gaze lingered on Katsuki’s teeth. And, to Katsuki’s absolute shock, Izuku’s top lip curled in a quick, faint display of his own. The canines weren’t long, but they glinted undeniably sharp, and Katsuki wondered how he’d been so dazzled by Izuku’s smile and the dimple in his right cheek to miss that definitive edge.

What the -

“Bakugou,” Izuku said, voice unsteady as he carefully slid down the glass and seated himself properly, his lips all swollen and sinful. To devour him now would be - “Um, K-Katsuki. Hey. We need to, um, not right -”

“Fuck.” Katsuki ripped himself away and plastered himself against his seat, hands fisted on his knees as he clenched his teeth and counted back from fifty, pointedly ignoring the way Izuku squirmed in his seat and like he could take a knot right here and now. Katsuki released a slow breath. “Fuck. Okay. Okay, I’m good.”

Izuku nodded frantically in his periphery, his feet tapping on the floor beside Katsuki’s.

“Yup. Same. Me too, I’m great.”

Both exhausted and revved up beyond belief, Katsuki released a rare laugh of relief and dragged his hands over his unmasked face, rubbing the heels of his palms over his eyes.

“Man. It’s not even eight in the morning.” When Izuku didn’t reply, Katsuki dropped his hands and found Izuku looking at him in a way he couldn’t place, not even a little. He just looked like home, warm and inviting and soft-eyed. “What?”

“I just -” Izuku scoffed at himself and looked away, his face flushed. “You have a nice smile. The not-murdery one.”

Katsuki grunted and felt his own face go hot as he rolled his eyes. 

“Yeah alright already, don’t get fuckin’ gross.”

Izuku sputtered an incredulous laugh and smacked Katsuki’s arm with the back of his hand, making a show of turning away to curl up toward the window and stare out at the scenery scream by.

“Me, gross? You gross. Real gross.”

“Say gross again, dumbass.”

“Gross.”

“What’re you, five?”

“You would know.”

“You probably weren’t even this annoying as a five year old.”

“No, I’m sure you were enough for the both of us.”

“You little shitbag.”

The remaining hour of the two was spent in easy camaraderie, something Katsuki had only reserved for few people in his life, but now he couldn’t imagine Izuku not being a part of that. He made a mental note to get the rest of his pack to hang out with Izuku again, under less strenuous and bizarre circumstances as New Year’s Eve at the karaoke place.

Izuku was funny. And he was smart with his funny. He kept Katsuki on his toes and, as Izuku had pointedly out, albeit jokingly, he did actually have a higher level of education from Katsuki. Most heroes never did the college thing, unless it was for some kind of expertise or backup plan. And while Izuku was never obnoxious with his knowledge, there was something bizarrely sexy about going brain to brain with someone and wondering if you’d actually come out the winner. 

In these four brief months together - a full three weeks of that spent not speaking at all - Katsuki had come to realize that Izuku wasn’t just a scent or a face or a body. Nor was he entirely his aggression or his police file or his scars. 

When they emerged at Echigo-Yuzawa Station, the sun had finally crept a golden crown above the vast, snowy peaks in the near distance. White fangs jut forth into a crisp blue sky, and the air no longer stank of smog and city stench, but clean and frosty and bright. 

“I’m ready!” Izuku was actually bouncing on his heels, eyes gleaming with excitement. “You talk about speed, but smaller people have the advantage in that, you know. Don’t underestimate me.”

“I’ve learned that,” Katsuki said blandly, fighting a smile despite his black flu mask back in its place. “The second part. Not that you have an advantage over me. You’re fulla shit.”

Izuku slammed into his side none-too-gently and laughed, muffled behind his scarf.

“Alright, we’ll see. Where to?”

“We’re not actually staying here,” Katsuki said with a shrug. “We’re headed to Mt Naeba.”

Izuku actually gasped. When the hell had he gotten so cute? Was this the result of them spending more time together as an Alpha and Omega, Izuku becoming more at ease with him, or was Izuku so excited he’d ceased to give any fucks and just wanted to get to the sporting now.

“Mt Naeba? Really? I’ve always wanted to go - it looks so cool!”

Katsuki snorted a laugh as he escorted Izuku from the station and followed the signs down the icy street. The temperature drop was considerable between here and Tokyo.

“Yeah well, it’s a fifty minute bus ride away, and then you can snowboard until you can’t feel your feet or your face. Whichever happens first.”

“This is awesome.”

Surprised at the pure excitement radiating from Izuku’s voice, Katsuki chanced a glance to the side and found himself lost in the way Izuku looked at everyone and everything with an open, joyful expression. Maybe it wasn’t simply Valentine’s Day or dating or whatever it was that they were doing right now that affected him so strongly. Maybe it was just doing something fun, something kids would do on an overnight stay with their high school, or as a young couple.

Children could be cruel, and more specifically, could be cruel to Omegas. Even more specifically, Omega males. Despite the age they lived in, the stigma still thrived, and the average consensus of the Japanese population wondered why Omega males kept existing at all. There was simply no purpose to them on an evolutionary or biological level.

Bigots, idiots, and assholes.

But they existed all the same. And they’d probably existed in Izuku’s school too. He couldn’t have had many friends, even with his pleasant disposition. And from what Katsuki could glean, that sunny side hadn’t been particularly visible during those pubescent years, anyway.

So, Izuku may have come skiing with school at some point. Almost definitely. But with friends? With someone he cared about, who cared about him in return? Katsuki boiled at the realization that this was less than likely.

“Your day is gonna be awesome from start to finish,” Katsuki snapped, long after they’d settled onto the bus and Izuku’s face was nearly smashed against the window, in awe of the winterscape beyond.

Izuku gave him a quizzical smile.

“It already is.”

Feeling all kinds of warm and weird from the inside out upon their arrival, Katsuki led Izuku by the hand through the entrance of the hulking Prince Naeba Hotel, the vast, stately resort firmly situated at the bottom of Mt Naeba itself. 

“It’s so big,” Izuku said as he kept glancing over his shoulder, back at the looming mountain cutting across the landscape in white and grey and black. 

“That’s usually why it’s called a mountain,” Katsuki drawled, and dragged him through the maze of the resort, aiming for the equipment rental area. But Izuku outright gasped and stopped - the guy was fucking strong, because Katsuki nearly tripped backwards in his attempt to pull Izuku along. “What, what now?”

“Waku-Waku Family Snow Land! That sounds so fun.”

“Oiy, shortstack.” Katsuki pointedly placed his hand atop Izuku’s head and physically turned him away from the giant sign advertising to fucking babies. “Don’t get distracted. We need to get geared up and then you can have your pick of any place on the goddamn mountain. No baby shit.”

The hour was early enough that the rental shop wasn’t overrun, and Katsuki was thankful when the cashier only widened his eyes in recognition and kept his mouth shut when Katsuki took off the flu mask while they changed in and out of ski suits that fit them properly. Katsuki was used to difficulties with clothing. His waist was small and his shoulders were broad, so while he struggled with different suit sizes, he was surprised to find Izuku with his own difficulties.

“These don’t pull up,” Izuku said with flushed cheeks as he attempted to yank the leg holes of the ski suit up and over his thighs. He sagged with a sigh of exhaustion and aimed a sheepish smile at their attendant. “Sorry, but do you have something made for Alphas?”

The clothes were divided like clothes anywhere else were sorted. Alphas and Omegas tended to gravitate toward vastly different colors - either that, or society and the fashion world encouraged them to do so. All of Izuku’s choices, regardless of male or female, were soft pastels, white, or creamy summer colors. Izuku had grimaced and picked the white. 

But Alpha and Omega clothes were also designed by their traditional body type. While not everyone fell into those designs - there were plenty of generic non-gendered clothes in the world, too - Alpha clothes tended to give more room for broadened builds and muscle, while Omega clothes were cut skimpier and slimmer. That was just the way things were.

Izuku’s suggestion had the employee stopping cold, as if this was some big fucking deal.

“They’re just fuckin’ clothes,” Katsuki snapped, a hot lava stare scalding in the direction of the their helper. “You got a problem, ‘cause I’d be happy to make your problem mine. Real fast.”

Not long after, they walked out into the snow, Izuku beaming and comfortable in a suit of vibrant red and slashes of black. Katsuki, in black from head to toe and content with his anonymity, if not the fucking flu mask, kept one arm around his snowboard and the other over Izuku’s shoulders.

“Where to, freckles?”

“Well.” Izuku unfolded the brightly illustrated map of the mountain, a confetti of markers, information, ski lines, and everything in between littering the spread. “The black lines in the middle are the most advanced trails.”

“Even I ain’t stupid enough to start right there. When was the last time you went skiing or snowboarding?” 

Izuku frowned at the map, his eyebrows scrunching at the edge of his purple hat. 

“Our third year class trip.”

Bingo. Katsuki had been right on the money with that guess.

“Yeah well, me too. And then maybe twice afterward. Let’s not break our necks this early in the game.” 

“Fine,” Izuku muttered, clearly displeased.

Katsuki snorted.

“You really are all or nothin’, ain’t ya, nerd?”

He didn’t miss the way Izuku’s lips twitched.

“Maybe. Come on, let’s take this Prince Gondola number one to the mountaintop station. Says it’s one-thousand six-hundred and fifty eight feet above sea level. So cool.”

“Then let get our asses in gear,” Katsuki said.

They headed toward the base station, where multiple enclosed gondolas ferried passengers to different heights and areas up the mountain. Once they were seated with an older couple across from them and the car jerked into motion on a steady incline, Izuku gasped and laughed at himself, smiling first at Katsuki, then the passengers, then intently out the window. 

Katsuki was glad for his own mask as he smirked and watched the changing exuberance shift across Izuku’s features as they rose above the frozen land and sea.

“This looks like the baby stuff for everyone,” Izuku said as he clipped his feet into the board. The wind was bracing, but the sun was bright and offered some warmth to their chapped cheeks. Both he and Izuku donned their slightly shaded goggles, and Katsuki couldn’t help but laugh at the sight Izuku made.

“You look twelve. Everyone’s gonna think you’re my little brother.”

Izuku gawked in good humor, the only parts of him visible being his freckled nose, cheeks, his mouth encased in scarf. A few tufts of brilliant green glinted in the morning light from beneath his hat. With a gloved hand, Izuku flicked him off with a single finger salute. 

“You’ll get grounded for that, y’know,” Katsuki said, smiling beneath the mask.

“Just enjoy the scenic Skyline Trail, Alpha.” Izuku was still laughing as he attempted to train his face into sobriety. Katsuki loved him like this. Far from the city, from worry and pain and judgement. 

As they easily traversed the barely-there slope banding across the uppermost part of the mountain, then curving around and down toward a curry restaurant and toilets, Katsuki wondered at the way his view of Tokyo had subtly yet undoubtedly shifted since knowing Izuku.

Yes, he’d battled a shit ton of baddies in the best and worst areas of the city. He’d worked his fair share of third shifts as a newbie, humbled by the brutal night hours straight out of UA, regardless of how well-known he’s been. He’d experience personal pain and loss, had watched friends fall apart and never return to the profession. Had seen others rise up, too. 

And, admittedly, as an Alpha at the top of his game, he’d come to realized in these four months just how much he’d dominated his profession. Not exclusively out of skill, but out of his gender presentation and the sheer balls it gave him to do and say whatever he felt like. With the Omega murders still unsolved - and Izuku having run right into the mess - conjoined with a past Izuku was slowly but surely sharing with him over what it was like to be a male Omega in this world -

Even Katsuki was man enough to admit there were ways in which their society fucked over one kind of person while lauding the other. 

Up until now, it just hadn’t mattered to him.

“Okay!” Izuku gestured toward the left veer of a path, his breath puffing out in soft white huffs of breath. “This is called the Large Trail and then it slopes right into the Challenge Trail.”

“We’ll see how much of a challenge it is,” Katsuki said, adjusting his goggles with a smirk. Izuku couldn’t see any part of his face, but somehow his eyes still glinted a sharp, jeweled green of recognition. 

“I guess we will.”

Finally, a wide open streak of snow, hurtling towards him as Katsuki leaned into and learned the motion of his board, his core muscles clenching, his thighs pleasantly aching with new muscles groups rarely used, even in fighting villains. He battled only the mountain now, and the blood rush of ferocious cold snapping like jaws at his face, the wind a howling freedom past his ears. 

When Izuku swept past him, knees bent and body lower to the ground, Katsuki could only bare his teeth in a ravenous smile. Everything about them had been a power struggle from day one. Physical prowess, mental agility, heightened intellect, sexual allure - back and forth and back and forth, each of them rising to an unspoken challenge again and again, until Katsuki could no longer keep count.

The thrill of screaming down that hill, an Alpha chasing his clever, elusive mate - Katsuki’s veins pumped with the predatory hunt. 

They swerved before each other more than once, in and out of periphery, only to cut the other off in a show that was way too dangerous for some silly ski resort. The fact that Izuku didn’t care about hard rules or impending danger absolutely fucking wrecked him. Katsuki may have won this race as they jerked their boards to a sideways stop, snow flinging and flying before them, but he was almost certain that Izuku was winning their war. 

That little shit. 

“Holy shit!” Izuku had dragged his goggled atop his head, his hat falling to the wayside in a wild halo of curls, his face pink and his eyes snapping with excitement as he awkwardly launched himself at Katsuki, board still attached to both feet. 

Katsuki fell back with a curse, his ass taking a painful hit from stamped-down, unforvigingly hard snow, his feet contained by the board as Izuku rolled off him with a laugh and sat up. 

“Sorry, I got - but wow. Wow. Can you believe this place? It’s amazing. And the way you shot in front of me and had the board spitting snow in my face as a distraction -”

“Most people wouldn’t praise that, dumbass,” Katsuki muttered as he struggled to his feet and offered a hand.

Izuku took it with a smile and hefted himself. The sun played unreal games with the greens in his eyelashes as he looked up to meet Katsuki’s gaze.

“Dragondola?” Izuku said.

Katsuki blinked and waited for more, his brain unable to process.

“A what?”

“Dragondola! Look.” Izuku pointed past Katsuki’s shoulder, where - 

Sure enough, the brightly colored sign and arrow advertised Japan’s longest scenic gondola, with a trip of twenty minutes.

“We can look at pretty mountains or some shit later,” Katsuki said, leaning in to rummage a hand in Izuku’s pocket, emerging with the map. “I want more of this.”

“Was that a map you were looking for or were you just happy to see me?”

Katsuki flicked an unamused look up from the unfolded map. 

“I don’t think that’s how the joke goes.”

“Well, I needed to change it to suit the situation.”

“Well, it flopped. Look at this fuckin’ thing with me, will ya?”

Izuku murmured a noise of wonder as he poked at the other side of the hill they hadn’t traversed.

“Look there. That Downhill Trail leads to something called Waku-Waku Trail. And look how zig-zaggy it is!”

“Better not be babies on that fuckin’ trail,” Katsuki muttered, squinting at the map with his most threatening demeanor. 

“Don’t be ridiculous. It’s not Waku-Waku Family Snow Land -”

“You wish it was.”

“It’s a trail. Look, it’s red, it’s intermediate like the one we just did. Just cooler. After that we could take, what is it there -” Izuku leaned into Katsuki’s space and his hair smelled like new winter and pine. “There, there in the expert level powder fields are two intermediate trails, too. If we can master those, I’m sure we could move to the black trails. We just take high speed lift number eight to -”

Katsuki had long tuned out Izuku’s pleasant, sing-song voice in favor of dipping his head to inhale deep of those curls. He hoped Izuku lost the hat permanently. While the color of his hair was undoubtedly special, it was the smell and soft, supple texture of his curls were Katsuki’s distraction. He wanted to bunch them in his hands again, keep those busy lips locked on his own, bury his face in the pulse of Izuku’s temple and breath in. 

“-go? Bakugou!”

“What? What the fuck you want?” Katsuki ruffled Izuku’s hair and shoved him away on instinct.

Izuku scrunched his face in distaste and waved the map at him. 

“We’re taking this little trail to base station so we can head back up the mountain and do the other side, okay?”

“Yeah, yeah.” Katsuki waved him away, shaking off his mood as he followed Izuku down a slow, easy trail, now jumbled with mid-morning tourists all heavy and slow with breakfast and their averageness. 

The gondola base station was a lot busier this time around, too, and Katsuki found himself on the six person gondola, wedged between an obliviously content Izuku and a teenage Beta kid who’d doused himself in way too much pseudo-Alpha scent. Dumbass.

“After this,” Izuku said, boarding to Katsuki’s side at the scenic mountain top and kicking up snow with a sharp stop, “We should get food.”

“You didn’t eat anything this m-” At Izuku’s expression, Katsuki cut himself off with a growl. “Of course you didn’t. How’re you not skin and bones, Omega?”

“Good -”

“Genetics, I got it, fuck you.”

“Feed me first,” Izuku said easily, shocking Katsuki into a frozen state of shock as he watched that goddamn irresistible shithead board away with a laugh. 

Time passed in bizarre fits and starts, only notable when one of them caught the clock admit the sun and snow and powder fields that prove to kick their ass for, apparently, hours . Izuku was just about the first non-hero Katsuki had ever met who refused to back down from a challenge until he’d definitively mastered it. 

Breathing hard, and sitting in a worn bank of snow between two trees, they dropped and took a rest.

“Really is pretty,” Izuku said, his curls plastered to his damp temples. He had indeed lost the stupid purple hat in their morning tackle, but the effort he’d put in to not falling ass-over-head down the Natural Trail showed in his overexerted face and the plumes of breath fogging before his features. 

“You were hungry like two hours ago,” Katsuki said.

“And I’m really hungry two hours later. What about that curry place at the top of the mountain?”

“The mountain is fuckin’ crawling with normies now -”

“Hey, I’m a normie -”

“There’s nothing normal about you. As I was fucking saying, there ain’t a good place I could take this mask off without people noticing me and then you. Not that it’s a huge deal, but I care about -”You. I care about you. “Getting to eat in peace.”

“Nowhere fancy, though.”

Katsuki rolled his eyes and flopped back into the snow.

“You’re real fuckin’ demanding, y’know that?”

“Demanding of what?” Izuku said with a disbelieving laugh. He leaned back against his elbows and aimed a loose, easy smile Katsuki’s way. “Cheap fare? I’m an easy date, Mr Zero. Mostly because no one has ever wanted to date me.”

Katsuki pillowed his arms behind his head and scowled.

“Bullshit.”

Izuku’s mouth twisted up, brows shifting back to serious as he seemed to consider something.

“I don’t have a good track record with - with partners. The first one was my fault -”

“Double bullshit.”

“I promise you it was. My fault.” Izuku chewed on his bottom lip, considering Katsuki for a quiet moment. “He - I saw him and I think already knew he’d hurt me like I wanted to be hurt. I didn’t know I was thinking that way at the time, but he told me so once before. I was so pissed off that he was right. He was good at being right about everything while doing all the wrong things.”

“Sounds like a winner.”

Izuku’s smile was humorless.

“He was a fiery one.” He sighed, gaze sliding away, sad. “After that, I thought was going on some straight and narrow path or something. Mr Yagi had taken me on at Parchment, I was successful in college and out of that drug and drinking phase. And I - I don’t know. I slept with a lot of people. Trying to feel out who I was, what I wanted. But what I wanted was always someone who would - who would treat me like I thought I deserved to be treated. Self-important Alphas who lied to me and used me as a fucktoy, and I convinced myself that this was the kind of freedom I wanted.”

“You were basically a kid,” Katsuki said, hoarse despite himself. Feeling so much for a person he’d barely known in the span of his lifetime was sobering. “I’d already killed an innocent by the time I was nineteen. Didn’t mean to - it was the in the fray and that shit. Couldn’t light a fuckin candle with my flame if you’d paid me. Not for months. They put me on goddamn desk duty like some retiree. Woulda blown a hole through the wall and escaped if my goddamn brain woulda let me use my Quirk.”

Izuku’s stare was steady, non-judgmental and silent. Katsuki twisted his face up until it hurt with the ugly. 

“I’m no good with this shit. I guess I’m sayin’ that my whole life I knew I was meant to be a hero, but even when you’ve found your place in the world you still fuck up. Usually again and again. So what if your life has been one slightly less fuck up after another. You’re here, ain’t you? Look at the scenery or whatever. Make your happy noises at it.”

“My happy noises?” Izuku said, smiling as he rolled to his side in the snow, his feet free from the board so he could throw his leg over one on Katsuki’s. 

“Nevermind,” Katsuki said, placing a hand on Izuku’s goading face and pushing away. “All of your noises suck.”

“Now, I do have sucking noises.” Izuku’s thoughtful tone edged on playful and walked the line of giving Katsuki an instant hardon in the middle of the mountainscape. 

“Izuku,” Katsuki rumbled, a warning his body could barely contain. 

Izuku’s thigh tucked firmly between Katsuki’s legs, pressing up against his crotch through layers and layers of clothes as he dipped in, amused expression hovering just above his own. 

“I keep forgetting your a virgin until you make faces like you might explode if I say the word go.”

Katsuki grit his teeth.

“Fuck you.”

Izuku rubbed his lips together, licked at the bottom one as his eyes went all bedroom heavy and dark.

“Yeah,” he croaked. “Soon. But I think I need to be on top.”

“On top?” Katsuki parroted, utterly fucking brainless, his presence of mind as blank as the sheets of snows surrounding them. 

“I mean.” Izuku’s nose brushed Katsuki’s jaw, nudged at the hat pulled over his ears. “You can fuck me, but I think I need to, you know, ride you. So we don’t have a repeat incident.” 

“Incident,” Katsuki said, his voice barely a wisp. 

“Hello?” Izuku murmured with a melodic laugh intertwined. His mouth trailed Katsuki’s blisteringly hot cheek, teeth nipping at the mask to tug it down. “Did the blood already leave your brain, Kacchan?”

“Oh fuck, oh -”

The shriek of incoming laughter shot them up from their secretive spot in the trees as a large group of skiers trudged through along a path too near to them.

“I’m gonna kill you way before I fuck you,” Katsuki hissed as he adjusted the heavy crotch of his snow suit, ignoring Izuku’s snickering. There was way more to Midoriya Izuku than meets the eye. Including a devious and rampant sex drive that has been apparently waiting for years to be freed on someone who knew next to nothing on what to do with it. 

Well. Katsuki was a very fast learner.

“Don’t be such a sourpuss about it,” Izuku said, smacking him on the ass as Katsuki leaned forward to clip his boots into the board. 

“Fuck off. You’re gonna be screamin’ my name before you know it, shortstack. Just wait.”

“Now that’s a promise I haven’t had the pleasure of being on the other side of.”

“How many people know you got that smartass mouth on you?” Katsuki grumbled as they kicked off into a slow, easy glide down the simple slope. 

Izuku hummed in thought, outright counting on his fingers.

“I don’t know, ten? Less, actually. This is your fault for wanting to get to know me. I don’t think I’ve made a new friend since I was twenty. Todoroki was the last one and that was at least five years ago.”

“Can’t see you two as friends,” Katsuki said, loosening his knees to embrace the idle weave of his board, side to side, his hips falling into the motion. 

“Me too,” Izuku said with a chuckle, matching Katsuki’s movements in time. He swerved to purposely catch a hump of snow, taking on an inch or two of air and dropping neatly. “At first, anyway. I was terrified of him and he wasn’t at all thrilled with me.”

“What, why?”

“Oh, I - uh. Hmmm.”

“Spit something the fuck out for once, dumbass. You think I can’t handle you?”

“He kind of found out I’d dated his brother for years and that was, um, weird, to say the least. Him and Hitoshi had already been dating for like a half year and I’d effectively managed to avoiding him ‘til then, but -”

“Wait, Natsuo?” Katsuki asked with an entirely incredulous look. He didn’t know the guy well - some wholesome jock type who looked like he had a brick for brains, but was nice enough. He didn’t see Izuku gravitating toward him in a secxual way.

“What, no, I mean D-” Izuku exhaled so sharply that Katsuki saw a shot of white dragon’s breath thrust from his mouth. “I just thought you knew the guy. He’s really not important. Long history.”

“Oiy oiy, you can’t just stop the story half way through!”

“That really wasn’t the story, anyway. The story was how Todoroki became the last good friend I ever made.” Izuku’s expression and voice had shut down, and Kastsuki already knew from past experiences that this was as far as he’d be allowed for the time being. The future would give him more opportunities, anyway.

Since when did Todoroki have an extra brother?

“I think we just bonded through a lot of shared experiences,” Izuku said with such shortness and simplicity that Katsuki knew there was more.

“Food?” Katsuki said.

Izuku aimed a grateful look his way.

“Food.”

They ended up devouring more than one kebab each, and Katsuki realized it was the first time he’d ever seen Izuku eat with such fervor. Knowing he couldn’t taste a thing increasingly irked him, though. The last time he’d offered to have Izuku’s nose fixed, the Omega had looked at him as if Katsuki had proposed to him.

Terrified.

“Y’know,” Katsuki said, as he trudged through the stamped snow toward the Dragondola for the twenty minute scenic trip, “You wouldn’t owe me nothin’ if I got your nose fixed.”

Izuku’s posture notably stiffened as they walked, the decibel of his words dropping as if it were some secret or shame.

“That’s the worst part about it. I’d never be able to pay you back. We barely know -”

Katsuki was fisting his hand in the collar of Izuku’s suit and dragging him in with a fury that coursed through him, quick as the fuse of a bomb.

“Don’t you ever tell me we don’t know each other no more. That won't fly anymore. You’re climbing through so much of your own bullshit it’s a wonder you don’t choke and die on it. Fuck you.”

With that, he shoved Izuku back, didn’t care to watch him stumble for balance as he dropped his board and had to run to chase it as it slid away. Katsuki kept walking, head down, breathing through the boiling blood and steam clouding his thoughts.

He stopped at the base station and stood in the short line, specifically loosening his brutal, cracking hold on his board as he stared straight ahead. Even when he recognized Izuku’s gait scamper up behind him and the soft, panting breath of his Omega, he did not turn. He didn’t want to look at him, not yet. Katsuki knew his limits, and while they were notably increased from his teen years, his fuse was still short.

They didn’t speak for the entire ride. In part because of the four other people crammed into the gondola with them, in part because Katsuki didn’t have anything more to say than what he said. Izuku stretched and stressed Katsuki’s ability with words, with self-expression, more than anyone else had. There were only so many ways to say the same thing over and over with no give from the other person, before hot, frustrated anger erupted. 

“Hey,” Izuku murmured quietly as they emerged from the gondola and stood at the edge of Mt Kagura in its own violently sharp, grey and white glory. A tug a Katsuki’s sleeve had him turning and eyeing Izuku with a critical air. Izuku’s gaze was plaintive. “I’m sorry.”

“Sorry don’t mean shit to me, Izuku. Come on, let’s find a map.”

“Wait.” Again, the tug, and again, Katsuki turned, his mouth curled in a sneer beneath his black mask. Izuku chewed on his bottom lip, looked away, looked back. “It’s not that you don’t know me, okay? It’s just… easier to say that. But I don’t want to owe you, especially with the way, uh, with the direction we’re going. What if I smell you and I’m not - and I don’t feel the same way as you?”

Katsuki balked.

“What -”

“I told you I don’t believe in True Mates,” Izuku said quickly, his words tripping over themselves in his rush to speak. “I told you I don’t and it’s true and I know you think - I’m pretty sure you do think, but I can’t, I can’t risk for a second even dreaming something like a fairy tale could happen to me, because nothing about me is a fairy tale, except maybe the monster in the middle of the story that fucks everything up for everyone.”

Izuku sucked in a giant breath, eyes huge and wet and jumped into his jumble of words before Katsuki could recover from the shock.

“And you - I don’t know what you are to me, but it’s - you’re - you, you are important to me. More important than I thought a person would be to me, in the way that a p-partner is, or whatever you want to call it. If you fix my nose and everything is different and I’m different, then this is different and -”

“Holy shit , freckles.” Katsuki looked around, wishing for more privacy and, for lack of anything better, yanked at Izuku’s wrist to lead him around the forested back of the large building of bathrooms. Izuku opened his mouth and Katsuki pulled down the mask, settled his hands firmly upon his shoulders, and leaned in with a fierce sobriety.

“Izuku . Stop. There’s - fuck, I don’t know where to start with you -”

“You can walk away now,” Izuku said, his expression close to crumpling, his jaw trembling with the clear effort not to cry. “I wouldn’t hold it against you, not ever.”

“Stop!” Katsuki pulled him in, an arm taut around Izuku’s waist, and captured his mouth in a firm, solid kiss. He pulled back just enough to speak, his brow leaning against Izuku’s. “Stop. You think so damn much it’s dizzying. I don’t know how the fuck you even walk in a straight line. Listen -”

“I -”

“Listen to me for once in your goddamn life. It ain’t your ears that’re broken, it’s your nose. You don’t have to be sure of us.” Katsuki paused, watching Izuku’s eyes widen, his eyebrows shifting in confusion before Katsuki continued. “You don’t have to be sure of this, because I am. I’m not - I’m not romantic and I don’t believe in love at first sight, even when I’d said it to you that first day I didn’t believe it, that was the - the hormones talking or whatever. I was half out of my mind with you then. Apparently I think with my dick a lot more than I ever thought I could.”

Izuku’s watery laugh fed him hope to work off. 

“But shit is different now. You, me, whatever this is. I’m not gonna nag you about your nose no more, but know that it pisses me off that I could fix it and your damn fears won’t let me. I’m - well, fuck, I’m your Alpha, ain’t I?”

Izuku’s eyes couldn’t get any bigger, his lips working around something Katsuki couldn’t begin to guess. 

“I - yes,” Izuku rasped. “Yes, you’re my Alpha.”

Katsuki captured Izuku’s mouth with a snarl, hand diving into those curls to grip tight, to keep him close and warm and perfectly imperfect. Izuku moaned against Katsuki’s tongue, his own curling around it, clashing and sucking in a kiss that surged from desperate to savage, all teeth and saliva and travelling hands.

When Izuku bared his neck and whimpered high, his grip tight on Katsuki’s hips as he flexed his hips forward, Katsuki didn’t think twice. Surrounded by snow and ice, merciless mountaintops of jagged stone and the threat of danger, Katsuki ripped aside Izuku’s scarf and collar, his teeth sinking sharp and unyielding into fevered, fragrant flesh.

The skin broke with a succulent pop that filled Katsuki’s mouth with blood, coated his tongue in slick, heavy copper and the heady, earthen perfume of Izuku’s gland. Scent pumped past Katsuki’s lips, tempting to bite harder, deeper, to brand a mating mark into Izuku that wouldn’t scab over and heal in a matter of weeks.

But even the beast in him pulled back, Katsuki’s brain knowing that was too soon for the vibrating, moaning omega in his clutches. Katsuki eased up from the shallow bite, the flat of his tongue lapping at the wound, sucking it into a bruise and kissing at the swelling while Izuku writhed, on leg wrapping around Katsuki’s, their cocks an unmistakable hardness through the layers of winterwear. 

“Kat-” Izuku hissed as Katsuki licked one last time and proceeded to rub his cheek over the sore spot. “Kacchan!”

Katsuki growled directly in Izuku’s ear, delivered a sharp nip before retreating enough to share a sloppy kiss with his not yet lover, but undoubtedly his mate.

“Mine,” Katsuki murmured into Izuku’s avid mouth. “My Omega.”

“Yes,” Izuku gasped against the onslaught of Katsuki’s lips. “Yes . Alpha. Mine. I’m sorry I’m so -”

“Mine.” Katsuki’s hands found Izuku’s burning hot face, held his jaw tight, waited until this foggy forest eyes focused on him. “You’re mine.”

Izuku’s eyes eclipsed, his scent tearing through the screen of blockers, a series of sharp, violent lightning strikes crackling ozone in the air between them, and forest fire of their mingled fragrance. 

“Yes,” Izuku said again, and this time, Katsuki saw that he got it.

“Fuck.” Katsuki grit his teeth and dug his forehead against Izuku’s with too much force, his hands dropping to coax Izuku’s leg away, their hips apart. “Remind me why we’re stuck on a shitty mountain with hundreds or thousands of people and not naked somewhere private?”

“Mmm.” Izuku nuzzled his nose against Katsuki’s and place a soft kiss to his lips, then another. “Because you’re a wonderful boyfriend who swept me away for the best date I’ve ever had.”

“Yeah, alright, you fuckin’ sap.”

Katsuki dropped his hand atop Izuku’s head and pushed him an arms length away, more for his own benefit than Izuku’s. While the blockers were still in effect, Izuku’s true scent and blood and taste lingered at the back corners of Katsuki’s mouth, driving him to salivate and practically slobber over himself with the mounting desire to claim his little Omega, here and now.

Izuku just laughed and shook his head, wincing slightly as he brought a hand to press against his scarf, hiding the spot where Katsuki’s teeth were printed.

“Let’s just find a map and get boarding. I’ve got feelings to burn off.”

“First reasonable thing you’ve said all day.”

The sun had long hit and passed its zenith by the time they’d exhausted themselves with Mt Kagura, discarded their boards at a different rental station, and took the Drangondola back to Mt Naeba. Katsuki hadn’t been above paying off the gondola attendant in order to get a six-person car to themselves, and even Izuku didn’t complain, as he was the first to straddled Katsuki’s lap within the car and devour his mouth in fervid, feisty licks and bites. 

“I hate this,” Katsuki had snarled into Izuku’s bared throat, having frantically unzipped the collar to expose the swelled, angry skin there. “I hate winter clothes forever. I’ll burn these to the fuckin’ ground.”

Izuku had laughed breathlessly, face canted toward the sky as he rolled his hips against Katsuki’s through way too many layers, gasping when Katsuki sealed his mouth around the mark again.

“Hope- ohgod - hopefully not while I’m still wearing them.”

“Don’t complain about how I get you naked,” Katsuki had said, one hand busy unzipping the suit further to sneak his hand into it and down, cupping Izuku’s erection with a squeeze. He was hot and hard ands so fucking receptive in the way he arched into Katsuki’s grasp that it was a wonder they’d managed to keep their clothes on at all in the gondola.

Izuku was marked, but he wasn’t yet claimed, and Katsuki’s Alpha soul rattled and screamed at his ribs with tooth and claw for release.

“The sun is already setting,” Izuku said, breathless as he shuffled hands through his curls in some strange display of rearranging them. Katsuki had to wonder if it was even safe to brush hair like that. 

“Yeah, well it’s five or something.”

“Seriously? The time has flown.” Izuku reached out and held Katsuki’s hand, the way children might with their big awkward gloves, just two hands cupping each other’s, rather than fingers intertwined. “Look at that down the hill! Kappa Snowmobile Land.”

Katsuki snorted and slid over a sidelong glance.

“You secretly like cute shit, don’t you?”

Izuku made a face.

“Everyone likes cute things. That’s normal.”

“Guess so. I like you, at least.”

“I’m not cute.”

They shared a combative stare and Izuku tsked and looked away, continuing their mild descent toward the Day Trip Ski Center, hand in hand.

“They’ve got an outdoor onsen here,” Katsuki said as they stepped inside and unzipped their suits half-way. While Katsuki was used to relative constrictive hero costumes, his had already left plenty of room to breathe. These things paired with the shriek of Alpha domination running through his blood as fast as a bullet train was… less than fucking idea. 

“I’d kill for that right now.” Izuku heaved a sigh as he unraveled his scarf and shoved a hunk of it in the pocket of his suit, the remainder messily draped out. “My everything hurts.”

Katsuki zeroed in on the bite hidden by Izuku’s collar, felt his stomach tighten, his cock thicken to a distracting, heavy weight between his thighs.

“I’ll bet. You ain’t built for this level of exertion every day.”

“Jerk.” Izuku side-checked him with a hip, and damn if it didn’t hold power. “Don’t underestimate me.”

“If anyone underestimates you its you.”

Izuku didn’t say anything in reply, but instead followed Katsuki as they found their way to the onsen. For everyone’s best interests - and, truly, that included everybody in the vicinity - he and Izuku changed without looking at each other, faced pointedly away even in the shower area as they bathed away the day’s excitement. 

Turned out, looking at Izuku, hair damp and slicked back, slim hips in a towel, thick midriff and thighs available for his touch, was an awful, horrible thing and Katsuki wanted to die. Izuku didn’t look any more pleased, his face red, despite not having placed a foot in the hot spring.

The onsen wasn’t busy, and the group of four middle-aged folks kept to their side of the tub, with he and Izuku slipped in at the far opposite. Izuku kept a cold towel folded atop his head as he stepped in, but Katsuki lived in life in heat and fire, so he had none and drowned himself down to the neck. 

Izuku reclined in the clouded water, arms hiked over the edge, the water teasing at his nipples, his lips relaxed to a subtle curve as he looked out at the snow-blanketed pines. A sleepy fall of flurries had begun to glitter and drift down from the darkened sky, bringing a fresh, bright bite to the air as Katsuki inhaled.

Silent, Katsuki used Izuku’s distracted relaxation to simply watch and savor. The swell of Izuku’s chest was considerable for his stature, proud and well-formed with the exercise Izuku claimed to only do at home. While his shoulders weren’t wide, they were sturdy, the sinew and muscle riding across them and down his arms contoured and supple.

The fresh, angry claim mark - not deep enough to scar, not strong enough to be permanent, and only enough to alter Izuku’s scent just enough to pronounce him taken - was a beacon for Katsuki’s attention. He wanted to taste it again, revel in the way the gland beneath would begin to pump out that fragrant, slick liquor to coat his tongue, rub across his throat and face. 

The blockers had to be gone now, because Izuku smelled like the outdoors and Katsuki’s low-burning cinder scent. Forest fire. Together they were a forest fire. 

“If you keep staring like that, those people are going to call security,” Izuku murmured, slipping further into the water with a mischievous little smile that scrunched his petite nose.

“You have no idea what I wanna do to you,” Katsuki said, low and menacing, only for Izuku’s now pink ears.

“I -” Izuku cleared his throat, looking away toward the trees and lazy snowfall. “I have an idea.”

“Am I making you nervous yet?” Katsuki rumbled, scooting closer to Izuku, one hand finding Izuku’s thigh, gliding up the wet skin to rest as his hip. “You seem to think it’s real fuckin’ funny to do it to me.”

“I d-don’t make you nervous,” Izuku said, meeting Katsuki’s stare now, his tongue tip darting out to swipe his bottom lip. “Nothing makes you nervous.”

Katsuki didn’t comment, his eyes narrowing, burning intensity on Izuku’s mouth. 

“I’m tired of waiting.”

Izuku inhaled sharply, his hand finding Katsuki’s hand upon his hip, guiding it back to his tense thigh.

“Me too.”

Katsuki ground out a frustrated sound and leaned in further, gaze flicking between the group at the far end and Izuku’s fuck-me eyes, that scent also rising up like an incoming storm.

“We can’t here.”

“Then we need to get out of here,” Izuku said, desperation dropping the decibel his voice, the sound riding Katsuki’s skin in shivers despite the steaming water.

They didn’t stay in the water any longer than they had to. Katsuki barely caught a heavenly glimpse of Izuku’s high, tight ass before he’d wrapped it in a towel and politely rush-walked out of the onsen and toward the locker room. 

Izuku made a beeline for his locked, his back a tempting spread of freckles and heat-flushed skin.

“Let’s get dressed and -”

Izuku yelped as Katsuki dragged him roughly by the arm, around the corner where a line of private dressing areas waited, only a floor to ceiling, ugly blue plastic curtain separating the spot from the rest of the locker room. Katsuki barely caught Izuku’s choked out rebuttal of shock before he was snapping the curtain closed behind them and pressing Izuku’s into the cold tile wall.

“Kat-”

Katsuki dragged a thumb across Izuku’s lips, dipped it into Izuku’s gaping mouth, pressed down on Izuku’s tongue and leaned in close, his voice dark and deep.

“You’re gonna have to be real quiet.”

Izuku’s lashes fluttered, lowered, lingered on Katsuki’s mouth in turn. And then his shoulders sagged, the wall taking his weight in earnest, lips closing around Katsuki’s thumb to suck long and slow, the raspy flat of his tongue caressing the pad of Katsuki’s finger as he looked up with eyes like sin and shadowed, secret forests.

“Holy shit.” 

His body, near naked and posed to pounce, could only keep Izuku pinned to the wall and nothing more, so still in the onslaught of sensation Izuku’s tongue shocked through his system. Katsuki’s cock rose up, strong and angry and wanting, and Izuku shifted his hips back to accommodate the desire, one hand unknotting the the towel as he felt with a whisper to their feet. 

Then Izuku’s fingers closed firm and confident around Katsuki’s cock, and Izuku moaned, guttural and utterly gone, mouth widening to encompass Katsuki’s first two fingers instead -

And the world snapped back into focus like a punch to the face and instant broken skin, blood bursting forth with violent force. A silent snarl ravaged Katsuki’s throat, desperate for freedom as he took Izuku’s mouth in a hasty kiss, his hips rolling into Izuku’s hold, stuttering when Izuku loosened his hold enough to work Katsuki’s pulsing erection with eager strokes. 

Everything fit, they fit, Katsuki’s dick dripping against Izuku’s stomach, Izuku’s full cock rising from between the towel folds to rut against Katsuki’s hip. Their mouths tore at each other, one of Katsuki’s palms clamped around the side of Izuku’s throat, covering the bite, Katsuki’s thumb coaxing Izuku’s chin, forcing his mouth open for a deeper, more desperate surge of tongue. 

“Here, here,” Katsuki whispered with a voice so wracked with want he barely recognized himself as he shifting to hook just one of Izuku’s legs up, over the crook of Katsuki’s elbow. Katsuki dropped his brow to Izuku, hunching into him as Izuku yelped and rose to the tiptoes of his other foot to accommodate. 

Katsuki didn’t waste time. His body pumped with endorphins, with the steam of the bath and this body, with the plumes of hothouse green flooding from Izuku like molten heat off the black asphalt. With Izuku’s leg over his arm, he could reach back with those spit-slicked fingers and thrust two into the ungodly dripping mess of Izuku’s waiting hole. 

Izuku wailed like they were the only people on the goddamn planet, and the quiver and clench around Katsuki’s hole was already enough to forcibly stop and take a breather as Izuku continued to jack Katsuki’s messy cock, dribbling over Izuku’s hand in a small, steady stream that refused to end.

“Shhh.” Katsuki’s free hand came up to clamp over Izuku’s mouth, the breath from his nose huffing hot and heavy and fast against Katsuki’s skin. Izuku whimpered and gripped Katsuki’s sweaty shoulder for balance, but Katsuki didn’t remove his hand as he began to fuck three fingers into Izuku anew, the sopping, viscerally wet sounds filling the barely enclosed space. “Shhh.”

Izuku murmured something against Katsuki’s palm that sounded plaintive and whiny and Katsuki grinned into Izuku’s neck, hiking Izuku’s leg up anew as he slapped against Izuku’s succulent, slick-sloppy ass, three fingers deep, the heel of his palm brushing Izuku’s taut balls each time. Izuku’s hips thrust and shuddered seemingly unsure whether to press back into him or grind at Katsuki’s thigh, but his hand still knew what to do, tunneling quick and sharp around Katsuki’s dick until the mounting tension coiled hot and red in Katsuki’s core.

A low growl muffled into the bite of Izuku’s throat, Katsuki slowed his fingers to the frustrated, high keen against his palm, and worked them around, curling his fingertips until he met the spot that -

Izuku shot off with a half-broken cry, mouth gaping wide until he bit down on Katsuki’s hand with teeth too fucking sharp for an Omega, his twitching ass stuffed full with Katsuki’s unyieldingly gentle, nonstop massage against Izuku’s prostate. Katsuki pulled back just enough to watch tears spill down the red curve of Izuku’s cheeks, rivers down Katsuki’s hand, still smarting from those jaws bearing down.

The sight paired with his mate’s plaintive sounds and the great well of slick-scent flooding between them, Izuku’s fingers around Katsuki’s weeping cock overwhelmed every sense, every function of his body but to let go. It hurt. It fucking hurt how hard he came, the sound of his own quaking release buried in Izuku’s shoulder as he dropped his arm and let Izuku’s leg fall with some distant groan in his ear. His bitten hand throbbed, freed to fall at his side, the ethereal, floating weight of his body slumped against Izuku’s trembling figure.

Lax, heavy arms banded around Katsuki’s waist, and Izuku gurgled some kind of death noise as he knocked his head back against the wall, eyes closed, lips parted to catch his breath. Katsuki nuzzled at Izuku’s hairline, actively sniffing, nose travelling to linger at the bite, lower to Izuku’s armpit where -

Izuku laughed and smacked Katsuki upside the head.

“Get away from there! What’re you doing?”

“You smell so fuckin’ good,” Katsuki said, licking a long line from collarbone to chin, his nostrils flared to soak in every spot where they smelled the same, smelled like each other, a pair, almost mated but not. Katsuki had badly wanted to bury himself into his wet, willing Omega, but there was no way he’d be able to control the knot that came, or how to deal with it after. “Wanna fuck you again, but home. In my bed. No one’ll ever touch you again.”

Izuku hummed and stretched his arms above his head, arched spine loudly crackling as he looked up to the dingy ceiling.

“How about we just get clean first, handsome.”

“Mmm.” Katsuki shoved his face against Izuku’s bared armpit, ignoring Izuku’s bubbling laughter and playful shove. “Smells good here.”

“So orgasms turn you into an affectionate puppy? Good to know.”

“Who’s a puppy? Fuck off.” Katsuki snapped, reaching down to retrieve both of their towels, wrinkling his nose at them. “These are gross.”

“That’s what happens when you cum on things.”

“M- me? This is all yours!”

“Likely story.” 

If they chased each other into the open locker room and found absolutely no one inside, and it was possibly-probably because the whole area stank of sex, well, Katsuki decided they could fucking choke on it for all he cared. He was in heaven.

They showered again and dressed, dumped their ski suits in a laundry bin, and decided to take the fifty minute bus back to the station and find something to eat before their evening train. 

Izuku’s scent was all-encompassing now, all edge of blockers washed away from the day, but Katsuki noticed as they settled in the back corner of a dim ramen restaurant that less people gave his mate questioning, dirty or downright lustful looks due to his loud Omega scent. Something about his own Alpha fragrance mingling and joined seemed to tamper Izuku’s scent, equalizing into something powerful and sexy, but entirely off limits.

Katsuki was over the moon, and his inner Alpha howled to it.

“Thank you,” Izuku mumbled, his speech lethargic and head heavy against Katsuki’s shoulder as they took their seats on the train. “I’m happy.”

Katsuki was glad Izuku couldn’t catch his blush. Not trusting his voice, he could only grunt in reply. He didn’t have to wait long for Izuku’s breathing to lengthen and ease into sleep, or for him to follow.

Drowsy from the day, they stepped into the lights of Tokyo, dirty slush at their feet as they stood before the train station and lingered.

“Am I coming home with you?” Izuku asked softly, his face still aglow despite the prevailing night sky.

“I - ah, shit.” Katsuki smacked a hand over his eyes and pinched at the bridge of his nose. “Fuck. I want you to, but I gotta be up for my first day back tomorrow.”

“Oh, of course, I mean - “ Izuku’s brows drew in tight, mouth pouted in question. “Your first day back? Did you take a vacation day for this?”

Shit. Shit shit shit.

“I -” Katsuki pressed his lips together, made an executive decision and shrugged, waving off Izuku’s concern as best he could. “Nah, I mean. There was a dispute at work or whatever and I was given time off to -”

“Given time off in a good way or a bad way?” Izuku said, and yeah, maybe he was way too smart for Katsuki at times.

At Katsuki hesitance, Izuku’s eyes narrowed.

“Bakugou. What do you mean your first day back tomorrow? Where did you go before that?”

“It’s really not that important,” Katsuki said. “Some shit happened and -”

“What happened?”

“For fuck’s sake, it’s not a big deal! I got suspended for a while and -”

“Suspended? A while?” Izuku gaped. “How long is a while?”

Katsuki rolled his eyes, but his heart was pumping blood in overtime. 

“A month.”

“A month,” Izuku said, face disbelieving. “You mean the last entire month that we’ve been actively seeing each other you’ve been suspended and it wasn’t worth sharing?”

“Of course it wasn’t worth sharing,” Katsuki snapped, slouching in on himself, fisted hands diving into his pockets. “It was total bullshit in the first place and I was doing fine, wasn’t I? I was doing all that publicity shit with the kids and whatever. I told you about that stuff, important stuff, y’know.”

“I thought that was through your job.” Izuku folded his arms across his chest, a clear delineation between the two of them as his face went flat. “I’m not an idiot, Bakugou. Even if you were ashamed, you’d have told me about something like this. And since you didn’t, I can only assume it was something you specifically didn’t want me to know. So, spill.”

Katsuki couldn’t even argue, and that was the kicker of it. Izuku had tied him up in a neat little bow in under five fucking minutes. 

“It’s really not -”

“Alright then.” Izuku’s expression was as merciless as the day they’d met before he turned and started to walk. “I’ll talk to you later.”

“You think you can hold back a world of shit from me and expect me to have to tell you every fucking thing that goes on in my life?” Katsuki shouted, trailing after him in long strides, his jaw aching with the clench of his teeth. “Fuck that. Fuck -”

“I don’t expect that at all.” Izuku bit off each word neatly as he continued to walk. “My past belongs to me, as does yours, and I’m not here to cut open scars and look inside at the damage. I don’t want to see anything you don’t feel comfortable showing me. But this isn’t about the past, this is now , this is our every day, and if you’re purposely not telling me, it almost definitely is something I should know.”

“I got suspended for looking up your address on the company database back in goddamn December , you dumbass!” Katsuki startled to a stop as Izuku whirled on him, eyes hot and wet but unshed, angry all the same. Katsuki frowned deeply, his eyebrows bowed, brain reeling for what to say when he could have just gone one more day and this would never have been an issue. “My boss found out that I’d abused company policy when I was crazy-fuckin-stupid for you, and then your name kept coming up, including with the Kouta kid and the Omega murders, and when my boss suggested I’d been looking into you due to suspicions of your involvement, I kind of -”

“What?” Izuku rasped, eyes huge and horrified. “What did you do?”

“I attacked him,” Katsuki muttered. “And then again, later. Well, almost. I guess. It was all kind of a mix of bullshit.”

Izuku didn’t reply. A merciless, frigid wind rushed at them, swept Izuku’s curls into a flurry around his wan cheeks. Katsuki shifted from one foot to the other, waiting. When Izuku finally spoke, his words were cracked through and damp, as if crying while his eyes shed nothing. 

“You got suspended from your job because of me and you didn’t tell me.”

“Not because of you,” Katsuki snapped, reaching out and stopping when Izuku flinched away. “Because I was a hormonal dumbass working off half a brain and whole horny dick. It wasn’t -”

“Your actions at work revolved around me and that’s why you didn’t tell me,” Izuku said, his features pinched and pained. 

“Yeah, but -”

“Your job is the most important thing in your life and you didn’t tell me because, what? You didn’t trust I’d be stable enough to know? You thought I’d walk out if the address incident came back up, even though we’d settled that months ago over the phone that night? Or was I just not worth telling, even as I spilled out all this disgusting, horrifying shit about myself, over and over, like you were going to give me even half of the same respect in return?”

Reeling and overwhelmed by Izuku’s forever dizzying tornado of thoughts and anxieties and accusations, Katsuki took a step in retreat. 

“What the fuck is wrong with you? No, no I -”

“I don’t need this,” Izuku snapped, his entire face changed to something confrontational and unfamiliar. They’d argued, but Izuku looked gone , his mouth on autopilot as he walked backwards, gesturing violently with his hands as he spoke. “I don’t need you or another Alpha who’s gonna use me up and wring me out to dry. I’m smarter than that, I’m better than that. I’m better, I’m so much better, and I am not how I used to be, I’m not, and I won’t let you or anyone else string me along with - with nice things or nice words or - or try to tell me I’m not fucked up and ugly and broken and, well - fuck you.”

Izuku was far down the street now, as he turned and began to run.

“Fuck you too, you crazy bastard!” Katsuki yelled down the sidewalk for good measure, spinning on his heel and striding the opposite way 

Katsuki had never seen anyone run so fast in their life. Not with their feet, but their words.

Shit.

Notes:

Do you ever notice when the best things in life happen, sometimes you end up sabotaging yourself because, deep down, you think it's what you deserve? If you haven't noticed that yet, you might now. If you say the world is yellow today, I bet you you'll see everything yellow the world has to offer as you go through your day. If you say the world is black, I promise you, you'll see the black.

Thank you for your support and kindness! I always appreciate the time you take to read and send me uplifting comments!

Chapter 26

Summary:

"You’re strong, but you’re not mean-strong yet, and that’s the kind of strong that ends up eating away at you.”

Izuku knew. He knew better than most.

“Are you there, Midoriya?” 

Ms Hayate’s voice was quiet and undemanding, the sound of Izuku’s past and present, a person he inherently trusted. He kept his eyes closed, head cocked, frowning against the violent swell of emotion that threatened his tight throat. He didn't want to cry, hated the stigma put on him for being an overemotional Omega, as if Alphas weren't the ones oozing testosterone and starting fights with parked cars and lamp posts on a bad day.

“You’ve got to let yourself feel it, Midoriya,” his therapist said again, without ire or haste. “Trauma is like tripping the wires in your brain, the circuit breaker snapping shut. The lights go out, and the electricity stops flowing between one place and another. Your energy shuts down, stuck in that traumatic moment.”

Izuku breathed through Ms Hayate’s words. They were familiar, but no matter how many times she’d said it over the years, they felt like a revelation each time. Blurring into focus was the hospital room, the drug-sloppy way Izuku had brought a hand to his pulsing head, only to find it shaved to the scalp and bandaged. 

“We’re made of energy, of atoms. But when we look closer, those atoms are made of something even smaller. And even more recently, we’ve discovered that those tiny pieces are made up of even smaller specks - all of it glued together with energy. No part of our body really touches - we are the endless current of electricity. And when we experience trauma, that moment freezes, and some of our energy passages shut down. We get caught in a loop.”

Izuku knew the loop all too well. The fear and shame and anger. Poisonous, rampant anger festering in his heart, making him both fight and flight, depending on the situation. 

The fury of helplessness, of laying there and taking it, of his body responding like some kind of disgusting Omega traitor, his frame not strong enough to fight back to two Alphas with their sanity stretched to tearing point. Outrage at allowing himself to be the victim, time and again in is life, like it was the only thing he’d been made for. 

The fear that he wouldn’t change. Would keep letting himself be that victim in new situations. 

“You have to feel it, Midoriya.” Ms Hayate’s voice kept him grounded. “You can feel it and still be safe. You’re experiencing those synapses and sparks rekindling, finding their old passageways to healthily flow. Each time we do this, the loop becomes weaker. What you remember in this room has no reality anymore - it's just energy firing around in your brain. You’re safe. You can feel your feet on the floor and you can hear the heater making noise behind the couch. You’re safe to look at it and be there and feel it, because you are here, Midoriya.”

You are here.

The full hour passed in tears and slowed, careful breathing to calm the tidal waves of emotion washing over Izuku like a man drowning. Ms Hayate was the lighthouse, but she forced him to be his own life raft. He had to learn not just how to survive, but how to thrive and pull himself out of his anxieties by recognizing them and working through them in a slow, methodical way.

Izuku had never been good at patience or, hell, self-love. Everything was new, even five years into their sessions.

“We’re never going to go back and address every single moment in your life that brought you to the person you are now,” Ms Hayate said, handing Izuku a fresh box of tissues as he wiped the snot away and calmed. “But I’d like you to take some notes from this session and return with them in two weeks time. What situations in your childhood emerged that first made you think something negative about yourself. Times where they compounded on themselves to confirm your beliefs about yourself as you got older. And times in the present where you currently find yourself affirming those beliefs about yourself by how you act and exist in everyday life.”

Izuku shot an alarmed look to Ms Hayate, who only gazed back with dark, inscrutable eyes. He hadn’t mentioned what had happened with Bakugou just three days ago, but his therapist had long learned his telling expressions and he had no doubt she had her intuitive guesses as to Izuku’s state upon walking in this morning.

Or maybe even her meager Beta senses had caught the marking scents wafting from Izuku like a giant billboard and had put two and two together. He might not be able to smell himself, but by the wide berth both Alphas and Omegas gave him on the street, they undoubtedly sensed the mark of a very powerful Alpha and weren’t interested in even brushing up against him.

Izuku wished he felt happier about that than he did.

“Okay,” was all Izuku had said, sure to thank her before he scurried out of the building and into the brutal winter. Izuku zipped his jacket to his nose and wished he hadn’t lost that stupid purple hat on the mountain, his ears going instantly icy.

Bare hands tucked into his pockets, Izuku dragged his feet to open shop at Parchment. He’d ducked his duties for two days now, claiming the flu and dropping the brunt of the work on Chisaki - who didn’t even get paid for that shit - and Eri. The latter had begged enough to get an after school job there, but she was too young to watch the place on her own. While she argued that she practically lived among the stacks since she was nine or so, Izuku couldn’t have her handling close-up for the day.

He really needed more staff.

Or to get off his mopey ass and properly get back to work.

Taking his time all the same, Izuku arrived at Parchment, late for its opening, and slipped inside, firmly locking the door behind him.

Inhaling deep, Izuku swallowed back a well of tears when he couldn’t smell the scent of books or the citrus dusting spray he used, or the coffee he would put on in his office. 

“Can’t smell right,” Izuku mumbled to himself, trudging to the back room to drop his stuff in a heap on the floor. “Can’t feel right, can’t fuck right, can’t even be an Omega or an Alpha right. Shit. Fuck. Shit!”

Izuku ground his teeth against the fresh onslaught of emotion, his jaw singing with pain as he whipped around and buried his fist in the office door.

The lightning crack followed instant shocked silence. Izuku gawked at his own bleeding hand, the hole gone clean through the flimsy plywood. He yanked his fist back without a wince, the adrenaline from his spark of fury a thundering storm in his head. 

“Good, great.” Izuku rummaged through his desk drawers, sloppily sending pens and nonsense flying to the floor like casualties of the war within himself. “Who doesn’t keep bandaids -”

Reaching around the back of the deep, lower file drawer, Izuku’s undamaged hand closed around a familiar crushed rectangle. Eyes wide, he emerged with a half-pack of cigarettes from - from he couldn’t even remember. When was the last time he’d stress-smoked? Years ago. 

The neon orange lighter was still wedged in the thin plastic film that wrapped around the bottom half. 

Izuku stared at the blood dripping on the tile. Thought of Bakugou’s red eyes - the shock and confusion, then the anger. 

Without a coat, Izuku found himself leaning against the biting cold of the brick wall, smoking a stale, disgusting cigarette and grimacing to the drab, dirty sky. His hand was starting to smart now, but he ignored it, shoving the bleeding mass of flesh and bone into his jeans pocket and ignoring the pain like his therapist told him not to. 

By the time he’d returned, his wound on his hand clotted, his face unfeeling from the February chill, lips chapped, and lungs burning with smoke, there was a group of people staring into display window of his shop. 

Frowning, Izuku approached, only frowning deeper when he noticed what the waiting customers were wearing. While he had plenty of very sweet, smart high school girls visiting his shop, he didn’t often have a gaggle of teenagers dressed primarily in pastel pink, tiny skirts undoubtedly hellish for his weather, all of them twittering and giggling at the entrance.

Quickly flipping on all the store lights, Izuku rushed to the door and unlocked it, his smile wavering and polite as he nodded to them.

“Um, good morning! Come in, come in, it’s a pleasure to have you.”

“Oh my gosh!” One of them with pigtails looked at him with huge, sparkling eyes. “Oh my gosh, you’re him, aren’t you? The guy who’s dating Ground Zero? You’re really him! You’re -”

“HE SMELLS LIKE HIM,” another girl screeched, her nostrils flaring as she stalked in toward Izuku, backing him up and up into the store, her friends following with equally hungry expressions. “Is this what he really smells like? Your scent is so loud, sir! You can barely smell Ground Zero and he’s the most powerful Alpha -”

“Are you bonded now?”

“Of course they’re not bonded, you can smell he’s marked, and he’s wearing that turtleneck to hide the bite, probably.”

“Well he smells like -”

“Get the fuck away from me,” Izuku snapped, baring his sharpened canines on instinct, his shoulders squaring as the fight in him flared. “He’s mine.”

Alpha is mine, his scent is mine, no one gets to smell him but his Omega.

The main girl gawked, stopped dead in her tracks, the others retreating several steps and murmuring to each other.

“We -” the girl swallowed and managed a bright smile. “I’m sorry, sir. We were just coming in to see if Ground Zero was here, or if we could meet him for pictures sometime or -”

“If I smell any of you on him,” Izuku said, stalking forward, his hackles spiked high, “I will be the first to find you, and you won’t be happy with the outcome.”

A moment of silence passed and Izuku swore he watched their souls float right out of their gaping mouths.

“B-but -” The main girl looked to the floor, submission. “But you’re an Omega. You can’t tell us what to -”

Izuku loomed in, shorter than the girl by several inches, but it didn’t matter with the unnatural growl grating from his tongue. 

“Tell me,” he said softly. “Do I smell like an Omega to you?”

The girl didn’t look up, only tilted her head to the side, exposing the pale line of her neck in a subservient sign. 

“You smell wrong,” she whispered.

“Great,” Izuku bit off. “That’s what I thought. Now please leave. If you need a book, order it online. I hear the internet is great for destroying small businesses, even more than rabid fangirls.”

The evacuation didn’t take long after that, the adrenaline from his morning draining like lifeblood when Izuku slumped onto the stool behind the cash register. Brow upon the counter, he breathed the way Ms Hayate had been encouraging for years, concentrating on the flow of his emotions exhaling from his body, a healthy circle of feeling and letting go. 

He'd never felt that way before. About anybody. The mark - well, while it wasn't doing him any favors in ramping up his wholehearted, body-aching desire to rub up against his mate and scent mark the daylights out of him - that wasn't everything. 

His own self and brain and thoughts and feelings not tied to biology or anatomy wanted Bakugou, too. And certainly didn't want anyone else to want him, either.

But Izuku had royally fucked all that up. Hadn't even received a text since then. Not that he'd sent any, either. The thought of being broken up with through a text felt just about as bad as that time the presently-known villain Twice had broken up with him through rape and attempted murder.

Izuku's anxieties were high enough that both felt on par right about now.

Senses dulled with exhaustion, his skin feeling too tight, his heart claustrophobic in his own chest from wondering where his Alpha was - stupid, you’re the one who scared him away - Izuku pulled out a tattered journal he kept beneath the desk. There was nothing important inside; grocery lists, appointment reminders, phone numbers, lines from books he liked, bored doodles. 

Situations from his past that confirmed what he thought about himself, huh? Izuku tapped a chewed pen against the clean paper and, after a moment’s thought, began to write. And write.

His father. The guy had been gone before Izuku hit two. Izuku hadn’t found it strange as a child, but there had been a time in his life when he’d realized there had to have been a point where he hadn’t been wanted, where something better existed in the world for his father, and it hadn't been his son. 

His mother. Telling him she was sorry when he’d presented as an Omega on the day of the UA tryouts. His body had writhed in pain - later, the height of the excruciating experience had been attributed to his Omega and Alpha aspects battling out within his body, a war in himself from as long as Izuku could remember.

His mother, looking at him without a spark of hope in her eyes. A male Omega was a death sentence and she’d never told him otherwise - only how to deal with it, how to hide it with the sprays and medications. Of course, the medications hadn’t worked, and thus had begun the endless doctor appointments.

His doctors. They told him to his face that he was all wrong. One person had said heterozygous alpha, the other had said intersexbut not exactly. Either way, all of them had said wrong wrong wrong. 

Your body is wrong, the way your brain functions is wrong, you act wrong, you smell wrong. Society felt the same, and they had made sure to tell him, too. Through television, magazines, self-help books, his own teachers and classmates.

His childhood. Izuku didn’t remember much. With the recent revelation of his shared life with Bakugou, there were new questions, new possibilities. Originally, Izuku thought he couldn’t remember his early childhood because it had been boring, uneventful, or just plain sucked. Now, with the realization that he might indeed remember Bakugou’s scent from the past, the idea that they’d imprinted early on and the separation had brought on a level of trauma that Izuku had simply blocked it out -

Well, it would be on par for the trajectory of his life, that’s for sure.

And now? Izuku stared at the pages of scribbles he hadn’t realized he’d written in such a flurry.

Now, he held his life at arms length. That fear, that anger and shame of what he’d been through and what he’d become because of it - everything was too much, too raw, too close to the surface when someone close to him dug their teeth in and decided to stay.

Sunday had felt like a miracle. Surreal and joyful, too good to be true and not what Izuku deserved at all. Bakugou had been kind and attentive and funny and real. He’d been so honest that it had scared Izuku, sent bone deep terror through him because he'd realized how hard it was to be anything but one-hundred percent honest with Bakugou in turn. 

Unfortunately, while Bakugou might think he'd seen all of Izuku’s ugly, this was only the beginning. There weren’t enough years for all of Izuku’s damage. How could he put Bakugou through all of that? How could he have let Bakugou mark him like Izuku could promise him anything but a broken body and brain?

Still. Still. Bakugou had stayed. He kept staying. 

Izuku was so used to people walking away. How could he handle someone who finally refused? 

The front door jangled distantly in Izuku’s periphery, but he was busy staring at his journal like it had personally insulted him.

“Oh,” a person’s clear tenor voice alerted Izuku from his reverie. “It is you.”

Already prepared to snarl at a second Ground Zero fan club, Izuku glanced up with distaste. A short, tan kid - not a kid, but a teen - stood in the doorway, his slim shoulders slumped, hands bunched in the pockets of his baggy jeans, his intensely dark eyes downcast and shifty as he looked between Izuku and the shop. He didn’t wear a winter hat over his spiky black hair, but instead a baseball cap with two stubby horns crowning either side. 

His familiarity was instant.

Realization bloomed, Izuku’s expression clearing with wonder and a wide, honest smile.

“You!” Izuku stood from his stood, stumbling a little, his foot caught in one of the rungs as he laughed awkwardly and untangled himself. “You, hold on - I mean, it’s you! You’re - you’re Kouta, right? Izumi Kouta?”

The teenager blinked at Izuku, taking a wary step back as Izuku approached with hugging probably written all over his face. Izuku caught the message and veered off course just a little, also realizing for the best he not hug people with his knuckle-scabbed hand. Kouta visibly exhaled with Izuku’s relenting affection and nodded.

“That’s me. Kouta’s fine. And you’re, uh - sorry. They wouldn't tell me your name before, and I actually got it off a magazine? It -”

“A magazine?” Izuku parroted, thrown off course from his initial joy. Kouta was here and released from the hospital and he looked great, the scarf hiding his neck in the same way Izuku hid his with the turtleneck. Additionally, Kouta had specifically come to find him which was amazing, but -

“One of those gossip ones, y’know.” Kouta shrugged a shoulder, his cheeks coloring as he scuffed an oversized shoe against the drab, raggedy carpeting. “I didn’t - I didn’t buy it or nothing, one of them old bag nurses left it to give me something to read the other day and there was some shitty picture of you and Ground Zero skiing -”

“Oh good,” Izuku intoned flatly. “Continue.”

“And your name and info was in there or whatever.” Kouta seemed to notice his increasing fidgeting, because he promptly stopped and glared at Izuku like it was his fault. “So I found you.”

“Um.” Izuku blinked, offered a smile and a dazed shake of head. “That’s - that’s impressive. I’m, uh, I’m honestly really happy to see you? I’ve been worried and the police wouldn’t tell me anything -”

“Your boyfriend didn’t tell you?” Kouta scoffed, rolled expressive dark eyes with an air of disdain only a teen could master. “Some hero. I knew he was a total fuckin’ lame.”

Izuku’s eyebrow twitched as he laughed nervously.

“Uhhh, I mean. Do you - do you want to come in? I can make some tea and there’s beanbags in the back where we could catch up.”

“You don’t seem like how you were when I saw you before,” Kouta said, ignoring him completely now, his arms folded across his chest as he eyed Izuku critically. “Badass or whatever. I thought you were gonna be cool and shit. You look like crap, by the way. You sick? You can’t get me sick after I just broke outta the hospital.”

Izuku gaped, gathering his wits as quickly as he could. This kid was going to give him whiplash and they hadn’t been speaking for more than five minutes.

“I’m not - no, I’m not sick, just a hard day and, er - break out? I’m sorry, you mean like you’re finally free because they let you go or -”

“I mean I broke the fuck out before my auntie could come and drag me back to fucksville, population ninety-eight,” Kouta said, meeting Izuku’s widening gaze dead on. In the wake of Izuku’s baffled silence, he cocked a hip and let out a mighty sigh, scanning the room with a critical eye. “You a nerd or something?”

“Or something,” Izuku said, mustering a smile. “Are you sure you don’t want some tea? Maybe we should discuss this whole breaking out of the hospital while you’re on police guard -”

“See, that’s the thing.” Seemingly confident that Izuku was indeed a loser like Bakugou, Kouta swaggered forward, nostrils flaring as he leaned in to take a sniff and wrinkle his nose in distaste. “I didn't get any guard. Not after the first week or something. The days all mix together. I couldn’t give them my name on the first day with my throat all fucked up, then my fingerprints didn’t turn up jack shit because I’m from the country and we just don’t do that there, I left a fake name at the shelter, so -”

Kouta shrugged, eyes lingering on Izuku’s throat, where Bakugou’s bite lay hidden. 

“Some asshole found my wallet in the alley and turned it in after they took all my savings from it. Probably saw my Omega medical card and thought it’d be fine to fuck over a person like me. Wish I’d seen their face, though. I’d give ‘em two black eyes. But anyway, that’s how they got my name and contacted my auntie and all.”

“But you’re here,” Izuku said dumbly, still reeling from this kid and just how much he already reminded him of a young and scrappy teenage Izuku. “And running away? You were staying at the Omega homeless shelter. Why?”

“Where the fuck else was I meant to go?” Kouta asked, looking at Izuku like he was exactly as stupid as Izuku felt. “Ain’t gonna waste my money on one of them tube beds they sell on every corner. I gotta eat, don’t I? Well, not anymore, I guess. Don't have money for shit, that fucker. If only I could find -”

“Won’t your aunt be worried about you?” Izuku asked as gently and politely as he could. He remembered being that age. Remembered his mom picking him up more than once from the police station. Kouta’s aunt must be beside herself with his disappearance, then learning of the attack.

His startled a bit at Kouta’s hard, humorless laugh.

“God, you really are a fuckin’ lame, aren’t you? Just like everyone else.” Kouta pulled off his hat, his hair shining with unwashed grease and sticking up at every angle before he ran a hand back through it and repositioned the hat. “Yeah, I’m sure she gives all the fucks in the world. Just as many as my parents who died half-way across the country while they were off being big damn heroes. Y’know she hasn’t even come yet, right? She’s known for, what, weeks? She’s on a mission or some shit. Heroes would rather die for strangers than live for their own family. Bogus as fuck.”

Izuku’s heart clenched for him, as did his fist in his pocket. He sighed, nodding, unable to argue.

“You’re right. Our world’s fucked up,” Izuku said, earning a renewed look of interest from Kouta. “And I don’t think heroes always have the right priorities in their lives. Same with parents. Regardless, you’re young and this city is meaner than your act. I believe you could grow into it, but I’d hate to see it all the same. You’re strong, but you’re not mean-strong yet, and that’s the kind of strong that ends up eating away at you.”

Izuku knew. He knew better than most. 

“Yeah, well.” Kouta rubbed his lips together and gazed at the ground, his expression softening. “Shit don’t always turn out how you want it to. Even when she does come, I’ll just be a hassle to her, y’know? She had a life way before my ‘rents got themselves killed and dumped me on her doorstep. I’ve been a burden ever since. ‘Specially with my, y’know…”

“Being a male Omega,” Izuku said quietly, waiting patiently to Kouta to meet his eyes. “Yeah, I get that. It’s a lot to take on. Too much has happened to you already, hasn’t it?”

Kouta’s lips instantly tightened, his face pinching up like he was holding something back, and Izuku recognized that face too.

“I didn’t want to die,” Kouta said, voice strained, barely reaching a whisper. Izuku frowned and leaned in, intent as Kouta spoke. “When you saved me, I mean. I realized at that point that I wanted to fight. I was gonna use my Quirk, but that person shredded up my throat before I had a chance to react. And when you were above me, holding my blood in my body with your hands, I realized that I really wanted to live.”

Izuku stared, utterly entranced by the strength in this boy, in this almost-man who had a will to live that was stronger than any he'd had at this age. Or had he had that same drive? Underneath the pain and the teenage angst and justifiable depression and anger was - was what? Had Izuku’s will to live kept him moving through horror after horror to bring him here, too? 

“So,” Izuku whispered. “Live.”

Kouta’s dark eyes widened briefly before he burst into a grin and roughly smacked Izuku’s arm.

“Damn well can’t with you breathing all over me like that. I said don’t get me sick! What you got, the flu? You really do look like shit.”

“Gee, thanks,” Izuku said dryly, but his smile ached, so unfamiliar from the past few days. “Seriously, I’m not sick. Just a rough couple of days.”

“Tell me about it,” Kouta said with a short laugh, unraveling his scarf to stuff in his pocket and revealing a neat white bandage wrapped around his neck. “What’s wrong with you? You smell all fucked up too, by the way.”

“Thanks,” Izuku said with his own laugh as he shook his head. “Yeah, it’s been weird, alright. Do you want that tea now?”

Kouta shrugged as he slipped from his coat and moved to hang it at the entrance rack.

“Sure, I guess. If I can hang out. You’re at work and all.”

“I also happen to be the boss and we also happen to not be busy. So, make yourself at home.”

Comfortable leaving Kouta at the front to wander, Izuku scurried back to the office to set the electric kettle to boil. Startled with the droplets of blood on the floor that trailed out and away, Izuku sighed at himself. That person didn’t even feel like him anymore. He felt drained, like angry anxiety Izuku had bled out on the floor along with everything else.

It always happened this way, Izuku thought, as he cleaned up his mess and found two faded mugs with his university’s logo on them. Even the Izuku of Sunday night had come and gone in such a whirlwind that it made it hard to breathe. The indignation and self-doubt and distrust and sadness had lingered and still did, but the infuriated Izuku who wildly rode his emotions triggered by the past was always reckless and short-lived.

Five years ago, Izuku was still learning to get a hold of those volatile reactions. Ten years ago, the reckless Izuku was the main character of the show. Now, the bouts were few and far between, with the notable exception being ever since he’d started getting involved with Bakugou.

Wiping that train of thought from his mind, Izuku took the finished tea through the shop, toward the front counter. When he heard two voices chatting, he startled and stopped among the stacks, peeking his head around the corner to spy Kouta amiably chatting with an older woman in the romance section.

“Listen,” Kouta said, tapping a book he was holding against the book the other held, “I get you like that lovey-dovey stuff and all, but haven’t you put any thought into what kind you wanna read? Look at the back of your book. It’s all about some lady falling into the arms of that ninja guy or whatever. Isn’t every book you’ve ever read about that stuff? Now, my book is still a romance, but the lady is a ninja and she rescues the prince and they fight all the time, but fall in love anyway. Don’t you want that instead? Don’t you wanna be a ninja or something?”

Izuku was still dopey with wonder as he thanked his - no, Kouta’s - customer and watched her leave. He turned slowly, watching Kouta blow on his tea and take a sip, his posture at ease as he scooted back onto the stool.

“So, you read romance novels?” he asked, careful again of his tone.

Kouta peered up from his mug, a sharp eyebrow raised.

“Who doesn’t?”

“Me,” Izuku said promptly. “And most teenage boys.”

“Yeah, well.” Kouta shrugged. “I never started reading ‘em on purpose or nothin’. My mom had tons and tons and they all got dumped at my auntie’s after she died. I found the box around age eleven and started reading for the sake of reading. I guess I got a shock at first, but I liked that no one in the stories my mom owned were pro-heroes, and she had a lot of books about Omega dudes because Dad was one and she was the Alpha and stuff. I guess it’s weird if you think on it too hard, but -”

“It was a way to be close with your mom and to feel more confident about your presentation later in life.”

Kouta’s face colored but he only snorted and rolled his eyes.

“Sure did me a shitload of good. Look at me now.”

“I’m looking,” Izuku said soberly, “and I see an amazing human being.”

Another eye roll. 

“I guess you’re alright, too. Not at as -”

“Cool as you imagined, yes, I got that,” Izuku said, already laughing. “I’ll work on it.”

“Nah. This is fine.”

They considered each other in a moment of comfortable quiet, Izuku lingering on the stark white bandage contrasting Kouta’s tan neck. If Izuku had never heard Kouta’s struggle and screams with his Alpha-enhanced ears…

“Don’t you want to call your aunt?” Izuku said carefully. “If you don’t have a phone, you’re welcome to use mine.”

“I said I don’t want to go back!” Kouta snapped, cracking his mug down on the counter. His painfully young face twisted in more pain and fear than anger, and again, Izuku was struck with their similarities. “You say you get it but you obviously don’t have a fucking clue. You’ve got your job and your life and your lame hero boyfriend who’ll probably die on you before you get a chance to make up your damn mind about him. And yeah -” Kouta spat when Izuku opened his mouth in mute shock. “You left your journal wide open on the counter for the world to see. I read some before I realized what it was and closed it before that lady could see.”

“Kouta -”

“But I saw enough to know you’re way more a coward than me. What haven’t you run away from in your life? Me, I’m starting a new life for myself. One where back-country assholes with Alpha egos and tiny dicks stop looking at me touching me like I’m their property.

“I am choosing to remove myself from a place where everyone knows your goddamn business, all your pain and fuck-ups and - and your heats. Where men think I owe them because of the fuckin’ body I was born into!”

Kouta’s face was red, his black eyes shining like dark, tumultuous water. He abruptly stood from the stool, palms slapped to the counter as he leaned across it and into Izuku’s space, his voice dropping with gravity.

“Do you know how many Omega males go missing or end up dead in those nowhere villages just like the one I grew up in? We’re a commodity, Midoriya Izuku.” Kouta had to have seen the flicker of pain in Izuku’s eyes, the knowledge, the recognition. He nodded. “You at least know that, I guess. So don’t you make a single fuckin’ move to bring me back to that hell. Not when I came all this way. Not when I found you. Please.”

Standing there on legs gone numb, Izuku woodenly reached up with his free hand and gingerly touched his own cheek. His fingertips smeared away damp, hot trails of unrealized tears tracking past his chin and down his throat to soak in the collar of his turtleneck. 

“Kouta,” he rasped, inhaling with a wet rattle and sniffling back snot and emotion.

“Please,” Kouta said, eyes begging.

“You…” Izuku swallowed and steadily met Kouta’s gaze as he searched for the right words. “Would you - would you like a job here? I’ve been looking for some extra help.”

Kouta startled, standing straight now, his mouth fumbling as he looked around, seemingly lost. 

“I - yes, I mean, yeah, but -”

“You can stay with me,” Izuku found himself saying. “But there’s just one thing.”

Kouta looked at him like he was made of gold, a treasure.

“Anything.”

Izuku thought of Katsuki and the sting of betrayal. Considered the law, right and wrong, and the grey areas of good in which he was more comfortable existing. Imagined how he might have turned out if a fifteen year-old Izuku had found a mentor to guide and strengthen him instead of encouraging self-destruction.

“You can stay with me,” Izuku said, quiet and firm. “But we can’t tell a soul.”

Kouta nodded slowly, the magnitude of Izuku housing an underage runaway while juggling a pro-hero partner seeming to set in.

"Not a soul."

Notes:

As always, I appreciate your insightful and uplifting comments. This story has begun to mean a lot to many people and I hope that where this journey goes, you want to keep following.

Chapter 27

Summary:

For a man who had everything, Katsuki was beginning to realize how much he really wanted out of life. And it wasn’t just a hero’s statue in a busy square or his name in lights. Fuck.

Notes:

I've been saying this to whomever will listen, but - every chapter from this point on (and if I'm honest, from almost the beginning) is not filler. Every chapter up until 44 is so meticulously planned, the wheels are in motion and we're speeding up more and more every single time. Please enjoy!

Katsuki hurt.

Not like a punch to the face or breaking your ribs for the third time before they shoved you into surgery and finally yanked the damn thing out. Not like burning your hand on the stove when you’re meant to be basically fireproof. Though the lingering shame and lasting pain of a burn radiating through your body was pretty close.

Katsuki hurt like he didn’t know people could hurt, and six days in, he still didn’t know what the fuck to do about it. 

He probably could have called. Probably should have, if Mina and Kirishima’s insistence were enough to go by. But they didn’t function like he and Izuku. Katsuki had already stopped searching for similarities between them from which to compare. If he was going to apologize - and he damn well was going to bite every bullet Izuku shot at him and apologize like a fucking man - it wouldn’t be over the phone.

Besides, Izuku hadn’t called him either. And he knew Katsuki’s address. There was a two-way street here. At least, that’s what Katsuki told himself when he found himself getting riled and indignant as fuck about this entire situation.

But when he was calm, face down in his big, lonely bed with the sound of the heater clicking and revving up the only noise behind soundproof windows overlooking a city that sucked the life and blood out of him day in and out, Katsuki just wanted Izuku back. That’s all. Just come back.

Well, Katsuki had never been one to lay back and let life happen to him. He’d visited Parchment on both Monday and Tuesday, only to find Chisaki and some teenage girl wandering around inside like they owned the fucking place. Izuku’s scent was a bare scrape at the doorway, not strong enough for him to have been there any time soon. 

And while Katsuki was raring for a fight, he wasn’t stupid enough to start one with Chisaki. Not that he couldn’t finish it, and not that Chisaki wasn’t a notable thorn in the entire pro-hero community’s side - but the last thing Katsuki needed was more ways to get on Izuku’s bad side. Katsuki had plenty of bad guys to legally beat the shit out of this week, and make no mistake, he’d taken full advantage of it in these past days. 

Beaten down and worn to the core by Saturday night, Katsuki limped into the office with the stench of blood and fire and brimstone clinging to his skin and clothes. For once in his life, he’d wished he wasn’t so good at what he did. Beating down numskulls all day was no fun when they barely got a hit in on him in return. 

Katsuki was so tired of hurting in ways he didn’t understand. 

Forgoing a shower altogether, Katsuki went to his cubicle for his backpack, blankly looking around the uncluttered space for a moment before his addled brain remembered what he’d come here for in the first place. With a sigh, he discarded his gauntlets, utility belt, kneepads and the rest in a charred pile, right on the floor for him to deal with come Monday. If anyone tried to give him shit for it, they’d be in for a hell of a reaction. 

Actually, he’d love that right about now.

“Hey.” Kirishima’s unnaturally tentative voice said from around the corner of their shared, flimsy wall. When Katsuki didn’t look at him and just stripped from his compression shirt to rustle through his pack for a clean tee, Kirishima cleared his throat. “Um, do you want to come over tonight? Mina’s cooking, so I can’t make promises for its edibility, but there will be beer. And that new anime -”

“Stop talking,” Katsuki said, too tired to bring any real heat into it. “I got shit to do.”

Kirishima had been trying to get him alone since Katsuki had walked in on Monday, stinking like Omega mating endorphins and looking like someone had incinerated his All Might memorabilia collection. Katsuki had offered the barest explanation, and ever since, the entire network of his close friends had been invading his inbox with shitty motivational quotes and even internet articles on how to woo your emotionally fragile Omega.

What a bunch of dumbasses. Fragile and Midoriya Izuku had never been acquainted.

Vulnerable? Right now, yes. But breakable or weak? Not his Omega. 

Strength and tenacity lived in Izuku’s bones, and from what Katsuki had seen and learned and knew, Izuku was only growing into his own more and more before his eyes. He was incredible, and no article was going to tell Katsuki how to approach this situation. Certainly nothing with a pre-biased assumption that he had to tiptoe around his Omega like they were walking on eggshells. 

If there was one thing the two of them had in common, it was their candor. They both appreciated each other’s straightforwardness, and while Izuku kept his past shielded, he didn’t lie to Katsuki, nor did he hold himself back from saying what he was thinking about a particular situation. Katsuki loved that about him and loving that about him meant seeing this problem head-on with no holds barred.

Katsuki just needed to get a damn hold on him first. 

“You’re seeing him?” Kirishima said, never one to get the hint. 

“We’ll see,” Katsuki said, removing the parka from the back of his chair and slipping into it. “He’s been… busy.”

“I’m sure he wants to make it right just as much as you do,” Kirishima said with annoyingly kind eyes that had a habit of making Katsuki actually believe the shit he said. “He let you mark him, didn’t you? I know I don’t know him well, or very much at all, but he doesn’t seem like the kind of person who would take that decision lightly.”

“You’re tellin’ me,” Katsuki mumbled to himself, searching his pockets for gloves and finding only one. This was just his luck these days.

“There’s the man of the hour,” came a voice that had Katsuki’s hackles rising. 

Zipping up his coat, his expression flat, Katsuki turned to face Camie. She’d been on third shift since he’d been back, and Katsuki had done well to quickly duck out before the end of his shift and the beginning of hers overlapped. Today was just not his day.

“The hour is late and this man is leaving,” Katsuki said, passing her by, careful not to touch his coat to hers. Despite knowing that Izuku wouldn’t be able to smell a willing Omega on him, Katsuki would know, and didn’t fucking like it. 

As annoyed as he was by this development of Camie and her apparent courting of him, Katsuki wasn’t mad. This was what Omegas and Alphas did, and it was extremely common for pro-heroes to stay in their lane when dating. Another reason Katsuki hadn’t even considered it in his entire life. The hassle would have never been worth it. 

Katsuki knew he was prime mating material. He wasn’t a fucking idiot. He knew what he looked like, what he smelled like, his accomplishments. 

He also knew that Camie had been his friend for almost ten years, and he wasn’t about to change the status of their relationship, ever. 

“You still chasing that little Quirkless Omega?” Camie asked casually, falling into step with him as they exited the offices and headed for the elevator. “Everyone you said you, like, stank of him big time on Monday, but I didn’t get to smell it until now. Totally hate to tell you this, blondie, but you stink.”

“Maybe it’s giving off the exact message I want it to,” Katsuki said, too exhausted to rise to this conversation. He knew how Camie worked, and while she was extremely talented at talking the soul out of an opponent, Katsuki was equally adept at ignoring all of humanity when he felt like it. 

“You should have been here when Twitter blew up with you and the photos of that dude,” Camie said, undeterred as she stood beside him while they waited for the elevator. “I mean, everyone here recognized him from the Omega Murders, but they never released his face to the public, did they? Nobody could believe their eyes, but Mirio made us all sign these non-disclosure thingies so we couldn’t leak Midoriya’s identity to the press. Everyone was shocked you’d date a nobody, you know? I guess I already knew on some degree, but I didn’t think you’d actually, like, go for it when you’ve got top tier prospects all around you.”

“Sounds like I’m fucking glad I wasn’t there,” Katsuki said, rolling his eyes to the ceiling. “You think I give a shit what this office or anyone else says about it? Do you even know me?”

“I think I know you better than most,” Camie murmured, the back of her hand brushing his as she spoke. Her scent coiled around him, a silken vice, but he could only wrinkle his nose against it. “And what I know you love more than anything else is a challenge. That's what he is, isn’t he? So mount him already and move on, B-”

Katsuki roared in the same moment the elevator doors dinged. Katsuki spun, his hand clamping around Camie’s throat as he dove into the elevator with her neck in his grasp, driving her back and back until her skull smacked against the metallic wall. Her glossed mouth gawking, manicured nails scrabbling at his wrist, her scent reeked of fear, the smell was overwhelmed only by the seething, black waves of fury filling the room as the doors shut behind them. 

Bared teeth gritted at Camie’s ear, Katsuki soaked in the sounds of her gasping for breath as he whispered, sharp and staccato in her ear.

“If you ever talk about my mate, expect to never be able to use that mouth again. Are we clear?”

A strong arm wrapped around Katsuki’s throat from behind and yanked him off, Camie sliding to the floor, sputtering and struggling for breath as Katsuki snarled over his shoulder. One of Camie’s illusion doubles pouted at him before reaching out for real Camie’s hand to leverage her up. Then it popped out of existence, the illusion only ever physically viable for a minute or two at most. 

“Bakugou,” Camie wheezed, mascara tears trailing down her flushed cheeks. “I’m sor-”

“Are we clear?” Katsuki said, Alpha aggression seeping from his pores. Friend or not, the beast inside him snarled and snapped, desperate to rip out the threatening Omega’s throat, to make sure dangerous Omega could never get to his most precious mate.

Camie’s eyes narrowed as she nodded.

“We’re clear.”

The doors dinged open.

 

 

The distance to Izuku’s apartment was considerable, more than half an hour, but it was enough time for Katsuki to talk himself down from the rage coursing through his blood at Camie’s insinuation.

A challenge? Izuku had never been a mountain to climb or a medal to win at the end of a race. In the beginning, there’d been a lot of cockiness and expectation on Katsuki’s end. He’d expected Izuku to fall for him, expected Izuku to be charmed by his presentation and accomplishments and his name more than he thought Izuku should be enamored with the person Katsuki actually was. 

But, from the first moment Katsuki had smelled him, had set eyes on him - and now he realized their past imprint had flared to life with familiarity right then and there  - Izuku had never been a challenge or a mission objective.

Izuku had been a dream come true. He had been something to strive for. To Katsuki, those were vastly different goals than to simply own or conquer. Katsuki had, and still did, want to be beside him, not in front of him or leading him. 

And that led Katsuki right to Izuku’s front step.

Some part of his brain, detached from the metastasizing, malignant confusion and misery purveying through his heart and spreading out, wondered when Katsuki would get to see Izuku out from the cold. They’d known each other from late November onward. Izuku had always been coddled and covered, keeping himself close to himself at all times. 

Would they ever get to a point where Katsuki could touch him in the sun and the warmth? Would they ever have the opportunity to go camping, to sweat in a tent atop a sleeping bag, their limbs entwined despite the heat? Did Izuku wear shorts? Did he smell different in the summer or, in his element, did the summer finally smell like him?

Katsuki wanted to know. He wanted to see Izuku through the seasons. He wanted Izuku to want to see him, too.

For a man who had everything, Katsuki was beginning to realize how much he really wanted out of life. And it wasn’t just a hero’s statue in a busy square or his name in lights. Fuck.

The steps were icy as he mounted them to Izuku’s front door, the night long and deep. Katsuki buzzed Izuku’s door and waited and hoped and needed.

A white-noise scratch of the intercom, and then his mate’s voice came through the speaker like a fucking dream, the hairs on the back of Katsuki’s neck rising to the sound, his muscles and bones aching like childhood growing pains, except Katsuki now realized adulthood carried growing pains of it’s own.

That was this hurt, wasn’t it? Growing pains. Knowing that made it a little easier to bear.

“Kat-Bakugou?” Izuku said, hesitant. Katsuki wanted to envelope him in his arms, bundle him in blankets, and bury his nose in Izuku’s hair, rub his cheek into those curls until he their scents were one, until his mate was him and he was his mate. “What’re you doing here?”

“Wanted to say sorry in person, don’t I?” Katsuki snapped. “You know I hate that teenager bullshit. Don’t take any balls to talk to someone through a screen, does it? I -” Katsuki kicked scuffed at the gravel and ice beneath his boot, chewed at the inside of his cheek. “I came to the store twice but it was that emo band reject inside and I wasn’t gonna bother.”

When Izuku didn’t reply, Katsuki clicked his teeth.

“Oiy. Are you even listening to me, dumbass! You gonna let me talk to you or what? I got shit to say.”

“Okay, okay!” Some shuffling in the background and Katsuki swore he heard the short eke of someone else speaking in the background. “I’m coming down.”

The intercom cut out and Katsuki was left scowling at the offending machine like it was the cause of all of his problems when it came to being on the other side of the door from Midoriya Izuku. When would he be able to simply walk in? When would Izuku start leaving the door open for him?

He wasn’t talking about this door.

Short minutes later, Izuku was standing in the entryway with snowboots loose and untied about his sagging sweatpants and a knitted afghan in burnt oranges and russet browns bundled around his frame up to that stubborn little chin. Izuku’s mouth with a small, tight pout of anxiety, his eyes large as he peered up at him in the meager glow of the porch light, his hair a riot of frizz. 

He was so very perfect and Katsuki wondered at what specific point he’d become the whipped Alpha he’d always considered with absolute distaste. From this end, it didn’t feel so bad, aside from the fact that he could wrap his Omega up and claim him like his every weeping nerve demanded.

“Shoulda worn a coat,” Katsuki said, instead of releasing maelstrom in his skull. 

“I felt rushed,” Izuku said, a similar storm darkening his telling eyes. “I’m sorry I can’t let you up. My cousin is visiting.”

“Cousin?” Katsuki’s nostrils flared, his head cocking just slightly as he watched Izuku avert his gaze and rock from one foot to the other. “You smell weird. Wait, is he an Omega, too?”

“Bad luck sticks together,” Izuku said with a wry, thin smile. 

“Bullshit. You got me and I’m plenty lucky.”

“Do I?”

Izuku said it so quickly that Katsuk nearly startled, taken aback by the heat in Izuku’s voice. He searched out Izuku’s eyes, but found him looking away again.

“Well, yeah,” Katsuki said, as if it were obvious. Because it was. “Look, ‘Zuku, I’m - all that shit was fucked up. What I did and said -”

“And what I did and said,” Izuku cut in, meeting his eyes now, that bedrock of strength emerging from the depths of his deep forest gaze. “We both fucked up, Bakugou. But just because we both did doesn’t mean we should still be together or - or if we should rethink why we -”

The tether of control snapped, a week’s worth of suffering stretched too thin as Katsuki enveloped Izuku in his arms, blanket and all, coddling Izuku to his chest with a low growling, Katsuki’s nose buried in the crown of Izuku’s hair. 

“I think that thinking has fucked us over enough, don’t you?” Katsuki murmured into Izuku’s curls, rubbed his cheek against their pillowed softness as he felt Izuku melt into his embrace, his scent rising up like heat waves off black summer asphalt and that first blessed, cooling rain. “I overthought how you’d react if I told you what was going on with me and it fucked us over. You overthought all the ways I’m gonna leave you. I know you are the way you are because you - I dunno, because you thought too little and followed your heart too much, but -”

Katsuki pulled back just enough, just enough for Izuku to take in his expression, hands come to rest on Izuku’s cheeks, one wrist lightly brushing at Izuku’s throat. Izuku’s lashes fluttered, dark wings in the dark night, but it filled Katsuki with light all the same. 

“But don’t you think,” Katsuki said quietly, terrified more than any villain or impending death hurtling toward him. “Don’t you think it’s time we stop thinking and just go all in for each other?”

“I -” Izuku’s eyes were indecipherable; new moons on starless skies, but Katsuki could read them all the same. The fear and doubt and the edge of hope that always seemed to infringe on Izuku’s heart even when seemed so desperate to turn himself away from it. “I’ve never been in a relationship where an Alpha didn’t hurt me. Mentally, physically…”

Katsuki palmed at Izuku’s face a little frantically, looking to soothe, to calm the tangy, copper panic that edged Izuku’s scent. His hands lowered, smoothing down Izuku’s throat, thumbs tracing the strong line of Izuku’s jaw, then back to dive into his curls anew.

“They didn’t always lie. One of them hurt me with the truth and gave me the pain I thought I deserved. The other one I couldn’t trust as far as I could throw him, but I did. I trusted him again and again and I forgive and forgot and I looked the other way more times than I can count before my naivety ended me in the hospital.”

“Trust isn’t naivety, freckles.” Katsuki waited until Izuku’s wet gaze found his own. “That’s the shit that makes you a good person. S’what makes them garbage.”

“I don’t even think they were garbage,” Izuku said quietly, his shoulders feeling suddenly small as he jerked them in a short, humorless laugh and sniffled, the tears unfalling but evident in his voice. “I think that’s what makes me the most fucked up. After all this time, I don’t even hate them. Because it still feels like my fault, sometimes. Like I deserved it, or I asked for it, or I should have seen it coming. And with you -” Izuku chewed on his bottom lip, already red raw and seemingly peeled of its first layer of chapped skin from previous worrying. “With you I thought, okay, I’m going to keep my eyes wide open.”

“And haven’t you?” Katsuki couldn’t help the jagged grit of his voice, the frustration and impatience biting through his tone as he held Izuku’s face in his hands and needed. “Haven’t you seen me, Midoriya Izuku? Haven’t you been looking? Because I’m looking at you back and I want what I see. I need what I see and fuck what everyone else thinks, I’ll damn well work for it. I’ll work for you. Forever, if I gotta. Where else’m I gonna go? I never wanted anyone else, not out of anyone I’ve ever met. Not even a spark. I’m not going anywhere. You can look at me all you damn well want but you’re gonna see the same thing every time.

“Me. Standing in front of you. And I’ll keep standing.”

Silence prevailed. Izuku stared, slightly slack-jawed, cheeks pink from either the cold or what was going on inside of him. Katsuki harrumphed in exasperation as he gave Izuku’s shoulders a little shake.

“Oiy, you still in there? I ain’t sayin’ all that shit again, like, ever. You gotta gimme a yes or no here, nerd. Stop thinkin’ so much.”

“Okay,” Izuku said, sounding winded and strained. “Okay. Kacchan, I -”

“What?”

Izuku’s eyes widened and Katsuki watched his nostrils flare, then his nose subtly scrunch as he likely caught no scent, his dark brows bowing in some kind of plaintive look before his fierce whisper cut through the bitter wind to arrow straight through him.

“I missed you so much.”

Katsuki’s faint whine of reply cut off as Izuku reached for him, cold hands curling around Katsuki’s fur hood to haul him in to take his mouth with a desperate, heady moan. 

And it was nothing like it had ever been before. Could have been the outpour of emotion or the floodgates of feral instinct rising up to clash at each other with tooth and tongue and claw - but the way Izuku’s scent and sounds settled into Katsuki’s bones was new, was down to that mark, was his mate. No final bite had sealed their relationship, but when Katsuki slid a hand beneath the blanket wrapped around Izuku and cupped the side of his throat, the scabbed indents remained, and so Katsuki’s scent also clung to and coursed through Izuku’s body, if only a touch of it.

Izuku shuddered with the pass of Katsuki’s palm over the bite, a languid, luscious noise riding from Izuku into Katsuki, their lips shifting, deepening, all deliriously wet and needy and now now now. A snarl flared from Katsuki’s chest, unbidden and fierce as he tore from the kiss to scrape his sharp canines along Izuku’s jawline to graze at the pulsing, fragrant bite. The high, welcoming whine calling from Izuku’s chest as he canted his chin for access was invitation enough for an Alpha.

Katsuki didn’t hesitate. Not now. No more thinking. Higher up Izuku’s throat, the bottom of the new bite overlapping the top of the original, Katsuki sunk his his teeth in lightly, a current of lightning rocketed through his nerves at the taste of blood. Marking Izuku was like sticking his tongue in a goddamn electrical socket and he didn’t care if it fried his brain to the core. He wanted more. 

A bright gasp and a heady, breathless laugh jolted from Izuku as Katsuki picked him up and slammed him against the front door of the apartment. The blanket came with, the patterned holes of the knitted afghan stretching as Izuku’s fingers tangled and pierced between the wool in his frantic attempt to bolt his arms around Katsuki’s neck and hold on. He had to be on his tiptoes now, his back riding high up the door, his throaty Omega calls mindless and dreamy and thick in the cold, cutting night. 

“Need you,” Katsuki muffled against Izuku’s scent-slick, blood-smeared bites before he lapped at the feverish skin there, hungry for more than this, more than Izuku could give on this stoop, messily wrapped in a blanket and moaning for him with lush slick rising up to tempt him.

“Yes,” Izuku turned his head, his voice dragging and his kisses frenetic and hot across Katsuki’s cheeks, nose, chin, ear, mouth. “Yes, yes - Kacchan - missed you, missed you - I need, I need -”

Katsuki captured Izuku's busy lips, licking into him hard and fast, thorough in fucking in that sinful mouth like he wanted to -

“Ohgodwait,” Izuku cried out, genuinely sounding near tears in torment as he pulled his mouth away just enough to speak. “Wait wait wait.”

Katsuki gripped Izuku’s chin hard, yanking him in for a firm, furious kiss. When they parted, he aimed a narrow gaze at his panting Omega to make sure he looked thoroughly kissed into oblivion. Izuku could barely blink, his apple cheeks biteable and smushed from Katsuki’s squeezed hold on his face, his lowered lashed like inky moons above the dapple of his freckles.

Katsuki wanted to swallow him whole.

“I hate waiting,” Katsuki hissed.

“I - hmmm.” Izuku inhaled deep, the deeper, his chest expanding against Katsuki’s, his face angling clumsily enough Katsuki’s palm to rub there like a contented cat basking in the sun. “Kacchan.”

The nickname still left him stunned and shaken with a completely unwelcome thickening through his pathetically desperate cock. Katsuki sure as hell hoped his body wouldn’t always react to the name this way. Problems would… arise, literally. 

Izuku peered up and him, his cheek pillowed on Katsuki’s war-scarred palm, his face both beautiful and handsome and odd in so many turns it left Katsuki’s head spinning every fucking time. So, maybe the nickname wasn’t going to be the long term problem. Izuku merely looking at him like this was enough to bring Katsuki very literally to his knees.

“Kick your cousin out,” Katsuki  drawled, deep and convincing as he leaned in to mouth at Izuku’s bottom lip, a scrape of teeth here, a faint, light lick there. “I can smell you dripping for me, ‘Zuku. Remember how good you opened for me that day?” Egged on by Izuku’s long shudder of breath and the way his nails bit into the nape of Katsuki’s neck, he nuzzled at Izuku’s cold little nose in turn, bit at that cupid’s bow top lip. “Don’t you wanna let me in? I’m a fast learner.”

“Oh my god.” Izuku pressed both hands to Katsuki’s chest, eyes wide and blinking hard now against the explosive lust emanating from him like a rocket ready to blast. “Holy - okay, no. Um. Fuck you, I can’t think.”

“You’re welcome.”

“I just - ugh. If he weren’t up there -”

“What makes him so special, hah?” Katsuki leaned his elbow against the door beside Izuku’s head and loomed in, his grin wide and sharp and cocksure. “Tell him to get a fuckin’ room. Hell, I’ll put him up in the best hotel he’s ever seen for the night.”

“No! Uh.” Izuku rubbed at his face and when he finally dropped his hands, he looked a little clearer and a lot more apologetic. “I can’t, I’m sorry. He’s only fifteen and, well - just trust me, okay? There will be other times. Better times.”

“No time like the present,” Katsuki murmured, leaning in further to lick a line up the unmarked side of Izuku’s throat. “Izuku.”

“Wh-when did you learn to talk like this?” Izuku said, his voice high and tight and nervous in a way that absolutely delighted the fuck out of Katsuki. He was so fun to tease. “I thought you were against, you know, words. Talking. Feelings.”

“Look in a mirror, freckles.” But Katsuki claimed Izuku’s mouth in one solid, lingering kiss before he stopped himself early and smirked down at Izuku’s renewed, glazed stare. “But alright. I trust you. We’ll finish this, and damn well soon.”

“Damn well soon,” Izuku mumbled, looking up at Katsuki like - well, hell, like Katsuki was his fucking Alpha. Katsuki’s chest swelled, the growing pains subsiding. “Really soon.”

Tearing himself from Izuku, Katsuki aimed one lingering look at him and pushed off the door. He stepped down on stair, his height lessened enough to bring them almost eye to eye. Izuku had his fingertips at his bottom lip, touching lightly at the swollen, red flesh as he watched Katsuki take the next step back and down.

“‘Night, nerd,” Katsuki said.

“Goodnight, handsome,” Izuku murmured, and didn’t that just make Katsuki smile all the way home.

Notes:

Thank you to everyone for your unfailing support in this story! I hope my words reach you in the way that you need them to reach you on any given day. There are thousands of people who read this story, which means even if you're reading this alone in your room and you have friends far or family who aren't close - your thoughts and experiences and pains resonate with thousands of other people, right here in this moment of reading. I wish you the best week!

Chapter 28

Summary:

Tonight, Izuku’s options had been severed, jagged and ugly.

Notes:

warnings for: sexual assault, abuse, blood.

The clear, crisp autumn night was an eerily calm backdrop to the double vision of two Jins standing in Izuku’s doorway, one of them holding his own blood in his hands and screaming. Blood poured from the gash cut straight down the center of Jin’s skull, his shirt front soaked, his open, wailing mouth a chasm of thick blood and drooling saliva. Izuku’s guts dropped like slop to his feet at the sight, every drop of frozen blood in his veins shrieking to shut the door.

He let them in.

“Jin!” Frantic, hands shaking, Izuku reached for him, eyes bugged out with horror as he scrambled for calm or logic or anything that would help him grab a slippery hold on the situation bleeding on his front step. “Come in, shit - what - get in here!”

“‘Zuku, Izuku,” Jin cried, voice thick with tears and copper as Izuku rushed him into the kitchen. “Help, I - fuck, I just wanted to get him out.”

Second Jin - whom Izuku had long started calling Twice, because he certainly wasn’t Izuku’s Jin, but some kind of doppelganger from Jin’s multiplying Quirk, unwittingly unleashed and thrust out of Jin’s body when he ‘forgot’ to take his medications. Second Jin followed, a cheerful green bottle sloshing half-empty linked in his bloodied fingers. He grinned, his handsome, bold features shadowed deep and unsettling in the half-light of the unlit kitchen cast in light from Izuku’s open bedroom door. 

“Good idea,” Twice said, running a tongue along clean white teeth as he watched Izuku duck Jin’s entire head right into the wide sink and turning on the faucet above his head. He couldn’t see past so much blood. “Drown him already. Pretty sure daddy already tried that on us once. He killed the wrong one, of course. Even you can’t tell the difference, can you, little Izuku.”

“Shut up, shut up, SHUT UP,” Jin screeched, coughing up blood and pink water while Izuku unearthed every towel from a kitchen drawer and moved to shut off the water. “You’re not me, you’re not me. Izuku!”

“I’m here.” Shit, Izuku’s voice was trembling almost worse than his hands as he came around to Jin’s side and fumbled to cup his cheek enough to turn Jin’s head and meet one frantic, beady eye. “I know who’s real, okay? I know, I know. I’m just gonna put some pressure on this, okay? Good - good, let’s just hold this here for a while.”

But the towel was already bleeding through. In the darkness, Izuku couldn’t get a look at the cleaned wound and he bit back a curse, gritted his teeth and forced himself into the calmest demeanor he could. His stomach churned, hot and noxious, and he swallowed a burp that tasted like vomit.

“Twice,” Izuku snapped. “Turn on the light.”

“I’m not Twice,” Twice drawled, pausing to take a languid glug from his bottle. “He’s Twice.”

“I said turn on the fucking light!” Izuku screeched, only inwardly thanking - or cursing - his shitty luck that his roommates were off at some Halloween party tonight and he’d decided to stay home. 

“You’re so sexy when you’re bossy, you know that?” Twice said as he finally followed instructions.

In the light, everything looked much worse. The spattered trail of blood from door to kitchen, the angry red cloth, soaked in JIn’s life, held entirely in Izuku’s shaking hands. 

“Twice,” Izuku said calmly, above the high, animalistic whimpers of Jin’s cries echoing within the sink. He carefully and quickly switched one blood-sodden towel to a clean one. “Go to my room. In my closet I have that stack of plastic drawers? The bottom one has a first aid kit. Bring it to me, please.”

“I’m not Twice, I’m not Twice,” Twice sing-songed, laughing hysterically as Jin began to retch and sob, his back heaving with panic and sorrow, white knuckles clenched on the ridge of the counter. “He’s Twice! That’s why I cut him open - to see what he was made of!”

“I cut me open, I cut me open to get you out!” Jin wailed, jerking with such sudden strength that Izuku stumbling back, his hold on the towel dropping, a new flow draining down the center of Jin’s frenetic face like a man torn into yin and yang.

The problem with Jin was that his yin and yang were almost indecipherable these days. Izuku had been lying when he said he knew the difference. He didn’t know a damn thing anymore. Izuku was a fucking failure.

“Hey!” Izuku jumped between Jin’s wild-eyed advance and Twice’s cocky approach, hands slapping on two strong, towering Alpha chests. “Stop, stop! Twice, just -”

“I’m not -”

“Jin.” Izuku met Twice’s grin with a scowl. “Jin, then, get the kit, pl -”

“You dumb fucking shit!” A fist lashed out and met Izuku’s cheekbone before he could even register the assault. “Don’t you call him that, you cheating little slut! You think just ‘cause we both fuck you that - that -”

Izuku caught a fist to the ear and Jin’s voice cut out into static and sharp, high ringing before he stumbled into the kitchen table and leaned over it with a breath punched from his lungs. Jin’s voice jolted back into focus from behind, hands riding up Izuku’s hips, a hot crotch against his.

“I’m yours - you’re mine, you’re mine, you’re mine -”

“You look pretty covered in my blood,” Twice said, and Izuku blinked back the haze of vertigo and nausea as he attempted to focus across the table he laid across, Jin’s groping hands going ignored as he spotted the stark white kit sitting neatly on the surface. “Smell good, too. Too bad this dumbfuck is ruining a good night. You should have drowned him.”

“Fuck you!” Jin spat, the full weight of his body pressed against Izuku’s, his cheek pressed to the Izuku’s cheek, blood dribbling from Jin’s brow into Izuku’s eyes. “He’s mine. You’re never havin’ him again. I’ll kill us both.”

“You wouldn’t kill me,” Twice said, same as if he were saying the sky was blue. 

“I didn’t mean you,” Jin hissed. One large, possessive hand rode up Izuku’s hip, snuck beneath his shirt where Izuku realized the wet he felt smearing across his ribcage had to be more blood. “I meant us.”

A slick ball of sick rolled around Izuku’s gut and he groaned, lurched back into Jin with his full energy. Jin protested but shuffled back, apologizing under his breath as Izuku stood, head hanging low between his shoulders, hands spread on the table as he blinked at them, searching for his balance. His jaw howled with pain, but the punch to the ear had fucked him up badly.

He needed to help. His partner needed him. Izuku couldn’t think about his own pain right now.

This wasn’t the first time Jin had lashed out at him out of fear and confusion, and it wouldn’t be the last. It was Izuku’s job to bear this and ease Jin into a safer frame of mind. They both knew he couldn’t do it on his own, especially off his medication, his Quirk gone haywire and split into Twice. This was ever the worst case scenario.

The last time had been so much easier. Izuku had found his body a useful distraction for his Alpha, a way to shy both Jin and Twice out of violence, their energy directed into the sexual, however rough it might end up. That was okay. Izuku had always liked it that way. And if seducing his boyfriend… boyfriends… into a calm state where he could later coax them back into one, well, he would use his body in the necessary ways.

Tonight, Izuku’s options had been severed, jagged and ugly.

“S-Stop.” Izuku’s tongue felt heavy and hot in his mouth, his saliva tart at the back of his throat as he pinched at his eyes with thumb and forefinger, working up his grit. “Just, ugh. Just sit down and let me see what we’re dealing with.”

“I don’t feel good,” Jin said, voice small and wavering, as if the imprint of his bones weren’t embedded into the flesh of Izuku’s jaw. He hiccuped and Izuku heard the screech of a chair on tile as he sat, a snotty sniffle catching in the air. “‘Zuku, I don’t feel good.”

“Oh my god,” Twice said, running a blood-stained palm down his face with an incredulous laugh. “Calm the fuck down. Act like your world is ending. Drink this, loser.”

Keeping his head low and his mouth shut in the way he’d long learned worked not to incite an unstable Alpha’s wrath, Izuku fumbled with the clasp of the first aid kit and finally popped it open. His fuzzy periphery caught the shadow of Twice moving to Jin, the slosh of a bottle as Twice murmured something in Jin’s ear that caused Jin to outright thank him and take a drink.

Izuku sighed and readied the all-too-familiar hook and thread. He’d performed stitches on himself more time than he cared to count. On Dabi, too. He’d been drunk or fucked up most times. In terms of what he knew he could accomplish with a needle, this would be a walk in the park.

Until he turned and assessed the true extent of the damage.

“Jin,” Izuku whispered fiercely, his eyes filling as he glimpsed the white flash of bone between two thin wedges of skin. Tools scattered across the table as Izuku struggled for peroxide and clean gauze to clean.

“Why,” Izuku murmured breathlessly, more to himself than anyone. “Why do you do this to yourself?”

“Why do you?” Twice said, standing in the doorway of Izuku’s bedroom, his expression drawn and tight now. It was when Twice went serious and thoughtful that Izuku just couldn’t tell who was who anymore. 

“Because I care about you,” Izuku said with a frown, wiping at Jin’s bloodied brow and sighing with exasperation when Jin only hiccuped a fresh sob and proceeded to tip his head and drink long from the bottle. “Both of you. All of you. I don’t think you’ve ever had a person properly care for you in your life.”

“And you have?” Twice again, such a broad, tall figure, imposing to most people until he opened his mouth with some kind of joke or nonsense, his smile both charming and a little wild. He’d always been so free with his words, so openly adoring of Izuku in the beginning. He’d been safe without being boring. 

But these days, Izuku was beginning to wonder at his definition of ‘safe’. He felt guilty for even considering that Twice - Jin, not Twice - might be detrimental to him. As if Jin would ever actually hurt him in a way that meant anything. Izuku had experienced so much worse. He could take a little misdirected aggression - he wasn’t a wussy Omega, after all. He had that prove.

Pointedly choosing to ignore Twice’s query, Izuku set his face stern, concentration sharpening his remaining senses as strung up the thin, hooked needle and ignored the way Jin rocked back and forth in his chair before him.

“We don’t have any numbing agent,” Izuku said, avoiding Jin’s plaintive, bloodshot eyes as he shifted and addressed the split curtain of flesh and the bone that peeked through. “You’re just going - Jin!” Izuku hissed as Jin tipped the whiskey over the top of his head and let it undoubtedly singe at the wound. “What the fuck - shit - just. Just don’t touch anything or move or -”

“Feels better now,” Jin slurred, grinning up at Izuku’s rising ire with sloppy lips smeared in red. Almost instantly, the smile wobbled and collapsed in on itself, eyes spilling over as he returned to a quiet, whimpering weep. “‘Zuku.”

“Stop,” Izuku bit off, dabbing at the drunken wound with more clean gauze and taking a step between Jin’s spread knees with needle in hand. “Just stop.”

It wasn’t until Izuku was halfway down the centerline of stitches that he realized the sound of crying wasn’t Jin alone, but himself included as his increasingly quivering fingers pierced into and pulled at loose flesh. The act itself wasn’t anything to him, so what was the damn problem with him? Izuku bit down on his wobbling bottom lip until the sting turned to a burn, the tears clinging to the line of his jaw, the tip of his nose as he pathetically blubbered through the remaining ordeal. 

“W-we n-n-need -” Izuku cleared his wet throat as he tied off the final stitch and clipped it with a small pair of scissors. What he now recognized as shock continued to swarm through his senses, stinging at his nerves and clattering his teeth. When Twice could only laugh at Izuku dropping a roll of gauze to the floor, Izuku didn’t have it in him to glare or stand up for himself at all. 

It was standing itself that grew more difficult by the moment, a numb, hollow grip climbing up Izuku’s legs as he began to waver in place, his fingers fumbling to place a protective bandage over the long row of stitches. 

“It’s done,” Izuku whispered, and gasped when Jin, dead silent, thrust himself forward and wrapped his arms around Izuku’s waist, the side of his face pressed to the copper and whiskey soaked front of Izuku’s oversized sleepshirt. Izuku sighed, gingerly placing one hand atop Jin’s damp hair as he met Twice’s amused gaze from the doorway of his bedroom. “It’ll be okay.”

Something flickered in Twice’s eyes, his superfine white-blonde brows bowing inward, like a strong rockface on the verge of crumbling from a lifetime of erosion and harsh environment. 

“You never smell afraid of me,” was all he said, quietly, almost reverently. The voice he always used for decreeing his undying love for Izuku, then asking what it would take to prove it. I love you, I love you - why won’t you believe it, baby? Lemme steal a car for you. Spray paint it at the top of Tokyo Tower. I’ll carve it into my chest with a knife. Wanna see me bleed for you? I love you, baby, I love you. “Why aren’t you afraid of me? I’m a piece of shit, baby. One of me shouldn’t exist in this world, let alone two or three or twenty-three.”

“Don’t say that,” Izuku said without much convincation. He’d drained out, like so much blood and booze on the floor as he idly pet Jin’s head, still nestled so close to his roiling guts, breathing Izuku’s scent in a shuddering sighs. “You’ve brought so much to my world and to others’. You got out of that shitty life and you’re here now. In school, a teacher’s aid, on medication -” Izuku paused pointedly at the last one because they both knew he wouldn’t have had a haywire Quirk incident if he’d been honorable with his meds. “And you have me, don’t you? I want you to exist.”

Twice only looked at him, handsome face gone grey and desolate and bleak with the night’s events and emotions. 

“You’re a sweet kid. I love you, you know that? You do good like nobody else in this fuckin’ town. Not even them good for nothin’ heroes. You don’t put the baddies in the slammer - you actually wanna help them.”

“You’re not a bad guy,” Izuku murmured, gaze cast low to the ground. “And I’m nothing special. We both know that.”

“Hey!” Jin peered up, glassy eyes and swollen pupils wide as he twisted his face in a mask of disgust. “Don’t say that shit about yourself. Don’t say that shit.”

“Baby Omega needs some love and attention,” Twice said, suddenly behind him, hands riding up Izuku’s back to grip and knead at his shoulders, hot breath at his ear as Jin hugged him tight enough to constrict his breathing. “Ditch this guy and I’ll give you a real nice thank you, yeah?”

“What?” Distracted with prying Jin off as delicately as he could, Izuku turned his head, nose scrunched on an instinctive snarl at being crowded. Twice was right there, looming over his shoulder, gunmetal grey eyes wide and a little manic, his smile tipping over the edges of his face. “Twice, what -”

“My blood’s all over your face, baby.” Grinning, Twice reached around and gripped Izuku’s still smarting jaw and forced his face further around, the cords in Izuku’s neck bulging against the strain. Frozen between the creeping horror of the situation and the numbness of shock overtaking his lagging brain, Izuku eked out a small, high noise of submission as his Alpha licked long, wet tongue strokes over his cheekbone, his one closed eye, the bridge of his nose. “So dirty for me, aren’t you? Alpha will clean you up.”

“I’ll help,” Jin said, voice gone dark from Izuku’s stomach. 

“Wait -”

Izuku had no time to protest before Jin stood, attention focussed on the Twice’s arm now snug against his neck and jugular. WIthout a word, Jin took hold of the collar of Izuku’s t-shirt and tore it in two, right down the center.

It was when Jin looked up, eyes flat and hooded with a number of darknesses Izuku couldn’t begin to wade through no matter how many times he tried, and smiled with nothing behind the eyes, that a true chill of terror tore up his spine and slashed through the haze.

“Jin.” Izuku tore his chin from Twice’s hot fingers, but gagged when he tried to break free from the muscular arm keeping him in a chokehold. Eyes bulging, Izuku’s hands clamped around Twice’s arm, nails digging in with purpose as he felt his head swim and his feet kick at the realization that he was being lifted ever so slightly from the ground. “Jin - Jin!”

“Oh.” Jin blinked, following in tow as Twice chuckled and walked backward, dragging Izuku toward the bedroom in a headlock, Izuku’s heels kicking out and catching a kitchen chair, the crash only giving Jin a moment’s pause as he looked between the chair to Izuku’s paling face. “Oh. You’re really scared this time? Baby, no, baby, we just wanna -”

“Thank you,” Twice completed his own sentence, allowing Izuku’s bare feet to meet the floor once they’d entered the room. Jin shut the door behind them and turned out the lights, a lonely amber glow cast from the bedroom window across the messy sheets.

But they didn’t go to the bed. Didn’t go anywhere but closer together, the three of them, the two of them, caught in a deadly ouroboros of one needing the other who needed the other and the other. Twice could never be without Izuku, who couldn’t be without Jin, who couldn’t be without Twice. Or was that the other way around? Inside out? Izuku was having a hard time breathing. 

“We just wanna thank you, baby,” one of them said.

Despite standing on his own two feet, Izuku’s back was forced flush against Twice’s rock hard chest, that arm unyielding below his chin, Izuku’s sweat-panicked skin revealed by his ripped shirt pressed against Jin’s absolutely blood-sodden clothes.

“Stop,” Izuku wheezed, and his nails had to be drawing blood in Twice’s forearm, but still he didn’t let up. Caged between two Alphas, his Alpha, the air oppressive and heavy and laden with blood like never before, Izuku knew, deep down, this Omega body carried no chance of escape. Izuku was nothing. Tears spilled over Izuku’s eyes as he met Jin’s distracted, lustful ones. “Please! Jin, st-”

“Look at me when you’re talking to me!” 

Streaks of stars and shadow shrieked past Izuku’s bursting vision when Twice fisted his hand into Izuku’s curls and catapulted him forward with such strength that Izuku couldn’t catch himself in time. He heard the hollow crack of his forehead colliding with the wall more than felt it, but as he toppled to the floor, the sickening crunch of the crown of his head catching on the frame of his bed hurtled past any previous context of pain.

A wave of sick washed over him like something hot and sticky, or maybe it was the fresh, wet heat flooding into his eyes as Izuku groaned and sucked in shallow breaths, lungs screaming for air in time with a heart frantic to escape the tightening cage of his ribs. The crushing weight of panic broke the strength from Izuku’s arms as he attempted to lift from the floor and -

No, it was the weight of another body above his that kept him down.

“You hurt him!” Jin screeched, dropping to his knees beside Izuku’s face, jeans staining through with new blood. “You hurt him, you -”

“He’s my Omega,” Twice snapped, his thigh wedged between Izuku’s, the hot iron length of his frame clamped around Izuku’s back like a trap, nose nuzzling at the clammy nape of Izuku’s neck, teeth skimming over the prickled, shock-iced fleshed as he spoke. “He’s my Omega and he should know you’re not us, you don’t deserve our name, you fucking coward. You’re the worst of me, the loser who cries in the corner over a fucking papercut.”

“You sliced my fuckin’ face open!” Jin screamed, shoving at Twice until they both went rolling, right over Izuku’s prone, bleeding-out body, two Alphas caught in a spitting, scratching fight for dominance. 

“You did that, dumbfuck!”

Someone’s foot knocked against Izuku’s temple, and his upending, blackening world reeled, his guts wrenching and spewing across the floor in acid and bile. Izuku sobbed, gagging as he slapped two hands to the floor and attempted to crawl away from the brawl and his own vomit. He had to get away, get help, escape, but the already dark room was closing in on him, and the path from here to the front door felt like an abyssal labyrinth.

Heavy grunts and snarls sounded at Izuku’s back as he willed his knees to meet the floor, to get on all fours and go.

“Don’t leave!” Jin or Twice said, and even in his half-conscious state, Izuku felt shame as he heard his own pathetic wail, his sob and cry and the sound of his nails scraping across the floor as a giant hand gripped his ankle and dragged. “Don’t leave, baby, I love you -”

“I love y-”

“I love you! I just wanna -”

“-make you happy, but it’s like -”

“You won’t let me! You dumb fuckin’ Omega, why won’t you let me show you!”

And they did. He did. He - they.

They showed Izuku exactly how they felt, in the dark, in a pool of Izuku’s own blood, his shirt ripped and soaked in the putrid waste of this, the night that Izuku’s life tore into two - the Izuku before and the Izuku after.

They took their turns in loving him, four hands filling and fumbling everywhere they didn’t belong, and it was okay, it was okay because they needed him to feel how they felt, and they couldn’t very well enjoy it while Izuku sobbed, and they couldn’t fucking appreciate it when Izuku went limp and unfeeling between one Alpha and another, his Omega body betraying him time and again, giving it up and open and wide and slick, another piece of Izuku seeping from his body, and Izuku would take the blood any day over the way his body fucking asked for this like he deserved it the whole fucking time.

He’d used this body so many times before for this purpose, hadn’t he? To save himself from a beating, to distract Twice or Jin or, hell, to get Dabi to distract him. With Jin, with Dabi, with those in between the two, Izuku’s body had opened until it was just a fucking hole, a black hole that sucked in pain and anger and abandonment and jealousy and need and the nothingness that finally, finally arrived in the height of pain to take it all away.

In the hollow in the back of his head where the blood had let was a chamber where Izuku could sit and see everything, like a movie or a play of a life utterly abandoned to base instinct and that chase of the next distraction, the next dick, the next drama to keep his head turned away from a world who hated him no matter how he achieved or failed.

It was clear now - the world was utterly indifferent to him. The knowledge was somehow freeing, or maybe that was simply Izuku finally floating away from his treacherous body.

“He’s barely breathing,” Twice whispered from far away.

“Oh, shut up,” Twice said. “You’re so fuckin’ dramatic. It’s just a little blood. We always get back up in the end.”

“But he’s not we and -”

“He is we, he’s ours, and we would never let him die, would I? We’re not a bad guy! We’re the good guys, here, man. What’s the matter with you?”

“Maybe we should call an ambulance or -”

“Don’t be stupid. He just needs some sleep. Look, he’s already nodding off. Hey, what’s -”

Izuku’s limbs no longer functioned, his eyelids unable to even twitch as dulled shock sparked briefly in the back of his hollow head with the wet crunch of hard objects against even harder objects. The body that dropped beside him gaped upon landing, one eye popped from the socket, the side of his face crushed and gushing out vitriol between them. 

Feeling nothing at all, Izuku watched Twice inhale one, weak gurgle, a wash of blood bubbling from his lips before he just -

Stopped.

Izuku blinked. Twice didn’t blink back.

“I’m - I’m gonna call an ambulance,” Twice said, boots stepping over Izuku’s head, blood sticking and squeaking the soles to the floor as he opened the door and walked away, a flood of kitchen light illuminating Twice’s silently screaming corpse. 

Izuku sighed and, for the first time in his life, hoped he didn’t wake up tomorrow.

And so he slept.

Chapter 29

Summary:

March gusted into Katsuki’s life in brisk winds and the promise of fresh, purifying rain instead of slush-clogged streets and vicious ice. If that wasn’t a sign of the times, Katsuki didn’t know what was.

Notes:

Here, have a happy chapter, lol! Wonderful things are coming to my patient readers! I love you all and thank you for getting through this journey with me!

A reminder that I have a Quiet Rapture Spotify Playlist.
I also have a BakuDeku Playlist.
I also have a Twitter.
AND a CuriousCat and Carrd

March gusted into Katsuki’s life in brisk winds and the promise of fresh, purifying rain instead of slush-clogged streets and vicious ice. If that wasn’t a sign of the times, Katsuki didn’t know what was.

His was kicking ass at work, Camie had tamed back into normalcy, and - and - he had a boyfriend. The word itself actually gave Katsuki the creeps - it was too much like teen bullshit for what he and Izuku were. Partners. Someone to talk to in earnest, someone who was authentic with him and didn’t take his shit, even when he didn’t know he was giving out shit in the first place. 

Izuku was the fresh air, the sun behind the clouds, the cleansing rains that cooled Katsuki’s temper and soothed his own previously scathing opinions toward relationships. Izuku was March, April, May, and June wrapped in one tight little package, his scent bursting and bright and utterly bewitching. 

Long, black peacoat unbuttoned and opened wide to the nipping wind, Katsuki approached the windows of Parchment and paused to eye the display window from behind dark sunglasses. The display with bountiful with greens and a forest motif, most of the books in similar colors and themes.

Katsuki wondered how long it took Izuku to choose what went there. It probably came naturally. Izuku’s brain was like some vast, towering tree, wild splays and spans of branches and roots in every direction, all of them budding with new ideas and thought processes. Katsuki was like a rocket - he only thought in a singular direction, hurtling toward it with blinding intensity. In turn, Izuku was steady and thoughtful and strange. He made Katsuki think in new ways.

Izuku had also been, for lack of a better word, odd. In Katsuki’s eyes, the guy was always fucking weird, but being generally weird as a person and then having odd behavior were two entirely different things. So, while the two of them were regularly talking on the phone and Katsuki was able to come around to the shop to renew his mating bites on Izuku’s neck - only to get a little more than carried away - Izuku always shoved him off and said, later, later. 

Which, fine. Not the worst thing in the world. Katsuki wasn’t going to drop dead if he didn’t get that dick in his mouth tomorrow or whatever. He wouldn’t even know what to do with it if he did, but he’d had plenty - plenty - of time to think on it. Living an entire life being generally uninterested in sex, relationships, or even receiving a blow job did shit to a guy when all of a sudden even nerve and instinct in his body lit up from one singular person on this planet.

Okay, everything wasn’t entirely fine. Katsuki was practically chewing on his arm when he was home alone, so desperate was he for a longer taste from Izuku, more of that powerfully strong body wrapped around him, a deeper connection to those clever fingers and cleverer mouth. 

Scratch that. Katsuki was dying.

And Izuku… was being odd. Not evasive, but he was no longer letting Katsuki up to his place when Katsuki managed to walk him home during the last two weeks. He insisted that Katsuki call the shop before he drop by, so Izuku could confirm if he was busy or not. And Izuku hadn’t stepped foot in Katsuki’s apartment again - not since that night in the kitchen. 

They both had opposing work schedules, of course. Katsuki was all over the place with shift work, his sleep schedule both very necessary to perform and peak, while also a huge hassle when he just wanted to bury his face in his mate’s neck and live there. Izuku was a solid seven days a week, from nine to nine or, when Chisaki would open for him as a favor - why the hell was he still working there when he was notoriously fucking yakuza, Katsuki couldn’t begin to guess - Izuku was a noon to nine.

Either way, Katsuki’s only day off was a Sunday, and Izuku closed early on those days. In the two weeks since their reconciliation, they’d shared one Sunday evening together, having dinner and dropping in a sale at a camping store, where Katsuki proceeded to buy way too much stuff in preparation for a future camping trip he judiciously informed Izuku they would one day go on. 

Izuku had put up the weakest fucking fight off his life and only rolled his eyes with a secret smile as Katsuki rung up the purchases. Katsuki’s heart had soared. 

Sunday aside, Katsuki had made do with dropping in before or after work, distracting Izuku during lulls by pressing him into the books and painting worlds of promises with fingers and palms beneath those warm, welcoming layers Izuku always wore.  Drinking in Izuku’s pants of breath that tasted of the minty peach tea he’d been savoring on these fledgling spring days, dipping his fingertips into the lush pool of soft curls, supping himself on Izuku’s early morning fog scent.

Squinting through the window, Katsuki frowned and cupped his hands around his eyes, pushing his brow against the glass as he caught sight of a stiff-shouldered Izuku talking on the phone with his back turned. He didn’t need to turn around for Katsuki to see the tension coiled in his frame, no doubt written plan as day across his face. One hand moved as he spoke - quick jolts of movement, anxiety snapping from his limbs.

Izuku turned and, sure enough, his expression was taut and stiff with stress, one hand holding the phone to his ear while the other hugged at his own waist. Katsuki couldn’t make out what he was saying, but his hackles were rising by the second just watching this interaction. Without a second thought, he walked in, shoving his glasses up into the spiky disarray of his hair as he went.

“- not going to see that doctor again,” Izuku said, peering over his shoulder with a frown as he spoke. “He’s not a specialist or - oh!” 

Izuku’s suddenly surprised and delighted smile was as warm as the soft gold lighting illuminating his shop. He was so like his little store - warm, welcoming, yet layered in mystery and lore. 

“Mom, I’ve got to - yes.” Izuku rolled his eyes as he approached Katsuki with bright, vibrant intent in his eyes. Before Katsuki could even remove his coat, a large palm curved around the nape of Katsuki’s neck and drew him in for kiss. “Mmhmm,” Izuku murmured, still on the phone with his mother, his fingers threading through Katsuki’s hair, scent rising to him like a new sun. “Yes, alright, I’ll make an appointment. I’ve got to - yes, I’ve got to go, Mom. I’ve -”

Katsuki grinned against Izuku’s temple, shifted to brush his lips around the shell of Izuku’s pale ear. 

“I’ve gotta go,” Izuku sputtered, laughing and shying away from Katsuki’s mouth. “Bye!”

“What doctor aren’t you seeing again?” Katsuki plucked the phone from Izuku’s hand and made an unimpressed face at it before he slipped it into the pocket of his jacket without thought or intent but for getting it out of the way.

“Eh, nothing important.” Izuku was busy linking his arms around Katsuki’s neck, leaning into him with an easy smile, eyes searching Katsuki’s with an adoration that constantly took Katsuki’s breath away. He’d been adored be hundreds, thousands of citizens across the country. The fanmail was a constantly waterfall. People had cried against his chest in thanks, hugged him until someone else needed to pull them off, hell - many had even offered their bodies to him.

But there was nothing like Izuku looking at him. Nothing like a person knowing you inside and out, the shiny parts and the shitty parts, and the shitty parts you tried so hard to make shine enough to fool everyone else. Izuku looked and saw, he saw and he accepted. So when he looked at Katsuki like he hung the moon - that was a feeling unlike any other. 

“I wasn’t expecting you,” Izuku said, his one dimple winking with his wide smile as he nipped the sunglasses from Katsuki’s head and placed them on his own face. His nose was too short for them, really, and the lenses too large for the shape of his face. “Do I look famous now? Am I handsome and mysterious?”

“I’m not mysterious,” Katsuki said, eyebrow raised, his smile unbidden.

“I don’t know.” Izuku left the sunglasses on as he went to his toes to place a kiss that lingered just a little too long. He sounded a little thin and breathless when they broke. “There’s plenty I don’t understand about you.”

“Well,” Katsuki murmured, wrapping an arm around Izuku’s waist and tugging him in tight. Izuku gripped Katsuki’s biceps, the tip of his tongue touching the bow of his top lip. “That’s your problem. Now shut up and come here.”

“We’re at the front door,” Izuku mumbled, voice gone husky. “Paparazzi still come around, sometimes.”

Fiercely intent on Izuku’s face, Katsuki plucked the sunglasses away. It should be a crime to let him hide those eyes.

“Let ‘em.”

“Kat-”

“Better yet.” Katsuki nuzzled at the collar of Izuku’s soft, flannel shirt, nudging away the misty grey plaid to mouth at the purpling halo bite just shy of Izuku’s swelling, fragrant gland. Izuku bodily shivered down to his toes, his fingertips digging into Katsuki’s arms like a lifeline as he keened and cocked his head to allow access. “Close early. I wanted to take you out.”

“Mmh- wait.” Izuku shook his head, blinking up at Katsuki with a mossy haze in his gaze. “Early? Out? I-I can’t just close for no reason.”

“I’m the best reason for anything ever.”

Izuku huffed a laugh and seemed to take a steadying step away, an action to which Katsuki was growing accustomed as something Izuku needed in order to think clearly around him. Frustrating as it was, in it’s own way it was a compliment - scent or not, Izuku couldn’t think clearly around Katsuki. The Alpha in him puffed his chest out and preened.

“Be that as it may,” Izuku said carefully, gaze flicking away as he rubbed at his own arm. “I’m not great to go out with. I don’t eat much of anything and I stink enough that people give me problems and -”

“Oiy, dumbass. Look at me.” Hands on his hips, Katsuki craned his body to the side, tipping until he could catch Izuku’s avoidant gaze. “Look at me. D’you seriously think anybody’s gonna give you shit when I’m standing next to you? Are you fuckin’ for real, here?”

Izuku flicked a look away, then back, his mouth twisted up as he swallowed and cleared his throat.

“I mean, I guess Alphas don’t really approach me now that I smell more like you. Or, uh, us. It’s rare, like when we don’t see each other for a couple of days in a row.”

“And you could kick their ass even if they did,” Katsuki said pointedly, proud of his strong, loyal Omega. “So, what’s the problem here? Stop makin’ excuses for your life and start living it.”

Both arms wrapped around his middle, Izuku glanced around the quiet shop for a moment. He sighed, shoulders sagging.

“Alright.”

“That’s what I thought,” Katsuki said with a grin, hands still on his hips as he puffed out his wide chest with victory. “Now lock the fuck up.”

“Bossy,” Izuku mumbled under his breath, but the curve of his lips told a different story from his side profile as he unearthed the keys from his pocket, locked the door, and turned the sign to closed. “You planned this all along, didn’t you? Seduce me and take me away.”

“I ain’t a meathead, y’know.” Katsuki came up behind Izuku, arms locking around his waist, and plucked Izuku from the ground to spin and turn him. “Now go get your coat and shit. We got shit to do.”

“Bossy!” Izuku hollered as he stomped away with a laugh. 

“I just know how to get what I want,” Katsuki said, trailing behind and pausing at a small round table of oddly titled self-help books. Do Your Laundry Or You’ll Die Alone. How To Weep In Public: Feeble Offerings on Depression From One Who Knows. How Not To Be A Dick. Get Your Sh*t Together.

Lips quirked, Katsuki picked up The Subtle Art of Not Giving A F*ck and idly flipped through the pages as he waited for Izuku to gear up. When he heard Izuku’s approach from the office, Katsuki read aloud with the usual perfection diction he normally chucked out the window, humor clear in his voice.

“If you think about a young child trying to learn to walk, that child will fall down and hurt itself hundreds of times. But at no point does that child ever stop and think, ‘Oh, I guess walking just isn’t for me. I’m not good at it.’ Avoiding failure is something we learn at some later point in life.

“At some point, most of us reach a place where we’re afraid to fail, where we instinctively avoid failure and stick only to what is placed in front of us or only what we’re already good at. This confines us and stifles us. We can be truly successful only at something we’re willing to fail at. If we’re unwilling to fail, then we’re unwilling to succeed.

“A lot of this fear of failure comes from having chosen shitty values. For instance, if I measure myself by the standard: make everyone I meet like me, I will be anxious, because failure is one-hundred percent defined by the actions of others, not by my own actions. I am not in control; thus my self-worth is at the mercy of judgments by others.

“Whereas if I instead adopt the metric: improve my social life, I can live up to my value of ‘good relations with others’ regardless of how other people respond to me. My self-worth is based on my own behaviors and happiness.”

Katsuki shut the book with finality and placed it back in its upright display holder. 

“What,” Izuku asked, shifting away to his side and pulling on a soft knit hat in mottled greys and mossy greens. “No clever reply to that?”

“Nope.” Katsuki tugged the hat over Izuku’s eyes and grinned at Izuku’s sputtering. “Seems pretty fuckin’ sound to me.”

“You’d be a terrifying therapist,” Izuku said, rearranging his hat with a scrunched little nose. He was so very pale from the winter that his freckles were stark amber speckles, and Katsuki wondered if he tanned or just burned. So much he didn’t yet know about this man. 

“Lemme guess.” Katsuki followed Izuku out the back door, into an alley full of puddles, and watched Izuku lock that door as well. “Your therapist is all sweet and sappy and shit.”

“She’s not, actually. Lead the way,” Izuku added, gesturing to either end of the alley. Katsuki took his hand and began to walk. “She listens, but she also challenges me a lot. She’s not passive, you know? She wants me to break out of a cycle and the only way you can break out of repeated actions is to throw a wrench into them. If talking and listening automatically fixed people, we’d all be perfect specimens of mental health. Listening is nice, but it doesn’t fix you.”

“Guess so,” Katsuki conceded, wrapping his arm around Izuku’s shoulders and yanking him in on instinct as he smelled some approaching Alpha scent. “And you like that? Being challenged.”

“I think I always have. I’m with you, aren’t I?”

Katsuki glanced down and caught Izuku looking away. He smirked.

“I’m the challenge in this relationship?”

“You have no idea.”

Izuku didn’t speak with malice, but the tired tinge in his voice had Katsuki frowning as they swerved to avoid a giant puddle in the misshapen slope of the sidewalk slabs. 

“If you don’t like it -”

“Then I can leave?” Izuku said, sliding a knowing look up to him. Though he didn’t shift form Katsuki’s hold on his shoulders, the distance was in his face. 

“No.” Katsuki scowled. “Fuck, man. Someone really did a number on you. I was gonna say, if you don’t like it, then damn well say so. I can’t change who I am and I don’t wanna, but I ain’t here to make you miserable either. I sure as hell tell you when I got a problem with you, don’t I?”

“I - yes.” Izuku a little confused and a lot helpless, like what Katsuki was saying didn’t entirely process. “Yes, I mean, you do. It’s very nice.”

“Christ, I’m gonna puke.” With an eye roll, Katsuki firmed his arm around the back of Izuku’s neck and purposely slowed his stride to keep with Izuku’s. “Tell me more about this therapist of yours. S’that the doctor your mom wants you to see?”

“What, no,” Izuku said quickly, his shoulders stiffening. “That’s - that’s just for my general health. I haven’t been seen in a couple years and she’s always at me about it.”

“Your -” condition. Katsuki bit off the question. He wanted to tear through the layers Izuku seemed to fond of wearing around him, both physically and emotionally, but that kind of assault just wasn’t the lasting impression he wanted to make here. “You’re not sick or nothin’?”

“I’m fine,” Izuku stressed, sounding enough like a teenager that Katsuki bit back a smirk.

“Alright, nerd, I got you. Your mom and I just care or whatever. Though I didn’t like how she talked like you were delicate or whatever just for bein’ Omega. It’s like she didn’t even know you now.”

“I don’t visit a lot.” Izuku sounded sheepish. “I love her, but the older I get the harder it is to talk to her about anything that’s important. I guess we grew up in different eras of Omega rights and mindsets. Not that the changes have been very notable, but there are more of us who make a difference in the world than not. We’re not useless.”

“No shit. Ain’t met a normie who was less useless than you.”

“Normie?” Izuku looked up at him with a perplexed smile. “Is that how you think of us non-heroes, Ground Zero-sama?”

“Fuck off.” But Katsuki was laughing as he yanked the hat over Izuku’s eyes once more and watched those curls fluff and fray out in wild array as Izuku struggled to fix it. “You’re way too much a smartass for your own good.”

“Don’t I know it,” Izuku said, that one dimple popping in and out as he spoke with a smile. “It’s gotten me into trouble more times than I can count.”

“I only know one good way to shut that mouth up, but I ain’t gonna do it now.”

“That’s a relief,” Izuku said tightly. “Uh. Where are we going, anyway? I hate all these surprises - they make me anxious.”

“You love them.”

“I don’t!”

“Shut up and lemme take care of you, already. I never see your stupid smiley, suspicious face.”

“I can’t be both smiley and suspicious.”

“You’re one of a kind like that.”

Izuku only huffed a laugh and shook his head, linked his fingers with Katsuki’s, and let him take the lead.

“A cat cafe,” Katsuki said, eventually. Izuku’s expression had begun to smooth out to one of idle thought, his plush lips carrying a faint curve, his cheeks rosy despite the overcast day. He appeared content, relaxed. “We’re going to a cat cafe.”

Izuku’s head whipped around almost unnervingly fast, his eyes like sparkling saucers as he burst into a full smile that had Katsuki physically startling back just enough to have his own cheeks coloring in surprise. 

“Wh- a cat cafe! A real cat cafe?”

“No, all the cats are fake. Stuffed animals. Yeah, obviously a real damn cafe. What, you’ve never been to one?”

“Have you?” Izuku asked, still dazzled and excitable as he was on their other date. 

“Nah, but this one’s been around forever and I know people who’ve been. Figured you’re one of those weird book and cat nerds and whatever.”

“Hey, don’t be so disparaging. You’re dating a book and cat nerd.”

“Don’t see me complainin’ none.”

“Fifteen minutes ago you implied I was the more difficult one in this relationship!”

“That’s not complaining, that’s just a fact,” Katsuki said, cackling and then even louder when Izuku punched his arm with a scoff.

In good spirits, they walked hand in hand toward their destination. And, true to Katsuki’s assurance, he noted not a single bystander gave Izuku anything but the quickest of looks. Despite the lack of a specific mating bite, Katsuki’s scent was absolutely steeped in Izuku’s skin, a smoky overcast soaking in and partially overwhelming Izuku’s summer lake scent.

“Wow,” Izuku said with an awed air, and Katsuki followed his line of site to an athletics storefront, the entire window dressing dedicated to Ground Zero sports merchandise.

That trademark orange X of his brandished most of the products, the entire branch of clothing sleek and styled in black, green, orange, and shocks of gold detailing. Katsuki had kept his hands deep in that particular project when the offer had arrived at his door. He wasn’t about to let assholes walk around looking like shit in his clothes.

Katsuki only grunted in reply, continuing to walk by and dragging on Izuku’s hand to keep him from lingering. Once again, it felt different to have Izuku admiring something on which he’d worked hard. Like Izuku’s opinion mattered in a world of people about which he couldn’t give less shit. Izuku was important and his opinions of him were, frighteningly, just as important, too. 

“I guess I’m so used to seeing that kind of stuff around that I don’t think about it,” Izuku mused allowed, more of a mumble to himself. “Everything in this country - no, the world - is so entrenched in the importance of heroes that it’s everything to us. Our clothes, food, laundry detergent commercials, television shows -”

“Don’t get me started on Mina and Denki’s reality show,” Katsuki said with a groan, shaking his head as they paused at a crosswalk. 

“Oh my gosh, of course!” Izuku snorted a laugh, his fingers squeezing Katsuki’s. “I forgot all about that. It was the first one like it, wasn’t it? Right out of graduation, right? I don’t remember you being in it, though. Not that I, uh, watched it or anything.”

“Liar. Shinsou was damn well in it enough at Mina’s side, and you’re one of those unnecessarily supportive friend types who probably watched every stupid second.”

“Maybe.”

“And I was in it,” Katsuki mumbled, his cheeks heating with ire and definitely not embarrassment. “Just once, because they damn well didn’t tell me they were filming on purpose. It was -”

“Holy shit, I remember!” Izuku’s arm wrapped around Katsuki’s, linking them close as Izuku leaned into him, his shoulders shaking with repressed laughter. “Holy - oh my god, how could I forget? It was, what, someone’s birthday -”

“Mina’s -”

“And you got there late -”

“I was only drunk when I arrived because I ended up in the fuckin’ hospital that night.”

“Right, your arm was in a cast.”

“And the doc had given me pain meds and everyone was blowing up my phone, guilting the shit outta me for not showing up or whatever. A broken arm’s jack shit in hero work - ain’t no time off for that stuff. So Todoroki says he’ll come pick me up because he was running late, too, but get this - he shows up with Hawks -”

“Nothing good ever starts or ends with Hawks showing up -”

“Because Todoroki can’t fuckin’ drive, I fuckin’ forgot he’s a lazy bastard like that. So Hawks is drivin’ because fuck knows why, and he gives me this - this - okay, I just wanted the pain to shut up and he said he had this moonshine he’d been trying his hand at brewing -”

“Oh my god, please don’t tell me -”

“So I fuckin’ drank it like the stupid ass nineteen year old I was -”

“You were absolutely obliterated at the party!” Izuku’s glee was evident all over his face and voice and the way he bounced on the balls of his feet as they walked. “I feel like you were barely in it, though -”

“My PR team had a field day negotiating the scene cuts. I was the rising star of goddamn Japan, for fuck’s sake and -”

“You did a running, one-handed round-off into -”

“Into a barbecue grill, yeah, you don’t need to remind me. ‘S the only burn mark I’ve got, ‘cause my immune system was all struggling and whatever.”

“I’m -” Izuku pressed his lips shut tightly, eyes welling over and shining with amusement as he took a deep breath and obviously attempted to hold back his laughter. Katsuki wished he wouldn’t. “I’m absolutely impressed by this story. My opinion of you has raised considerably. Even you might have a little bad boy in there.”

“Shut up,” was all Katsuki found to say, digging through his pocket and slipping on his sunglasses. “How the hell d’you know Hawks anyway?”

“Eh.” Izuku shrugged, just like he always seemed to when it came to his bizarre relationship with heroes. As far as Katsuki knew, Izuku had idolized the lot of them as a child. Maybe being friends with Shinsou for so long, paired with Chisaki’s scornful influence, had sawed off the edge of wonder. “You know him and Endeavor -”

“That’s not public knowledge, y’know.”

“It’s not like I’m attaching their ten year affair onto a banner and a plane to fly through the city.”

“Would love to see Endeavor’s face if you did, though.”

“That’s one encounter I wouldn’t want to have. Me and the Todoroki family need to keep a healthy distance,” Izuku said, seemingly to himself, laughing short and soft with a shrug.

Katsuki frowned. 

“Why?”

“Hmmm?” Distracted and seemingly at ease, Izuku blinked up at him in question. He glanced away for a moment, eyes popping and bright as he explained, oh, and pointed. “There - that’s it, isn’t it! Oh my gosh, it’s so cute!”

Scoping out the bubblegum pink, two-story building of windows upon windows, Katsuki sighed.

“Looks like it.”

“I wonder if it’s busy on a Sunday,” Izuku said as he opened the door for Katsuki, who rolled his eyes at the gestured and slouched through the door all the same. 

An attendant in a short, poofy dress the color of green tea and vanilla greeted them cheerfully and showed them through the bottom floor, which was, in fact, the main part of the cafe. All the food was cat-themed, which was, well, fucking weird, but Katsuki couldn’t judge. He knew a lot of cat people and they were all fucking weird.

“You pay by time slot,” Katsuki murmured to Izuku as they both stared at the laminated menu presented.

“Well, we can split the time and money,” Izuku said, pointing to one of the reasonably priced options. “Or you can pay for time and I’ll pay for food.”

“Get outta here.” Katsuki smooshed a hand over Izuku’s face and lightly shoved him away from the prices. “Where you think all that money from my clothing line goes? Fuckin’ nowhere. I work and sleep and eat, dumbass. Lemme buy this.”

And so, of course, he bought the unlimited time option. His Omega would want for nothing, even if said shithead bitched and moaned under his breath about the favorable treatment.

They hung their coats on a wall fixed with hooks shaped like various curved cat tails, and made their way upstairs. 

“KITTIES,” Izuku wheezed with the most repressed whisper-scream Katsuki had ever heard. His scent bloomed with sweet summer grass as he rushed into the room, one wall filled with windows and cats dozing, the center of the space towering with a literal cat tree, it’s branches and hidey-holes and dangling toys like some kind of mythical anime beast of lore. 

While it was clear to Katsuki that he had been instantly forgotten in the wake of about twenty round-eyed, fluffy felines, he was content to watch his Omega flop to the floor, de-stress, and play. Two walls were lined with a long, unending couch of periwinkle, and he in a corner that left him free from people on either side, crossed his legs and leaned into the seat to chill. 

He was falling into a daze of admiring the curve of Izuku’s smiling, dimpled cheek and the strong line of his jaw when something bumped his ankle and slid up against him. Scowling, Katsuki peered down at what had to have been the ugliest cat he’d ever seen. The whole thing was white and gigantically fluffy and whatever, but its face was smashed in like a cat who’d run face first into a door and never came back from it. It’s eyes were bulbous and huge, little fangs jutting from its frowning mouth, and he looked shocked at all times.

“What the fuck’re you?” Katsuki jolted back into his seat, hands up like he’d been shot when the cat bounded up onto his lap and began to turn in circles. “A gremlin? Someone put you outta your misery.”

“He likes you,” drawled a gritty, familiar voice. “You don’t like cats?”

Katsuki gaped. If his old teacher hadn’t announced himself, he wouldn’t have had a clue he’d sidled up next to him on the couch, only feet away. Aizawa had always been a fucking ghoul of a human being. Having a cat lounging over his shoulders like a shawl didn’t make him any less intimidating.

“They’re fine,” Katsuki said, clearing his throat and hoping his shock wasn’t palpable. Aizawa looked so average in his black jeans and sweater, it was unnerving. “Animals are just weird to me, y’know? They’re thinkin’ all this shit we don’t know about or whatever. And the only way they can communicate with us is by screaming or rubbing their bodies on us in one way or other.”

“Sounds like humans to me.” Aizawa picked up a tiny cat who’d dawdled over to him and started to scratch behind its ears, his piercing dark eyes drilling through Bakugou as they had so many years ago. This wasn’t their first run in, but it had always been on the job or hero and school functions - not at a fucking cat cafe. “Why’re you here?”

“What’s it t’you?” Katsuki shot back. The man was a human lie detector. You could only avoid. If you lied, he’d know, and Katsuki wasn’t about to have some kind of twisted conversation about his new relationship with a man who lived out of a sleeping bag and went through his weight in eye drops every week. 

“Just thought I’d get your side of the story instead of straight up asking why you and All Might’s pet project smell like each other.”

Katsuki faltered, his hands burying in the downy fluff of the ugly cat’s fur, the endless rhythm of its warm, purring body like a grounding point as his eyes widened on Aizawa’s. 

“Say that a little louder for all the ears in here, why don’t you,” he bit out, sharp and staccato. “What the fuck, Aizawa? You knew? He doesn’t know.”

“I don’t imagine he does.” That lazy voice was disjointed from the look he cut across the room, attention sharp on where Izuku laid out flat on the ground and laughed as a herd of cats walked all over him. “Very few people knew of Toshinori’s life outside of hero work. We all saw how it devoured him down to bone. But he had a home to go to, and someone who, I guess, he treated a bit like a son.”

“He’s never made the connection,” Katsuki said, taming his voice into low, modulated tones that wouldn’t reach Izuku’s unnervingly excellent hearing. “All he knows is Mr Yagi and the bookstore. The guy turned him off a shitty path, I guess.”

“I know.” Aizawa’s expression shared no shadow of his thoughts, but the edge erased from his voice in the wake of almost melancholy. “He kept pictures of that kid in his wallet. Talked about him all the time - how he was going to university, working at the shop part time, how smart he was. His stint in the hospital.”

Another person who knew about this ‘attempted murder’ Camie had mentioned so long ago on Izuku’s police file. When the hell would Izuku open his mouth about it?

“I was the one who notified him of his death,” Aizawa said, shocking Katsuki out of his sulk. “He’d never recognize me. It was more than five years ago, now, and he all but collapsed when I told him. Toshinori wanted me to make sure he got ownership of the shop, some of his personal belongings, their photos, and a wad of cash that has to keep the kid in the green for the rest of his life.”

“He never told me that much,” Katsuki murmured, almost in a daze with how intertwined Izuku was in the hero world without even knowing it. 

“How did you two even meet?” Aizawa’s frame seemed to go lax now, his shoulders hunching in to make him seem smaller than the intimidating breadth of him when he stood tall and furious. The cat around his shoulders yawned.

Izuku had found a little girl, no more than six, and was showing her how to drag the string in circles to keep the cats chasing it around and around. The sun had begun to seep through the clouds, gracing shocks of new, livelier greens through Izuku’s crown of curls. Katsuki’s lips thinned.

“None of your damn business.”

“Well -” Aizawa yawned and dragged a hand down his face. “Either way, never thought I’d see the day.”

“Fuck you,” Katsuki mumbled, no heat to the statement at all. They sat in silence for a while, teacher and student, a lifetime of struggle and pain and blood, scarring them into one brotherhood forever. After a while, Katsuki said, “Neither did I.”

“You should tell him,” Aizawa said, half-lidded eyes watching Izuku stick his face in one of the tree holes to say something to a cat. “About Toshinori. He’d have liked that in the end, I think.”

“Who the fuck’re you to know All Might’s wishes?” Katsuki snapped, going spikey on pure instinct against being told what to do. 

With an old man’s groan, Aizawa got to his feet and busied himself with removing cats from his person as he spoke.

“I never thought I’d see the day with me, either.” Aizawa brushed off his ripped jeans, black hair a curtain past his stubbly face. “And then I did. Well -”

Aizawa stood tall and considered Katsuki, who knew he was looking up at him with a little too much mingled shock and awe as he clutched the ugly, purring cat to his chest. 

“See you at that godforsaken gala soon, I guess. And don’t blow this up like you do everything else.”

“Motherfuckers,” Katsuki muttered as he watched Aizawa slink away and down the steps. He held the cat close and looked down at its smashed gremlin face. “Guess I’d better tell him.”

“Hey!” Izuku bounded up to him, all bouncy curls and smiles that shaved years off his face and the bruises beneath his eyes. “Who were you talking to over here? You looked like you knew each other. He seemed familiar. A hero?”

“Yeah,” Katsuki said, content to answer all questions with that one word and leave it. He wasn’t about to have another one of their dates ruined with talk of the past. “Hey, you wanna get a drink or something downstairs? We can come back up and you can play as long as you want after.”

“I’m not playing,” Izuku said, outright pouting as he leaned in and considered the cat to which Katsuki clung. “Aw, who’s this? Oh my gosh, he’s albino, isn’t he? Look at those red eyes. He kind of looks like you.”

“I’m not this ugly, you little shitbag!”

“I don’t know, I think I’ve seen this expression on you before.”

“This thing looks like its mother was a pancake!” Katsuki sputtered as the cat bumped its flat nose against the underside of its jaw and yowled an ugly, mangled meow. “Listen to it - it’s suffering!”

“Oh, calm down, already.” Izuku placed a smiling kiss atop Katsuki’s head and ruffled his hair to Katsuki’s seething silence. “You two are both very cute.”

“Cute?” Katsuki looked up to where Izuku stood before him, scowling at Izuku’s teasing smile. “I’m not cute.”

“Hmmm.” Despite the sunlight now flooding the room, Izuku’s eyes shadowed as he scanned Katsuki’s displeased face. When he spoke again, his voice dropped to something that shimmered, hot and sparkling, through Katsuki’s thighs. “I suppose cute isn’t the best word for you. Maybe -”

Izuku leaned in, soft mouth to Katsuki’s ear, words a gentle rasp. 

“Stunning? Delicious? I want to taste you, Alpha. Every time I look at you, I want to put my mouth on you.”

Katsuki absolutely did not eke a high, helpless noise from the back of his throat as he struggled to repress his own dark, swelling scent. 

“Izuku?” he whispered, helpless to what this one person could do to him with a word.

“Katsuki,” Izuku whispered in his ear. “I don’t want to go home tonight.”

Notes:

Songs For This Chapter:
A Love of Some Kind - Adrianne Lenker | Spotify | YouTube
Open - Grady, Cailin Russo | Spotify | YouTube
Kiss The Boy - Keiynan Lonsdale | Spotify | YouTube

Chapter 30

Summary:

"I think I grew out of that skin a long time ago, even if this body still looks the same.”

They took a taxi home in total silence and Izuku had to wonder that the driver didn’t run out of the cab screaming from the hormones they just had to be filling the car with like a hot, humid afternoon. Even without the ability to smell, Izuku’s lungs struggled to breathe, his tongue heavy and awkward, the dark corners of his mouth salivating as he relived the moment realization back at the cafe which had crossed Katsuki face like a slap. Those sky high cheekbones had stained red, eyes going lava, tumultuous and roiling with a need barely held at bay.

But Izuku wanted to watch him erupt. Wanted to be the earth that shook his foundations, the power that bubbled him over, molten and searing inside Izuku as he took Katsuki deep. 

His fragrance must have bloomed open because Katsuki suddenly jolted beside him, nails digging into the seats as he stared straight ahead with a low, barely-there rumble sounding in his chest - a threatening and deep thunder. Izuku gasped softly in turn, eyes wide and avidly staring straight ahead as he felt a wet warmth respond from the long-hidden darkness between his legs. 

The taxi driver must be a beta, Izuku thought as the guy driving only heaved a sigh and took the final turn toward Katsuki’s apartment. There was no person with active scenting abilities who could feasibly withstand the taut, pregnant weight of tension pressing against every window, every pore of Izuku’s skin like he was about to pop. 

Katsuki practically threw money at the driver when the ride ended, Izuku manically mumbled a thousand thank yous as they dove out of the car and made for the wide, glittering glass doors of Katsuki’s high-rise apartment building. Even with the haze of desire clouding Izuku’s senses, he still marveled at how vastly different their worlds were. 

After forty ungodly awkward seconds of waiting for an elevator while people either turned their nose up at them or outright lowered their heads until their chins touched their chest in submission, they both released uneasy exhales upon cloistering themselves in an empty elevator to the top. Unsurprisingly, everyone insisted they get in first. 

Izuku had to wonder just what his Alpha smelled like to bring an entire waiting room of people near to their knees. The knowledge was intoxicating. Pride and awe mingled as they stood on opposite ends of the elevator, Katsuki’s hands fisted in his pockets, expression stern, his color high, his gaze like a brand, cauterizing Katsuki’s energy into the bone of Izuku’s ribs more than any mating mark could. 

Everyone knew a mate’s mark didn’t equal emotion - not really. Mates could separate over time. Their world was a modern one, and choices fell out of peoples’ pockets like loose change. Anyone could have anything, if they wanted it enough.

For five years, Izuku’s hadn’t desired for a single thing. For five years, he’d been content with the idea of being alone and safe for the rest of his days. 

And then Katsuki had burst through his front door, all cocky, shrapnel smiles and eyes the color of fire, a mind like a forest fire that consumed and demanded more, always more from him. And somewhere along the line, Izuku had begun to give it. He didn’t know the exact moment he’d allowed Katsuki’s fierce determination and desires raze through him, but he had, and here they stood at his front door with an inferno threatening the foundations of everything Izuku had built.

The most surreal part was Izuku didn’t mind anymore. He welcomed it. 

“D’you -” Katsuki’s voice broke the straining silence for the first time since they’d left the cafe, and Izuku turned from locking the apartment door to curiously consider him. Despite the strong set of his shoulders and the imposing presence of him, Katsuki kept his head lowered as he bent to undo the laces on his boots as he spoke. “Ah, d’you wanna eat or? You probably haven’t all day and -”

“Katsuki.” Izuku kicked out of his shoes and stood before Katsuki’s hunched in form, waiting until Katsuki paused to look up, expression somehow sweetly vulnerable. Swallowing hard, Izuku reached out, drifted the pad of his thumb over Katsuki’s cheekbone. “How long have you been waiting for me?”

Katsuki blinked and stood to his full height, yet at the moment Izuku still felt as though he held the upper hand. When Katsuki’s spoke, his voice was parched as the desert.

“Since the second I saw you.”

Izuku raised a brow, his lips quirking as his heart kicked into double time, his skin practically humming with renewed remembrance of the tease, the chase, the hunt. He wanted to feel Katsuki’s teeth on him. Wanted to put his own on his Alpha. 

Ownership. Alpha is mine.

“So,” Izuku stepped out of the genkan and scoot past Katsuki’s frowning form. He began to walk, paused, looked over his shoulder. “Come get me.”

Katsuki visibly startled, the overwhelming whole of him stiffening, nostrils flaring at the demand, his top lip twitching and curling up as a slow, feral smile cut across his features. He cocked his head, taking one single step in approach. 

“Go.” 

Heart floundering, erratic and sudden, Izuku laughed despite himself and dashed toward the kitchen. Not a single footstep sounded in persuit, but when Izuku squealed to a halt, socks sliding on tile, he gasped, eyes wide as Katsuki already stood in the opposite entryway, his grin wild and wide as he stalked inside. Izuku’s entire face burned as he stumbled back a step.

“You think I haven’t spent my entire life chasing things?” Katsuki rumbled, fingertips caressing the counter as he idly approached. “Strength, accomplishment, success - you. I always get what I want in the end.”

Izuku gulped, gaze flickering over Katsuki’s stunningly sharp features, a man cut out of rubies and a blood lust for life. Katsuki smiled back, pupils blown black as he loomed over Izuku without touching. 

“And I want you more than anything I’ve ever known, Midoriya Izuku.”

Their eyes locked, held. 

Izuku ducked past and around Katsuki, quick and agile as he slipped from the entryway and sprinted past the living room with a bubbling laugh. Something long-chained broke free, years of rust and misery crumbling through steel until the tether around Izuku’s throat finally snapped. 

A high yelp kicked from Izuku as a solid weight collided into him, the snarl sharp and clear to Izuku’s exceptionally heightened senses as he tumbled over the back of the couch, rolling off the cushions and onto the floor. Katsuki had his arms pinned above his head quick enough to have Izuku’s head spinning, his blood howling with the desperation to touch and be touched, to claim and be claimed as Izuku attempted to wrench from Katsuki’s hold, breathless and incensed.

“Little Omega,” Katsuki crooned, nuzzling at Izuku’s neck, at the gland Izuku could feel pulsing like a second heartbeat. Alpha breath whispered hot over Izuku’s throat, tickled at his ear. “Just how much can you run when you’re dripping like that for me?”

Izuku’s eyes flew open, lips parted in mute shock, a thrill shining from throat to between his thighs, where one of Katsuki’s hands slid down to duck past the waistband of his jeans. Both of Katsuki’s knees fit between Izuku’s spread legs, and Katsuki widened his stance to keep Izuku open and vulnerable as those determined fingers found his cock and fisted it over his underwear. 

The noise Izuku eked out was so high it might have gone entirely unheard, except for the way Katsuki inhaled deep of Izuku’s aching gland and pumped his cock lazily, the thin fabric separating them only increasing a delirious friction. 

“I can smell it,” Katsuki murmured, voice muffled and sloppy as he licked and lapped at Izuku’s neck, his jaw, messily kissing and biting at Izuku’s parted lips of stuttering shock. “How wet you already are. Didn’t think that kinda a thing would ever do shit for me, but fuck, I wanna eat you out like it’s my last meal.”

“Holy -” Izuku wheezed, chin canted back, eyes gaping blankly at the ceiling. The sun was setting, apricot and amber light across the walls, angelic in Katsuki’s hair. Izuku’s body was singing like he never knew it could, and Katsuki’s clumsy first-time fingers were playing him like the plucked, vibrating strings of a harp. “Kat- fuck, I -”

Katsuki hummed something soft and hungry into his skin, his weight urging Izuku into the floor. 

A sour note stabbed between Izuku’s ribs, aiming for the heart and barely missing as a sliver of panic stuck itself in one of Izuku’s lungs, slowly seeping the air from the room. He choked off a sharp noise and pinched Katsuki’s arm, twisting the chunk of flesh between his fingers until Katsuki snarled and sat up halfway, both hands on either side of Izuku’s head.

“What, wha- fuck. Hey, okay, hey -”

Almost instantly the pressure alleviated, the kindness and concern in Katsuki’s lust-clouded eyes, the removed insistence of his body all soothing.

“Katsuki,” Izuku murmured, lifting a hand to cup Katsuki’s hot cheek, his thumb skimming the frown on those expressive lips. Katsuki’s pale lashes lowered, all shot through with a sunset burn as he tilted his face into Izuku’s hold and absolutely purred.

“You’re slow,” Izuku said, already rolling from under Katsuki’s body, righting himself and running. He could only laugh, his heart buoyed by Katsuki’s curse behind him. 

“You lil’ shit, what the f- get back here!”

“Catch me!” Izuku laughed, diving through a doorway he didn’t recognize that turned out to be a guest and work out room. He lofted over the bed, squeaking when Katsuki slammed both palms on the wall, caging in Izuku’s head. Izuku grinned and ducked away. “Too slow, big guy.”

He had the gall to smack Katsuki’s ass as he rounded the bed and gripped the door frame’s edge as leverage to whip himself out of the room, his socks fumbling his steps on the wood floor as he dashed into Katsuki’s bedroom, shrieking with laughter as Katsuki roared in frustration from a close distance.

Life hadn’t pumped through his veins like this in years, in - maybe ever. This wasn’t the same rush as a fight or drugs or doing something in the shadows he shouldn’t be. This was its own bond, its own heady rush of being pursued by someone who quite possibly loved him in the realest sense of the word, whatever that was. This was freedom and levity and trust that they wouldn’t hurt each other’s hearts like people were wont to do everywhere Izuku had looked his entire life. 

When Katsuki caught him from behind and wrapped him in an embrace, rolling them onto the bed so Izuku laid on top of him, flailing his legs and laughing until tears caught the corners of his eyes, something in Izuku knew. The animal, the instinct, the heart - whatever it was - knew.

This person might be the person. 

“Hey,” Katsuki said, mouth at Izuku’s ear, Izuku still splayed across Katsuki’s body, his ass nestling against the considerable interest pulsing in Katsuki’s sweatpants. “Don’t move.”

“You mean I can’t do this?” Izuku murmured, already dizzy with power as he rolled his hips back against Katsuki, blood surging with thousands of years of inherent knowledge. To push and pull at an interested partner, to drive them into a frenzy fit for madness and mating. He laid his head back to rest against Katsuki’s shoulder, turned his head to nose at Katsuki’s cheek. “Or I just can’t get off of you?”

“Fuck you,” Katsuki snapped off, voice tight and small as his hands trailed the length of Izuku’s body and began to unzip his fly. “Aren’t you s’pposed to be the passive one?”

“Aren’t you a virgin?” Izuku asked, laughing when Katsuki growled low and threatening, despite his gentle palms skimming Izuku’s shirt up to his armpits. “I think we’re both allowed to be a little surprising in this relationship.”

Katsuki only grunted, thumbs rising to slowly scrape over both of Izuku’s nipples, a quiet and thorough exploration of back and forth, a curious roll of budded, swelling flesh between two fingers, finding what made Izuku sigh and moan and gasp. 

“Nails,” Izuku managed, whimpering, arms rising over his head, one hand clenching in Katsuki’s hair, the other grabbing at his own for a lifeline.

“What.” Katsuki sounded drunk, voice deep and dazed.

“Use your nails on me,” Izuku slurred, no better off himself, his jeans only halfway down his hips and his cock already rock hard and peeking out from the top of his underwear. “Make it hurt.”

Izuku felt Katsuki’s long, shuddering breath through the chest against Izuku’s back more than heard it, but a second later a sharp scrape of nail burned a bright, hot trail over one puffy nipple. Crying out, Izuku’s spine arched right off Katsuki’s body, a flaring flame melting him syrupy slick from his aching hole, his scent no doubt weeping to be fucked into oblivion. 

Then Izuku’s world was upending as he was promptly rolled off of Katsuki in the wake of his Alpha sitting up like a shot. Stuck in the thick, sticky miasma of lust, Izuku only rolled onto his stomach, still basically fully clothed as he presented his ass like a bitch in heat, his whimpers a soundtrack to the inviting sway of his hips.

“Izuku.” The urgency in Katsuki’s voice rode down Izuku’s spine, a wake of scorched flesh, hypersensitive to the touch as Izuku pillowed his cheek into the black sheets and looked to Katsuki.

He was so beautiful. Perhaps not classically - he was too angled and aggressive, a fox’s face carved of ruby and gold with eyes that spoke of supreme confidence and a mouth that said the same. But when he looked at Izuku, his jaw ticking with tension, his faint brows drawn in, Izuku only saw a dazzling Alpha who was supremely more on the inside than he even appeared on the outside. 

“Once I really start,” Katsuki bit off, eyes dropping to the mattress, “I don’t know that I’ll be able to stop.”

The taut clamp around Izuku’s heart didn’t belong to his own shaking hand of fear or the fist of Jin or the scathing grip of Dabi or the aching, scarred absence of his father. The hold around his heart was Katsuki warm palms, protective and just strong enough to make Izuku lose his breath and the track of his heartbeat in awe. 

“Katsuki...” Izuku knew his face was burning bright, a beacon of his weakness for this Alpha, for this man. Rolling over to kneel on the bed, Izuku kept eye contact as he found the hem of his own shirt and slowly stripped it from his frame. The cool air tongued over his skin, hairs standing on end, missing the molten magnetism of Katsuki’s body. 

His Alpha was watching him with lips too swollen for having yet to kiss, eyes volcanic as they traced the musculature and scars cut into the terrain of Izuku’s body. Izuku was presented before him, half naked, jeans undone and half way down his hips to expose the band of his underwear and a cock desperately dripping out the top, and still he did not touch. Did not make a single move.

Izuku glanced down, eyebrows bowing as he realized thin slips of smoke had begun to slither from where Katsuki gripped the sheets. His shoulders had risen and bunched, hackles high, nose flared wide, the harsh inhale of him scenting the room, scenting Izuku, all flared something altogether new and fragile in Izuku - something that wanted to be strong, powerful, but hadn’t ever had the opportunity with a previous partner.

“Katsuki?” Izuku murmured, crawling across the bed to where Katsuki sat, burning the blankets through. On hands and knees Izuku approached, a lithe and hungry thing with teeth taking over as he nosed at Katsuki’s jaw, heard him suck in a harsh breath. Izuku bit at Katsuki’s ear, heard the sharp, quick keen muffling into a growl, and smiled against Katsuki’s fervid flesh as he whispered, “You can touch me, you know. Alpha.”

“I’m gonna scare the fuck outta you,” Katsuki bit off, sharp and toothy, his voice plummeting somewhere dark and deep that rushed a second syrupy slick to soak down Izuku’s thighs. 

Izuku groaned, propped his forehead on Katsuki’s stiff shoulder, and blindly searched the spread for Katsuki’s hot hands. Without words, he guided Katsuki’s palms to Izuku’s hips, then lower to where they caught on the rough fabric of his jeans.

“Katsuki,” Izuku mouthed against his throat. “Please. Fuck me.”

A gasp of surprise was all Izuku could eke as he found them both kneeling on the bed, heaving chest to chest, the sheer breadth of Katsuki’s body like a mountain face to him as eager hands yanked and shoved down underwear and pants. Izuku breathlessly laughed, linking arms around Katsuki’s neck, hanging on for dear life as Katsuki raked his clothes off one leg and the other. 

Once freed, Izuku attempted to break away, eyes going wide with shock and delight as Katsuki sat back on the bed and guided Izuku to straddle his thighs. Loosening his hold on Katsuki’s neck, Izuku seated himself on Katsuki’s lap, whining when he realized Katsuki was one-hundred percent clothed next to his own bare, flushed body.

The concern sparked out to vibrant star bursts behind Izuku’s eyes when Katsuki reached around with both hands to knead at Izuku’s ass, one palm guiding Izuku’s thighs wider while the two fingers slipped shoved in with sloppy, wet sound. 

“AHfuck!” Body tight as a bow string, Izuku clung to Katsuki, face buried in his neck where he could feel more than hear the crescendo of a growl rising to the surface, a dark and dangerous quake that unearthed from Katsuki’s chest and cleaved through them both with rising intensity.

Embarrassment didn’t cross Izuku’s mind as he felt Katsuki’s entire hand go sopping wet with slick, an unholy amount for an Omega out of heat, but Izuku’s entire body hummed with something new, something more than any partner or sexual experience he’d ever encountered. Katsuki didn’t speak a word, but Izuku felt the strain of his desire, both physical and otherwise as he hissed in Izuku’s ear and slipped in that third finger too easily, stretching him where he didn’t need to be stretched, but holy fuck did it ring through Izuku like a bell, high and bright and trembling. 

“M-more,” Izuku breathed out, sitting up straight, hands on Katsuki’s sweat-damp shoulders for balance as he rolled down on and rode Katsuki’s three fingers, then a blessed four. Wet mouth agape, Izuku struggled to breathe, eyes opening to slits only to find Katsuki looking up at him with eyes narrowed, lips pulled back in a silent, threatening snarl, long canines bared and desperate to bite as he fucked up into Izuku with increasing, slapping urgency. 

The sloppy mess of sound alone was just shy of bursting Izuku apart when Katsuki leaned in, one tooth scraping the edge of Izuku’s gland, and sunk his teeth in deeper than ever before. The pain was like a lightning strike, an instant sparkle and pop and burn of nerves, a fire racing straight through Izuku as he came over Katsuki’s hand in waves, cock untouched as it coated Katsuki’s shirt and pants. 

And then Izuku’s world upended as he was flung across the bed, the snarl of an Alpha shattered filling the humid, sticky room. Splayed out and weak, Izuku leaned back against his elbows, legs spread and wanton as his cock bobbed and dribbled against his stomach, eyes and mouth wide. Katsuki tore himself from his clothes like a man who’d never worn them before, the veins in his neck stark, the gland on his throat glistening with scent, his muscles pumped up like an entire day at the gym, his expression feral and burning on Izuku as he stripped.

On all fours, Katsuki approached, lithe and large and gold, a wild cat scenting its prey as he asserted between Izuku’s trembling legs, hands riding up ankles to calves, knees to thighs, to grip Izuku’s hips and yank.

With a yelp, Izuku slid across the rumpled sheets, legs akimbo, brain scrambled from the first orgasm but body already reacting to its mate with a blood pumping fury. Yearning seethed just under the skin as Katsuki brought Izuku’s legs up, one knee hanging over each shoulder, Izuku’s filling erection brushing flush with Katsuki’s engorged cock. Thicker than Izuku had seen it in the locker room surrounded by snow, larger than the times he’d felt him up secretly in the whispered corners of the book shop. 

Izuku gawked at it, mouth watering, his tongue pricking against the subtle point of his own canines. He wanted to bite just there, that spot inside Katsuki’s thigh where the burnished gold fuzz rode up and stopped, wiped smooth just at the hollow of his pelvis. Izuku wanted to sink his teeth in and mark.

“Who the fuck did that?” Katsuki boomed, jolting Izuku from his hunger, shocked and dazed eyes meeting Katsuki’s near glowing red ones. Katsuki’s dragged a thumb along three pale circles tucked along Izuku’s inner thigh, that explosive Alpha energy vibrating beneath the surface of Katsuki’s demand as he looked between the three on one side and the two on the other. “Who the fuck -”

“Shhh,” Izuku soothed, his voice scraped out and fucked already as he sat up, strong legs easily wrapping around Katsuki’s waist the enclosed their cocks tight and glorious between their hot bodies.. “Another time, Alpha.”

Banding his arms around Katsuki’s neck, Izuku nuzzled at Katsuki’s nose with his own, mouth brushing the bared teeth and guttural growl as he spoke past the waves of aggression. No one had ever seen those marks and cared. It made Izuku’s voice thick and damp as the almost stifling air surrounding them. 

“Soon, handsome, okay? There’s only us here, only us.”

A kiss, short and sweet, delivered to Katsuki’s teeth, then another and another to a mouth melting to a frown as Izuku murmured sweet nothings, fingers idling through Katsuki’s fray of hair until Katsuki whimpered a sound like a question and opened. Izuku sighed, the fires not banked but momentarily quelled as they wrapped up in each other, nested in sheets, lips and teeth and tongue exploring and challenging in turn. 

Katsuki kissed like he cared. There was no artful way to put it. 

Izuku nosed along the line of Katsuki’s throat, inhaling deep to no avail, despite the whisper of scent at the back of his skull, a memory his body refused to forget despite the ravages of his relatively short life. A soft keen called to Izuku from the back of Katsuki’s throat and Izuku held him as close as Katsuki did, a waxing and waning moon making one.

“You can,” Katsuki rasped, tilting his head. 

Perhaps, Izuku distantly thought as he sunk teeth into the rise of Katsuki’s shoulder for the first time and felt his mouth fill and spill over with warm, thick blood, he wasn’t so far removed from the animal as he’d thought. Katsuki still seemed to hold onto a single chain link of control, but Izuku could not. 

Not any longer. 

Moaning deep as he lapped at Katsuki’s skin and the welling blood dribbling down Katsuki’s chest, Izuku released the thing that scared him the most - the beast that made him different. 

Lips stained crimson, Izuku reached around, fisted Katsuki’s hair and yanked him back, rising up on his knees to loom above his Alpha and  claim a kiss, all messy, plunging tongue and bites that dragged and pulled at Katsuki’s abused lips. The sounds riling from Izuku’s core spilled out, ravenous and vicious, victorious in the capture of their one and only person. 

Katsuki fought back. 

Izuku snarled as strong hands palmed at his waist and yanked him off, tossing him back to the bed like he weighed nothing. Before Katsuki could cover him with his body, though, Izuku had rolled, mounting Katsuki’s back and biting him hard on the shoulder blade. Katsuki howled and hissed, elbowed him off on instinct, a sharp flare of pain to the gut that had Izuku grinning as he toppled off the bed and popped up, wiping the blood from his mouth with the back of his hand. 

“You sneaky little fuck,” Katsuki snapped, voice hoarse, his feral smile eager and toothy as he leapt off the bed and tackled Izuku to the ground. The anxiety pains didn’t come, but the wood meeting his back and skull did. It dizzied Izuku a moment, just long enough for Katsuki to smack his shackled wrists to the hardwood, his hold nearly cutting off the blood to Izuku’s hands.

Didn’t matter. Izuku had never been harder in his fucking life. Not through a heat with another Alpha or anything. His cock was the most painful thing here, the crown so engorged and full it spurted onto both their bellies when Katsuki leaned in and sucked a biting bruise into the thin skin just beneath his chin. Izuku’s hips thrust forward to no avail, only the hard weight of Katsuki’s body embedding him into the floor. 

“Katsuki,” Izuku crooned, eyelids falling heavy and seductive, tongue trailing across his top teeth as he smiled up into the face of pure red Alpha dominance and very little remaining human. 

“Say I won,” Katsuki demanded, biting off each word like fresh meat. He leaned in and took Izuku’s mouth in a harried, filthy kiss, only pulling back when Izuku was panting and grinding mindlessly against Katsuki’s thigh. He squeezed Izuku’s wrists tighter and the euphoria only surged, Izuku’s thoughts gone foggy, a heady film over everything that left him smiling wider as he whispered.

“You won.”

Katsuki looked at him hard, a sharp huff bursting from his nose like some great beast before he released Izuku as suddenly as he’d tackled him.

That was a mistake.

With a giggle that edged on manic, utterly desperate for that fat, purpling cock standing angry and proud as the man himself, Izuku shoved Katsuki to the floor and mounted him quick. Gaping up at him, Katsuki didn’t stand a single chance as Izuku reached behind him, lined the crown of that beautiful, weeping cock up with Izuku’s ass, and slowly began to ease himself down. 

“OhfuckFUCK.” Katsuki’s expression of shock would have made Izuku laugh had he not been gritting his teeth, his core and thighs trembling as he took his Alpha, inch by slow inch.

Palms splayed out over Katsuki’s chest like stars, Izuku held his breath, capturing every spark and splinter of pleasure of pain stinging beneath his skin as he split himself open on his Alpha, rocking his hips to the subtle, bone-deep memory unfurling from the Omega within. 

Looking down at Katsuki’s awed expression, the red flags of color high in his cheeks, the crimson, clotted brand of Izuku’s teeth on his shoulder, Izuku had to ask himself: How did you not know?

How could he not have known the power an Omega truly held over an Alpha that was genuinely their own? This was not a surrender or renouncement of who he was. This was a fucking triumph.

Izuku whimpered high as Katsuki bedded deep within, too full for his body to take without shivering from fingers to toes, his skin breaking into sweat from every pore as he shifted his hips to take in the heartbeat and pulse he could feel from the inside out. Katsuki gasped, expression almost frantic as he gripped Izuku’s waist with arms bulging.

“‘Zuku, Izuku,” Katsuki managed in a tight, barely controlled voice “It’s - your’e - holyfuck you’re everything, I -”

With a deep, midnight moan, Izuku began to move. Bottom lip caught sharp between his teeth, gaze solid on Katsuki’s roiling waves of fire eyes, Izuku drew his hips up, the delicious friction of Katsuki’s cock, his skin, their flesh together in high definition, in pure feeling as he sat back down slow. Each time that dick left him was like torture, and their moans quickly devolved into pathetic murmurs and cries of desperation as slow became too much, too sensitive, Izuku’s thighs shuddering so violently he could barely keep his balance top his mate any longer.

And then a snarl was sounding the air and Katsuki was rising up, a volcano erupting at its limit, Katsuki wrapping around Izuku as he rolled into a stand that no man with average strength could ever do. The mere knowledge that his Alpha was strong, was powerful and stunning had Izuku’s cock spurting between them in a tremor of not quite release, not nearly enough as Izuku clung arms around Katsuki and released a single sob as he was laid onto the bed. 

“Shhh.” This time it was Katsuki soothing him down from the override of emotion, of feeling, of a world opened to Izuku like he’d never known in all his life. To let go not through drugs or drink or pain he felt he deserved, but letting go through love. The difference was rapturous. “Shhh.”

Izuku didn’t understand from where these tears emerged, his body a symphony of sound and Katsuki the orchestrator of all of it, from day one to today. His body hummed and rung and sprung to life, a chorus rising from the curved auditorium of his ribcage, echoing through his body, his mind, his past. His chest heaved with a sudden sob of joy, and Katsuki was there, the flat of his tongue a rasp over his cheeks and closed eyes, licking at his tears. He remained standing at the edge of the bed, hands a song over Izuku’s body, warm palms cascading over every inch to comfort, to incense.

Opening his eyes, Izuku looked to Katsuki through the film of tears, smiled as he drew in that scrunched face all twisted in concern, and kissed him soundly. Katsuki’s muffled murmured was that of a question but Izuku swallowed and licked it down, his legs hooking around Katsuki’s waist as he lined his ass up with that beautiful cock of his. 

Those wide palms gripped Izuku’s hips still, and this time it was Katsuki who fucked into him swift and thorough and hard, looming over him, feet still on the floor, as he broke from the kiss to stand taller with every slap of skin.

“K-” Izuku’s eyes flew open wide at the dark, growing rumble from Katsuki’s throat, shocked eyes meeting ravenous ones as Izuku frantically gripped the sheets, each ruthless plunge pummeling him back into the mattress, the only reason Katsuki didn’t fuck him straight across the room being the iron, bruising hold he held on Izuku’s thick flanks as he bared his teeth and thrust harder. 

“Ah - ah - ah!” Izuku couldn’t quiet, couldn’t control a single part of himself anymore as his throat gave way to staccato cry after cry, Katsuki’s expression a mask of threatening hunger as he was no longer looking at Izuku but the place where they met, watching Izuku’s sloppy, dripping hole taking him deeper and wider, Katsuki’s cock swelling and spreading his hole to a delirious din of pain pleasure.

“Gonna - fuck,” Katsuki stuttered, pounding through Izuku at an unrelenting pace, his face red in tandem with Izuku’s own burning one, curls clinging to his cheeks and brow as he howled over Katsuki’s voice. “Gonna fill you the fuck up, gonna - agh shhhit - you’re gonna take it real good, aren’tcha, Izu-ah!”

The force of the filling knot as Katsuki buried into Izuku was a detonation, a white hot bomb bursting from the inside out, a catalyst wracking tremors through every nerve and blood vessel and limb as Izuku’s rose his hips to meet Katsuki’s deep cock, his scream going soundless to his ears as he scrabbled nails in the sheets and felt his stomach distend. He didn’t know what Katsuki looked like as he came or how he sounded, the static of this knotting like nothing - nothing his body had ever conceived. 

Shrieking in a sharp breath of precious air, Izuku scrunched his eyes in alarm when he felt Katsuki move, their knot pulling enough to rain sparks through him, searing and scintillating in tandem as he scrambled to wrap around his mate on instinct, legs and arms in a tight embrace as Katsuki collapsed and rolled them to their sides with a pained hiss and a groan. 

Time immeasurable entwined their connected bodies, red thread a circle on Katsuki’s shoulder and Izuku’s throat as they murmured nonsense comfort noises and pet each other’s faces, arms, hips, fingers entwining and releasing, mouths meeting in senseless, lazy kisses that missed the mark more than not. Every so often a lightning flash of pleasure shocked through one or the other and they shared it, clinging to each other in twin gasps, Katsuki wordlessly lapping up the tears that fell from Izuku without warning. 

It felt as if everything Izuku had ever been holding in had and continued to release while in the protective hold of this hero, this flesh and blood man carved from Alpha bones, fashioned just for him. Izuku didn’t know which one of them was purring - he’d never heard the sound in his life until Katsuki - but all the same his lips sleepily curved as he nuzzled into the soft spot just beneath Katsuki’s chin.

“You smell -” Katsuki croaked and Izuku felt him wince from his dry voice and swallow, lick his lips. “You smell different now.”

“Mmm.” Izuku was already drifting, wrapped in strong arms, skin humming sweet and low like a harp. 

“You smell like mine,” Katsuki finished darkly, voice stern and final. The surety in his voice, to Izuku’s muted shock, did not raise red flags from his heart, but warmth it through and made a home there. 

“On a different day,” Izuku drawled, deep and relaxed as he spoke into Katsuki’s pulse, “I might find it in me to be offended by that.”

A shot gasp caught in Izuku’s throat as hard fingers found his jaw to lift his face. Izuku blinked quizzically as Katsuki grim, seething gaze met his. 

“You are mine, Midoriya Izuku.”

Izuku didn’t reply. His heart hurt, but not in any way he recognized. Was it possible to feel pain through such yearning?

“I am…” Izuku licked at his dry lips and found his voice. “I am yours.”

An expression Izuku hadn’t yet seen on Katsuki’s face melted the stern lines of his face. And it was joy, pure and simple. Katsuki didn’t have to smile for Izuku to see it, clear as a new day dawning. 

“Now let me sleep,” Izuku rasped, lips curving as he leaned in to lightly kiss Katsuki’s lips. “You’re a stubborn asshole, you know that?”

“And you aren’t?” Katsuki asked, incredulous in the rise of his brows.

“Well,” Izuku said, burying his face in the strong swell of Katuski’s chest to hide his smile. “Maybe we really were made for each other, then.”

Izuku didn’t know what Katsuki said in return as he passed out, but he sure it was one thing in which they were in agreement. 

When he next woke, deep night cradled him in the mattress, the velvet warmth of his comforter cocoon enough not to alarm him when it slowly dawned that he was alone. The chatter of kitchen utensils pricked at his ears and Izuku nuzzled his face further into the pillow. His body ached beautifully, like a bruise singing from skin, his bones or something even deeper gently pulsing with life anew. 

They hadn’t exchanged bonding marks - both had seemed unconsciously careful to sway just shy of sinking teeth into those supple, sensitive spots that would forever scar. So if the way he felt now was sex outside of heat or rut or mating - what the hell was that going to be like? 

Izuku barely realized he’d laughed out loud, short and bright and giddy as he rolled into the blankets and smashed his face into the pillow. Wrapping his arms around it, he muffled a squeal that he wouldn’t be caught dead making outside of being five years old. And then he squealed again, high at the back of his throat, rolling and tangling in the blankets as he fanned out onto his bed - 

And found Katsuki leaning in the doorway with a shit-eating grin. Bland light from the living room cast across the muscular, imposing frame as he folded his arms across his barrel chest and cocked his head, eyes aglow with merciless glee.

“What the fuck’re you doing?” he asked, the laugh barely contained in his voice.

“Uh.” Izuku sat up, wincing at the soreness from the waist down as he ran a hair through his tangle of curls. “Fuck you.”

Katsuki snickered and swept from the room.

“Would like to see ya try, shortstack,” he goaded as his bare feet padded back toward the kitchen. 

Izuku narrowed his eyes at the doorway and proceeded to smack a pillow into his face to muffle a mortified scream. Stop being so happy, you idiot!

After a futile search around the dead dark room, Izuku relented and ripped the pure black sheet from bed and stood to wrap it around and around his waist, tying it off firmly before he ventured from the room. He only had to take two steps before he paused in the center of the living room and winced, his face crumpling as he felt cum dribble warm and relentless down his thighs.

Now he remembered why he made his partners use condoms.

“Ugh.” Making a face, Izuku beelined for the bathroom and locked the door, dropping the sheet to clean himself up with a hand towel and warm water. Katsuki’s towels probably cost more than Izuku’s entire wardrobe, but it was his mess, and he would pay the price. 

Finished, he righted himself to re-wrap the sheet. Catching his reflection in the mirror, Izuku paused, frowning.

The bites on his throat and beneath his chin were still red and angry, tender and hot to the touch. Tentatively, Izuku touched the deep shadows beneath his eyes, brushed the curls from his freckled face, ran his hands down his chest. 

What did Katsuki see when he looked at him? Izuku couldn’t recall a time Katsuki had complimented him overtly on his looks. Maybe he had, but nothing came to mind. Katsuki wasn’t exactly the type, either. So what did he see? Because Izuku only saw a plain, awkward boy wearing too many scars and stories. 

Biting back a sigh, Izuku tied off his sheet and followed noises to the kitchen. He caught sight of the clock. Nearly four in the morning. Shit. He’d never messaged Kouta. Where was his phone? Double shit.

“The hell’s that face for?” Katsuki asked the moment Izuku slipped into the kitchen to eye him at the stove. “When’re you not worrying about shit?”

“Have you seen my phone?” Izuku said, wandering up to Katsuki and giving into the desire to wrap arms around that wide, solid back and rest his cheek in the cradle between his shoulder blades. 

“Phone?” Katsuki leaned back into Izuku for a moment before he heaved a sigh and disappeared from the room. Izuku eyed what looked like the end steps to giant omurice and offered a weak, sleepy smile when Katsuki returned, scowling down at Izuku’s phone. “Was in my coat pocket. You got a shitload of texts. Who is this K person and why they asking you where you are? I gotta kill a bitch?”

“Oh.” Izuku’s smile stiffened as he snatched the phone from Katsuki’s hand and faced away as Katsuki finished with their food. “That’s just my cousin. I forgot to tell him I wouldn’t be home.”

“Well, tell your cousin to fuck off, ‘cause I get you once in a while, too.”

Humor shimmered just under the skin as Izuku tapped out a quick message and clattered the phone to the countertop. 

“I sent him those exact words.”

“Liar.”

“Me? Never.”

“Oh, yeah?” Katsuki asked, a weight in his voice that sent Izuku’s nerves on alert as Katsuki busied with plating the omurice and pulling out the ketchup. He turned then, face set earnest and quiet as he took Izuku’s hand and turned it, a thumb dipping into the circular cigarette scar Dabi had inflicted a lifetime ago. “Then who gave you this? Same ones as your legs.”

“I -” Ever past trauma screamed to clench up, to pull up the gates and hide in his safe tower. Izuku cast his gaze aside and stopped himself from yanking his wrist back. “An old boyfriend. My first boyfriend. I practically asked for it.”

“You didn’t.”

“I did, actually.” Izuku’s lips twitched without humor as he finally peered up, tentative as he met Katsuki’s bunched brows and quiet, intent eyes. “A lot of times. I was a stupid teenager and I - I thought that if I made myself hurt, I wouldn’t hurt so much on the inside.”

“That’s stupid,” Katsuki said and Izuku winced at his brutal honesty.

“It was, yeah.”

“You made me hurt you,” Katsuki murmured, something unreadable - dark, troubled - storming over in his gaze. “Tonight.”

“Wh- oh.” Izuku smiled, brought his hand up to cup Katsuki’s cheek, the rasp of pale stubble prickling his palm. “No. It’s not like that anymore. I think I grew out of that skin a long time ago, even if this body still looks the same.”

For a moment, Katsuki looked at him hard before he melted into Izuku’s touch, his aura feeling almost small, vulnerable as he curled into Izuku’s embrace, his arms strong and his breath soft in the crook of Izuku’s neck. Izuku sighed.

“Are you going to feed me or what?”

“You’re the most demanding Omega I’ve ever met,” Katsuki murmured into the mess of Izuku’s hair before he released. “Stuff your face with food and shut up already.”

They ate stretched out on the couch, Izuku’s feet on Katsuki’s lap as they talked and laughed and teased until the watercolor bleed of sunrise began to seep over the skyline painted in the vast window before them. They spoke of television - neither of them watched much; books - of which Izuku had many opinions and Katsuki actually listened; argued about heroes and relented; reminisced over all the times they almost-didn’t-nearly-did meet throughout their lives, and drifted off with Katsuki’s head on Izuku’s lap and the sun warming their bare skin. 

As Izuku meandered through the thickening mist of sleep, fingers carding through Katsuki’s starburst of hair, he wondered if tonight had shed him out of an even older skin than the one before. Because the morning sun washing across his body felt like the first sunrise he’d ever seen. 

Notes:

Time for fourteen final chapters of absolute fucking mayhem.

Chapter 31

Summary:

Everything about Izuku was different and Katsuki was ravenous for him.

“Fuck, yeah, yes - right there - there, there, there!” 

Perched on the ledge of the kitchen counter, legs splayed in abandon, ass dripping and sucking in Katsuki’s cock with a sight and sloppy sound that ricocheted like lightning through every burnt-out thought process Katsuki had left, Izuku held onto the knobs of the cupboard doors his head was banging against and continued to look down and watch himself get fucked.

His unrelenting encouragement was like a goddamn leash on which to yank Katsuki along, his heavy panting and the way Izuku’s red, swollen lips parted and gasped and glistened with spit and precum like a goddamn flag for Katsuki to chase with steam bursting from his nose as he twisted into some great, stupid beast. Izuku dumbed him to the extreme. His thick, rich scent coated the inside of Katsuki’s throat, filling his nose with the colors of earth and basic lust, clouding his brains and thickening his cock the more Izuku dared him to go harder, faster, fuck him through whatever surface he demanded. 

Who the hell was in control here?

The backs of Izuku’s knees where Katsuki gripped to hold his thighs spread wide were slipping with sweat, Katsuki leaning into that electric little body to keep Izuku sliding right off the counter as he thrust with increasing ire and imprecision. The night’s fresh bites glared from Izuku’s flushed skin like angry red eyes, daring him for more, much in the same way Izuku flicked a look to Katsuki’s face and curled his lips back in a silent snarl. 

“What the fuck are you,” Katsuki rasped out between feverish thrusts, his mingled awe and Alpha posturing clashing in a fervent, furious battle with each other. No Omega should bare their teeth to their mate, nor should they meet their partners eyes with such daring - violent and hot and ready to draw blood at the wrong move. 

Everything about Izuku was different and Katsuki was ravenous for him. 

Gritting his teeth against a wave of arousal but refusing to be the first to go this time, Katsuki raced hands down Izuku’s thighs, pulled out his throbbing, heavy cock so it dribbled to the tiled floor, and dipped both thumbs into Izuku’s dripping, slick-lush asshole to spread it further. 

“Ahnnn!” Izuku’s eyes widened, hands frantically scrabbling now, sweaty and slipping from the handles of the cabinets above his head, toes curling as he breathed hard and staccato. “Fuck me, god, fuckmefuckme please, I’m - oh shit, shitshit -”

Katsuki did fuck him. Rammed his little Omega through, breathing like a goddamn animal, lungs laboring with each snarl as Izuku released the cabinet doors and lunged forward to cling and claw at him, mouthing at Katsuki’s neck, jaw, bared teeth, lips. Sunk his teeth anew into the mound of Katsuki's pectoral and pulled on flesh with teeth still embedded into skin and muscle. 

He didn’t know who howled as they split at the seams, but the fall went unfelt by both of them as they both came to on the cold tile floor, Izuku’s cheek smeared with blood where he’d pillowed it upon Katsuki’s chest.

Izuku raised his head with eyes curtained and heavy, his swollen lips dyed crimson, plush and curved as Izuku reached out and idly caressed the pad of his thumb down the bridge of Katsuki’s nose, traced the sharp slash of his eyebrow.

“Nice face,” Izuku rasped out, voice parched and husky, a flash of pearly teeth.

Katsuki had been called good-looking a thousand times if he’d been called it once.

But with Izuku, he blushed from chest to crown. 

“Idiot,” he croaked. “You too, I guess.”

Izuku blinked, his freckles instantly swimming in a pink wash. He said nothing. 

Katsuki narrowed his eyes and sat up, effectively dislodging Izuku until Katsuki could manipulate his frame into cradling him upon his lap, Izuku’s temple warm against Katsuki’s shoulder.

“Nobody ever tell you you’re pretty?”

“I’m not a girl,” Izuku muttered, burying his face in the curve of Katsuki’s neck. He smelled like the lingering coals of their forest fire and the shy, sweet earthen scent of approaching autumn.

“Definitely fuckin’ not,” Katsuki said with a short laugh. “But you’re - you’re something.”

“Something?” Katsuki could hear the smile in Izuku’s question. “You should write a book, you wordsmith.”

“You should shut you’re fuckin’ mouth,” Katsuki said, grinning.

“Make m-” Izuku choked on a laugh as Katsuki’s tickling fingers dug into the crux of Izuku’s tender thigh, Katsuki cackling in victory as Izuku dissolved into giggles and clawed at him in futile attempts to escape.

They did eventually get up from the floor. And ate and showered and dressed. Katsuki could feel Izuku’s eyes lingering on him when his back was turned, and the warmth that spread with the knowledge of Izuku’s approval was like nothing he’d ever experienced or even thought to achieve.

Alpha makes Omega happy and safe. Alpha is victorious.

“I really have to go,” Izuku murmured against Katsuki’s lips at the front door, his entire frame melting into Katsuki’s arms as they licked into each other, slow and methodical, easy as the sunrise to which they’d fallen asleep. Both of them had barely snatched three hours of rest before their days had to begin, and Izuku sounded sleepy and luxurious in Katsuki’s hold. 

“Me too,” Katsuki mumbled into Izuku’s skin, mouth travelling to Izuku’s temple to nose at his hair and inhale deep. “Go away now.”

Izuku laughed, bright and clear as he parted from Katsuki, only their fingers now linked, and peered up at him with a guileless smile.

“I’ll see you soon?”

“Obviously,” Katsuki instantly replied, gaze intent on his Omega. “Our schedules -”

“Are not great, I know,” Izuku conceded with a sheepish nod. “But we’ll find time. Just - just call me before you come around, okay? I don’t want you scaring my cousin.”

Katsuki raised a brow.

“I really don’t give a fuck what your cousin feels.”

Izuku sputtered a laugh and pushed at Katsuki’s brick wall chest, not even budging him.

“Asshole. Right, okay, okay. Call me anyway. The last thing you need is to visit and end up with Chisaki on your hands.”

“I don’t want him anywhere near my hands, believe me.”

“I’m sure the feeling is mutual,” Izuku said, lips curving as he caught Katsuki by the shirt collar and pulled him in for a final, lingering kiss. “Goodbye, Mr Zero. I’ll be seeing you.”

Katsuki inhaled sharply, something expanding within his chest so large it didn’t have space to fit. 

“Bye,” he managed, and watched Izuku go. “Fuck.”

 

 

“Bakugou, good morning!” Mirio boomed as he burst through the door of the office kitchen, all golden boy smiles and punchable face. “My, you’re practically sparkling!”

Face bland, Katsuki flicked off his boss and earned a wider smile in return. 

“Let me boil water in peace,” Katsuki said, arms folded across his chest as he waited on the electric kettle. He eyed Mirio suspiciously, watching the Alpha’s nostrils flare. The recognition was there, but in usual Mirio fashion, was swept away in favor of that forever personable expression.

“I just wanted to see how you were doing,” Mirio replied jovially, pouring himself a coffee from the half-empty pot. “There’s a rather, well, strong smell -”

“You sayin’ I stink?” Katsuki snapped. “Well, good. Maybe you bastards will start leaving me alone.”

“There’s that,” Mirio said, nodding amiably as he paused for a drink from a mug covered in cute dogs. “There’s something else, too. Would you consider having a check-up with our in-house doctor sometime soon?”

“What?” Katsuki paused from pouring water over his tea, eyes narrowed on Mirio’s casual stance. “Why?”

“Your scent -”

“I have a mate now,” Katsuki said, point blank and sharp. “We’re not bonded, but we’re mated, so I smell -”

“That’s not entirely it,” Mirio said with a shrug. “You haven’t been in rut since you first presented, is that right?”

“So?” Katsuki frowned outright, ire simmering in his veins. “The fuck’s it to you?” 

“That’s a long time for anybody,” Mirio said, placid now, already leaving the kitchen. “I’ll set up that appointment for you. Keep an eye on your calendar. And congratulations on your mating!”

“Stay outta my business,” Katsuki hollered in return, finishing with his tea and meandering back to his cubicle. 

“Bakugou!”

Katsuki should have known he wouldn’t reach his destination unscathed. Teeth grinding, he turned to face Kirishima’s exuberant greeting.

“Bakugou!” 

“Watch the tea, dammit!” Katsuki sighed and held out one arm to keep his tea at bay from the embrace Kirishima flung around him. “Why’re you - let go of -”

“You smell amazing,” Kirishima mumbled, nosing at Katsuki’s hair and bitten neck, gasping with delight as inhaled deep of Katsuki’s throat. “Wow, wow, he really did a number on you didn’t he! Wow, Midoriya, amazing! He’s really manly, isn’t he?”

“How many brain cells you got left?” Katsuki grumbled, heaving a sigh as he waited out Kirishima’s inspection. 

There was no helping it. They were as close to a pack as it got, borne in blood and death and brotherhood as much as Katsuki and Todoroki or Shinsou. While Katsuki wasn’t necessarily thrilled with the extensive sniff party, it wasn’t unusual for someone as close to him as Kirishima to learn this new scent.

When Kirishima sniffled and pulled back with a wet gaze, Katsuki’s own eyes bugged out.

“What - why’re you -”

“I’m just so happy for you!” Kirishima wailed, hooking an arm around Katsuki’s shoulder and dragging him the remainder of the way to their cubicles. “So, so happy.”

Katsuki rolled his eyes.

“Great.”

“Hey,” came the subdued voice of Camie as they passed her work space. She’d turned in her chair, legs crossed, her expression mollified with a faint smile. “I just heard - and smelled, I guess. Congratulations, Blondie. Really. You’re happy, huh?”

“Yeah,” Katsuki croaked, one brow raised. “I am. Thanks, I guess.”

She only nodded and turned back to her space. Kirishima made an odd noise at the back of his throat and dragged Katsuki onward.

“What happened there?” Kirishima whispered.

“It’s nothing now,” Katsuki said, waving him off as he dropped to his seat. “Now get your shit done before shift change.”

“Alright, alright.” Kirishima was a heavy presence at Katsuki’s back for a moment, and Katsuki could tell he wanted more details about Izuku, about Camie, about everything, but instead returned to his own area, eventually. “Give me ten minutes.”

“Yeah, yeah.”

Shutting out the world in favor of tea and catching up on boring emails, Katsuki settled in for the morning with a contented sigh that gave him the creeps the minute he realized he’d done it. Shaking it off and slipping into concentration, he skimmed assignment alterations and updates. 

Izumi Kouta’s case was being relinquished to the police. Hospital security footage showed the kid walking out of the institution on his own, face full of a dismissive scowl as he stepped away. While his was a minor and the concern existed of his whereabouts, especially as the report showed his aunt, a fellow hero that Katsuki vaguely recognized from his years in UA, had come to retrieve him to no avail - this was no longer hero business, but merely a case of a runaway. 

Katsuki didn’t have to dig into that to know the police would toss the Izumi kid to the side and mostly forget about searching him out, Omega Murder survivor or not. Teenagers who didn’t want to be found in the big city did well to not be found. All the same, Katsuki made a mental note to update Izuku on the kid’s whereabouts - or lack thereof. 

Sipping his scalding tea, Katsuki scrolled through the extensive reports over the rim of his cup. While he didn’t need to know everyone’s business within the agency and no one was required to read the entire document but for cases of their own, Katsuki didn’t like to be caught off guard. He always needed to know everything there was to know. 

So when the name Todoroki popped up, he set his tea down with specific care, the hairs on the back of his neck rising with each word he soaked up. 

He was already reaching for his phone, eyes glued to the small excerpt on the screen.

A flash of brisk white on lush green as Izuku idly skied beside him on Mt. Naeba, his voice thoughtful.

“He kind of found out I’d dated his brother for years and that was, um, weird, to say the least.”

Of course. How the fuck could Katsuki have forgotten? It had been six years ago, maybe more, and Dabi had fried Katsuki out of battle extremely early into the fray and Katauki hadn’t been conscious for any of it. The whole thing had been so thoroughly masked by the powers that be controlling the media that Dabi’s actual identity never officially released. Katsuki had only heard through whispers - even Half and Half hadn’t confirmed. 

“Wait, Natsuo?”

Phone to his ear, Katsuki read the short, emotionless update over and over again.

“What, no, I mean D-”

[ Todoroki Touya, alias Dabi, released from Hotaru Rehabilitation Center in Hokkaido on 12 March XXXX. Therapy signed off as successful. Quirk nullified through arm bands. Address: XXXX. Father, Todoroki Enji, alias Endeavor, has placed 24/7 watch on the residence. Considered a non-threat. Likeness attached. ]

The phone continued to ring out as Katsuki scrolled to a set of photos, essentially a before and after. The first appeared to be a surveillance photo of some kind, grainy but clear enough to make out the purpling, gruesome scars and stapled skin, the riot of black hair.

The second photo was crisp and clear, more like a forward facing line-up photo, but the background was a simple white and the lost sibling in question appeared relaxed, if not a little exhausted and put out from standing before a camera. Head cocked, an entirely different person stared back with a flicked brow.

“What’s wrong?” Todoroki said by way of answering his phone.

“Why’s something always gotta be wrong?” Katsuki snapped, eyes narrowed on the shock of white hair filling the second photo, the mottled scarring no longer discolored, but sagging beneath bunsen blue eyes staring at him without fear or emotion. Was this really -

“You don’t talk on the phone,” Todoroki said simply. “Ever.”

“Yeah, well I -” Well, he what? Katsuki paused, realizing he couldn’t place the reason for his phone call in the first place. It had been simple instinct. “Shit. I dunno. There’s this update about your brother -”

“I’m well aware that my brother has been released.” Todoroki sounded terse and chilled. “Why would you call about this?”

“I don’t -” Katsuki scrunched his face into a scowl. “Fuck you, man. I just wanted to make sure you're cool and shit.”

Todoroki was silent for longer than was acceptable or comfortable for a phone call. 

“I’m cool,” he said softly. “Thank you. He’s - things are different now. I think. It’s hard to tell with someone you barely know.”

“Yeah,” Katsuki said, for lack of anything better or more helpful. “So that’s -”

“Don’t worry. I doubt he holds any interest for Midoriya anymore. That was so long ago, they were teenagers.”

“Then who gave you this? Same ones as your legs.”

“An old boyfriend. My first boyfriend. I practically asked for it.”

“You didn’t.”

“I did, actually. A lot of times. I was a stupid teenager and I - I thought that if I made myself hurt, I wouldn’t hurt so much on the inside.”

Todoroki may as well have dropped a ton of bricks atop Katsuki’s chest for how easy it was to breathe. He hadn’t even fucking considered it. The realization and the shock had been enough to keep him busy in the scant minutes between reading the brief and speaking to Todoroki. 

“I - right,” Katsuki bit off. “Obviously. He wouldn’t -”

“Be care-” A muffled struggle sounded from the other end and suddenly a lazy, smiley drawl colored the line. 

“Bakugou,” Shinsou all but purred. “Congrats on the sex.”

The emotional whiplash between one idiot and the other dislodged and spun Katsuki’s entire brain as he sputtered.

“Are you - what the fu-”

“Kirishima to Mina to Me,” Shinsou said in a sing-song, and Todoroki mumbled something in the background that had Shinsou outright laughing. “News does travel over our big bad virgin.”

“I’m not a virgin!” Katsuki hollered, eyes popping wide as he realized how many ears would catch his conversation. “Fuck you, goddamn shit gremlin! Stop yer nosin’ into my business and work on your own damn personality! Therapy - get a goddamn number from Izuku already!” The raucous laughter from the other end riled Katsuki into a fury as he roared and stood, chucking his phone across the entire open plan floor of the office, a distant shriek from someone as the phone hailed down into their cubicle. “FUCK YOU!”

“So good to see you lively again!” Kirishima chimed in, popping up from his own cubicle with a bright smile. “Bakugou has the fire back to his blood!”

“I hate all of you,” Katsuki hissed, ducking back into his cubicle to solidly sit in his chair and glower at the smarmy face of the man most commonly known as Dabi.

Of course. Of fucking course. Katsuki had thought so before, but Natsuo wasn’t Izuku’s type at all. But this piece of shit - yeah, he looked exactly like the kind of person a young and damaged Izuku would have gravitated toward.

Piece of shit. Katsuki wondered if Dabi was the type who could still be injured by fire. Katsuki would be more than happy to deliver the experience.

Ignoring the rattle and roar of a rabid Alpha against the cage of his ribs, Katsuki forced himself to drink his cooling tea and scroll away from the incriminating photo of the man who’d had Izuku for years before Katsuki had known of his existence. The fire of competition had no place here, but Katsuki burned all the same.

His fingers itched to call Izuku right away and demand answers, the entire story. But Todoroki was right on one front - he hated talking on the phone. And second, it wouldn’t do any good. If there was one definitive thing about Izuku that Katsuki had learned in the five-ish months they’d known each other, it was that demanding anything out of Izuku only led to a flared ego and dug in heels. It would get both of them nowhere.

And anyway, Izuku was opening in his own time.

With his second sigh of the day, Katsuki propped an elbow on his desk and dropped his cheek upon his palm, eyes glazing over as he recalled Izuku showing him his wrists in the pre-dawn purple haze of the kitchen. His voice had sounded like how bruises looked, swollen and tender and dark as he’d revealed old wounds. 

In that same kitchen, scant hours later while Katsuki was plating a quick breakfast for them, Izuku had dropped to his knees and taken Katsuki into his mouth with lips chapped and red from Katsuki’s own. He’d looked up at Katsuki from below, eyes wet and deep as mountain lakes, inviting Katsuki to dive in and drown. 

Katsuki had brutally fucked him on the counter, and even then Izuku’s scars had been bared, his legs spread wide and shameless for him.

Yes, Izuku was opening for him, and in all the ways that he did, they were all connected. Katsuki wouldn’t force him. Izuku had been defiled into enough throughout his short life - Katsuki wouldn’t be one to add to the violence. 

Huffing out a suddenly hot breath, Katsuki scratched at an itch on his arm, growling as the niggle scattered and spread up to his shoulder and the back of his neck. His stomach had coiled and melted to thick syrup between his legs as he’d allowed his mind to wander, and now he felt too hot for his skin, stretched too tight, cock desperate to release inside his mate, to watch those eyes glaze over as Katsuki filled him up to bursting. 

He wanted to use his own cum to lube up Izuku after they’d both spent, to drive him into a second orgasm, to watch his little Omega cry just for him, begging to be mated and marked and -

Katsuki came to with a sharp inhale, nostrils flaring in a desperate attempt to capture his mate’s scent, eyes wild as he realized where he was again. Scrubbing his hands through his hair and face, he stood, biting down on the groan of his thickened cock demanding it’s Omega, too.

What the fuck was this?

Shaking his head, Katsuki pressed a firm palm to the bulge in his crotch, more than a little horrified at his abrupt lack of control of his body.

“Right,” he hissed, looking down at his dick. “Stop. Stop. Shower, I’m gonna -”

Standing, Katsuki blinked away the odd dizziness that sloshed around his brains as made a beeline out of the office and toward the locker rooms. Cold shower, uniform, then go work outside in the cold. Excellent plan.

If this was what it was like to be in a relationship, how was society still standing?

Chapter 32

Summary:

The concept of someone caring for him so wholly that they would forgive or embrace the dishonest and ugly things about him was a notion unattainable.

Then again, being courted and cherished and carried by the infamous Ground Zero was about as unattainable a notion as it came. So maybe Izuku could, in turn, embrace hope in the way that Katsuki embraced him.

Notes:

Songs For This Chapter:
Open - Grady ft. Cailin Russo | Spotify | YouTube
Moral of The Story - Ashe | Spotify | YouTube
I Wish I Never Knew You - Oh Wonder | Spotify | YouTube

Alpha is mine.

Three days in and every time Izuku’s throat pulsed and smarted the bruising bite marks, that deep, earthen voice would rumble through the splintering cracks of his Omega core.

Alpha is mine.

There was nothing Omega about the ferocity that claimed Izuku’s aching chest when he thought back to that night and the feel of his own teeth marking into a mate for the first time in his life. No Alpha had ever let him near their neck, nor had Izuku ever made the faux pas to try. It simply wasn’t done. 

While an Omega was allowed to mark their Alpha only after the Alpha had made their claim, an Omega’s bite was optional and dependent on the couple. Many Alphas pursued polyamory separate from one or more Omegas, and if they did, a mark to their gland would alter their fragrance like a neon sign that said TAKEN. 

Neither of them had broken skin into the other’s scent gland, but it had been a close thing, and Izuku’s chest and shoulders and throat were conspicuously bruised and blissfully tender. From a coupling like theirs, Izuku didn’t need to smell to know he had an Alpha’s scent all over him. Katsuki had been sure to rub his throat over Izuku’s before they went their separate ways; the marking had done its job.

Everyone looked at him and knew. Izuku could see it in the appraisal of their eyes and the quickness with which they averted their gaze, as well. Izuku could only imagine Katsuki’s Alpha pheromones were powerful when put to purposeful use. 

Alpha is mine.

“Mine,” Izuku murmured thoughtfully, licking at his bottom lip as if he could taste what the word meant. No one had ever really been his - not in any way that made a man’s heart howl, anyway. Nor had anyone ever been Katsuki’s. 

So what did it mean for them now?

Unconsciously, Izuku rolled down one sleeve of his fleece-lined flannel and then the other, the warm tones of sunset and marigold and russet orange pattern easing the tides of his thoughts. Just knowing he was wearing something his Alpha had once picked for him soothed the beast inside that paced with raised hackles and long teeth. 

Just what was going on inside his body now? Who was winning - the Alpha, the Omega? If they chose to bond in the future, what would that do to Izuku’s body? Would the Omega overwhelm the rest of him? Izuku couldn’t imagine that possibility. His personality was distinctly more high octane than any Omega. And what of the rest of his body? The questions and concerns were endless. 

And yet -

Izuku smiled and felt his cheeks warm as a familiar buzz alerted from his corduroy pocket. Worries all but vanished in the haze of a greedy, growing kind of desire and glee, Izuku checked his messages. 

>>>my shitty friends want to meet you

<<<they already met me, remember? at the karaoke

>>>that entire night doesn’t count

<<<that was our first kiss!

>>>that was MY first kiss, period, you fucking shitbag. why does no one else realize what an asshole you are?

<<<OH NO ARE YOU SERIOUS OH MY GOD I’M SO SORRY THAT WAS AWFUL

>>>oh sure NOW it was an awful kiss. fucker.

<<<i’ll make it up to you ;)

>>>don’t make me hard in uniform. boners and jock straps don’t mix

<<<if only your fans could hear you now, kacchan

>>>I SAID DONT GIVE ME A BONER FOR FUCK’S SAKE

<<<i’m

“I think I should meet him,” Kouta said around a squishy chew of bubble tea. 

He sat hunched on the stool behind the counter, scrawny frame bowed toward the book laid out before him. Izuku had never been one to bother with early release order copies, but when Kouta had practically begged him for the newest installment of The Torrid Sea Affairs series, Izuku had relented. 

Hell, he gave in to practically everything Kouta demanded. Somehow it felt like paying it forward to a kid who could have ended up as lost as Izuku had once been. 

However, this request had Izuku dropping his phone  and nearly toppling off the short step ladder he used to shelve - or pretended to shelve while he daydreamed.

“W-what?” Izuku choked out, taking careful steps down and fumbling the ground for his phone as he composed his scrambled brain. “That’s - you’re not asking about -”

“Your Alpha, yeah,” Kouta said, casual as anything. Had the relative bliss of their cozy little living situation somehow scraped his brain of just who it was that he was talking about? Bad boy image aside, Izuku had quickly come to learn that the guy was a stringent upholder of the law. None of this could go over well - ever.

“That’s, uh -” Izuku squawked an awkward laugh and busied his fingers with undoing the top button of his flannel. “No, that’s definitely not -”

“He’s like your bondmate or whatever, isn’t he?” Kouta asked plainly, peering up from beneath his horned flatbrim hat to pierce Izuku with those relentlessly intelligent eyes. “Or, one day. You smell a lot different since you skipped out on coming home the other night. It’s weird, you almost don’t smell Omega.”

“That’s - that’s, ah, Kouta, the thing is -” Izuku chewed at a hangnail for a moment as he looked away, brain scrambling when even he knew he didn’t have the right answers. Keeping a secret this big from his very new and freshly minted boyfriend was so unlike the man he’d worked himself up to be - and so like the teeanger who so expertly kept himself distanced from those who might hurt him. He’d been in enough years of therapy to recognize the pattern. “He wouldn't react… positively. We both agreed on that the first day we met.”

“That was then,” Kouta said, sipping on his tea from a lavender straw. “This is now. Are you stupid? I made that agreement before I knew you, and your life, and practically started living out of your pocket. Don’t think I didn’t catch your pathetic ass mooning over your boyfriend on the news like days before you two shacked up in the first place. I never seen you two together and I’ve never been in a relationship myself, but aren’t you supposed to trust your partner or whatever? Aren’t they supposed to be there for you in return?”

At Izuku’s gawking, horrified silence, Kouta lifted the book he’d been reading and shrugged.

“Or so I’m told by the many chronicles of Akahana, the Omega pirate queen.”

Izuku deflated with a weak laugh.

“You’re too much.”

“You really think he’ll blow a gasket?” Kouta asked, dropping a cheek on his palm as he considered Izuku. 

“I - I don’t know,” Izuku answered as honestly as he could. He liked to think that maybe Katsuki would be understanding or, at the very least, willing to turn a blind eye, but -

But the people Izuku had cared for most in life had often done him wrong. Hurt him both physically, mentally, and emotionally. Betrayed him when he never would have guessed it. Pulled the rug from under his feet. The concept of someone caring for him so wholly that they would forgive or embrace the dishonest and ugly things about him was a notion unattainable.

Then again, being courted and cherished and carried by the infamous Ground Zero was about as unattainable a notion as it came. So maybe Izuku could, in turn, embrace hope in the way that Katsuki embraced him.

“Maybe you should figure it out,” Kouta said, like it was that simple. 

And it was that simple. Wasn’t it?

Izuku lived a life in greyscale rather than black and white. Katsuki did the opposite. But there was no purgatory about this specific situation, was there? Either Katsuki would accept what Izuku had done or he wouldn’t.

But if he didn’t -

If he didn’t, Izuku realized, he would lose the first person to whom he was willing to give everything. 

“I don’t exactly have the best track record with relationships,” Izuku mumbled, worrying at his bottom lip with thumb and forefinger.

“I’m shocked,” Kouta deadpanned, slurping again at his tea. “You seem so fucking balanced, just like me and every other Omega dude out there.”

Izuku rolled his eyes.

“Alright, alright, I -”

The bell door dinged, a fresh sweep of damp, early spring air cleansing the conversation like rain. Izuku’s customer service smile melted into a sunshine beam as Chisaki slunk into the store, Eri’s arm hooked in his, with Inasa, Hitoshi, and Todoroki in tow.

“Hey!” With a puzzled smile, Izuku accepted Inasa’s burly bear hug and nodded to the rest. “What’re you all doing here on a week day? Are you -”

“Holy hell, it’s really true,” Hitoshi said, eyebrows raised, his chin canted as his nostrils flared. “You absolutely stink.”

“You don’t stink,” Eri butted in quickly, her eyes wide and sweet. “Ignore Uncle Shinsou, you smell, um, you smell different, but nice!”

“Different is another word for it,” Hitoshi said smoothly, his slow gaze fixing on Kouta for a moment, eyes narrowing before he smiled blandly at Eri. “You got all the manners in the Chisaki family, didn’t you?”

“Congratulations, Midoriya!” Inasa swooped up a sputtering Izuku in his arms for a quick, crushing spin. “I’m so proud of all you’ve overcome to get to this point! Your Alpha -”

“C-can you put me down!” Izuku squawked, struggling to free himself from Inasa’s increasingly amorous hold. “I’m - thank you, phew. Are you guys seriously here for -”

“We thought we’d give you a few days before we assessed the damage,” Hitoshi said, his smug smirk from ear to ear. “How much did he scent you down? You practically smell Alpha yourself.”

“Do I?” Something about the knowledge warmed Izuku’s cheeks as he forgot to be aggravated with his friends. “Well, I mean, that’s because, y-you know -”

“A Midoriya in love is the absolute cutest!” Inasa boomed, swooping in for another embrace.

“Stop.”

A gloved hand slapped directly over Inasa’s smiling face, Chisaki wedging between Izuku and Inasa, sharply assessing eyes trained on Izuku as his hand slid from Inasa’s face to press firmly against his chest. 

“Good,” Chisaki said without a glance to the giant he easily kept heeled and at bay. His attention didn’t shift from his obvious intent. “Izuku. What the fuck is this?” 

Frowning, Izuku accepted the daily gossip paper Chisaki presented with his free hand and addressed the cover. In the bottom corner was printed a surprisingly clear likeness of himself, bundled up with a dreamy little smile, leaving what the newspaper claimed to be Ground Zero’s apartment. Which, well, it was. 

Inside was a short article, once more speculating and confirming their relationship, including a few bland details about Izuku that anyone could find on him with a quick internet search. More than anything, the article, or whoever was writing it, appeared outrageously ecstatic that the infamously single Ground Zero should finally be connected with someone - and a ‘nobody’ at that.

“What’s that?” Kouta asked, already snatching the paper from Izuku. “Wow, check it out. You’re famous.”

“Famous for fucking one of the most notorious Alphas in Japan,” Chisaki said, his tone cuttingly cold as he nipped the paper from Kouta’s fingers without sparing him a look. His eyes were all for Izuku, his voice enunciated and clear. “May we speak somewhere privately?”

“Uh oh,” Hitoshi said with a smile in his voice. “Daddy’s mad. Hey Eri, why don’t you show us the good manga these days? This old man is behind on the times.”

“You’re not old!” Eri said said with a giggle. “I didn’t know you read manga.”

“I don’t. But Shouto does and he’s too nervous to ask.”

“I’m not nervous,” Todoroki said, frank and assured as ever. “I’m just overwhelmed by all the new stuff. It’s too much.”

“Hey,” Kouta cut in. “I’ll take you guys there. Eri, what are you reading now?”

Izuku and Chisaki hadn’t shifted for the entire conversation, their gazes watchful, stubborn clash as their mass of friends made their way to the back of the store. 

“Your office,” Chisaki said.

“I need to be by the register,” Izuku fired back, meeting Chisaki’s frigid stare for as long as he needed to in order to hold his own. “You can’t talk here?”

“Have you lost your mind?” Chisaki asked, almost conversational in tone. “All of this. Your life. The world you built for yourself. He is the antithesis of it all, you know. You do understand that much, don’t you? At the very least.”

“At the very least,” Izuku said, careful of his words, the warning implicit in his tone, “I would think that you of all people would understand the importance of standing for the things and people in which you believe. You’ve never believed in anything halfway, Kai. Never done anything that wasn’t with the entire strength of your purpose. It doesn’t mean that everything you’ve ever done is good, but you’ve done it with passion all the same. And now you’re telling me that the first thing that’s given me a sense of - of belonging in this world, in this body, in this fucked up brain - you’re telling me I’ve lost my mind because I’m finally beginning to embrace it?”

Behind the black mask that concealed half of his face and emotions, Chisaki seemed to fall into a standstill, unmoving but for those feline eyes, a little wide and watchful.

“Izuku,” he said, his voice still cool, albeit softer now. “You’re - to me - fuck. Do you really feel -”

Chisaki quickly held up a hand to silence the reply on Izuku’s parting lips.

“Nevermind, don’t say it. I already know. Your face says too much every time. Just tell me you’ve got both eyes open, here.” When Izuku didn’t reply, his expression a curious pout, Chisaki sighed and leaned in, allowed one gloved hand upon Izuku’s shoulder. They rarely touched, even after so many years of friendship. “When you and Dabi - those two or three years, we weren’t close enough that I felt like I should interfere with you two. Most of the time I didn’t care. With Twice, I should have known, but I didn’t, and now -”

“Hey,” Izuku interrupted, gentle with concern as he stepped into Chisaki’s space, lips faintly curved when Chisaki didn’t recoil. “Hey, it’s fine. I’m starting to realize how many of my friends put it on themselves that I was out there making shitty decisions. But I wasn’t working with the - I don’t know. The right tools. I didn’t have the right tools to fix myself, or even look in the right direction for help. That wasn’t on you, or Hitoshi, or anybody else. And neither is this.”

Izuku didn’t have to see Chisaki’s full face to recognize the suspicion behind the mask. Despite himself, he breathed a hushed laugh and reached up, fingers wrapping around Chisaki’s bare, warm wrist, that concerned hand still resting upon Izuku’s shoulder. 

Chisaki may have been many peoples’ image of the devil on a shoulder, but rarely had he ever been for Izuku. Chisaki was working with his own fucked up set of tools to manage his world, too, after all.

“My eyes are open,” Izuku said soberly. “Trust me.”

Instead of relenting to the moment, Chisaki only narrowed his eyes.

“And what of the runaway Omega?”

Izuku groaned, a kid under the scrutiny of a father or older brother as he dropped his hold on Chisaki and slouched, eyes rolling to the sky in the same way Kouta might have.

“Seriously? Are we seriously -”

“The others are too dedicated to you to speak a word of it to you or anybody,” Chisaki said, appearing disinterested as he picked a fuzz off of his jacket. “I personally don’t give a flying fuck what happens to the brat.”

“Are you only saying that because her and Eri are making puppy eyes at each other?” Izuku said, smiling and hoping to derail the conversation.

Chisaki’s eyes flashed.

“Puppy is the last word I ever want to hear in reference to my daughter.”

“I wouldn’t worry.” Izuku bit back the gleeful stretch of his grin. “For his age, Kouta’s a gentleman. A romantic, actually. He’s a really good kid trying to make the best of what the world has given him. I’m just trying to give him a step up.”

“You’re not his guardian,” Chisaki said, entirely and obviously ignoring Izuku’s idle chat. “And he’s not you. Stop coddling him and rescuing him from imaginary monsters who -”

“His and my monsters are very real,” Izuku cut in sharply. “I -”

“I’m not talking about the Omega Murders. I’m talking about you. You, Midoriya Izuku. That boy is not you and you don’t have to be his hero just because no one was yours.”

Shocked by the delicately delivered assault and the battery against the walls he kept so strongly fortified, Izuku blinked back the sudden and unexpected well of tears.

“H-hey,” Izuku said, sniffling wetly as he wiped the back of his hand across his face. “That’s not - that’s not fair.”

“Neither his nor your life has been fair,” Chisaki said, not unkind but not with empathy either. He was delivering his view of the facts. This was, and had always been, his way of taking care of the people around him. “But don’t you feel his guardian deserves a chance to give him some new opportunities? If Eri ran away, I - well. She wouldn't. She’s a good girl. But if she did, and someone held her back from me because they knew… who I was. And what I do and have done. I would say that I hadn’t been given the proper chance to prove how I could really raise a child.”

Izuku stared, wonder coloring his tone.

“Kai…”

Chisaki hurled a sigh and threw up his hands rather flamboyantly as he turned on his heel to meander back toward the sound of friendly voices. He spoke flippantly, over his shoulder.

“I’m not one to throw niceties out there, but can you imagine if it all worked out serendipitously? Wouldn’t that be something. Not that I expect it, but you’re the type who needs to hear heroic speeches to get anything through your brain. So perhaps a little hope and a lot of balls could go a long way right now.”

In awe, Izuku could only watch his friend walk away and wonder who the hell had gotten into Chisaki to warm that chilly exterior. 

When Inasa boomed Chisaki’s voice in greeting as if they hadn’t seen each other in years, Izuku wiped a wet sheen of happiness from his eyes and swallowed down his anxieties for the day. 

Yes, maybe some optimism and bravery was in order.

Izuku was grateful for the friendships he’d forged over the years. As a teen, he’d been almost entirely friendless. Grammar and middle school as a Quirkless, male Omega loser couldn’t have been more alienating. He’d gone from meek and miserable to aggressive in angry, though one was always a mask for the other, and Hitoshi had been the first to see past that as someone who’d grown up on a similar path to Izuku. 

After Hitoshi, something had changed. Izuku had rediscovered what it meant to be a friend, to be there for someone and have them be there for him. Hitoshi had been the gateway to more friendships, and while Izuku’d decision making had still often been fueled by fear and loneliness and depression, there had been a change. 

Here he was, a handful of months from his twenty-sixth birthday, cozied in the warmth of his own business - one handed down to him from someone who had no reason to go out on a limb for him, but had - surrounded by the laughter and chat of his friends and makeshift family, the marks of a brave, obnoxiously tenacious Alpha buried into his body and soul, and the words of well-intentioned but rough encouragement from his friend ringing in his ears.

Life was good. No matter what happened from this point forward, Izuku allowed himself to bask in this moment of solid, soothing rightness. His life was aligning. 

Hours later, Izuku was still smiling, his cheek pillowed on his arms, the table sticky with too much beer and cluttered with empty plates of sweet, succulent barbecue. His belly was full, his head sparkling like effervescent bubbles, his neck pleasantly sore from the settled bites scattering his frame. 

Izuku was so happy.

“I’m so happy,” Izuku mumbled, cracking a yawn and sleepily squinting  at the overflowing shot glass sliding across the table toward his eyeline. 

“Drink more,” Chisaki, of all people, said.

“Is this incoming hangover your version of a punishment?”

“Hardly. If anyone will regret tonight, it’ll be me.”

“What? Why -”

Inasa slammed an empty glass to the rickety table with too much force, his cheeks shining like suns as he beamed.

“I shall walk you home once more tonight, Chisaki!”

“Wait,” Hitoshi said, a slow smile creeping across his pale face. “Since when do you walk this guy home?”

“This guy? I have a name,” Chisaki muttered.

“I most certainly do!” Inasa announced to practically half the establishment. “After a recent rise of Yakuza-related crime in the area of his estate -”

Hitoshi clucked his tongue.

“Chisaki, your crimes are becoming ostentatious. I can’t believe you.”

“As if they would be me. And stop drinking, you’re obnoxious.”

“You’re so easy, though -”

Izuku groggily watched Todoroki’s hand snatch Chisaki’s outreached wrist stretched across the table, intercepting whatever malicious, booze-induced assault Chisaki was about to throw at Hitoshi’s smug face. 

“Off,” Todoroki bit out, quick and heated, releasing Chisaki almost as quickly as he’d caught him.

Their friendship was a tenuous one at times, and Izuku had to wonder what would happen if the two of them ever had to be in the same room together and alone. Izuku giggled into his arms and peeked at the sunset color seeping over the crisp black of his mask. Neither he nor Todoroki would likely speak a word to each other.

All the same, they remained a mishmash of a pack. Inasa had once told him that Izuku was the glue that held them all together. At the time, Izuku had been quick to brush aside the compliment. But the more he grew and their bonds strengthened between their different dynamics, the more he realized that he really had been the initial reason for their coming together. 

The world had an altogether unfair and inconvenient way of piecing together a patchwork life until you couldn’t imagine it being any other shape, color, or comfort. 

“I love you guys,” Izuku idly murmured as he watched Chisaki threaten to disintegrate the nose from Todoroki’s face if he ever touched him again. 

The table stilled in various states of disarray. Chisaki was standing, one gloved hand slapped to the unsavory surface as he jammed a finger at a blithe Todoroki, Inasa halfway out of his seat with a tentative hand just shy of heeling Chisaki back, Hitoshi with a beer paused at his curved mouth, eyes fixed to Izuku as he’d spoken. Everyone looked at him.

“Ugh.” Chisaki sat with less grace than usual, the night of uncharacteristically heavy drinking obviously taking his toll as he narrowed his eyes across the landscape of barren plates and empty cups. “You’re disgusting.”

“Way to ruin what would have been a perfectly entertaining fight,” Hitoshi said with only amusement in his voice. 

“It wouldn’t have got that far,” Todoroki said, drowning a shot he’d had waiting for some time beside his food. It took a lot more than catty Chisaki to ruffle him. 

Sometimes Izuku looked at him and realized there were Alphas in the way everyone envisioned one, and then there were the Alphas who simply commanded an audience by existing, the way they held themselves, their sheer strength of character. Todoroki had always been this way. 

Now that Izuku thought about it, Dabi hadn’t been much different in that respect. Izuku had to imagine that even without the staples and scars, he would command a space through the magnetism of his existence. Izuku could never tell if it was Izuku the Omega or Izuku the Man who found that innate confidence unbearably and dangerously sexy.

“May I get you a water?” Inasa murmured to Chisaki, with more quiet delicacy than Izuku assumed he had in him. His beefy hand fluttered finely at Chisaki’s sharp elbow, fingertips barely brushing the fine, royal purple cashmere as he kept his mouth close to Chisaki’s pale ear. 

“Stop,” Chisaki said, jerking his elbow to edge Inasa off him even as the color shined high on his cheekbones and his lashes raised, gaze flickering to meet Inasa’s and away. “I’m perfectly fine, you oaf.”

“Midoriya,” Todoroki’s voice cut through Izuku’s boggling expression as he watched the world’s most improbable scene play before him. Perhaps no one else would have noticed the change in their postures or voices, but if anyone would, it was Izuku. “Come with me.”

“Huh?” Izuku blinked, brain sloshing in sparkling amber ocean as he tore his gaze from the way Inasa flagged a waitress for a water and Chisaki didn’t even protest. “What?”

“I think he needs some one on one time,” Hitoshi said, gesturing to Todoroki’s oddly terse expression. If anything, Todoroki spent his relaxed hours looking just on the verge of dozing off. He and Hitoshi had that in common. Izuku had to wonder just how much the two of them spent in their relationship actively sleeping.

“But -” Izuku looked to Chisaki, alone on his side of the table, shards of indignant annoyance glittering Hitoshi’s way.

“Don’t worry, I’m very good with cats,” was all Hitoshi said, his smile widening as Chisaki flicked him off.

Concern marring his brow, Izuku only nodded and followed Todoroki’s lead, escaping outside where the air was blessedly damp and cool, a sprinkle and fizz of mist floating down to Izuku’s sake-hot cheeks. He hadn’t brought his coat and was thankful for it, the flannel Katsuki had given him just the right amount of cozy as he faced Todoroki in the dim lighting. The hour was growing late, and only a few businessmen speckled the grey streets. 

Todoroki looked unnaturally stern in the steely, drab night. 

“Touya’s come home.”

The name didn’t register for one heartbeat, two, three, before an agitated fist clenched around Izuku’s heart and squeezed. Blood swelled in his ears, closed around his neck, a muffled bass of his pulse filling his plugged ears. 

And then sound returned in a great swoop, talons and blue dragons breath and all as Izuku gawked. 

“W-wait. Tou- Dabi? Dabi is, he’s back? Since when, how? Where is he staying?”

“He’s been cleared by the doctors,” Todoroki said, not sounding thrilled nor unhappy about it. “It’s been a long time. He has a lot to make up for, but he seems inclined to try. In his own way.”

Izuku still couldn’t keep up. The knowledge that Dabi was out and free, possibly walking anywhere around the city to jump out and -

“Hey.” Two firm hands on Izuku’s shoulders, a comforting presence, a reminder that Izuku wasn’t alone like he’d once convinced himself he was. “Hey, it’s alright. I think? He’s still himself but, I don’t know, more like the self I remember from childhood. He’s still an asshole, but he’s not going to hurt you. Not unless he wants burns even six years of professional help can’t fix.”

Izuku felt trapped in the tightening husk of his skin, the cage of his ribs as he kept his head lowered, gaze to the ground as he vehemently nodded. 

“Right, yeah, I - of course. I’m just, just surprised. I guess some part of me thought he’d never return.” With a gasp, Izuku whipped his attention to Todoroki’s somber face. “Ah! Not that I didn’t want him to get better or come back into the family or -“

“You’re my family too.” Todoroki dropped his hands but the warmth remained as his shy, small but always soothing smile eked out. “It’s okay. I know you’d never think like that. Leave that to me, I’m better at grudges.”

“I -“ Overwhelmed for too many reasons to name, Izuku faltered with his words. Gave up and inhaled deep, then finally met Todoroki’s patient eyes. “Thank you. For telling me.”

“I won’t lie,” Todoroki said. “I didn’t tell you out of the kindness of my heart. I would have preferred you not know at all. But there’s one more thing.”

A familiar seething breath of foreboding crept down Izuku’s spine. 

“What?”

“He wants to see you.”

Chapter 33

Summary:

“I don’t need to mark you to know you’re mine. I told you before - I ain’t patient but I can wait and work for what I want, all the same.”

Notes:

I'll normally be posting every other Monday from now on, but I realize now that I won't even be near a computer all of Monday, so enjoy your filth for the weekend!

Sunday.

“S’been too long,” Katsuki murmured against the soft, pinking shell of Izuku’s ear as he pressed his Omega’s strong, little body into the unforgiving shelfwork of murders and mysteries. His clothed erection, both instant and insistent the moment Izuku had flicked the lock on the door like some kind of Pavlov’s bell, smoothed against the small of Izuku’s back as Katsuki traced palms beneath the loose sweater, trailing over the cage of Izuku’s ribs and the knitted muscle that quivered at his touch. “Way too long.”

Izuku’s breathy laugh was meager and short, the hold he kept on the length of shelving all white-knuckled and telling enough to bring a smirk to Katsuki’s lips as he bowed his head to brush his mouth along the delicate hills of Izuku’s vertebrae. 

“We - ah.” Izuku sucked in a harsh gasp when Katsuki sucked at his nape, tongue swirling, his teeth only grazing with the promise of a bite. “W-we saw each other l-like six days ago.”

“Forever ago,” Katsuki said, nose buried in the fragrant riot of curls as he palmed up the hot, hidden flesh beneath Izuku’s baggy clothes, thumbs swiping at nipples until they beaded perky and hard for him. Izuku shuddered, a brief whimper cut off at the back of his throat even as he leaned into Katsuki’s frame, a solid, trusting weight that thrilled Katsuki’s blood. 

“Forever,” Izuku whispered, tilting his head back to rest against Katsuki’s chest. His arms rose - strong arms for an Omega, for anybody - and linked behind Katsuki’s neck with a sweet little sigh. “Kacchan.”

Katsuki’s deep-throated hum was both of pleasure and warning, the Alpha of him reading open-bodied gesture of submission like a predator scenting out prey. He’d barely touched his Omega and Izuku was already crooning for him, hips pressed back to cradle Katsuki’s cock, chin elevated, neck long and presented. 

Despite the overt submission, though, Izuku faced away from his Alpha, still not fully relenting. And if that wasn’t Midoriya Izuku all over, Katsuki didn’t know what was. 

Katsuki had never in his life been a man to take the easy way out. Effort and challenge fueled his blood. He was both gasoline and his own match. 

There was something of that in Izuku, too. Katsuki didn’t know when he’d first recognized the likeness, but the inner fire was there, and that singular quality was sexier than any random, needy Omega offering themselves to him in a heat. 

Izuku’s tireless drive to better himself, to surpass his goals, was stunning. Katsuki had been enraptured by his stubbornness from the start. 

“Touch me,” Izuku murmured, even while Katsuki already was, but he reached down all the same, fingers dipping beneath the waistband of worn, ripped jeans to merely tease and stroke the thickened cockhead straining against its confines. 

Instantly, a familiar thick scent arose like steam from steeped, heady green tea on a frosty morning. Leafy and pure and hot, soothing and enticing Katsuki’s tongue to water as he relented to the instinct to nuzzle and snort at Izuku’s pulsing gland, lips smearing with the dewy slick sweating from Izuku’s supple skin. Izuku’s fingers idled and flexed in Katsuki’s hair, encouraging him in with another throaty coo. 

Katsuki’s heart skittered, pulse scattering with the invitation as he opened his mouth wide to encompass the largest chunk possible of Izuku’s nape, pausing only a moment, just in case - just in case the skittish prey ran once more. But Izuku fisted Katsuki’s hair and jerked hard, effectively clamping Katsuki’s teeth over his flesh. 

With a muffled snarl, Katsuki sunk in, his lengthened canines popping past the skin, welling blood that tasted of his mate flooding his mouth. Izuku’s moan was a bright, singing crescendo as his entire body stiffened, then went suddenly lax, his frame pitching forward in slow motion. His arms folded upon a shelf ledge, books abruptly shoved away as Izuku dropped his brow to his sleeves as Katsuki followed through, his teeth still embedded into the sinew of Izuku’s nape.

The bite was a scruff; a heel, a forcible stilling, and Izuku had asked for it. He’d melted for Katsuki like hot wax, all but spilling over at the seams with soft, sweet noises and blood that sang with the promise of surrender.

More, the Alpha in Katsuki seethed. Alpha needs their Omega belly-up and crying. Alpha needs -

Moaning into the blood and burning flesh of the bite, Katsuki wrenched at the buttons of Izuku’s jeans and yanked them over soft-skinned hips to take hold of that fragrant, succulent cock. Half delirious on Izuku’s blood and the musky, earthen scent of arousal that rose from him in heatwaves, every instinct howled not to release his catch, begging to fuck his mate like a goddamn dog, teeth immobilizing Izuku into pliancy as he railed him into the shelving.

Izuku’s long, throaty moan hiccuped into a wrecked sob as he wetly mumbled into the fold of his arms like a drunk.

“F-fuck me. M’yours, Alpha, my Alpha.”

The barbed choke chain on Katsuki’s savagery snapped.

Teeth scruffing the back of Izuku’s neck, blood trickling into the collar of his cable knit sweater, Katsuki tore his hands from Izuku’s quivering body to release his bulging cock from the confines of his sweats. It felt harder and hotter than he could ever remember as he palmed it against the cleft of Izuku’s tight ass, the ripe slick there catching on the length and lubricating every harried thrust along that dark, secret valley of skin. 

Izuku whined in turn, needy little slut noises Katsuki’s animal brain could only hear as fuck me, mate me, shove my face into the ground as Katsuki cupped a hand around Izuku’s throat, palmed at a ransacked pulse, his free fingers pinching and pulling one tortured nipple as they ground into each other. 

Lights shocked behind Katsuki’s squeezed shut eyes, a razed scent between the slick sounds of their bodies that flickered firelight and fury behind his lids. Izuku writhed back into him, going to tiptoes with a building growl of frustration as he attempted to shift his ass, to catch his tight, sopping hole on the crown of Katsuki’s cock. His brow knocked none-too-gently against the shelf, once, twice, the rumble of desire increasing like an avalanche into a full out snarl as he reached behind him and parted his asscheeks in a display so brazen Katuski had to let go of Izuku’s neck just to place hands on his hips and take a moment just to gaze in awe.

“Oh.” Breathless, rusted voice; not his own, certainly not his fucking own as his mouth watered at the sight of his Omega offering himself up like a goddamn three course meal. “Holy f- you, I -”

“Just fuck me already!” Izuku looked over his shoulder, face a mask of darkened doom and delirium, those faintly pointed fangs of his own bared as he yanked the choke-chain around Katsuki’s heart instead of simpering on his belly like any other Omega would. 

Katsuki’s mate didn’t purposely entice or trick - he demanded and took, tooth and nail like Katsuki did in turn. The shift in mood made Katsuki’s knees melt, molten and useless as plastered himself to Izuku’s livewire, spark-hot body and wrapped arms around tight. Izuku was vibrating out of his skin, breathing hard as he instantly burst into motion, rolling hips back into Katsuki’s anew, gasping wet and humid when Katsuki tunneled fingers around that beautiful cock, his other hand sneaking between their flush bodies to circle and dip two fingers into Izuku’s waiting heat. 

Izuku’s moan was long and lewd, dripping lush over Katsuki’s fingers, that swollen summer greenhouse scent rising to fill his lungs and mouth. Smearing his lips and tongue over the bloody flower of teeth at Izuku’s nape, Katsuki added that third finger quick, knowing from their first night together a week ago that not only did Izuku relish the burn and stretch, but he’d already be wide and willing enough to take him now now now.

“Kat -” Izuku bit off a hiss, wiggling his ass down to the base of Katsuki’s fingers, his grip once more pearl-knuckled on the disheveled shelving unit, his forehead pressing into the backs of his flushed hands as he shuddered out a long, breath. “Oh, yeah, yeah, just like - nnnfuck, fuck you! Fuck you - fuck me, need your, ah! Yeah, yesss -”

Even when Katsuki snarled, hiked one of Izuku’s legs up, guiding his knee onto one of the lower shelves and shoved his cock into that liquid heat in a single, desperate plunge, Izuku didn’t shut the fuck up. He hadn’t the other times, either. Katsuki’s short, breathless laugh could have been mistaken for a sob for air as he pounded his ripe, bursting Omega into the books, fingers flexing around Izuku’s throat, feeling more than hearing the barrage of lurid, encouraging words flooding from his brazen, fucked-brainless mate.

The angle wasn’t enough, though, and Katsuki wanted to watch. Never in his life before Izuku could he have envisioned himself wanting to watch an Omega get fucked more than he wanted to eat or drink or sleep. 

And that was how Katsuki ended up switching his grip from Izuku’s throat around to his nape, palm over the physically pulsing heat of his weeping, angry bite to push Izuku down, down until Izuku was outright crying, bright and loud and clear with his ass jut out, his sweat-slippery grip grappling with a lower shelf a new set of books pushed askew. 

“Stay.”

Katsuki was drunk off the view, of watching his thick, long cock spreading that pink, blushing hole agape, the way Izuku’s ass leaked over and twitched when Katsuki pulled out in full and bedded himself deep in a single thrust. And again, sliding out slowly, the heavy drag and pull of that ass clenching around him, desperate to keep him, and a solid slap of hips and the jiggle of Izuku’s full ass to follow. 

“Mine ahhhfuck,” Katsuki snapped, a trail of sweat dampening his t-shirt as he brought the hem to his teeth, holding it back as he fucked into Izuku with an increasing energy. His cock fucking glistened with how soaked Izuku was, that ass slurping and sucking him down, tight enough to have Katsuki seeing double if he didn’t goddamn concentrate, his rhythm fraying further into some harried and hectic and heat-crazy.

“Ah - ah - AH!” Izuku sucked in a wet breath, a high keen singing at the back of his throat as he kept his ass high like the good, obedient Omega he absolutely wasn’t. So that fact that he was doing it only goaded Katsuki higher, his balls clenching tighter, the searing coil deep in his cock winding hotter.

The pace raced toward erratic, maddening, an incoming roar from the bones outward, Izuku’s babbling disintegrating into begging, Katsuki’s jaw screaming from biting down on the t-shirt in his mouth as he watched the sweat from his temples dribble over the small of Izuku’s blotchy, overexerted back. He smeared it there with his thumb and groaned into the fabric as a feral thought shredded everything else. 

“Why are you slowing down!” Izuku cried - literally, literally cried, the desperate sob dampening his voice as he breathed through beautiful tears that Katsuki wished he could see. 

Omega is crying for Alpha’s cock, for his mate. Alpha is a good Alpha.

“Bite me,” Katsuki muffled through the t-shirt, draping his body over Izuku’s hothouse frame and presenting the minor gland of his wrist to Izuku’s tear-dripping lips. 

“What?” Izuku sounded incredulous or maybe just delirious, fraught and shaking with it. His deep, wet heat clenched around Katsuki’s cock as if attempting to milk an orgasm out of him - and with excellent result, because Katsuki was burying his face into the rain forest drench scent of Izuku’s hair and biting down behind the shell of his ear to keep himself from rocketing off. “Whaddayou -”

“Bite -” Katsuki eked a high, sharp noise of something pain, nothing of the body but only the mind or soul or the Alpha balking in very horror of the request “- me!”

Izuku’s hesitation stilled his entire body for a heartbeat before he groaned and, without taking it slow or easy, sunk his blunt teeth into the side of Katsuki’s wrist with a visceral squelch.

Katsuki howled. The pain rioted through his arm with shredding claws and slobbering fangs, tearing through him as he shook and shallow-fucked Izuku through an orgasm that shrieked from the abyss and consumed, a forest fire as they ever were together, devouring into flame and ash as Izuku moaned, mouth full of Katsuki’s blood sloppy wrist, and came like a vice around him.

How they both ended on the floor without knocking themselves out on the shelving or each other in the fray, Katsuki didn’t know. An ethereal haze shimmered like a filmy curtain over his consciousness as they collapsed, Katsuki coming to honey-glazed awareness cradling a shivering Izuku in his lap and arms, Izuku’s arms draped around Katsuki’s neck, breathing hard against his ear, legs askew over Katsuki’s blood and cum smeared thigh. 

The entire shop scented of rain after a dry spell; dust kicked up from the earth, green petals spreading wide to drink in the damp, fresh mud, the vibrant tang of renewal. And beneath that, the sticky musk of sex and copper, the spit and flare of sparks and devastation.

Katsuki drank it in, murmuring something lazy and intoxicated into Izuku’s shoulder, trailing fingertips along a strong, freckled thigh and bursting into goosebumps out of empathy from Izuku’s own prickled legs. A glow, unseen but deliciously radiant, cast in amber stillness, felt like it surrounded them both as Katsuki faintly rocked in place with a now-dozing Izuku in his arms.

The silence didn’t last long. Katsuki recognized the moment Izuku came to full consciousness, that electric bumblebee buzzing of his inherent nature coming to life in his lap. 

Just as quick, Izuku sat up straight, one arm still slung over Katsuki’s shoulder, his deep eyes large and dark as he mutely gawked at the length of the shelving unit.

“My fucking books, Kacchan!”

Katsuki gaped in turn.

“That’s really all you gotta say? For fuck’s sake, I’ll buy ‘em all, okay!”

“And do what with them? Izuku looked petulant and entirely unintimidating in no pants and a sweater on, his bottom lip stained crimson with blood, his freckled cheeks a little puffy and pink from crying. “That one is covered in jizz - that one too! And that! And there’s blood on -”

“If you could not talk and ruin my entire life right now that would be great,” Katsuki muttered, narrowly watching as Izuku’s pointed glare turned into one of suspicion then, somehow, shyness as he glanced away with flare of flushed face. 

“I’m - uh.” Izuku found Katsuki’s stern gaze again. “Sorry if I hurt you.”

Katsuki blinked. Literally looked around him, in search of some book that might be titled Hidden Language Discovered: The Elusive Midoriya Izuku and You, but alas, he was out of fucking luck.

“What?” he finally asked, already dreading what over-thought nonsense Izuku would come out with.

“I mean, your arm and - and everything.”

Katsuki frowned, turning his wrist so his arm cast across Izuku’s bare lap. The knobby bone of his wrist was already crusting over in a bright, angry scab.

“This? It’s fine. I heal fast. And anyway, I asked you to do it. Stop apologizing for shit that ain’t even your fault.”

“I -” Izuku pressed plush lips together, and Katsuki found himself softly kissing them before he’d strengthened the resolve not to. When he pulled back, Izuku’s eyes were soft moss and fog, pupils like deep lakes. “I - what was I going to say?”

“I really don’t care.”

Izuku’s shoulders shook, his lips tipped down as he fought a laugh.

“Okay,” he said, humor in his voice. “I’m glad my input is so valuable to you.”

“Yeah, well.” Katsuki winced at the cooling spend that had been slowly leaking from Izuku onto his lap and legs. One minor reason why he had also avoided sex for so damn long. Total disinterest aside, the fucking mess. “My input and yours is clearly all over the place, so maybe we can talk about this later. Or never. Never would be great.”

“It’s like you haven’t even met me,” Izuku said, but there was an easy candor to his voice, untroubled and free for now. “I have to over-discuss everything.”

“Anyone other me ever tell you you’re fuckin’ obnoxious?” Katsuki asked, groaning as he carefully got to his feet and hefted Izuku to his. Izuku wobbled and tipped into Katsuki’s waiting arms, his vibrant summer gaze wide and warm as his smile. 

“Can’t remember right now, but I’m sure you reminding me is my favorite, anyway.”

“You’re a twisted man.”

“Now that’s a secret.” Izuku ran a hand through Katsuki’s hair, spiking it back up from its flattened, sweaty state, his lips curved with self-satisfaction as his scent evoking sunshine summer lakes and sweetened tea. “Don’t tell.”

Katsuki laughed, couldn’t help himself.

They cleaned up carefully and dressed with even more care, both of them achy and wounded from each other’s passion. Izuku decided to address what books he needed to rid from the shelves, and shooed Katsuki to the office to boil the electric kettle for tea and to dig up some melon bread Inasa had recently showered him in. 

Katsuki kind of wanted to ask how often Izuku saw that bizarre crew of heroes & one anti-hero, and how they worked as a pack, and how the hell anybody handled Chisaki fucking Kai without stabbing him directly in the eyeball - but he refrained. There was time for questions, time for learning each other. Katsuki just wished it wasn’t relegated to Sundays and quick texts, phone calls while falling asleep after another challenging day.

“Alright!” Izuku walked in with a small stack of books in his arms, his cheeks rosy and his smile bright as he set them upon a short tower of cardboard boxes in the far corner. “You’re paying for these. This is your fault.”

“Yeah, yeah.” Katsuki waved him off as he poured the boiled water over teabags, watching them go cloudy green like Izuku’s eyes after an orgasm. “You’re loud.”

“You’re louder.” With a shit-eating grin, Izuku flopped back into the large desk chair, his thighs spread wide to encompass the entire space, his arms folded as he considered Katsuki. “Saying that, though, you can be very mellow when others aren’t around.”

Katsuki’s entire face mutated in disgust.

“You say that like it’s a compliment. Fuck off, I ain’t no lap dog.”

Something shifted in Izuku’s expression. A sharpening of his smile, maybe, the angle of his eyebrows or the cant of his chin, jaw faintly flexing like he was preparing for a sprint or a challenge.

“How do you know?”

“Know what?” Katsuki asked, not following the conversation at all. He braced his hands back against the desk, ass digging into the edge. “The fuck’re you talkin’ about? You jizz your brains out or something?”

“How do you know -” Izuku leaned forward and took Katsuki’s wrist and Katsuki frowned, allowing it, since he didn’t know what the hell was going on, anyway. When a fissure of sparkling pain and pulsing pleasure sapped from the bite around which Izuku traced the pad of his thumb, Katsuki’s eyes widened, his lungs pausing altogether. “- that you’re not a lap dog?”

Katsuki froze. Not out of fear or horror or whatever, but shock. Clueless, dumbfounded shock as Izuku’s sweet little face morphed into something two-thirds bedroom eyes and one-third predator. 

“Wh-” Katsuki shook his head, his hand palm up and limp in Izuku’s soft, constantly stroking hold. Distantly, he recognized his own scent, but odd. Less aggressive inferno and more smoky warmth. Katsuki shook his head again and removed his wrist. “Sorry, I uh - hold on. What were we talking about before?”

Izuku blinked and it was like his demeanor had never been, his shoulders relaxing as he blinked up at Katsuki with a perplexed little smile.

“Katsuki?”

“Wh...at…” Katsuki found himself asking more carefully than he’d asked any question in his life.

“Why did you let me mark you?” Izuku flushed from the neck upwards but seemed determined not to look away. “You know that’s what it was, right? I know you’re not entirely versed in how everything works and fuck knows I’m not the relationship expert, but, Alphas - they don’t just let… Omegas, y’know, mark them. First. Or sometimes ever.”

And just like that, confidence filled Katsuki once more, his steady ground as he grinned, cocky and wide and cutting.

“First off, I don’t give half a shit what other couples do. At what point in the past four months have we been anything like any couple you’ve ever known?”

“None,” Izuku murmured, his lips curving almost sheepishly. 

“Second.” Katsuki pushed off the desk to loom in, fingers firmly grasping that stubborn chin to angle Izuku’s eyes to meet his. “I don’t need to mark you to know you’re mine. I told you before - I ain’t patient but I can wait and work for what I want, all the same.”

“Katsuki,” Izuku whispered, his eyes welling up unexpectedly.

Katsuki rolled his eyes before pressing a kiss to Izuku’s lips, lingering and lush, no tongue, just a patient confirmation through touch. 

“Third,” Katsuki said, a little breathless now, his hands now gripping both armrests to cage in his Omega lest he escape at the final admittance. “I think we both know you’re not like any Omega, period. Not just whatever the hell our relationship is, but you. Just you, Midoriya Izuku. Are not an Omega in any way that I’ve known one.”

Izuku’s eyes widened as he sputtered, shifting in his chair as if looking for a way out.

“Hey.” Katsuki’s voice was firm, commanding, but not a yell. Izuku’s gaze linked to his in a snap, body stilling. “It’s fine. I don’t get it, but I don’t get a hell of a lot about you yet, anyway. We got time, okay, freckles? We got time. So if you wanna bite, then bite. I ain’t a fuckin’ pussy, you know.”

Izuku’s mouth opened, closed, opened, broke into a smile as he shook his head in wonder. Warm hands rose to palm Katsuki’s face, cradled it as he brought him in for a long, sweeping kiss, sweet tongue and delicate, easy exploration. No rush, no fear, just acceptance, learning, guidance, savoring each other as they were. 

“‘Zuku,” Katsuki rasped against Izuku’s ear when he could come up for breath, his knee balanced on the chair, flush with the pulsing length Izuku mindlessly rut against Katsuki’s thigh. “Le’s go back to your place.”

Izuku stopped and whined, grappling for Katsuki’s hair, yanking in needy handfuls as he pulled him down to kiss again, again, and again as he mumbled between the sloppy mash of their lips.

“Can’t.” Izuku sucked on Katsuki’s bottom lip, then spread his legs, the deep, coy scent of his arousal rising to curl at Katsuki’s senses. “Cousin’s there. Can’t. Your place.”

“Fuck him,” Katsuki hissed, brain buzzing and frayed with the way Izuku was using his leg as a goddamn jack off. “Whoever he his, I fuckin’ hate him and I don’t give a shit if -”

“Your place,” Izuku urged, grabbed Katsuki by both ears to yank him in for a deep, searing kiss that left them both panting by the end. 

“Don’t complain if I fingerfuck you in cab on the way there, then,” Katsuki snapped, pissed off and turned on in equal turns. 

“How about now instead,” Izuku breathed into Katsuki’s gaping mouth. “Now, now, hurry, Kacchan, hurry.”

A frenzy of frayed nerves and flung clothes followed, Katsuki on his knees before the chair, a mouth-watering, front row seat to Izuku’s knees flung wide and hooked over either arm rest, his hands over his head to grip the back of the chair as Katsuki fucked him with fingers and stiff, searching tongue. 

Izuku entire body flushed red, everything in Katsuki’s vision red on red on red, burning up hot and wet and wanton, scalding from the inside out as Katsuki watched that ass take three fingers, then four, Katsuki’s thumb massaging the velvet soft spot beneath Izuku’s taut balls until Izuku came over himself, cock untouched and crying out his name.

“C’mere,” Izuku whispered, hoarse and broken as he dropped to his bare knees and encouraged a shaken and fully clothed Katsuki to stand. “C’mere, lemme -”

Izuku had Katsuki’s cock out quick, his eyes big and wet and beautiful as he swallowed down a good length of him, spit-sloppy and desperate to take him over fast.

Katsuki didn’t have a fucking choice. Came like a goddamn comet, red on red on red all over again, Izuku framed in a halo of fire as they locked eyes, Izuku choking around the cum he so greedily swallowed down. Katsuki had the vaguest sense of thanking Izuku just about twenty times in a row as he gripped the edge of the desk on weak legs and watched Izuku lick up the aftershocks of his cock like that was just something people wanted to do. 

They didn’t leave Parchment until deep night, the streetlights meager and the air heavy, sopping wet, refreshingly cool blue. 

Izuku clung to his arm, a beacon of warmth in a world that was determined to prove just how cold it was. 

“Hey,” Izuku said as they walked, both of them having agreed to take the very long walk to Katsuki’s place just for the sake of cooling down and working out the aches in their bodies. 

Katsuki grunted in reply, instinctively draping an arm around Izuku’s shoulders and yanking him closer as they passed a single man walking past them. 

“I just want to tell you that, um.” Izuku didn’t speak for a moment, took a breath and unloaded quickly on the exhale. “My old crappy boyfriend is back in town and wants to see me, but I don’t think I want to see him right now, so I just want to tell you that, um, yeah, that’s what’s happening in my life right now and -”

“Yeah,” Katsuki said, clipped and curt, not angry with Izuku but with the rising recollection. “I know. I mean, I knew.”

Izuku immediately stiffened and balked away from Katsuki’s hold.

“Wait, what -”

“Calm your tits, freckles. I wasn’t snoopin’ or nothin’. Dabi - that’s the guy, right? His release showed up on our agency updates. So I called Icy Hot to, I dunno, see what the fuck was up with him -”

“You knew they were brothers,” Izuku said, sounding accusatory or shocked or both.

“I mean, I guess. I forgot. Not like I give a shit about other people’s family fuck-ups. Anyway, he musta thought I knew about… the two of you. Because he said something like, oh, that asshole wouldn’t be interested in you now, you were just teens and whatever.” Katsuki shrugged, stubbornly walking forward as he felt the force of Izuku’s drilling gaze. “Told you a bunch a times. I ain’t fuckin’ stupid. I can put two and two together.”

Izuku stopped in the dead street and Katsuki rolled his eyes, forced to stop and turn to steadily meet his gaze. 

“I’m -” Izuku looked to the ground, then away, small and lost despite being strong and in safe hands. “Yeah. I’m sorry I freaked there, I just thought -”

“I know what you thought,” Katsuki said dryly, pocketing his hands as he considered Izuku with a straight face. “And I know why you thought it. But I’m real fuckin’ tired of misunderstandings, shortstack. So can we just not do this? If he goes near you, consider his arms ripped out of their sockets, alright? Boyfriend service, free of charge.”

Izuku blinked at him, eyes wide and suddenly wet, like they were wont to do.

“Okay,” he croaked. “Yeah, okay. Thanks.” 

“The fuck you thankin’ me for?” Katsuki griped, riled up and jamming his arm around Izuku’s neck to noogie his nest of curls. “You lil’ fucker! Stop takin’ me for an idiot or you’ll be real sorry one day! Do you know who I am - do you?”

Laughing and gasping and laughing harder, Izuku futilely attempted to duck out of Katsuki’s hold and escape the knuckles that knotted up his hair. 

“Stop, ow, stop, okay! I give, you win! You’re the winner!”

“Ha!” Katsuki barked with laughter, releasing Izuku only long enough to round his arm over Izuku’s shoulders and kiss him loudly on the head. “Of course I am, dumbass!”

“Who’s a dumbass,” Izuku hollered, cracking up as they stumbled down the sidewalk like drunks. 

Sunday, Katsuki thought, as he kissed up Izuku’s smile and swallowed his laughter into a moan. Sunday was his favorite day of the week.

Chapter 34

Summary:

Sometimes important things are the hardest to reveal, but the most necessary. Sometimes it’s too terrifying to remove the knife stuck in your gut because you’re afraid everything that bleeds out will kill you before you can heal anything at all.

Notes:

1. Thank you all SO MUCH for the supportive and lively comments while I've been gone. They fill me with joy & life, which are two things I've been severely lacking in the past months. You guys interacting with my work really makes my day and I just want to express how much I appreciate you, notice you, and treasure you. All of your little screen names and personalities shine for me and I know you're out there!

2. That being said, PLEASE don't comment with just a line begging me for an update or 'is that really all?' or 'is this fic dead?' (after only 2 months) or 'are you really going to leave it like this? are you ever coming back?' Ladies, gents, and otherwise, I spent all of January highly suicidal for the first time in six years. It wasn't a great time. Please think about how emotionally sensitive this work is and how not-cool it is to guilt me or demand from me this piece of work. I LOVE that yall love this - I LOVE that so many of you can read this and feel like I'm reaching out to you, because I am. But LET ME LIVE LOL. I am sadly not getting paid to write something that equates as two full novels.

ANYWAY. Please try and be patient with me. I am a single mama with a kidney transplant, PTSD, and a very weak body. I'm doing what I can!

That being said, please please do enjoy and let me know what you think! The whole story is about to take a turn into new territory!

“I’m lying to my partner about something and it’s eating me up.”

Izuku hadn’t meant to say it. 

Sometimes important things are the hardest to reveal, but the most necessary. Sometimes it’s too terrifying to remove the knife stuck in your gut because you’re afraid everything that bleeds out will kill you before you can heal anything at all.

Izuku didn’t know when he’d realized the knife was stuck, or who had stabbed him with it in the first place, but he was coming to realize there were worse ways to die than bleeding out.

People died inside every day from cowardice and dishonesty. It was suicide in the worst way, because your body kept on living even after you accepted the knife in it.

“Something about your past?” Ms Hayate said without missing a beat. Her eyes remained cool and dark and calm. No judgment or anger.

“N-not this time.” Izuku looked off to the shuttered window and the watery grey light leaking between the dusty slats. His bitten nails scraped at the beginnings of a ragged hole in the knee of his jeans. “I probably shouldn’t tell you either. Not that you’d say anything but I’d rather not drag you in.”

“I understand. Partnering with someone of renown carries its own weight. It can be difficult to find a balance between what you might consider ‘real life’ and his.”

“Yeah,” Izuku murmured, thoughts tangled and tripped, no clear path unknotting for him. “I guess. I just - I know he won’t react well and then he’ll know I’m - I’m -“

The unsavory glob of emotion stuck sticky and wet in Izuku’s throat as he blinked back a wash of tears in surprise. 

“Sorry, sorry, I don’t know why I’m-“

“Do you feel safe with your partner?” Ms Hayate asked quietly as she gestured to the tissue box beside Izuku’s chair as a reminder.

“What, yes!” Izuku laughed damply, mostly at himself. “Yes, absolutely. He’s - he’s very trustworthy.”

“But are you safe?” Ms Hayate replied, delicate hands folded upon neat tweed trousers.

“I’m never safe,” Izuku blurted out weakly, eyes spilling over with the abject shock of his own admittance. “Wait, no, I mean! I know I’m safe, I know it logically, I just - I just -”

“Where do you feel it? This lack of safety, the impending danger.”

“Around my throat.” Izuku dragged a hand down his neck, fingers curling into a protective fist at the center of his chest as he hiccuped a wet sigh. “A-and my chest, like someone is sitting on it all the time. It… it feels like I’ll never be able to breathe again, or when you’re a kid and you test yourself in the pool for how long you can hold your breath but you start to panic before you reach the top.”

“When was the first time you remember this feeling?”

“I -” Izuku shook his head, his memories fogged and dark, a haunted backroad no one dared traverse lest the car breaks down and leaves them stranded in desolation and hopelessness. “I don’t know. Before Jin. Before Dabi or - or before I even presented Omega, I think. Maybe, ah, maybe around the time we moved from the neighborhood I grew up in. I think I was around four when I realized we weren’t like everyone else - that I didn’t have a father to take care of us and the world wasn’t going to help us unless we did it ourselves.”

“Was that not also the time you and Mr Bakugou also had your initial imprint broken?”

Headlights approaching down that foreboding road, a hope, a little blinding after all that dark, a lot surprising. Katsuki had been ripped from his life just around the time Izuku had learned what abandonment felt like. The timing of being ripped from Katsuki coincided with a young Izuku’s first real understanding that not only did he not have a father, but not having a father also equaled poverty, sadness, and stress in his tiny household. Abandonment meant empty heart and empty cupboards, a hollow in his stomach and the struggle in his mother’s eyes.

Izuku realized he’d been staring at the same spot on the carpet for who knew how long.

“I - I mean, shit. Yeah, yes, that’s - that’s when I started to feel, I don’t know, anxious and - and scared, I guess.”

“If I may place a thought in your head for consideration until we next meet,” Ms Hayate said, voice a soothing, cool balm over the ragged, raw gape of new realization. “Mr Bakugou is not only safe, but his disappearance was one primary reason you felt lost and desperate for human contact throughout your life from that point on. Consider, and truly let it sink in, that he is back. For you and with you. And you are no longer a scared little boy, but a man of intelligence, strength, and bravery beyond most.”

Izuku could only nod and look in on in awe at the realm of possibility one simple conversation could have on an entire life. 

Safe. You are safe.

What a thought. 

 

Izuku hated free time. Relaxing did not come naturally to him, and if he was at a loss for something to do, his ever-racing brain could come up with something.

Early on in his recovery process, Izuku and his therapist had quickly come to the agreement that Izuku’s idle hands almost always led to mischievous predilections and addictions. His home gym routine had become iron clad after that, including meal prep for food he didn’t want to eat because he couldn’t taste, organizing and throwing out the things that pulled him into dark states of nostalgia, journalling, yearly to-read book lists, and regular visits with his mother… whom he’d been more recently neglecting among the mayhem of his current life upheaval. 

But today was different, and no distraction could cage the anxiously pacing animal treading deep tracks in his skull. After therapy, Izuku had grocery shopped, come home and worked out, showered, fretted over dousing himself in scent suppressants, decided against it at the memory of Katsuki’s pure ire with them, completed a hasty meal prep for the coming week, and found himself standing in a bedroom assaulted with a slew of clothes he’d been wearing for so long that Izuku knew he’d look dirt poor no matter what he wore.

Hitoshi was always quick to remind Izuku that he was, in fact, not poor, and had a hefty chunk of inheritance from Mr Yagi’s passing. But Izuku had always felt wrong using that kind of money on clothes or frivolities. He’d invested in new, hearty wood shelving units for the shop, new flooring, and keeping a wider array of books on hand and to order.

And, more recently, Izuku had been turning over the idea of offering Kouta - or, perhaps even better, Kouta’s aunt - some kind of financial aid toward private schooling in the city. Something with dorms, safety, a place to grow that was both to Kouta’s preferences and his guardian's approval. 

But right now, he just needed to get through this night. 

“Dude, what the fuck.” Kouta’s voice from behind as he strolled to Izuku’s side and critically eyed the bomb site of dubious fashion. “Do you own anything that’s not retired professor or boring gym clothes?”

“I have plaid,” Izuku said weakly, gesturing to the pile of unending tartan. 

“If there’s a log that needs chopping, you’ll be the first I notify.”

Izuku groaned and flopped face down on the bed, limp and useless. 

“But seriously,” Kouta said, slapping Izuku on the back with too much force for his scrawny frame. “It’s not like this a fancy date. You’re just having dinner with his friends, who you already met. So maybe they’re some of Tokyo’s top heroes -”

Izuku groaned even louder.

“-but you are also the mate -”

“We’re not actually mated yet.”

“-of arguably the most powerful hero of my generation. Have some self-respect, for fuck’s sake. Aren’t you supposed to be my mentor or some shit? You’re embarrassing.”

“Maybe I can cancel,” Izuku said into the comfort of his blanket. 

The foot that kicked very nearly up his ass had Izuku yelping and scrambling across the bed, Kouta in pursuit as he tackled Izuku in a melee of curses and rough-housing. After receiving a particularly overzealous bite on the arm in the fray for dominance, Izuku kicked Kouta off the bed and dropped back into the cloud of clothes with breathless laughter. 

He couldn’t recall having a friend to roughhouse and puppy around with as a child - toddler years with Katsuki aside - and he could only assume that Kouta had lacked in that bonding department as well. He didn’t know when they’d started playfully battling each other, but at some point Kouta had shouldered him on the couch as they’d watched television and looked shocked when Izuku had done it in return. From there it had been like a pair of brothers testing dominance techniques long past when they should have grown out of it. 

“Just wear black,” Kouta said from the floor, head popping up from the edge of the bed, his hair a wild spray of spikes. “Even you can’t mess that up.”

Izuku grinned at the ceiling.

“Black it is.”

 

And it was in black that Izuku wandered up to the tiny barbecue joint in very old, high black army boots from his days influenced by Dabi’s fashion choices, slim black jeans ripped at the thighs and cuffed at the ankles, and a plain black tee. He had no idea where he’d misplaced his spring coat in such a small apartment - Hitoshi had probably stolen it at some point without return - and so he’d opted for an old red hoodie layered beneath a grubby jean jacket. 

It was with some chagrin that Izuku’s clothes of five and ten years past still fit - it meant he really wasn’t physically bulking up as much as he’d prefer - but at least he didn’t look like a dreary librarian or a lost lumberjack. 

Kouta had given him a thumbs up, anyway. That was something. Not that his fashion choices were anything to be jealous of. 

“Holy fuck,” rasped a hoarse, familiar voice jerked Izuku’s attention up from the wet pavement upon his approach.

Izuku startled to a stop, his alarm melting into a smile as he watched Katsuki stomp toward him with a heated look that pooled thick and instant through Izuku’s limbs, dizzy and drugging all in a heartbeat. 

“Hel-” Izuku managed before Katsuki swept him into an embrace, nose buried in Izuku’s haphazard hair to inhale deep and groan, low and aching with a longing Izuku barely knew what to do with when it was aimed his way. With arms pinned to his sides by Katsuki’s powerful hold, Izuku laughed a little breathlessly, wiggling in Katsuki’s now utterly silent embrace until a little voice in his head said: just let yourself have this.

And for one rare, blessed moment, Izuku allowed himself that. Relaxed and relented into the hug, pressing his cheek to the scratchy wool of Katsuki’s coat with a sigh.

When Katsuki only kept breathing into his hair for far too long, Izuku cleared his throat and tried to glance up.

“Uhhh, are you - is something -”

“FUCK.”

With a sharp, twisted grunt of frustration, Katsuki pushed out of the embrace, hands briefly held up like Izuku were pointing a weapon at him, and then flopped them at his sides with a look of feral hunger and frustration. Movements jerky, he raked a hand through his hair and paced in a tight circle, edgy energy sparking in every gesture.

“Alright, alright, I’m calm, I’m fucking calm -”

Izuku cracked a quizzical smile, his head cocked. 

“I didn’t think you weren’t?”

“HOW COULD I BE CALM WHEN YOU CAME HERE LOOKING LIKE THAT?” Katsuki's voice strained and cracked, carrying down the bustling evening street before the Alpha dropped into a high, needy keen, Katsuki taking a step toward Izuku, then stopping and fisting his hands with an absolutely comical show of self-control. “No, it’s fine. I’m fine. Fuck. Just gimme some warning before you -”

“Get dressed in the morning?” Izuku asked, humor lilting his voice even as the realization of his affect on his Alpha radiated through him like light clearing old shadows and cobwebs. “I’m not exactly flaunting what I’ve got, Kacchan.”

“Fuck,” Katsuki repeated, looking equal parts horny and mad as hell about it in the middle of the street, the strain in his face and the fire in his eyes speaking volumes as he pointedly shoved his hands in his coat. “Don’t call me that right now. Let’s go in before I decide to throw you over my shoulder and take you home instead.”

That new, welcome little quiver of power Izuku had begun to experience around his partner pinged at the back of Izuku’s skull, and without really thinking on it, he grinned, eyelids drooping hooded and hungry as he strolled toward Katsuki with his own hands in his pockets. The steel toes of his boots stopped just shy of Katsuki’s pristine sneakers, Izuku canting his chin to meet Katsuki’s wary gaze.

“Am I really so irresistible to you, Kacchan?” Izuku murmured, low and smooth and too soft for any passerby to hear. 

If Katsuki’s hair could stand on its end like a cat’s, it would have in that moment as those expressive eyes went large.

“I - the fuck’re you -”

“Just what,” Izuku went to his toes, mouth whispering across Katsuki’s strong jaw, “would you do to me right here in the street if I only asked it of you? My Alpha.”

Katsuki shuddered from head to toe and Izuku couldn’t remember the last time he’d ever felt more powerful or desired in a relationship. If he wasn’t careful, this could become an addiction. But somehow, for reasons Izuku absolutely could not apprehend, one of Japan’s most notoriously powerful Alphas could be reduced to a puddle with only a word. 

Izuku would be insane to think these urges were that of an Omega. Something about Katsuki’s viciously Alpha levels of adoration brought out the tooth and nail of Izuku’s own other side. 

Maybe this was something akin to playing with fire, but if anyone could handle the burn, it was the Explosion Hero. Izuku was beginning to believe he could trust Katsuki with this part of him, and perhaps he wouldn’t necessarily be so shocked to hear what Izuku had to reveal. Maybe there were a lot of things Izuku would be safe to share.

“‘Zuku,” Katsuki murmured, ducking his head to nose at Izuku’s cheek, his snuffles and sniffs of Izuku’s scent somehow endearing and exciting all at once. “Don’t do this to me right now, shit. We gotta - we gotta go in there and those assholes are gonna tear me a new one if I’m -”

Izuku caught Katsuki’s lips with a warm, humming kiss, a sigh filling his throat as Katsuki chirped a high, questioning noise before dissolving into a muffled groan and a slow, easy lick into Izuku’s mouth. With a hiccuping sigh of breath, Izuku drew back, teeth slightly sunk into Katsuki’s bottom lip as he tugged just enough to get a growl out of the Alpha, then released with a shaky laugh.

“‘Kay.” 

Izuku allowed his eyes to fall shut as Katsuki touched their foreheads together. In that split second, Izuku soaked the scene up like a sponge. The heavy blue damp in the air from an abated drizzle, the crisp brush of breeze against his cheeks, the radiating heat of Katsuki’s body and the familiar sound of his breathing in the midst of a busy Saturday evening.

A moment crystallized in time, a watery panorama beyond a brow pressed to the window, looking past the raindrops and the grey to find two people who hadn’t felt the cold at all since finding each other.

“Let’s go in,” Izuku said, taking a steadying step back with a bright smile at the ready. 

Katsuki looked like he was going to say something for a moment, his mouth forming words Izuku couldn’t quite make out before he nodded and slung an arm over Izuku’s shoulder.

“Come on then, shortstack. Let’s feed you to the animals.”

“I think I can take care of myself,” Izuku said dryly, meeting Katsuki’s grin with his own.

Yes, they both knew Izuku was a man who could stand on his own two feet. And, for some reason, Bakugou Katsuki might just love him for it.

 

“So he’s still blind drunk from the night before -”

“Stop,” Izuku wailed into his arms, tears streaming as he couldn’t breathe from laughing anymore. “Stop, I can’t, I -”

“He’s fucking wasted,” Sero continued, grin a mile wide as he leans across the table to mock-whisper the story as everyone at the table, but a red-faced Katsuki, is in stitches, “I don’t even know if he slept that night -”

“He didn’t,” Ashido intervened, glee written across her face as they recounted some infamous summer camping trip of years gone by. “He did not sleep. He was up all night calling every single person in his phone to leave them voicemails that he was officially no longer friends with Eiji -”

“I am never forgiving him for those fucking bees,” Bakugou seethed.

“Wait wait wait!” Sero was tripping over himself, drunk as the rest of them, his tongue barely keeping up with his mouth and giggles as he slapped the table and spilled recently refilled pints. “So he’s fucking destroyed and trying to cook over the fire and this boar - this giant-ass boar -”

“Biggest boar I’ve ever seen,” Denki said, quickly catching his glass before it toppled from Sero’s sweeping motions.

“This boar comes into our camp looking for food or whatever and Bakugou -” Sero wheezed and Kirishima had his head on the table just trying to breath as he cried all over himself, “Bakugou takes one look at the thing and says -”

“I’M GONNA MAKE YOU MY BITCH,” Ashido and Denki screamed in tandem, as if they’d been waiting for it the entire time.

“And he disappears into the forest for the entire day in nothing but his underwear, trying to hunt that thing down and burning trees in the process. We basically followed the scorch marks until we found him, covered in mud and finally passed out asleep, just face down on the ground like he’d been shot.”

“And that’s why we monitor Bakugou’s drinking,” Ashido said gleefully, like this was the highlight of her life. “It’s not that he can’t, but -”

“My blood composition doesn’t mix well with booze,” Katsuki said flatly, at the same time that he mumbled into his beer and looked away with a rise of color to his cheeks. 

Even in the shitty bar lighting, Izuku had to marvel at the sharp lines of his face, the cut of his jaw - it was a wonder Izuku hadn’t felt more instantly attracted to him. Although acting like a complete asshole had detracted from a good face. 

And Izuku was definitely drunk or else he wouldn’t be licking his lower lip as he eyed the rasp of stubble along Katsuki’s throat. The corners of Katsuki’s eyes crinkled briefly as one of the group made a joke at someone else’s expense, and Izuku found himself once more taken with how calm and reassuring his general presence could be when he wasn’t about to burst a gasket and rocket into the atmosphere. 

Months ago on New Years Eve when they’d all incidentally congregated in a messy mass of heroes and friendships at karaoke, Izuku had been too drunk and anxious to really notice how the famously brazen Ground Zero seemed more content to sit at the sidelines of conversation and watch while no one was looking at him.

Izuku sipped his drink and nodded along with the conversation, but he found himself tilting into Katsuki’s space, shoulder to Katsuki’s arm, smiling up at him in a kind of daze whenever Katsuki spoke. 

Was this normal, this draw? Izuku had been drawn to danger for so long it was still difficult to distinguish what was his preference and what was his trauma. When Izuku saw pain or damage in peoples’ faces, eyes, energy - he was drawn to them, in many senses of the word.

Katsuki had… the air of danger. The hulking stance of a threat. But cruelty or damage - he didn’t seem built from those foundations at all. 

With a jolt, Izuku blinked up at Katsuki, the realization sparking through him like an electric current with every nerve left shocked and wide awake. 

It wasn’t Katsuki’s face or humor, or even his intelligence that attracted Izuku. It wasn’t even the delicious chill Izuku felt when the whole of that raw Alpha intensity was directly entirely at him. It was, through all of that, Katsuki’s resolute and stubborn-edged goodness that made Izuku realize:

I love this man.

“Oiy.” Katsuki’s cross expression filled Izuku’s vision, Katsuki’s cheek squished into his palm as he leaned against the table and tilted into Izuku’s space. “You’re makin’ a weird face.”

And then everything was just -

Normal. As anything could be in Izuku’s life, this moment felt normal and easy and simple, despite everything so complicated that could threaten it.

And holy fuck was Izuku boring, but all he wanted was to feel normal with another person who was just his brand of normal, too. 

“Am I?” Izuku asked, smiling despite himself.

“Well, now you’re not,” Katsuki said with a scrunched face. The conversation around them has risen to shouts hurled across the table, an apparently years-long argument over who wore it better, Ashido or Denki. What they’d both worn was beyond Izuku, his attention lingering on the pale spikes of Katsuki’s lashes and the unflinching red that never seemed to shy from his gaze. “Now you look -”

Izuku leaned in, shifting until his thigh could drape over Katsuki’s under the table, his hand smoothing down the crease of Katsuki’s thigh, fingers scarcely skimming his crotch. Katsuki made a short choking noise, but Izuku couldn’t see his face as he pressed his cheek to Katsuki’s, mouth touching a burning red ear. 

“Hey. Fuck me in the bathroom.”

Katsuki shot up from his seat so quickly Izuku nearly got whiplash. 

“Excuse me!” Izuku called out, sputtering and laughing as he was dragged away from their raucous table by the wrist. “I’ll - Kacchan, wait, I’m - we’ll be right back!”

Izuku was still laughing when Katsuki sealed his mouth over his, one hand possessive on Izuku’s waist, the other grappling for the lock of the bathroom. Giggles melted to moans, Izuku’s arms banding around Katsuki’s neck, thigh hooking over Katsuki’s hip as he went to his toes to drag his Alpha into a kiss. 

Katsuki grunted into Izuku’s mouth and lofted him up, both big palms on his ass. Izuku gasped at the wet heat that flooded between his legs in a sudden hot, syrupy pull through his frame. He licked into Katsuki’s mouth, frantically rolling his filling cock against Katsuki’s hard body, go go go. When the mercilessly hard sink met Izuku’s backside, he didn’t give a fuck, couldn’t think past for -

“Need your cock in me, ‘kay?” Izuku whispered frantically against Katsuki’s lips, feverish hands shoving between them to inch Katsuki’s sweats low enough for that gorgeous dick. Katsuki snarled and bit hard at the delicate skin behind Izuku’s ear, sucking a bruise to life that zinged and soaked between Izuku’s legs. “God oh god okay okay -”

“You talk -” Katsuki bit off each word like a curse as he yanked back far enough to work Izuku’s jeans and underwear down his thighs, not bothering to get them even past the knee, “too much.” 

For a moment of brief, ridiculous awe, Izuku lost brain function at the sight of Katsuki pulling his cock out in one big fist, his erection long and flushed and ready for Izuku only. Then Katsuki wasn’t turning Izuku around to fuck him from behind, but leaving him on the counter and shoving Izuku’s legs right up, entirely trapped in the ungodly confines of his jeans, to expose the heart shaped frame of his ass and dripping hole. 

Izuku yelped in surprise, both at the cool air hitting his ass and at having to scramble for balance, hands desperate for grip on the edge of the sink counter as Katsuki firmly held Izuku’s legs up by the ankles. 

Face set in almost stern lines of concentration - Izuku didn’t think Katsuki could look away if a bomb went off - Katsuki lined his cock up with Izuku’s damp hole and slipped into him tight, slow and unrelenting until full to the fucking brim.

Whatever sound ripped out of Izuku was probably inhuman by the way Katsuki was gaping at him, all pretty flushed cheeks and violently red eyes, but the moment snapped like brittle bone when Katsuki wrapped his arms around Izuku’s legs, ankles rested on Katsuki’s shoulder, and fucked into Izuku with quick, sharp thrusts that knocked the brains right out of him.

They watched each other. The slick slide and slap increasing in hard, deep brutality, Katsuki’s lips pulled back from his teeth to expose sharp canines dull in the shitty bathroom lighting, Izuku’s body jolting back and fizzing through with fire; they watched each other, eyes locked, lungs heaving, enraptured in each other and the feedback loop of pleasure on pain on pleading hiccups and cries as the swollen build of pressure began to fill and drip down the very walls.

“Holy fuck, holy fuck -” Izuku’s eyes widened, a high keen catching in his throat as he felt Katsuki’s cock start to fill thicker, stretching him with unrelenting, sloppy friction. “Kat- Kacchan, Kacchan -”

Katsuki’s gaze was black, the rising growl threatening the air working up to a crescendo as he railed Izuku into the sink -

“Don’t knot, don’t knot!” Izuku squeaked, hating himself, hating his entire fucking life and loving it with such violence that he could die on the spot as he felt the familiar lush girth of Katsuki’s erection widening. “Don’t you dare -”

Katsuki snarled as he pulled out and came over the backs of Izuku’s thighs, streaks of warm dribbling down Izuku’s exposed asscheeks and catching on his messy hole that clenched around nothing as Izuku whined. Izuku hadn’t realized his eyes were bunched shut as he moaned, not until they shot open with the shock of Katsuki’s cum-slicked fingers dragging over his hole, dipping in and out, two fingers hooking in and stretching, then three cum-fucking into him with the most sinful sloppy sounds.

Katsuki was looming over him, that inhumanly intense attention seemingly rapt on Izuku’s face, pupils swelling and pinpricking, gaze scattering from Izuku’s eyes to mouth and back again as Katsuki eased in four fingers and -

Izuku experienced one brief second of Katsuki touching one specific spot before the lights went out, a circuit snapping, a light bulb bursting with a blinding spark and crack and dark.

He couldn’t have been out for more than a few seconds, but the booze and the orgasm and the everything about this and them was dizzying as he came to with arms slung over Katsuki’s shoulders, simply sitting on the counter with his pants barely off and a mess to deal with.

“Ugh,” Izuku said, face buried in Katsuki’s shoulder. “I did not think that through.”

“I like it when you stop fucking thinking.”

Izuku grinned, turned his face to kiss the side of Katsuki’s neck and feel him shiver. 

“Yeah, me too. Sometimes.”

Katsuki helped clean up and didn’t bat an eye at pulling off his hoodie to shuck his black undershirt and lend it to Izuku. With a sigh at his plain black tee totally screwed over with his own mess, Izuku trashed it, intent on not carrying a cummy t-shirt in his back pocket to the table with them. The tank top was too long and baggy, but he tucked it into his jeans and belt, zipped up his red hoodie, and looked relatively like Japan’s Number One Hero hadn’t just railed him in the bathroom.

He’d be stupid not to think the entire establishment wouldn’t smell it on them, though.

“You’re worrying again,” Katsuki said, ruffling Izuku’s hair as they left the bathroom. “Stop. I want everyone to know you’re mine.”

“Nobody would be jealous of you, believe me,” Izuku muttered, ducking his head as he felt his face burn in the wake of his very horny and poor decision-making skills. Just what had Katsuki unlocked in him after all these years? He’d been so sure his sex drive was dead and buried until this Alpha.

“Oiy.” Strong fingers shackling Izuku’s wrist, holding him still before they approached the table. Izuku frowned over his shoulder at Katsuki, who looked decidedly pissed. “Don’t talk that way. It’ll fuck you up.”

Izuku blinked, looked away and down as his face burned hotter.

“Yeah.” 

He knew. He really did know. But somehow Katsuki caring about it made him feel all weird inside.

“The returning heroes come home!” Ashido announced with way too much fanfare than any one person should exhibit in celebrating two people fucking in the bathroom like horny teenagers. “We bought another round for all, so let’s do this thing.”

“From the bottom of my heart,” Sero said, and reached across the table to take Izuku’s hands in his - Katsuki growled. “Thank you for making Bakugou a more bearable human being.”

“It was touch and go there for a bit,” Ashido added, holding up a shot and gesturing that everyone should, too. “I wasn’t sure if he was going to lose his mind -”

“I’m going to bury you,” Katsuki muttered, taking his own shot glass. 

“But you’re good for him,” Kirishima said, smiling kindly, almost dreamily between Katsuki and Izuku. “I don’t know what you did, but -”

“Tamed the beast!” Denki hollered, holding out his shot. 

“I - I, uh -” Izuku snatched his hands back and laughed despite himself as he lifted his own glass and looked between all the friendly faces. “Sorry, but I don’t think I really did much. All I did was punch him in the nose when we met.”

The beat of silence drowned in a rowdy chorus of laughter and wheezing, then a shouted cheers to Katsuki’s nose, and down the hatch.

“I don’t think you give yourself enough credit,” Ashido continued after their excitement had settled. “People have been throwing themselves at this guy since I can’t remember when it started.”

“I’m gonna vom,” Katsuki said, sipping from his pint with his free hand heavy and assured on Izuku’s knee beneath the table.

“Even now with Camie -”

Katsuki choked and Izuku’s ears pricked, something spiny and sharp digging in the back of Izuku’s skull as he cocked his head and shifted a slow look to Katsuki.

“Who?” Izuku said quietly.

“Mina,” Kirishima whispered loudly, then amped up his voice even louder as Katsuki avoided Izuku’s hardening, intent stare. “Uhhh, she’s not anybody. She’s just a friend we work with who was interested in -”

“We’re friends,” Katsuki said, and even to Izuku’s ears he sounded truthful, totally at ease and confident with his statement. It was so weird being with someone who inherently told the truth. Izuku wanted to be more suspicious of this Camie person, but he already knew Katsuki’s tells well enough to see that the situation was exactly as it was being presented. “That’s all. She knows that.”

“I’m not a fan,” Ashido said flatly, her entire demeanor shifting, and there was the Alpha behind her depthless eyes. “She’s got some crappy ideas about Omegas in this world and if she upsets my man, she upsets me.”

“She’s got issues,” Katsuki said, nodding soberly, eyes falling to his beer in thought. “It ain’t our business to talk about it, but her and someone close to her were victims of Omega abuse by Alphas and she thinks -”

“She thinks Omegas should only be strong, and if they’re not strong, they deserve what they get for not better compensating for their faults,” Ashido snapped. 

“You two would might along, though,” Kirishima quickly said, his toothy grin a little too strained. “You’re both strong Omegas and stuff.”

“So are you.” Izuku offered Kirishima a warm smile. “I’m not anything. I remember thinking you were so cool and manly when we were teenagers and Hitoshi would tell me about what adventures you’d all get into. I always rooted for you at the sports festivals and st-”

“Wait, did you go to the Sports Festival?” Katsuki asked with a frown.

“Oh, uh.” His adolescent obsession with heroes hadn’t entirely faded, even when he’d decided to cast away the dream of ever being one. He’d wanted to go and support Hitoshi, too. “Yeah, I mean - yeah. When Hitoshi was a second and third year.”

“And you didn’t recognize me?” Katsuki asked, clearly aghast at the very idea.

“You were either on fire or screaming bloody murder - it wasn’t exactly how my childhood memories of you aligned,” Izuku said dryly. “And you didn’t recognize me the next time we met, so -”

“I did fucking so or how else would I have insanely thought I was in love with you the second I fuckin’ saw you, dumbass!”

Izuku gawked. The table plunged into silence.

It wasn’t as if it was the first time Katsuki had roundabout inferred something to this effect, but hearing it so clearly -

Izuku’s stiff shoulders slumped, lips curving as he reached out to Katsuki’s flushed, incensed expression and cupped his jaw, brought him down for a quick, chaste kiss.

“Me too,” Izuku murmured, low enough that the rest of the table would still have to lean in to hear. “Me too, handsome.”

“I’m going to lose consciousness over how surreal this is,” Ashido mumbled, her attention fixed on the sight before her. “Is this a dream? Eiji, pinch me, come on -”

“I’m not pinching you,” Kirishima shot back, looking genuinely offended that she would even ask. “You are my beautiful wife and I could never!”

“Another round of shots for my man Midoriya!” Denki hollered.

“Leave me out of it,” Katsuki said, blushing and waving his friend off with a gesture of his pint glass. “You assholes are gonna get sloppy and I’ll be the only goddamn sense between the six of us.”

“Count me out, too,” Izuku said, laughing as Denki dramatically groaned and laid himself across the table to lament. “I’m walking home and would love not to trip over my own feet more than I already do.”

“I’ll walk you home, idiot,” Katsuki said mildly.

“Don’t put yourself out.” Izuku smiled and knocked his temple to Katsuki’s hunched shoulder. “I have to open Sunday morning, anyway. I’ll head to yours after close.”

Katsuki snorted a huff of dislike, but didn’t argue. Izuku hummed happily and linked their fingers beneath the table. He could swear he could faintly feel the current of Katsuki’s contentment flow from skin through skin. 

Tomorrow, Izuku thought to himself, practically vibrating from excitement.

Tomorrow I’ll tell him everything.

 

The deep night of early spring was a refreshing, sobering slap to Izuku’s rosy cheeks as he took backstreets and short alleys through the city toward his side of town. The trains were done for the day and Izuku preferred the exercise of walking long distances over wasting money on a ride if he didn’t have to.

Plus, the alone was nice. Home would bring Kouta, and the next day would bring customers, and the riot of this evening had been more than enough for Izuku to soak in until he was left brimming with the excess emotions of everyone at that table.

So much energy and vibrancy and power in these incredible heroes, but at the same time their base of strength and loyalty and goodness was staggering. Izuku had his own little pack of heroes - and one anti-hero - but it wasn’t the same. They were glued together in strange odds and ends, unbreakable in how tangled they were in each other’s lives. Katsuki’s pack was somehow more united, like an unbreakable symbol of smooth infinity. 

And while it was all kinds of fascinating and fun, Izuku was tired. The brisk walk beneath dim streetlights and splashing puddles was refreshing and calm, Izuku’s head still jaunty and sloshing with one too many shots.

Relaxed. A word Izuku hadn’t equated with himself in - in a long time.

He was relaxed.

So, Izuku did not hear the approaching footsteps as he shuffled through his pockets for his keys. Nor did he feel the breath on the back of his neck before his body rocketed between the two buildings and shattered against a hulking dumpster.

The shrieking, searing eruption of something sharp raking across his throat, a body crushing him, pinning him into the grime and slop and gravel - Izuku felt it in every raw, screaming nerve. In the darkness he could only gawk at the looming figure above him, one hand slipping and slopping over the blood streaming and sapping from his neck.

“I’ll wait ‘til you're dead this time,” the crooning voice said in the facsimile of a smile. They didn’t bother to stop Izuku from frantically attempting to strangle himself in hopes to tide the bleed-out. “Wow. You’re, like, a lot prettier up close, aren’t you? Oh well. Bye bye, little Omega. See you never.”

Chapter 35

Summary:

Heart pain didn’t have a name. It only tasted like starvation.

Notes:

Songs For This Chapter:
Winter Song - Ingrid Michaelson | Spotify | YouTube
Both Hands - Ani DiFranco | Spotify | YouTube
Better Now - Oh Wonder | Spotify | YouTube

 Katsuki rolled in his bed and puked over the side. 

Eyes spilling with tears, his head howling and throat burning, he heaved and splattered again and again onto the floor.

Shock and horror railed through him, train spikes powerfully driven into his neck and chest and gut as his sleep-addled brain scrambled for clarity. 

Food poisoning? Allergic reaction? Over drinking? Quirk effect?

NO NO NO, something or someone screamed from the shattered back of his skull as he groaned and scattered from his sheets to dash for the bathroom. 

SOMETHING IS WRONG, ALPHA HURTS, ALPHA IS SCARED. WHERE IS OMEGA?

Even as his stomach twisted and wrung dry into the toilet, and Katsuki pillowed his arms and face on the porcelain, his lungs struggled through the searing fire of his throat, the vitriol ripping through his chest.

Was he dying? Katsuki knew what the fuck that felt like and it was just about this.

Without the pain in his chest abating, Katsuki bit into a towel and screamed, hoarse and ragged until he could collect breath enough to crawl on hands and knees into the shower. Beneath the hammer of cold spray, Katsuki pressed his brow to the freezing tiles and dry-heaved, salty streams of tears swimming with the shower and into his mouth.

No pain in his excruciating profession had ever come close to this.

Katsuki needed help.

Sobbing, his heart torn in two and completely confused by the sorrow that wracked through him, Katsuki stumbled to his feet, holding the wall for balance as he dripped a sodden trail from the bathroom to his bedroom. Gagging at the mess beside his bed, Katsuki skirted the edge enough to snatch his phone from the nightstand, and dropped to his knees the moment he stepped from the doorway. 

Another dry heave and sick, sloppy stomach roll threatened. Katsuki hiccuped a short sob and viciously rubbed at his swelling eyes with the back of his hand, his shoulders shuddering, spine cracking with wet wails that he stubbornly kept swallowed down.

Get yourself together! Do you know who you fucking are? Have some self-respect!

But the baffling tears continued to fall and his body had begun to shiver from the ice shower and the settling shock, Katsuki helpless and increasingly horrified as he hacked a series of coughs that sprayed blood across the hardwood.

He was gawking down at it when the phone rang, the buzzing phone bumbling across the floor beside Katsuki’s blood.

For some reason, Katsuki’s fucking guts dropped when he saw Izuku’s name pop up.

“What’s wrong?” Katsuki snapped, then released a shaky breath, looking and thinking past the pain as best he could.

“Ground Zero?” A young man’s voice, still cracking and broken, or maybe it was tears, too. “B-Bakugou?”

“Who the fuck is this?” A streak of pain stabbed through him and Katsuki gasped and hissed, dropping his brow to the floor once more as he spoke in quick staccato. “Where’s Izuku, where -”

“He’s in the hospital, we’re in the hospital, I smelled something wrong and the window was open,” The kid was talking fast, an information download that sucked the blood from Katsuki’s veins and closed every muscle in on itself in a full body clench threatened to crack ribs and shatter hearts, “and I - and I came out and he was just and she was and - I, I, I, I -”

“SHUT UP,” Katsuki snarled, rising to his knees first, breath seething from between his teeth as the fury overrode the pain, red staining around his vision as he bit down on his lip and pushed to his feet. “SHUT UP, tell me where, tell me where you are and I’ll be there, I’m coming, tell him I’m -”

“HE’S GOING TO FUCKING DIE, YOU ASSHOLE,” the kid screamed in reply, each word a chest kick through Katsuki’s sternum to crack and rip out his failing lungs. “You didn’t see all the blood and he was white, he was - I don’t know if he’s alive in there at all!”

Katsuki was already at his front door, ripping open the zip of his gym bag and yanking shorts and a tank top over his shower-wet body. They clung like a second skin and the cold would cleave him to the bone, but he didn’t care, didn’t fucking care if the entire world froze over if what this kid was saying was true.

“WHAT KIND OF HERO ARE YOU,” the kid was still screaming, his voice torn to shreds as Katsuki grabbed his keys, leaving his front door wide open and forgotten as he sprinted to the stairs of the highrise and used one flared hand to throttle and throw himself in great leaps down the endless flights. “YOU’RE THE BEST, AREN’T YOU? AND WHERE ARE YOU? WHERE ARE YOU RIGHT NOW?”

“Just tell me -”

The moment the kid named the hospital, Katsuki hung up and flung himself down the stairs faster than any human or hero should. The deep night air spiked and spit sharp and cold at his cheeks as he flew with the force of rockets at his tail. His shoulders still screamed like they were pulled from the sockets and the backs of his eyes were on fire, his throat like a bleeding glass swallowed, but that pain wasn’t the the pain that hurt him the most.

OMEGA IS DYING. WE DIE, WE WILL DIE TOO.

A lance ripped through Katsuki’s chest and the next thing he knew, he was coming to consciousness in a dead drop through the night sky, the pavement rising up to meet him with a concrete kiss. Flailing from the sudden faint and confusion, Katsuki blasted too hard and arrowed back toward space, a snarl wrenching from his mouth as he rocketed into the distance.

Think, think, Katsuki egged himself on as he swallowed down thick blood and hot tears. What was going on, what was - they weren’t entirely bonded yet, right? Izuku had solidly bit him only once on the gland in his wrist, Katsuki’s blood and scent and soul drawn into Izuku’s system, but not vice versa. Not entirely. 

Was that it - this pain as Izuku was surely experiencing somewhere across town?

No. Katsuki hadn’t heard jackshit about anything like this between bonded pairs. If that were the case, partners dying in car crashes or wars would have mates dropping like flies all over the world. It didn’t fucking work like that.

Another savage shriek shredded through Katsuki’s guts, eviscerating him like an animal hung upside down and left to bleed out. The second blackout flashed him out of existence before he woke to the sickening crunch of his body pummeling into the side of a building. Brick and steel skinned his cheek, bare shoulder, thigh, and hip, but he didn’t feel it as he throttled back into the sky and urged his failing body forward. 

When Katsuki crashed through a random window of the hospital and dropped into a roll, blood that must have been his own spattering across the floor and shattered glass, it was the least he could do to mutter a sorry to the horrified nurse and bedded patient before he sprinted out the door and into the hall.

Panting hard and stumbling from the mounting pain, Katsuki’s blood-streaked handprints on the pale walls painted his journey until he slapped palms on a nurses station and screamed only one thing.

“FIND ME MIDORIYA IZUKU.”

“Sir!” The nurse looked one part horrified and two parts pissed as she stood and met his manic stare with a steely one. “Where did you come from? Do you know where you -”

Katsuki fumbled with the wallet in his basketball shorts, only briefly noting his entire arm and leg on one side profusely bleeding down into his squelching, overflowing shoe. He point blank presented the hero license to her face, his teeth bared, lungs faltering through shocks of throat pain as the woman squinted at it through the blood marring his title. 

Her eyes widened with realization.

“I said,” Katsuki began, and swallowed down hard before the Alpha Command in his voice resonated and rose in an unholy dual vocalization of deep and deeper, “FIND - ME - MIDORIYA IZUKU. Now!”

The nurse went lax, stiff shoulders slumping as she faintly nodded.

“One moment, please.”

Heroes were expressly forbidden from using their Alpha Command voices on Omegas and Betas while on duty. It was an invasion of human rights and, aside from the Pros, generally frowned upon in situations outside of the household or with a partner. 

There was absolutely no part of Katsuki that fucking cared right now. His brain felt like it was expanding in his skull, swelling against the limits of bone, and scraping claws behind his light sensitive eyes. While the stabbing pain in his throat had blessedly come to abate down to a pulsing ache, Katsuki’s nerves were razors beneath his skin and the tether on his temper shaved down to ragged tendons. 

“Can you just fucking -” Katsuki dragged his hands over his face and startled at the sight of so much blood coating his hands. His face felt damp, but between the shower and the sweat and the tears, the idea that he could be profusely bleeding had been distant and unimportant. “Just - he’s probably in emergency. Surgery. Emergency surgery.”

“HEY.”

Katsuki whipped around, teeth bared, hackles and shoulders high as another nurse strode forward with an expression of pure annoyance.

“Sir, you’re bleeding all over the floor!  How did you get into this ward? Where -”

Katsuki’s fist slammed into the nurse’s station hard enough to leave a dent.

“THERE’S GONNA BE A LOT MORE FUCKIN’ BLOOD IF SOMEONE DOESN’T TAKE ME TO MIDORIYA IZUKU, BUDDY.”

“Who?” Other than perturbed and tired, the nurse barely seemed fazed as he beelined for Katsuki with a hand outstretched to help. “You’re in the wrong place. Let’s get you some help -”

“Fuck this.” Katsuki dodged the nurse and shot down the first hallway with an elevator symbol. He’d been to this hospital a dozen times over the years. As long as he could get to the ground floor he’d be able to find Izuku, get to Izuku -

SAVE OMEGA, SAVE OMEGA, WE HURT SO MUCH.

Katsuki groaned, vision wavering as he dully recognized the way the corridor slanted and his bloodied side dragged against the wall for balance as he slowed to a walk. Grinding his teeth against the black edging his vision, Katsuki pushed off the wall with a slippery hand and slumped down a second hall where a line of elevators waited. 

Exhausted and furious with it, Katsuki thudded his brow to the cool, metallic doors and jammed the bottom floor button.

“Sir!” It was that same fucking nurse again, trailing after him now with a second bigger guy in tow. “Sir, you can’t just -”

“Haaah?” Katsuki slowly peered over his shoulder, chest heaving with every burning breath, his teeth tasting like blood as he licked at his feral smile and pierced the nurses with an ominous stare. “What can’t I do?”

Both nurses stopped dead and paled before Katsuki even need speak a word. They carefully watched each other from opposite ends of the bleeding path Katsuki had dripped across the flecked grey tile. Nobody moved.

The elevator dinged. 

The doors opened and Katsuki collapsed inside, his bare knees taking the brunt of his fall as he wiped bloodied palms on his shorts and struggled to a stand before he reached the bottom floor.

No one. No one would stop him from finding his mate. 

Steeling himself against the tremors threatening to weaken his legs, Katsuki took a steadying breath and burst from the doors the moment they opened. The first floor was instantly recognizable, but it wasn’t that which had his nostrils flaring and a ragged growl rising from his throat.

Izuku’s scent was like a bomb dropped, sweeping through the floor with ferocity, and Katsuki a bloodthirsty hound on his trail. As he pushed past errant personnel, Katsuki realized there was no terror or fear in the copper-soaked forest scent, and it made Katsuki realize Izuku must be unconscious. 

Chest twisted and knotting, his pulse a frantic thunder in his ears and through his bleeding body, Katsuki burst through the doors leading to the emergency room front desk and snarled.

“WHERE THE FUCK IS MIDORIYA IZUKU, IF I DON’T GET ANSWERS IN FIVE SECONDS I’M TEARING THIS PLACE -”

“Ground Zero!”

Katsuki whirled, eyes popping large, shock railing through his shivering form as he the familiarity of the dark-eyed kid standing before him hit home.

“Who are - wait, you’re -”

“Save the shock for later, asshole,” said the teenager who absolutely was Kouta goddamn Izumi and the same voice as the person who called him screaming on the phone. He didn’t look strong now - he looked just as close to collapsing as Katsuki was, and his clothes were just as covered in blood. “They’ve got him stabilized, but -”

Katsuki dropped to his knees before the unfamiliar Omega and, by actions completely out of his control under heaven and earth, fisted his hands in Kouta’s bloodied shirt and shoved his face into the scent of his mate.

Tremors took over as he hiccuped a sharp breath into the blood, ignoring the kid hollering and ripping at his hair to tear him off and away. 

One second, Katsuki just needed one fucking second to breathe. To inhale an iota of calm, to get himself together enough to not burn the entire hospital to the ground in the journey to find his Omega. 

“S-sir?” A tentative voice behind him. “The police are on their way. A-and you’re bleeding everywhere. I think you need medical atten-”

Katsuki whirled, on his feet in a flash, sharp bared teeth at the ready as he closed in on the horrified clerk. 

“WHAT I FUCKING NEED -”

“You’re here?” From the opposite entrance came the icy cool voice of the last fucking person Katsuki wanted to see today or ever. Chisaki strode in, pristine and fully dressed to Katsuki’s gym clothes and bleeding body, Chisaki’s sickly yellow cat eyes narrowing in obvious distaste as Katsuki stopped his pursuit of the attendant. “What an eyesore. You’re a hero, aren’t you? Handle yourself properly. Now -”

“Fuck you, what the fuck is happening here?” Katsuki didn’t have time for this. He hurt, he hurt, everything hurt and was whining and whimpering and crumpling within him, the Alpha in him howling and calling for its mate with no reply. “DO ANY OF YOU PEOPLE KNOW WHO THE FUCK I AM? I want goddamn answers!”

“I’m sure everyone knows who you are,” Chisaki said crisply, approaching the terrified attendant and putting his back dismissively to Katsuki. “So much is the shame. Hello, sir, please excuse this fucking imbecile. Is Mr Midoriya Izuku in surgery right now? Is this the best waiting room for us or should we go elsewhere for updates?”

“He’s not your fucking -”

“Shut up,” Chisaki snapped, flashing a look over his shoulder that hinted at the ugly beast below the Beta’s skin. “Are your needs and demands more important than Midoriya's right now? You could die on the floor right now and I wouldn’t give a shit except for the stench of pathetic desperation radiating off you right now. Calm the fuck -”

“YOU WANNA GO?” Katsuki launched forward, his muscles and joints trembling through the adrenaline and anger fueling his veins. “‘CAUSE I WILL -”

“STOP.”

Katsuki and Chisaki looked to Kouta, who stood there, tears overflowing, fists clenched.

“Just -” Kouta swallowed thickly. “Just stop. He’s - he’s in surgery from the attack. There’s a lot of damage to fix. He’s not done yet but afterwards I guess we can go to the intensive care unit.”

“What -” Katsuki croaked, realized his throat was dry as bone and his nerves just as brittle as he clenched and unclenched his fists. “What happened.”

“Sir,” the desk attendant was still standing nearby, nearer to Chisaki than anyone else. “You’re - you’re bleeding all over the floor. You can’t just - I’ve notified personnel that you’re here and they’ll be coming out shortly to bring you into a room.”

“Fuck your room and fuck you,” Katsuki hissed, ignoring the ingrained burn beginning to flare to life down the entire right side of his body. He would heal from this - it wouldn’t be the first or last time he’d been thrown into the side of a building, and he’d had much worse. His body would heal. Other things might not. “Just find me a fucking doctor who’ll tell me what the hell is going on with my mate.”

“Your mate?” Chisaki scoffed from behind his black flu mask. “Sir, this man is not my friend’s mate. You won’t be able to divulge the details of Midoriya’s condition to -”

Katsuki slammed into Chisaki with the entire weight of his Alpha frame and sent him sprawling into the waiting room chairs. 

“He -” Katsuki approached as Chisaki bounced back to his feet with murder in his eyes to match Katsuki’s volcanic gaze. “Is mine.”

“Your delusions as a hero have reached every other part of your brain, haven’t they.”

“You ain’t gonna have much of a brain left after I -”

“S-sirs! Everyone, please!”

“SHUT UP,” Katsuki and Chisaki said in tandem as they rounded on the attendant. 

“Sorry I’m late to the party,” came a familiar drawl as Katsuki watched Shinsou and Todoroki quickly enter the room. Despite Shinsou’s drab tone, his eyes and mouth were tight, his face exceedingly pale as he approached. Todoroki looked steely faced and remained silent as he started to picked up the chairs from incoming scuffle. 

“Wow, you sure are bleeding, huh,” Shinsou said, giving Katsuki a quick, concerned once-over. “Details?”

“There was an attack,” Kouta cut in before Katsuki could speak. “There was a - a woman. I smelled something strange from the open window, like - I don’t know, it was just bad. Smelled like - like the person who attacked me, but didn't look the same. A-and when I ran outside, I-Izuku was, he was bleeding from his neck. She was sitting on top of him, but he kicked her in the back of the head, and when she did, I - it all happened so fast. I used my flash flood to - to slam her into the building or something and then went right for Izuku. I didn’t see her face or anything. I’m sorry, I’m so -”

“Please don’t be sorry,” Todoroki said, considering Kouta in his calm, concise way, his voice  low and soft. “It doesn’t help. You probably saved his life. Thank you, Kouta.”

Katsuki blinked at the easy way Todoroki used this kid’s name. His fried brain was searing through his skull, exhaustion and confusion and fear smoking up wild and choking his sense of clarity. Just what was going on here?

Questions could come later. There was only one thing Katsuki cared about.

“If I have to say this one more time I swear to fucking god I will go through this hospital room by fucking room,” Katsuki seethed. “Where. Is Izuku?”

They were led to the intensive care unit after Katsuki incinerated a waiting room chair in the fury of waiting for answers. Security guards had been called, but when they’d recognized the group of alleged miscreants overflowing the emergency waiting room with the stench of anxiety and aggression, no one felt powerful enough to tell them to calm down or go.

Nor did anyone attempt to give aid to Katsuki’s wounds. He snarled and bit at them like a feral street dog when one of them neared with gauze and tape. Sure enough, the wounds were healing and the blood coagulating. 

Katsuki barely noticed. All he could look at, all he could scent was the wide bloom of blood across Izumi fucking Kouta’s shirt. 

“What -” Katsuki inhaled deep, finding some semblance of center even when his core was careening and screaming in confusion and rage. “What the fuck. Are you doing here?”

“What’s it t’you?” The kid spat back with equal venom, his bullet-black eyes biting like flint to stone. 

“You’re the one fucking saved him, aren’t you?” Katsuki mumbled. His head had begun to grow heavy from all this waiting. From police who came and went with questions, from doctors who wouldn’t come out of surgery and nurses who would only tell them the barest details despite their countless heroisms for this goddamn murderous city. “You sayin’ you didn’t see shit?”

“I was more concerned with your boyfriend.” Kouta flinched and huffed a breath with Shinsou of all the fucking people laid a hand on Kouta’s knee to calm him. Damn Omega things. Katsuki would never understand it. They spread homey, comfort scents between their kind in ways Katsuki couldn’t decipher, even with his sharp nose. They were their own breed and brood. “But you're welcome. No thanks to anybody else. Boy, heroes really are as lousy as -”

Katsuki jumped from his chair.

“YOU SHUT THE FUCK UP BEFORE I TRADE YOUR ASSHOLE WITH YOUR ESOPHAGUS, KID.” 

“Please,” Chisaki said from his corner of the waiting room where he stood, refusing to sit in the dirty chairs, gloved hands in his fur coat pockets. “Please do add assault on a minor to your list of recent offences. That’s using your head, now isn’t it?”

“You’re not helpful,” Todoroki said with a sigh. “Kai.”

Chisaki tsk-ed and said nothing, but the message was received and even Katsuki wasn’t stupid enough to take this too far. The kid was obviously hurting in his own way. Just what the hell was his relationship to Izuku? Why this kid? How long had they been in contact? Why had Kouta been in Izuku’s house in the first place - and that late at night?

And why had Izuku told him none of it?

“Oh my goodness!” wailed a feminine, familiar voice as every man in the room stood on two feet to attention. Auntie Inko stood in the doorway looking fit to faint, her freckled face standing stark, her rosy complexion wilted and wintery as she seemed to sway in place with watery eyes. “Oh my goodness, you’re all - you’re all here, aren’t you? I’m - I just spoke with someone at the desk.”

“Tell me,” Katsuki urged, crossing the room in great strides to hold her hands and fold over into himself, their height difference so great he had to loom in to meet her wet eyes. His own voice sounded just as damp and clenched. “Tell me what’s happening.”

Auntie Inko only shook her head and burst into tears. 

Were it any other day or any other person, Katsuki would have set this person into a chair with a big NO THANK YOU written across his face, but this was Izuku’s mother, and so he gently wrapped his arms around her and let her cry, his solid glare passing over her head to meet Chisaki’s calculating, feline stare. 

Auntie Inko’s scent had been faintly like Izuku’s when they first met, that sweetness of the rain on a tongue, and though there was nothing hearty and homey or forested about her Omega fragrance, Katsuki clung to that one small piece. 

“He’s going to be okay,” Auntie Inko finally said into Katsuki’s chest, all snotty and gross into his blood stained, sweaty tank top. “They said he’s stable and he’s going to be okay. They believe he’ll still be able to speak - the damage just missed his vocal chords - but his - one of his throat glands is permanently damaged and drained. It’s non-functioning.”

Todoroki’s steady, solid voice surrounded them in their own calm way.

“We would all rather have a Midoriya who is alive and healthy.”

The silence between them seemed to be of some form of agreement or other as Auntie Inko nodded into Katsuki’s shirt. She sighed and stepped out his his hold, her cheeks tear stained and her eyes the same evergreen as Izuku’s when she looked up.

“You’ll take care of him, won’t you?”

Katsuki balked. 

“Of course. Obviously. What the f-”

“Even with this condition? I don’t know how it will affect that horrible ailment of his. For the better or worse or all the same. Perhaps the Alpha in him will finally be drained from his body and he’ll go back to how he should be.”

Katsuki blinked. He blinked again, and he wasn’t so fucking stupid and he didn’t hear the entire room hold their breath.

He also wasn’t stupid enough to act like he didn’t know what the fuck Auntie Inko was talking about.

For a lack of anything better to say under the circumstances, Katsuki only murmured:

“I’ve always liked him just the way he is.”

Auntie Inko’s expression softened, but then she sighed and shook her head, gaze falling to the floor. 

“Perhaps so. But it can’t have been easy on either of you. I can’t begin to guess the trials you two may have been through because of him. My little boy, he’s the kindest soul, but that Alpha in him - it simply wrecks him. Has wrecked his life - more than I fear he’s ever even told me. Maybe - maybe him getting hurt like this could put an end to the worst of it. Or maybe -”

“Shut up.” Katsuki said it quietly, but the command was resonant and deep, dangerous, murderous. “Shut up.”

“Bakugou,” Todoroki snapped, scent slapping Katsuki’s across the face, acrid in warning. “No.”

“JUST WHO THE FUCK -” Katsuki whipped around, addressed four wide sets of eyes, “DO YOU ALL THINK YOU ARE TO HIM? JUST WHO AM I TO HIM THAT NO ONE IN THIS ROOM SEEMS SURPRISED BY WHAT THIS BITCH IS SAYING, OR BY THIS LITTLE ASSHOLE’S PRESENCE, OR -”

“Calm down,” Shinsou stated as he stepped forward.

“I’ll burn your hair fucking bald,” Katsuki snapped, his voice cracking as he took a step back. “Just what do you all know here that I never got to -”

“Do you realize how you’re acting right now?” Shinsou asked, eyes pale pale purple, deadly.

“Yes!”

And that was all Shinsou had needed.

Katsuki felt the invisible fist around his throat, the silence overtaking him, the control Shinsou waved over him as sure as any drowning man felt the water flood down his gullet. His muscles strained against the stillness as Shinsou approached, brushing past him to put an arm around Auntie Inko’s shoulders and gently herd her trembling form to a chair on the far side of the waiting room, away from Katsuki.

“Don’t worry about him, Auntie,” Shinsou murmured as he helped her into a chair. “I’ve got him now.”

Katsuki ground his back teeth against Shinsou’s will, but the Quirk held fast. This was why Shinsou was an awful conversational partner. You could never dare answer one of his questions. Katsuki should have learned that one long ago - especially when he was pissed off. Shinsou was just about the only one who had been able to trick Katsuki into quiet back in their days at school. And his tricks only got stronger with age.

All the same, Katsuki sure as fuck still had willpower enough to spark a minor blast from one clenched fist - and it was enough to his own personal joy to see Chisaki startle in surprise from his allegedly germ-free corner of the room.

“Stop that,” Todoroki croaked , sounding exhausted as he settled back into his seat. Kouta looked to Katsuki with uncertainty, his expression hard and crumpled in a way Katsuki recognized in himself as a teenager. Eventually, Kouta sat, but his intensely black eyes never left Katsuki’s frozen form.

“Is he out of surgery, then?” Shinsou asked in the low, dulcet tones he could use to sooth victims or ensnare villains. 

Auntie Inko nodded weakly, staring her small hands atop her lap. She wasn’t dressed cutely like she’d been that day at Mom’s house. In the dead of night she wore a long nightie that she clearly hadn’t bothered to change out of, a pair of hastily pulled on sweatpants, and her overcoat. Her hair looked like a wild nest and, again, Katsuki’s heart clenched for his mate.

Where is Omega? Where is our Omega?  WHERE IS OUR OMEGA?

Katsuki hadn’t noticed he’d whined, high and sharp and needy at the back of his throat, until he found everyone staring at him in a mute spectrum between wonder and horror. 

And then his body went lax, muscles collapsing in on themselves as Katsuki dropped to his knees a shrieked a breath, eyes watering as he memorized the pale grey grain of the tiled floor until the pain in his heart abated a bit.

A pair of very clean, shiny shoes filled his vision and Katsuki looked up.

With a sour face not at all diluted by the face mask, Chisaki stood there with a gloved hand outstretched. 

“You’re making all of us look like fools,” Chisaki said flatly. “Not me, but the rest of you. Have some fucking self respect. Get up.”

Katsuki stared at Chisaki’s hand.

Resolutely, he slapped it away with what little energy remained and lugged himself to his feet. The pain had greatly waned from his body, but the soul still sang a lonely howl to the moon outside. 

He briefly met Chisaki’s eyes, and instead of annoyance he saw something else. He didn’t know what it was, but it was better than nothing. 

“Tell me,” Katsuki breathed out, dropping to the seat between Todoroki and Kouta. “Tell me everything I deserve to know.”

“You don’t deserve what Midoriya feels you shouldn’t know,” Chisaki said. 

“He also doesn’t deserve to be the dumbest person in the room,” Shinsou countered.

Chisaki flashed him a look. 

“If he was never told -”

“If he was never told by now,” Shinsou cut in sharply, the drawl to his tone entirely gone, “it’s because Izuku was scared. Not because he didn’t trust Bakugou with the information. Not at this point in their relationship, anyway. They’d never be together this long if Izuku didn’t plan on -”

“Can we stop talking about Bakugou like he’s not in the room,” Katsuki mumbled, exhaustion deep in his bones as he dropped his face into his hands, elbows on his thighs. The headache stressed against the back of his eye sockets. “Just -”

“Tell him,” Kouta said, resolute and stern beyond his years. Little Omega - another strong one. Not as unique as his mate, but it would do. “Tell him everything. Izuku - he’s wanted to for a while.”

Todoroki looked at Shinsou. Shinsou shrugged and looked at Chisaki. Chisaki threw his hands up, muttered a curse, and said something about a cigarette as he left the room. 

Katsuki swallowed hard, dread an iron fist around his lungs.

“What is everything?”

 

 

Exhaustion and shock had muted and fogged over Katsuki’s emotions by the time he entered the room of his mate. 

His nose wrinkled on instinct at the stench of trauma and fear and blood that seeped from the walls like poison and copper-soiled iodine. He wasn’t unfamiliar with the heavy drag of death that lumbered through these violently fluorescent halls, nor the smell of those slowly passing from this shitty world into the next.

Katsuki was a hero. He knew the smell of death like a baby instinctively knew its mother’s scent. One was not whole without the other to complete it. 

But this room. This room was a nightmare Katsuki had yet to experience. 

Izuku smelled black. Like fear, like pitch black rooms with locked doors and the cold prickle of fear-sweat, like the acid stomach drop when the person you loved betrayed you, like a night terror where you could never ever wake up at the end.

Gone were the summer storms, and the heartfire of a new hearth in a new home beside deep, quiet, cool lakes, and a smile that you could feel in your chest before you even saw it. Gone. 

And then -

Then, Katsuki realized the smell wasn’t coming from the still body in the bed - it was his own. 

All at once, he crumbled.

Didn’t know how he’d reached the bed or crawled onto it, making himself small in the meager wedge of space between Izuku’s pale, bandaged body and falling off the fucking edge of more than just this goddamn mattress. Didn’t understand that the wretched sounds were his own as he laid his head upon a slice of pillow and took a limp hand with a wrist carrying a killer’s scar drilled into the veins there, just to burrow the damaged gland up against his own throat in a harried mark.

Through the blur of disorienting emotion, Katsuki fixated on the thick white gauze choking Izuku’s throat, keeping in that voice, those clever and kind and cutting words, that laugh, those stupid happy noises and the sigh he made only only only for Katsuki when they touched.

The pain had returned, now, but it wasn’t the pain from before. Wasn’t the pain that Katsuki had grown to realize was something to do with this man and his soul and the very blood shared between them. 

This was a pain of a new flavor.

Heart pain didn’t have a name. It only tasted like starvation.

Izuku’s eyelids looked so paper thin from up close. A tangle of blue threads beneath the palest silk, and that one little freckle on the right one. His lips were wan and immobile, the only sign of his breathing in the ticking machines and the tiny tubes stuck up his nose. Katsuki wanted to rip them all out and curl Izuku inside of him, warm and safe in the emptied cave of his body.

He wanted to scream at Izuku, too. To shake him in demand, to tear from him the explanations no extra fucking pack member could give. Needed to rip the bloody answers out of Izuku no matter how much it hurt him, because fuck if Katsuki wasn’t bleeding out here, over the hospital and this city and the love of his life. 

Couldn’t he get a little healing, too? What would it cost Izuku for them to do it together? Surely Izuku knew better than anyone what it was like to spill your guts between your fingers, desperate to keep it all together even when the wounds were too deep.

So, why do this to him? After all this time, why hold back from Katsuki for so long?

Katsuki didn’t know if he was crying or screaming, howling or whimpering into the little shell of his Omega, but there was the vague and errant intrusion of other scents attempting to enter the room. He’d snarled and bit, spat and thrown fire in a delirium to protect, to keep safe and close his muted mate. 

Watery, grayed-down slush puddle morning sunlight was dripping behind the curtained window by the time he allowed a nurse in to see Izuku. He hadn’t relented his cramped, curled spot on the bed, though - a low, warning growl bearing down upon her as she injected shit into the dripping tube connected to Izuku’s gnarled hand. 

There was still blood beneath his nails.

When the doctor arrived to assess the situation, the light was pounding behind the curtain and Katsuki’s eyes hurt for refusing to rest. There was a humming beneath Izuku’s skin. He’d noticed it hours in to his guard, the sound that wasn’t a sound but a feeling, like being unable to hear, but sensing the music anyway. Every point of contact between them was a song he couldn’t quite make out, but it was theirs, and he wouldn’t break their skin to skin by pain of death.

Eventually, he did. Sleep, not die. 

He dreamt of Izuku, asleep in a field, blood red poppies bending to the gentle breeze. Izuku had opened his eyes to tell him something, but Katsuki had only seen the color coming from Izuku’s mouth. Summer didn’t have a color, but Izuku was it. Katsuki had kissed him and tasted the deep green lake of Izuku’s secrets before black water had begun to flood his mouth and he’d woken up choking.

Kacchan.

Katsuki startled up and promptly rolled off the bed with a great thud. He scrambled up, sure, so fucking sure he’d heard Izuku’s voice -

And found himself staring into quiet, mossy eyes, half-lidded and drowsy.

It was then - then, of all times, that the haze of protective fury and muddled devastation cleared from his senses that Katsuki smelled someone on his mate who did not belong.

Chapter 36

Summary:

“You don’t get to put this on me, anymore. I’m sick and tired in every goddamn way you can imagine. I am done asking and begging like some sick dog in the alleyway outside your house, Midoriya Izuku. You’ll tell me exactly what you feel I really deserve to know. No more and sure as hell no fucking less. This is in your hands, not mine. I already washed mine a thousand times of all that blood. Time for you to come clean with yours.”

Notes:

Reminder that Quiet Rapture has it's own gargantuan Playlist on Spotify.

“Please state your name for our records.”

“Utsushimi Camie.”

“And your age?”

“Twenty-five.”

Katsuki didn’t know how many times he’d watched the interview in the past two weeks. Twenty times, maybe more. The visuals always felt surreal, even when it was Camie’s voice coming out of Camie’s body on the night she’d been apprehended. She’d put up a fight—one Katsuki hadn’t been able to see, as he lay curled against his mate, both of them healing but perhaps in not the right ways.

The Camie in the grainy police station video footage was tousled and a little bloody from her encounter with the cops, along with Amajiki and Kirishima, who’d happened to be on call that evening when Katsuki had frantically reported to them the scent he’d got from Izuku. When he’d shown a photo of Camie to Kouta, he’d gone bone-white and stiff at the sight. Katsuki hadn’t needed much more evidence.

The urge to stalk to her apartment on his own and rip her own throat apart as retribution had been strong, almost stronger than the whole of him. But if there’d been one thing Katsuki had begun to learn in these past five months, it was that his biology did not own him. There was something in this knowledge that gave him power, even when he felt so powerless in this vast, dark world, on that single endless night.

“You’re an Omega.” Katsuki faded back into the interrogation, his arms folded sloppily across his desk, one cheek squished atop as he gazed despondently at the open laptop. “Why would you try to kill so many of your own kind?”

“My own kind?” Camie laughed the same way she’d laughed and giggled at Katsuki’s antics of the years growing up together in different schools. They’d had a way of drawing toward each other—Camie took Katsuki’s personality on the chin like a champ and Katsuki had begrudgingly respected her skills and sense of humor. To hear her laugh in the same way about attempted murder - and that of his own mate—chilled him to the core, hollow and frozen. 

“Those people are not my kind. Have you, like, heard of me? I’m a bad bitch. I get shit done. I have my own hashtag, you know? Jeez. People these days. Do you understand how hard us Omega heroes work to show the world that we aren’t pathetic, mewling babies writhing on the ground with our bellies up and our legs spread? Those Omegas—the ones who feel entitled that the world treat them gently, who let people walk all over them, who just expect heroes to watch their every move so that they don’t have to learn to be stronger themselves? Those aren’t the Omegas of the future. That ain’t it, honey. I’m it. I’m the future. Don’t bunch me in with them.”

“So, you kill Omegas who you deem too weak?”

“Omegas like that give us a bad name. Housewives battered by Alphas, the homeless who run away from their shitty family lives, Omega men who would rather wear a skirt and pretend to be a woman instead of show the world who they can really be. They’re just cowards, don’t you think? Who needs any of them when the world of Omegas could be so much better without?”

“And Midoriya Izuku  —”

“Well.” Camie uncrossed legs, recrossed them, and seemed intent on picking a clot of blood out from beneath an elegant nail. “That was a little personal. I guess I can be a petty bitch sometimes. Don’t hold it against me, ‘kay?”

The familiar, sickening clench of blood and guts in Katsuki’s stomach roiled up his throat, bile held back at the disinterest in his friend’s voice. For the hundredth, two-hundredth time in the past weeks since he’d last left Izuku lying in the bed with confused, sad puppy eyes, Katsuki thought of Izuku’s dead pallor, the veins in his eyelids, the breath so faint on Katsuki’s throat when he’d tucked Izuku against him.

Izuku hadn’t been conscious enough to give any manner of report, not for days upon days. And, during that time, Katsuki had stayed loyal to his side, forever skin to skin, Izuku’s flesh so abnormally cool in contrast to the summer that usually bloomed beneath. 

They didn’t talk. Izuku couldn’t. When he was awake, he was disoriented and in pain, and it wasn’t long before the nurses gave him something to sleep, something to heal.

Of course, it had become clear to all medical professionals who visited that it wasn’t simply medicine and rest that mended him. Katsuki’s presence was what kept Izuku stable. On the rare occasion that Katsuki would lurk from the room into the overbearingly bright, disinfected corridors of the hospital, Izuku’s heart rate would plummet, his pulse slow, his face contort into a pain that might have been more in his dreams than physical - there was no knowing.

Katsuki, too. He, who refused medical care even after bursting through a hospital window, threatening personnel with a cracked rib, shattered cheekbone, and a chunk out of his ear that would scar for life after thrusting himself into the side of a brick building -

Through all of that, and with no medical assistance, Katsuki also healed at Izuku’s bedside. 

A specialist had been called. Asked questions, poked and prodded the tender underbelly of their relationship and the incident of Katsuki’s near-death experience, and gave the vague assessment that, yes, the two of them were more than likely True Mates. Fates and bodies intertwined, living for one and the other. 

At least, if they chose to complete their bonding. Katsuki wasn’t stupid enough that he didn’t realize, albeit belatedly, that the bite he’d invited upon his wrist that day in the bookshop had not only been a simple blood share, but the pheromones and hormones inside Katsuki’s smaller wrist gland had cuffed him to Izuku with the same bonding effect as if Izuku had sunk his teeth into the larger gland on Katsuki’s throat. 

At the time, it hadn’t been on purpose. Bonding hadn’t been the intention. Something in Katsuki had only wanted to connect them, and perhaps it had been the sheer strength of his need that had bonded him to Izuku, but not vice versa.

Because if Izuku never chose to complete the bond with Katsuki, then. . .

Then Katsuki would forever be stuck to Izuku’s being with nothing in return.

He felt the pain of that, now. Nothing felt more true than this.

Every day apart from Izuku felt like hell. Physically, mentally, emotionally. He couldn’t eat, struggled to sleep, found his attention fuzzy and blurred at work. His body felt weak, but half the time he couldn’t fucking tell if it was a mental weakness purveying his limbs or something inherently wrong with his body now that it wasn’t near his mate’s. Either way, Katsuki woke up each day with a thought he’d never had in his life:

How do I survive another day?

Because a life without Midoriya Izuku was not one worth living.

The realization that he’d become so dependent on another human being in his pitiful, suffering world - that he wasn’t only dependent, but irrevocably in love with this person through the worst, the best, and the worse  —

Katsuki didn’t know how people lived like this.

Of course, he had been the one to walk away. He had been the one to wait for sleep to seduce a silent Izuku once more before he backed out of the room while his heart unraveled like a bundle of red yarn, his heart growing thinner, weaker, smaller the more string he left behind in the distance between them.

His chest felt empty, now. Ball of yarn spent and stretched across the city and down empty night streets, the other end firmly held by Izuku, to create what he would with it. 

Katsuki wasn’t sure they’d knit anything with it at all anymore. That much was in Izuku’s hands. Katsuki would not exhaust himself for the Omega again.

The harsh vibration of Katsuki’s private phone in his pocket was a startle from his dissociative thoughts, the buzzing a single, lonely sound in the agency office. He’d been half-asleep at his desk, or maybe not asleep. That place in between where time didn’t exist and neither did pain.

“Stop,” Katsuki murmured with exhaustion as he answered the phone. He didn’t have to look at the caller.

“C’mon, Bakugou, please,” Kirishima pleaded through the phone, the exuberance in his voice too tight, like a red balloon filled just past the limit. Less cheerful, more unnerving. “It’s your birthday! We should be celebrating you! The entire city loves you, we love you  —”

“I don’t give a fuck who loves me,” Katsuki lied, because there was one person. “I don’t wanna drink and I sure as hell don’t wanna sit there watching you assholes get sloppy enough for a stiff wind to knock you on your ass. It’s pathetic and I’m sick of all your fuckin’ faces.”

“We want you there. We miss you, man.”

“You see me practically every day.”

“Not— not at work. Work Bakugou is way scarier than home Bakugou.”

“I will pull your esophagus out your ass if you don’t stop referring to me like I’m not the one you’re talking to.”

Kirishima’s laugh was easy and full, and Bakugou’s firm lips twitched, just barely.

“Bakugou, come on, bro! You have so many people who want to celebrate you. I promise you’ll have a good night. I won’t even get sloppy, I promise. Can’t say the same for Mina, but —”

“Hey!” Mina’s voice chimed in and, of course, that asshole had put them on speaker phone all along.

“No,” Bakugou said, dragging a hand down his face, palming into his eye sockets and watching the stars behind his shut lids. “I’m—no. I’m goin’ home. It’s late.”

“You have a day off tomorrow,” Kirishima said, forever insistent. “I made sure of it. Come on, come on - just one drink? A toast to you. Heck, I’ll toast with boba at this point if you’ll let me. You’re my best friend, dude, don’t leave me hanging.”

“Fuck off,” Bakugou muttered, tired of this and everyone and everything. He couldn’t even find it in him to rage. “Drink for me.”

He hung up before Kirishima could reply. 

Half the office lights were off as Bakugou dragged his hoodie over his head and disregarded the unkempt splay of his hair, slumping toward the exit. In passing, he half-paused to eye the lit office on his way out, catching Amijiki’s eye briefly in a nod.

Despite their altercation months and months ago, and the brittle tension they’d shared in disagreements, it had been Amijiki who had implemented their company’s contingency plans and hefty bank account to keep Katsuki’s hospital antics on the downlow. The hospital had been paid well, as had the nurses who had been forced to deal with Katsuki. Contracts had been signed.

Silence and order had been maintained, and it was down to Amijiki’s quiet fortitude and thoughtfulness.

Katsuki wouldn’t forget that he owed the guy. His respect for Omegas had seemed to grow exponentially in less than half a year.

Despite the distance home, Katsuki chose to walk. He didn’t want a car and he wanted the train even less. Bursting from the staid, grey building, Katsuki was met with even grayer weather. 

Sometimes his April birthday was cheerful, others not. Sakura petals swam like confetti through the damp breeze, a single pink tear clinging to Katsuki’s cheek before he swiped it away and trudged onward. The hour was growing late and the streets nearly dead but for errant groups of college students and salarymen, the air both savory with stall food and clean from the sweet spring wind. Eyes drawn low, Katsuki watched his shadow jump ahead of him, then disappear altogether depending on the night lights guiding his way. 

More than once on the way home, Katsuki’s phone buzzed in his pocket. He didn’t look. Didn’t care. Needed to clear the fog from his head and the drowning in his lungs. He just needed to breathe.

Stepping into the elevator of his high rise apartment, Katsuki cast a glance at the sagging, heavy-eyed mother with a toddler nodding off in her arms, his fat cherry cheek smashed against the woman’s shoulder. He opened dark eyes to stare directly at Katsuki. 

Katsuki stared back, expressionless. 

One chubby little hand, wrapped in mama’s long hair, released and fingers wiggled in a brief greeting. Katsuki’s shoulders relaxed, his mouth softening. And, for the briefest moment, something unfamiliar and new panged to life between his ribs, a miniature big bang, a constellation created. 

A family would be nice. One day. Coming home to the same apartment, alone and alone and alone - a year ago it would have been something to brush off, to sleep through until the morning made him forget the unwelcome desire.

This time, it took hold. A message written in the sky, across his chest. 

A person to care about, to lean on. A shoulder, the soothing scent of someone’s hair.

Katsuki dragged himself from the elevator and startled stone still to the sight of a familiar form sat down before his door, arms wrapped around knees pulled up to his chest, temple resting there in what looked like sleep.

Blood jolted through Katsuki’s body like a lightning strike, his pulse rocketing heavy and loud to his ears, breath catching tight in his lungs as he stared. For the first time in a long time, he didn’t know what to do, what to say. 

This single Omega seemed to have that effect on him. 

Izuku looked so small. 

Katsuki approached quietly and crouched, head cocked, frowning deep as he searched Izuku’s face for signs of fatigue, exhaustion. Izuku’s face was drawn tight, even in sleep; his cheeks more gaunt, his scent still spring grass and soft wet moss of the woods, but mellower now, less overpowering. Katsuki couldn’t see the pink, gnarly scar low on one side of his neck, but he knew it had to be there—a death-strike that missed a major artery and struck through a pheromone gland, leaving permanent damage. 

Katsuki wondered how Izuku felt about it. How he’d taken the trauma of the situation. He’d only received secondhand reports from Shinsou and Todoroki, mostly. The Alpha in Katsuki doggedly berated him for abandoning his mate - but the man inside him only hurt, raw and pulsing like an open, infected wound that didn’t want to be poked and prodded any longer.

Katsuki didn’t realize it was his own high, needy whimper that made Izuku’s eyes pop open until their gazes locked, twin expressions of shocked on shocked. 

Izuku didn’t jump from his position, but his shoulders stiffened and his scent sharpened to spilled copper and the electric tang at the back of Katsuki’s tongue. When he spoke, his words were sleep roughened and soft.

“Can we talk?”

Katsuki hadn’t heard Izuku speak in weeks. His skin and bones threatened to concave, to cradle Izuku inside the empty hollow of his heart and keep him in that private dark forever.

Instead, he said:

“Sounds like the last thing I wanna do.”

Izuku’s face crumpled a little, but remained pillowed atop his bony knees in ripped jeans.

“I-I mean, me too. It’s not—“

“Well then.” Katsuki grunted was he got to his feet. “If we’re in agreement, you can just fuckin’—“

Emotion speared through Katsuki in a sudden series of merciless strikes—desperation, devastation—all shrieking from Izuku’s quickfire grip on Katsuki’s wrist as he used Katsuki for leverage to stand. 

Izuku jolted, shock flashing across his expression before he shook it off, pleading eyes on Katsuki.

“I need to talk to you,” Izuku said quickly, voice cracking down the center as Katsuki shook off his hold. “How about that? I don’t want to, but I know I need to. I’ve needed to for a long time. I owe you—I mean—“

“You’ve always made a point of reminding me that you don’t owe me anything,” Katsuki said, hard and unyielding as he shuffled through his pockets for keys. 

Izuku’s energy was buzzing beside him like a hive of hornets, intent and unrelenting as Izuku wedged himself between Katsuki and the shut door to glare up at him.

“But I do owe you this. I really do. Can I—will you just listen for a little while? And then—then I c-can. . . go or whatever.”

Katsuki’s top lip twitched, the silent curl of a snarl at the corner of his mouth at the mere thought of Izuku dumping bombs on his head again and walking out of his life. How weak had Katsuki become to this Omega that the very idea of him leaving again sent panic alarms red behind his eyes?

For a length, they only stared at each other. Katsuki holding the keys to his door loosely at his side while their gazes both battled for entry, for a give and a tell. 

Katsuki’s lips thinned. He shot a sigh through his nose and irritably gestured for Izuku to move without explicitly touching any part of him.

“Whatever.”

He left the door open behind him.

Tension was tighter than the knotted muscles crumpled around the nape of Katsuki’s neck as they both shucked their shoes aside and entered an apartment that had long stopped smelling anything like Izuku. Even with the pops and bangs of orange and red scattered around the grey living space no longer brought any warmth. Not without that sunrise scent to match.

“When’d you get out?” Katsuki found himself asking as he automatically went to the kitchen to put on the kettle. 

“Today.” Izuku’s voice trailed behind him, timid and soft. “I—yeah. I pretty much just, um, came right here.”

Expression schooled with every ounce of control he’d learned in twenty-six years, Katsuki set his jaw tight and turned to unearth two mugs. He’d gotten into the habit of giving Izuku the UA one, the faded logo a bruised red and blue of a thousand uses. Izuku had once smiled to himself when he’d cupped it between his hands and drank, like he’d pretended for a moment he was a hero who’d earned the stupid piece of knick-knack shit. 

“When?” Katsuki said.

“When what?”

Katsuki placed palms on the cold counter and tried not to think of the time he’d fucked Izuku right there. He stared at the grain of the surface. 

“When did you get out today? You were sleepin’ on my fuckin’ doorstep, weren’t you? How long you been sittin’ there?”

“Oh, I—” From Katsuki’s periphery, Izuku flapped his hands around a second before he pocketed them and murmured, “I don’t know. A couple of hours. It was fine. The least I could do after you—you know.”

“Sure do,” Katsuki snapped, just as the electric kettle popped and Izuku jumped half a foot into the air. In dead silence, Katsuki poured the tea over the dingy green bags and watched them swirl and leach their color. “And so? You want to talk. Where the hell do you plan on starting?”

“How far back do you want?”

“No.” Katsuki whirled, face contorted and ugly as he felt inside as he jammed a finger to Izuku’s chest and lurched into his shocked space. “You don’t get to put this on me, anymore. I’m sick and tired in every goddamn way you can imagine. I am done asking and begging like some sick dog in the alleyway outside your house, Midoriya Izuku. You’ll tell me exactly what you feel I really deserve to know. No more and sure as hell no fucking less. This is in your hands, not mine. I already washed mine a thousand times of all that blood. Time for you to come clean with yours.”

Izuku’s expressions ranged from surprised to stricken to simply sad, green eyes gone deep, dangerous lakes with depths Katsuki couldn’t swim.

“I—” Izuku rubbed at his arm, the scarred one, his shoulders drawn in and smaller than they actually were. Like he was reverting to a person Katsuki didn’t know. “I presented when I was fourteen. The day before—the day before UA had their yearly tryouts.”

Katsuki blinked, shook his head.

“Tryouts? Wait, for—”

“Yeah,” Izuku breathed out, his smile tight as he flicked a quick look to Katsuki. “I—yeah. Those ones. Guess we would have met a lot sooner if I had or —”

“That wouldn’t have been a good idea,” Katsuki said dismissively, turning his back and returning to the steeping tea, giving his hands something to do that wasn’t touch the skittish Omega before him. “I’d have slammed your face into the ground and walked over your body to reach my goals.”

Izuku’s laugh was short and not really a laugh at all.

“That sounds like you now.”

Katsuki turned, carefully offering the handle side of the mug to Izuku, letting go quick enough that their fingertips did not brush. Whatever their connection may now be, Katsuki wasn’t interested in inviting it to the table right now.

“It wasn’t the same,” Katsuki said, solidly meeting Izuku’s jittery gaze. “Believe me. I’d have made your life hell—especially for being Quirkless. Back then, brute strength and victory were the only things that mattered. Not saying they don’t now, but I’m not a stupid kid anymore, either.”

Izuku hummed noncommittally and padded from the kitchen to nestle into the further corner of the couch, feet tucked up beneath him. He wore a red hoodie that nearly dwarfed him, and the bunching of cloth almost managed to hide the thick pink slash of new scarring low on the side of his neck.

Katsuki’s blood ran a cold so frozen that it burned. He nearly lost his hold on Izuku’s voice altogether as it filtered in.

“I’ve heard stories, you know. Over the years, from Hitoshi. He showed me how he imitates voices once when we were drunk and hanging out on the outer side of the wall and I think I just about peed myself laughing.” The smile in Izuku’s voice had Katsuki snapping a sharp look from his own end of the couch to find the shy dimple in Izuku’s cheek winking out as he grinned into his steaming tea. “I hadn’t even met you, but he mimicked you so well that I didn’t have to guess if it was true to not.”

There was a rebuttal on the tip of Katsuki’s tongue, but instead his heart said:

“All that time, you were just on the other side of the wall. I—”

All at once, Katsuki recalled the confusing, unwelcome feelings he’d begun to harbor for that purple-haired freakazoid just about half-way through their first year. The feelings would come and go like the tides, and sometimes Katsuki would tell himself he’d utterly imagined the insatiable scent clinging to Shinsou like a second unholy skin because there might be months in between where he wouldn’t smell it on him at all. And the entire time, the awkward, horrible thing he’d categorized has a hormone-induced crush had been Izuku’s scent —

“What? What’re you making that face for? Do I smell bad —”

“I just—fuck.” Katsuki dragged a hand down his face, pinching at the bridge of his nose with a ragged sigh. “I just remembered how sometimes—sometimes he’d smell. . . different. And I’d think, well—”

Izuku’s delighted gasp had Katsuki snarling on automatic, only the scorching tea spilling onto his knee reminding him of the situation.

“Oh my god—you had a crush on him!”

“Fuck if I did! Hell no! Hell—stop laughing, fuck you,” Katsuki sputtered as Izuku’s shoulders shook, tea sloshing dangerously close to the rim of his mug as he swiped at his wet cheeks with the sleeve of his sweater. “I’m—I smelled you on him and I think I thought it was him, so—“

“Oh my god—does he know?” Izuku finally set aside his precarious tea and aimed that natural, pink-cheeked smile Katsuki’s way. Hello again to the sun. “That’s great, I—”

“Tell him and die!”

The final word seemed to snap Izuku back to the present, because his face paled and a hand subtly shifted up to cover the scar on his neck, not-so-smoothly skimming back into his hair to ruffle at the overgrown curls. With an expression shadowed over and rained down, Izuku stared at his knees and spoke softly once more.

“Yeah. But, well, anyway. . . I was fourteen and so determined to be a—a hero. I can laugh at myself now. I was so scrawny and stupid and hopeful and hopeless—”

“People have dreams. That’s not weird, even if you weren’t suited at the time or whatever.”

Izuku met Katsuki’s gaze firmly, his brows drawn in and stubborn.

“Don’t be nice to me. I don’t know what to do with that.”

Katsuki’s eyes narrowed.

“You said something like that before. When I’d fucked up, stalked you, risked my job because—because—”

You were everything, so fast. It happened so fast I don’t think I had a clue how big this would be.

“I’m not worth that,” Izuku said, clear and sharp arrows to Katsuki’s gut. “I never have been. But I—I still want to explain myself. Not in a—not to defend myself, but just. . . share with you. Why I am the way I am. And then we can—we can do whatever you want.”

Whatever Katsuki wanted? Did Izuku truly have no clue? Weren’t they supposed to be connected at the heart and dick or whatever? Or maybe that was only from Katsuki’s end. Katsuki had never claimed Izuku, not past some scenting and shallow bites.

Katsuki sighed and angled his body away, drinking from his tea and muttering under his breath.

“Whatever.”

The air clenched around them in a tight fist once more, Katsuki’s chest going claustrophobic and fierce. Izuku only sounded even smaller, like he was crushing himself into a small space to fit the mood.

“Anyway. . . I presented the day before UA opened its doors. I could have gotten in on grades alone, gone the Support route, but I wanted to be a hero, not just a helper. For once, I didn’t want to be in the background, I wanted to be dependable and strong and useful. Things my dad never was, I guess. Things that I never have been.”

“Oiy.” Katsuki felt as absolutely fucking offended as he was sure he looked. “You tryin’ to insult my taste, haaah? Think I’d ever mate with someone beneath me, lesser than others? You’re incredible, you’re—”

“I said stop,” Izuku snapped, cheeks red and eyes bright, livid, panic clawing up his rising voice. “Stop that. Not while I’m trying to tell you—trying to show you what a fuck up I am.”

Katsuki stared in open disgust, disbelieving that anyone as amazing and accomplished as Izuku—a Quirkless male Omega at that—could talk about themselves with such poison.

“Don’t you ever get tired of talking like that?”

The fight seemed to drain from Izuku as quickly as it had come. He hid his hands in the sleeves of his hoodies, lashes lowering. Now that Katsuki knew about the freckle on his eyelid, it was the only thing Katsuki could see.

“I’m always tired,” Izuku murmured. “Peace is something I hope to give to others since I can’t quite manage mine.”

Katsuki’s fists screamed to punch something, anything. Preferably the people who had poisoned his mate with a venom from which there seemed no cure but patience and gentle healing. Katsuki wasn’t good at either of them. And so he said nothing at all.

Izuku took to his tea, cupping it in hands still hidden in sleeves. Sipped and stopped, repeated. Finally, he spoke.

“Something was wrong with me the moment I presented. I wasn’t—I wasn’t meek or soft or sweet like I was expected to be. I wasn’t delicate and I didn’t know how to talk to or interact with other Omegas. Not to mention I was one of only two male Omegas in my entire high school, and the other guy slipped through the cracks of bullying by wearing the female uniform and blending into the population.”

Izuku drank long from his cooling tea, eyes on the sparkling city skyline presented in an evening landscape of the high rise window.

“But I—I laughed too hard, cried too much, got angry and indignant for others too fast. I didn’t mind my business or understand that I was meant to look down when an Alpha looked down on me.”

Katsuki thought of their first series of interactions. The way Izuku seemed more angry the more Katsuki pursued him. He’d been on the tightest of edges, seemingly ready to run or fight at any wrong word from Katsuki back then. It made sense, now, of course. That Izuku was different. That he’d always been fighting a losing battle with society, within himself.

“I wasn’t strong for the longest time,” Izuku said, eyes glazed over and no longer seeing the lonely city. “But I wanted to be. I worked at it. After the Sports Festival—the one where you placed first—I was really inspired by you guys. Your power, the force of your will. Even the male Omegas were so proud and strong. I wanted that for me and I worked toward that. My brain could never comprehend why an Omega wouldn’t want to strive for that.”

“No shit,” Katsuki agreed, earning a half-smile from a slightly distracted Omega.

“I’m—” Izuku heaved a sigh, hefted a full of exhaustion before he’d even begun. With obvious reluctance, he shifted to fully meet Katsuki’s stare. “So, I have a genetic condition called heterozygous alpha. It basically means that, um, how do I put it. . . In the womb, all non-Beta fetuses have the possibility to present Alpha or Omega glands and secondary gender characteristics. And you already know that, obviously. You’re so smart, I feel stupid even trying to tell you—”

“Stop,” Katsuki said, as gently as he could, which wasn’t very gentle at all because he was absolutely bursting to scream and set half the city on fire from banked fury. Not at Izuku. At everyone who’d made him this way. “Just talk. I wanna hear it from your mouth, not some half-assed explanation from an extra.”

Izuku swallowed hard and looked back to his tea. Katsuki wished he’d look at him longer than five seconds. It was making Katsuki's skin prickle and itch without a scratch to relieve it.

“My body didn’t decide between the two. I’m—I’m both. Kind of. It’s like my body tried to be Omega. but the Alpha tried to—to claw its way to the surface. My hands, my feet, my ability to build muscle, my, uh, my teeth, my sense of smell and hearing. My—”

“Your scent?”

A blush rushed up Izuku’s neck to fill his cheeks and Katsuki desperately wanted to chew on them until Izuku cried.

“That’s—yeah. My glands, they’re uh, large. For an Omega, anyway. Even when I could still smell and control how much my pheromones released, I always smelled stronger, louder. Like the capacity for my scent was so much more vast than others. It’s, um, it became a problem pretty quickly.”

Katsuki blinked. At this point, he wasn’t particularly surprised. Auntie Inko had bumbled through some shitty, biased explanation herself, and Katsuki’s many red flags during his time spent with Izuku had all amalgamated into some bizarre sense of understanding, even before this moment of proper explanation. 

Hell, going by the way Izuku acted in the sack, even acted in a heat—Katsuki had already known Izuku wasn’t an average Omega. It was what he’d liked most about him from the start.

“And you didn’t tell me this, why?”

Izuku snuck a look to Katsuki, who only raised his eyebrows expectantly. 

“Uh. . . I guess, at first it wasn’t your business. And by the time it was, I thought—well, I’ve heard stories, but I’ve never personally met an Alpha who wanted to, you know, m-mate. . . with another Alpha. Let alone a broken Omega who is only a little Alpha in all the wrong ways.”

Katsuki scowled, unable to hold back his disgust at this self-deprecating bullshit any longer.

“What the fuck are the right ways to be an Alpha?”

“I—”

“You’re so full of shit. I never thought nothin’ was wrong with you, dumbass. Stubborn as hell and too hard on yourself even by my standards, but fuck if I ever thought you were deficient. You never have been. You’re—you’re—”

Perfect.

Panic tightened Izuku’s voice high and rigid.

“I—I can’t talk about this. I can’t hear this, it’s—it’s too much. I never thought I’d have to tell Ground Zero to stop being nice to me, but I really can’t deal with it right now, especially when I don’t deserve it. I fucked up my whole life, Kacchan! It was so much easier to be angry and indignant, to fuck around with Alphas who would hurt me when I was too much a coward to hurt myself on my own. I—”

“STOP.” And Katsuki could not hear that. Not in this moment, when tensions had rocketed into the atmosphere and Katsuki could only see red at the thought of somebody purposely hurting that which was his. Lurching from the couch, Katsuki made a beeline for the bathroom, ignorant to the calls following in his footsteps. “I need a break.”

Running the sink water cold, Katsuki gripped the edge and watched it drain and drain until he remembered to splash and slap at his face with it. Looking up, he met his own eyes in the mirror. 

“They’re words,” he said, quiet and low, assured and strong. “They’re words, and that shit doesn’t touch you. It’s over and done. You’re the only man left standing. You always are. Be fuckin’ better than this.”

Refreshed and steadier on his feet, Katsuki emerged and stalked the familiar scent of his Omega back to the kitchen. Izuku was sitting on the counter, lightly kicking his legs, his socks a mismatched yellow and a Christmas one. Katsuki only stared meaningfully at them before meeting Izuku’s eyes.

Izuku blushed like a tomato and glanced quickly away. Pretty soon Katsuki would get real fuckin’ sick of that.

“Lotta shit happened in this kitchen,” Katsuki said.

That only made Izuku redder, and Katsuki was glad for it. He deserved it.

“It, um—yup, it did.” Izuku picked at the threads of the hole in one knee. “Th-that first night, when you took me home from the police station, I—”

“M’not gonna apologize for jumpin’ you back then.” Katsuki folded his arms across his chest and wandered a little closer to Izuku, not entirely up in his business yet. He’d test the waters of his skittish Omega. “You were—” Stupidly brave and stubborn and I was totally gone for you when I’d realized what you’d done. “I was worried about you, alright? Knowing now that it was Camie you went up against, that you scared away—fuck. She coulda killed you easy, she—”

“She didn’t, though, did she?”

This time, Izuku met Katsuki’s eyes longer, more defiant, more alive and less buried.

There you are.

“Yeah.” Katsuki moved in quickly, just a hand on Izuku’s thigh; soft, worn jeans and strong, hard-earned muscle beneath. Something Katsuki could appreciate. He leaned in, searching Izuku’s expression for that give, that allowance. “You’re harder to break than you think of yourself, y’know.”

Something flashed in Izuku’s eyes, brightened them further as his pretty mouth twitched. The scent of golden fields and swaying poppies colored the air in blooming summer.

“I think I’m finally starting to learn that I can handle a lot more than I’ve given myself credit. Doesn’t excuse my attitude or actions in getting to this point of discovery, though.”

Katsuki cracked a smile, a real one.

“You sure do use a fuckton of words just t’say you’re sorry for gettin’ reckless.”

Izuku blinked up at him, both cute and startlingly attractive all in one. Katsuki missed the taste of him, the pheromones he’d sweat out when he wrapped his body around Katsuki like a livewire.

“Yeah, um, that. I’m—I really am sorry. For so much. And Camie. I’m sorry it—I’m sorry you lost a friend.”

Just like that, the sky fell, and the dark plunged around Katsuki anew. He roughly shrugged and yanked away, already steering away out of the kitchen.

“I can’t,” he bit off as he retreated. “Talk about it. Or whatever.”

“Oh, god, right!” Izuku scurried after him, and of all things, gripped the edge of Katsuki’s shirt as he trailed behind. “That’s—that’s fine! I wouldn’t want to force you, I just wanted you to know that I wish—I wish things had turned out differently.”

Katsuki halted, staring at nothing and seeing a lifetime of memories with a person he thought he’d known inside out. So, some people have faults. Some people are born into biases, or in order to understand the world, they decided to see it in a very specific way. Katsuki had always thought Camie would grow out of the hints of hatred he’d caught from her now and again. People could change. Fuck knew Katsuki had, over the years.

“Me too,” Katsuki all but whispered. He stiffened at the sudden, soft press of Izuku’s cheek against his back. Nothing more. No embrace, only another warm body to lean back against. The single action nearly cracked Katsuki in two. When he spoke, his strangled voice showed it. “She was—fuck, it feels so wrong to remember all the good when she’s a murderer more than once over. But. . . She was a friend, too. I don’t how to—”

“Welcome to the grey area of life,” Izuku murmured into Katsuki’s t-shirt. One hand rested lightly on his hip, a warmth radiating from the two simple touch points to ripple through Katsuki’s rigid frame.

“Hey, I’m plenty fuckin’ acquainted. I’m just—”

“It’s not who you are,” Izuku said, his thumb lightly skimming back and forth, just shy of reaching beneath the shirt. “It doesn’t sit right on your shoulders. There should only be black or white, right or wrong, good or bad.”

“Makes sense,” Katsuki snapped irritably, even as his shoulders began to sag back into Izuku’s surprisingly sturdy weight. “S’logical, isn’t it.”

“And then there’s me.”

Katsuki rolled his eyes and hoped Izuku could feel it through whatever fledgling bond they might have.

“There’s you. What I feel for you is logical, too.”

“Maybe,” Izuku whispered. “I don’t—”

Katsuki whirled and enveloped Izuku in a tight embrace, waves of emotion pouring from him, waterfalling onto Izuku and crashing into Izuku’s own tumultuous riot of feelings as Katsuki buried his face in Izuku’s hair and vehemently hissed.

“Don’t you dare say you don’t fuckin’ know after—after I nearly died because you were dying! You don’t get to be grey about that shit, dumbass! Be straight with me for once, for fuck’s sake!”

“I know!” Izuku shoved at Katsuki’s hard chest and sputtered when Katsuki didn’t do more than give him a few inches of leeway. The furious little face looking up at him without shying from Katsuki’s gaze was absolutely everything he needed right now. “Shit, I mean. I know, okay? We’re—we’re True Mates. We’re True Mates, right? In the—in the hospital, I healed faster because you wouldn’t leave my bed those first days, right? The doctor told me there’s no scientific way I could have healed so quickly without some Quirk or healing entity. And it’s you—you heal me, every time. Inside and out. You heal me and I almost killed you.”

Katsuki gawked. He took Izuku’s face between his palms and squished his cheeks in like a fish, mushing and mashing Izuku’s red, angry expression as he hollered.

“Are you fucking insane? Are you out of your fucking mind? You didn’t kill me—you didn’t tear my throat out or make it feel like that. Camie! Camie did that, did that to you, Izuku. And because we damn well are True Mates, what happens to you happens to me and vice versa. Do you think I take that lightly? Do you think I take us lightly? The weight of us is so fucking heavy that we bend the rules of physics, of life and death, of mates and genetics and humanity as we know it. You and I, Midoriya Izuku. You and I tell the world to go fuck itself, and it damn well does what we tell ‘em.”

At some point, Katsuki had ceased mauling Izuku’s face and simply cupped Izuku’s jaw in both hands, tender and a little frantic as he ranted and raved. When he finally paused to breath, Izuku was looking at him with lips softly parted, eyes glistening. His voice was husky and warm when he spoke.

“C-can I kiss you?”

Katsuki groaned and rolled his eyes into fucking space.

“For the love of -”

Izuku’s body fit against his like every time before, rising to his toes, the strong, stable heat of his body filling Katsuki’s own. Big hands, calloused, scarred, and mapped in a harsh history, dove into Katsuki’s hair to grip him still as Izuku’s mouth tasted Katsuki’s with unbearable softness. Curiosity, tasting, the honeyed thread of something new slipping from Izuku’s mouth to Katsuki’s when their tongues flicked and licked at the other’s.

And then Izuku breathed a sweet sight into Katsuki’s mouth and he just about fucking crumbled. A whimper sounded between them, neediness reeling them in from both ends until they crashed together with rising fervor. The ripe, secret scent of Izuku’s arousal rose like humidity off the tarred black top, wet and heavy in the air, like mossy, deep swamps where no man makes it out alive. Katsuki choked on its thickness sloshing down his throat and welcomed the dizzy high of Izuku’s slick, syrupy lust. 

With a harsh inhale, Izuku ripped from Katsuki’s groaning lips, half-lidded eyes and swollen, biteable lips seducing Katsuki into slumping to capture Izuku’s drugging kiss anew.

“Waitwaitwait,” Izuku mumbled, sounding drowsy, sloppy as his breath hitched in time with Katsuki’s palms riding beneath that hoodie to claim and brand feverish flesh. “Fuck. Fuck, w-wait, I’m—we’re not done—”

“Believe me.” Katsuki outright moaned as the heady, tropical hothouse scent of Izuku’s dripping slick whet the drooling beast barely chained to the curved bone bars of his ribs. “Fuck. We are done here.”

“H-hold on!” Izuku yelped as Katsuki altogether ignored him by lofting his Omega over his shoulder in a fireman’s carry, that beautiful ass nicely presented up for Katsuki to rest his roaming hand against as he strolled to the bedroom. “Hold on! We—we need to talk about that night at the hospital! Stop groping my ass, dammit!”

Katsuki flung Izuku onto his all-black bed without any grace or gentleness. Izuku bounced and splayed out, the oversized hoodie riding up to reveal pale skin Katsuki only wanted to mark up, just like the rest of his sinful little body. Katsuki nostrils flared at the overpowering scent of Izuku’s pheromones, designed to cut the strongest Alpha off at the knees and leave him helpless and worshiping his Omega.

Katsuki literally bit his tongue until he tasted the tinge of blood and crunched his face up in impatience.

“That night? What about it? Spit it out, already, I got better things to be doing.”

Still lying back, stomach bared and arms flung over his forest of curls, Izuku chewed on his plump bottom lip before he spoke.

“Kouta.”

Katsuki would happily set on fire any innocent passerby if it meant not having this conversation at exactly this moment. Any other moment would do.

Instead he folded his arms, ignored the dwindling erection that had begun to tent his sweatpants, and loomed at the end of the bed with fiery eyes.

“Oh yeah. Him.”

Izuku visibly swallowed and scrambled to sit up, very pointedly yanking his sweater down to cover his crotch. Katsuki could smell the desire on Izuku, and it was powerful, potent. Izuku was fucking ripe for it.

“That—it was really fucked up that I—” Izuku worried his bottom lip with between his thumb and forefinger, muttering, “Shit, I don’t even know where to start with that one.”

Katsuki wondered if he rolled his eyes enough times in the day that they’d get stuck at the back of his skull. He sighed and hunkered down beside Izuku on the bed, their thighs pressed warmly, a promise of touch to continue in the future. 

“How about why the hell you hid it from me in the first place.”

Izuku shrugged, shoulders sagging as he stared at the twisting, worrisome hands on his lap.

“I didn’t think you’d like it.”

“Well of course I don’t fucking like it,” Katsuki snapped. “Not only was he a witness in an active investigation—one that, no matter how small the part, involved you at the time—but he has a guardian already. Just what the fuck got into you?”

Izuku peeked a little sidelong look at Katsuki, and it was so fucking endearing that Katsuki had a hard time keeping stern.

“Honestly? At—at the time we’d, um, we’d been fighting after, you know, at the trains station—”

“Jeezus fucking—”

“And it just sort of happened. I mean, he showed up at Parchment and he looked so small and sad and angry and alone and I, and I—”

“Saw yourself.”

Izuku physically flinched, his shoulders drawing further in. Katsuki sighed and reached out, hand nesting in Izuku’s to draw him in, encouraging Izuku’s head on his shoulder. 

“Hitoshi said the same.”

“Much as I hate that smug piece of shit, he’s right about most things. Tell him I said that and die.”

This time, Izuku only snorted a laugh and leaned some of his weight into Katsuki’s side.

“So, Kouta happened. It was kind of um, you know, a rebellion on my part—”

“Shocker.”

“And I just—it felt right. I won’t lie, it felt like the right thing to do. I wanted to, I don’t know, give him a chance in the world. Support. Things I didn’t have at fifteen and furious.”

“I get it,” Katsuki murmured, sliding his arm around Izuku’s shoulders to nudge him in. Strong shoulders. Not large, but powerful. “Not sayin’ I condone it, but I get it or whatever. How it would be for you, seein’ him like that.”

“I didn’t like how it felt,” Izuku whispered, like it had been a secret, even from himself. “Even at the start, I hadn’t liked how it felt. My therapist—well, she didn’t tell me right out, but I realized that I was testing our boundaries just to prove to myself that I wasn’t as affected by my feelings for you as my heart was telling me.”

“That’s shitty.”

“Er, yeah. I know. I mean, I get it now. I was still scared of what we were and some part of me was constantly testing just how far you’d stretch to reach me. . . or something.”

At that, Katsuki lowly growled and shifted on the bed, turning enough to consider Izuku and take him by the upper arms, holding him in a position to face him without running. Katsuki frowned deeply as Izuku blushed, eyes wide and genuine.

“Look, I’m tryin’ to be, like, sensitive and shit to all this, but I’m really not used to whatever all this is, so I’m just gonna ask you to stop doin’ all that bullshit and let me fucking rest. I swear you’re more exhausting than any fucker I know.”

Izuku’s expression fell. 

“Sorry,” he mumbled, looking down at the mattress. 

Katsuki groaned and pulled Izuku in, embracing him tightly, even when Izuku tried to wiggle free, his face nestled in the crook of Katsuki’s neck.

“Stop lookin’ like I punched your mom in the face,” Katsuki said into Izuku’s hair. He didn’t smell the same. Not the shampoo, which was obviously some hospital bullshit. Not his inherent pheromones, which seemed somehow hotter, like the back of the throat burn from a spicy pepper. But he was still Katsuki’s Omega. “Which, by the way—no, nevermind, later for that one. I’m not —ugh. I’m not mad, but I ain’t thrilled to know you trust me, of all people, so little—”

Izuku flailed out of Katsuki’s hold, waving hands and sputtered, red-faced and flustered.

“No no no, I do—I do trust you! Or, most of me did! I’m just, I’m learning. I’m learning how you work, how we work, how I work when I’m in what feels like my only healthy relationship in history. I don’t know what to do with it except test its limits. And I did, and I shouldn’t have, and now we’re here and you’re here and perfect and—”

Izuku clamped his mouth shut, eyes comically large and a little wet as he seemed to stare right through Katsuki’s skull.

“And what,” Katsuki snapped.

Izuku’s gaze locked on Katsuki’s.

“And I love you,” Izuku said, his voice clear and true, no tinge of fear or doubt. He reached out to a gawking Katsuki, brushed his thumb across Katsuki’s top lip, tracing the shape. “Real love. Not the stuff I was so afraid of from the books. Stuff that always involved pretty faces and appealing scents and a person you couldn’t stay away from due to the biological drive. I didn’t want to romanticize our dynamic or anyone’s dynamic with me. But I thought that was my only choice, and that everyone else felt the same, and that I’d be forever stuck outside the fence of Alphas and Omegas, hunter and prey, matched and mated.”

Izuku’s lips curved, his head cocked as his thumb smudged away the unfamiliar wetness on Katsuki’s cheek. “But you climbed over the fence. Or, I don’t know, more like tore it in two for me to walk through. You did all of that for this, and us, even when I didn’t believe in it. You’re the love that the books never told me about.”

Katsuki blinked, stillness purveying through him but for the frantic dance of his heart and rampaging pulse. 

“I—yeah. Same, er. With you. Same with you.”

There. There it was. Izuku’s smile, wide and glittering at the eyes, little dimple indenting his freckled cheek.

“Wow, I’ve sure been swept off my feet.”

“How’s this,” Katsuki rasped, and promptly dragged a squealing Izuku across the bed to outright force him onto Katsuki’s lap, cradling a flustered, laughing Izuku like a baby in his arms. He leaned in, brushed his nose against Izuku’s, nuzzling at his cheeks, their lips errantly brushing as Katsuki spoke, soft and secret. “You’re the most difficult person I’ve ever met, but I’d tear through more than a fuckin’ fence for you. Make it the earth, the sun, whatever, I don’t give a shit. You’re mine. All of you, but especially the shitty parts, because I’ll hold onto them too, even when you don’t want ‘em.”

Izuku inhaled sharply and, before Katsuki could react, wrapped both arms around Katsuki’s neck and hugging him tight, clinging fiercely, a tremor to his small voice at Katsuki’s ear.

“Thank you. Thank you.”

Katsuki was glad Izuku couldn’t see his own red face.

“Don’t be gross,” Katsuki mumbled, allowing his lids to fall shut as he drowned in the swelling, bursting flavor of his Omega in the air, around him, in his bed. His. 

Mine.

Ours, the Alpha in him rumbled. Ours, always.

And then Izuku’s stomach growled like a fucking human and they both broke apart with twin looks of surprise. Izuku blushed fiercely.

“Um. I might be hungry.”

“For fuck’s sake,” Katsuki said with no heat as he hefted Izuku off his lap and left him rolling onto the mattress in favor standing. He needed to cool himself off, needed to take care of his Omega in one way first before he could move onto more fun activities. “I’ll cook for you, I guess.”

Izuku giggled, splayed out like a star on Katsuki’s bed, grinning up at him like a little boy.

“You really do like taking care of me, don’t you? You really don’t think I’m a burden, do you?”

Katsuki could feel his cheeks going hot and could do nothing to stop it as he pocketed his hands and shrugged.

“The only burden is keeping my hands off you.” With that, he left a flabbergasted, flushed Omega in his bed and made for the kitchen. Over his shoulder, he hollered, “Go shower! You smell like hospital and I fuckin’ hate it.”

In the kitchen, Katsuki busied himself with finely chopping bunches of veggies and pork for a quick stir fry. He lived off fast, protein-heavy meals most of the week—and besides, slicing and dicing gave him time to process this evening’s events. 

“Your conditioner is nice,” Izuku said as he flopped onto the couch, all bare, softly-furred legs in a pair of worn shorts Katsuki had left out and one of his old UA t-shirts that no longer fit him. He smelled like Katsuki’s clean, no nonsense soap, and that was good. Katsuki eyed Izuku’s towel-dried damp hair, the shiny splay of curls. 

“How d’you even brush that thing?” he asked, offering out the wide bowl of food for Izuku. He’d made it spicy on purpose. Most things he cooked for Izuku were in that line, since he couldn’t particularly taste anything, anyway. 

“I don’t,” Izuku said sagely. He broke into a grin and it felt better than old times—something newer, fresher. A springtime for their relationship. “Thanks for the food. I’m starving.”

“Eat more often, dumbass.”

They ate in silence for a bit—mostly because Izuku was absolutely shoveling food into his mouth, his cheeks filling up like a hamster as he decimated his plate with an enthusiasm Katsuki had never seen from him.

“Kai felt bad,” Izuku said as he chased a bit of rice around with chopsticks. “Later on, I mean.”

“Chisaki?” Katsuki snorted. “Bullshit.”

“I mean, he didn’t say it.”

Katsuki’s eyebrows crept up, dubious.

“Uh huh.”

Izuku’s eyes widened, adamant, his chopsticks wildly flailing as he spoke.

“No, believe me, really! When you—when you weren’t visiting anymore and everyone else would, he’d ask about you. Where you were, then later kind of slipped in how you’d gone ballistic and if he’d known the two of us were True Mates he probably would have helped a little more.”

Katsuki outright laughed.

“Fuck off. Like hell he said that.”

“He did!” Izuku pouted, looking down into his bowl. “He can be. . . thoughtful. With his friends. And only his friends. Sometimes.”

“He sounds like a real fuckin’ catch.”

“He’s always been a little strange about me dating people,” Izuku mumbled, a familiar distance in his eyes when he was looking somewhere that wasn’t the present. “I mean, because of my history with Alphas, but more because I know he thinks it’s his fault.”

Katsuki paused, carefully set his plate aside so he wouldn’t hurl it at a wall.

“What’s his fault?”

“It wasn’t his fault,” Izuku said quickly. “But he introduced me to my first boyfriend. Uh, Dabi. You know. Todoroki. The, uh, the other brother.”

Katsuki bared his teeth on instinct, felt the beast inside salivate for the blood of those who wronged his precious mate.

“Oh, that flaming piece of shit.”

Izuku squirmed in place and also put aside his plate, eyes darting to and from Katsuki’s thunderous expression.

“Right, uh, him. We—we first met at a party Kai was holding. He’d—Kai, not Dabi—he’d spent some years running with a bad crowd, really digging deep into his Yakuza connections and drug lords and general villains in order to find Eri. She’s, um, his daughter, officially adopted by him, but actually a distant relative related by his—”

“Jeezus, I don’t need his entire life fucking story.”

“Right, right, sorry! Um, where was—oh, right. He had this party, I wasn’t even seventeen and I’d dragged Hitoshi along with—”

“Wow, this sounds like an outing I’d rather die than be a part of.”

Izuku’s lips curved and for a moment he considered Katsuki with amusement and adoration entwined. 

“Probably. Anyway, I met Dabi there. Hitoshi and Kai also met for the first time.”

“Now those two assholes I can see as friends.”

Izuku laughed, his demeanor loosening as he stretched out his legs, feet crossed at the ankles and propped upon Katsuki’s lap.

“Well, they were more than just friends, for like an entire year.”

“A what?” Katsuki choked off, one hand absently squeezing Izuku’s big foot. They really were too big for his frame, like an overgrown puppy. “A year? Wh—how?”

“Yeah, that was also the fateful party where they, uh, hooked up, I guess? After that, Kai kind of helped Hitoshi through his heats for a while.”

“Oh my god, that’s fucking disgusting,” Katsuki managed, his entire face collapsing in on itself. “I’m gonna barf. Fuck, oh my god.”

“This coming from the man who had a crush on Hit-”

“IT DOESN’T COUNT AS A CRUSH IF I IT WAS YOU I WAS SMELLING.”

Izuku was collapsing in on himself with giggles.

“Oh sure, and his personality had nothing to do with it!”

“STOP,” Katsuki squawked helplessly and dove across the couch, tickling fingers digging mercilessly into Izuku’s sides. Izuku’s ungodly screech followed breathless gulps of laughter, flailing and flying limbs, errant kicks, and a knee to Katsuki’s gut that only had him grinning manic and full of sharp teeth as he wrestled and rolled Izuku off the couch, hands busy and unrelenting in armpits, the crease of Izuku’s neck, the hypersensitive dip of his hip.

“Okay okay okay!” Izuku screamed, gasping for air, tears streaming as he grappled for Katsuki’s arms or wrists to push him away. “I give, I give!”

“HA!” Katsuki crowed his victory, straddling Izuku’s stomach and breathing hard himself because Izuku sure as hell wasn’t a wilting flower to wrestle with. “In your face, nerd!”

Izuku only flopped out in exhaustion, his cheeks pink, both smile and eyes lazy and mellow in surrender, arms relaxed above his head. He looked edible as hell. 

All the same, there was one part of their conversation that still nagged at Katsuki.

Biting back a sigh, Katsuki inwardly steeled himself and got off of his Omega, standing and offering a hand.

“Back to that burnt-ass french fry of a human being,” he said grimly.

Izuku made a face, but took his hand and dropped back to the couch.

“Right, Dabi.” Izuku rubbed at his shut eyes for a moment, like he was closing his eyes to picture the past. “I mean, he—yeah. That’s another story. But Kai feels responsible for my first real boyfriend being the first line of men who I let hurt me.”

Katsuki grit his teeth.

“For fuck’s sake.”

Izuku made a noise, somewhere between a whine and a growl of frustration.

“Look, I’m not normal like you are. I mean, you’re not normal, but I’m not—” Another sound of frustration before Izuku looked to his hands and murmured, “I’m dirty. Like, in ways that’ll never come off. The drinking, the drunks, the sex, the violence—they were just ways to feel different in my body because every day just hurt, inside and out. I’ll never be clean in the way you are.”

“Don’t you fuckin’ glorify me,” Katsuki shot back, reaching out to clench Izuku’s chin between his fingers and force their stares to class. “Not like the rest of the world. You ain’t stupid like that. Hasn’t it ever sunk in for you, nerd? I’ve killed people. A lot of them. Mostly villains, a couple innocents. I’ve watched people die at the hands of evil and I’ve seen my friends lose their lives time and again.”

Katsuki’s voice broke, and he had to swallow tight to hold back to flood as he kept his stare steady on his silent, wide-eyed Omega. 

“A man can’t wash that shit off, either. The dirt, it sticks. We all got somethin’ on our hands, blood hiding under our nails.”

Izuku blinked slow, like a man coming out of a dream. His mouth pressed into a pout, thoughtful, eyes quietly scanning Katsuki’s expression. Without a word, he turned his head to pillow his cheek in Katsuki’s rough palm, softly nuzzling at Katsuki’s hand with a small, questioning noise. 

On instinct, Katsuki replied with a gruff, throaty hum and pulled Izuku into his arms once more, reclining back against the couch so Izuku could tuck his head beneath Katsuki’s chin.

Izuku matched Katsuki’s hum an octave higher before he spoke.

“Kouta went home.” At Katsuki’s noncommittal grunt, Izuku sighed. “I got to meet his aunt—she’s a hero, too. You probably know her. She’s a member of the Wild Wild Pussycats.”

“Fuck. Yeah, I know ‘em. Obnoxious as hell.”

“Well, she seemed nice. Overwhelmed, and her and Kouta didn’t seem to get on great, but she was fine. Anyway, I offered them what I’d always intended in the first place. To fund his schooling, to pay for his tuition in a good boarding school here in the city. During breaks he can go home or stay with me. Maybe I’ll even get a bigger place.”

Katsuki snorted.

“Yeah, like my place.”

Izuku unwedged his head from beneath Katsuki’s chin to look up at him strangely. 

“Yours? No, he couldn’t stay with you. You two would tear each other limb from limb.”

“As if a puny Omega could lay a finger on me.”

Izuku nipped at Katsuki’s stubbled chin.

“This puny Omega can and has.”

Katsuki tsked and took Izuku’s stubborn chin in hand once more, tilting his head back enough to place a firm, assured kiss. 

“You’re special,” Katsuki rasped against Izuku’s mouth. “You’re the perfect mix.”

Izuku chirped a happy little noise that Katsuki hadn’t heard in a long time, and licked at Katsuki’s bottom lip, sparkling new nerves to life.

“That’s a first to ever have been applied to me.”

“Well, get used to it,” Katsuki grumbled, promptly patting down Izuku’s curls and fitting his head beneath his chin anew. Izuku snorted a laugh.

“No, I don’t think I will.”

“And about Kouta.”

Izuku yawned, jaw-cracking and long. They had to be approaching midnight or past it now.

“Mmhmm?”

“I wasn’t sayin’ he should stay with me. I was sayin’ he should stay with us.”

“Us? I don’t get—oh.” Izuku stiffened. “Oh.” He jerked up in Katsuki’s arms, sitting on his lap, arms slung around Katsuki’s shoulders as he looked into Katsuki’s eyes, jittery and searching. “Oh my god. Are you? You’re not asking me to stay here, are -”

“Stay here?” Katsuki scrunched his face. “No, live here, idiot. With me. Live with me. You got brain damage now or what?”

Izuku’s jaw had dropped, mouth opening and closing, face flushed as he minutely shook his head back and forth.

“I—I, I don’t—I’m not—this is a lot and I’m a little, uh, panicked now, so uh, um—”

“Don’t have a fuckin’ heart attack right outta the hospital, for fuck’s sake.” Katsuki dragged his wrist along Izuku’s throat where the pulse skyrocketed beneath the only good gland he had left. It was an action based on instinct—comfort Omega with your own scent—and while Katsuki didn’t know how well it would work on this Omega, he did it all the same. “You can answer later. Whenever. The offer stands, so don’t pretend it doesn’t.”

Izuku sniffled once, the welling tears clinging to his lashes totally unexpected to Katsuki, but he was starting to get used to the roller coaster of Izuku’s emotions. Sometimes. 

“You do have a way with words,” Izuku murmured, cupping Katsuki’s face in both hands. He leaned in, pressed their foreheads together, and through him Katsuki felt emotions vast and multicolored as rolling hills and wildflowers. “Thank you, I’ll—I’ll get my head around that.”

For the first time in a long time, Katsuki felt like he’d come home.

“You damn well do that.”

“Hey, Kacchan?”

“Yeah?”

“Happy Birthday.”

“Huh. I guess it did turn out that way.”

Notes:

EDIT:
rolls my corpse into the room to stare you dead in the eyes

I don't know why this needs saying, but if you have complaints about this fic... a whole 190,00 words in... I just. Don't. Care. When I see those comments I don't even read them all the way through. You're wasting your breath. Each chapter of QR seems to be a breeding ground for those who don't realize how biased and hateful they are against the mentally ill, and I'm Not Here For It. I write this fic for free, for me, and you can absolutely see yourself out the door if you read up to this point and hate the fic. I will not miss you.

Now let me sleep.

Chapter 37

Summary:

Was this what Katsuki’s love felt like from the inside out? Something as fiery and unflinching as the sun’s gravity? And what did Izuku’s love feel like? Was it a needy tangle of vines and deep, drowning lakes or something better, something with a chance to thrive when cast in the light of someone as blinding as Bakugou Katsuki?

Notes:

HI HELLO READ THIS: Finally, FINALLY we are at our heat/rut chapter! I think it nearly killed me lol. Thank you all so much for your support. Please mind that we are going full-on messy as hell A/B/O mating and there will be blood, sweat, cum, spit, biting, extreme possessiveness and y'know... all that stuff. I hope you enjoy! After this, we get to jump back into our final arc!

Izuku roused to thick, melting consciousness at the sound of his Alpha’s groan, a gritty, dark sound that nuzzled and nudged at the edge of Izuku’s sleep. On instinct, Izuku inhaled, long and deep, face pressed flush to soft skin, fervid flesh against his cheek and lips.

“‘Zuku—“ Katsuki’s voice drifted into Izuku’s dream and made him sigh, mouthing wet and sloppy at the patch of skin he couldn’t smell but knew through touch and bone deep memory belonged to his mate. A hissed breath from above, and big hands on his face—rough hands, savior’s hands, a killer’s hands. Izuku wanted them all shoved into him now; slow, then fast, robbing him of doubt and sadness, killing him over and over with that little death. 

“Are you awake?” Katsuki whispered, voice choked off as Izuku dove his face into the hot junction of thigh and crotch. The hard, heartbeat pulse of Katsuki’s cock against Izuku’s cheek plus Katsuki’s question were what really woke him from the dream.

Startled, Izuku yanked back, blinking blearily into the early morning light that cast a stunningly naked, carved gold Ground Zero in fire and halos. And Izuku—Izuku was on his knees before the couch, wedged between Katsuki’s spread legs with his mouth watering and his body aching and wet for his Alpha. Still fully clothed and achingly hard in Katsuki’s old UA shorts, Izuku wet his lips, fingertips digging into both of  Katsuki’s scarred knees as his humid, sticky thoughts kept him thirsty and dazed.

“Um.” God, Izuku knew he should be making eye contact, but he couldn’t rip his attention from the shining red crown of Katsuki’s cock, thrust high before him in the sunrise sheen of the room. Izuku whined unconsciously, chewing on his bottom lip as his mouth flooded with spit and want. His brain felt fried on the summer blacktop, cracking and spitting hot in his skull. “Shit, um, fuck. I—I don’t know how this is—I mean it’s not my time of the month or—“

A gasp barely escaped Izuku’s lips as Katsuki launched forward with a guttural snarl, hands shoving Izuku back by the shoulders until Izuku was flat out on the hardwood with Katsuki pressing into him, nose shoved in Izuku’s neck, face smearing across the unscarred gland, cheeks and chin, lips and tongue over the aching swell. Panic cut through Izuku like a blade and he stiffened for an instant before instinct swallowed him whole, all drooling fangs and and gaping maw.

Izuku’s own growl rumbled alongside Katsuki’s, even as his thighs spread to accept the thick, long length humping against his own cock through the thin fabric of shorts. Beneath Izuku’s hands, Katsuki was burning up, feverish in temperature and in his flurry to rid Izuku of his shirt while still pressing their bodies flush. 

“You smell like the goddamn death of me,” Katsuki hissed in Izuku’s ear, biting down on the lobe too hard, a spark of sharp pleasure going jagged and hot through Izuku and to his cock. Izuku struggled for breath in the sudden humidity, the searing coal touch of Katsuki’s fingertips bruising against his ribcage, dragging down his hips, tugging his waistband just enough to free his cock to press against Katsuki’s. “Holy fuck, holy fuck, I’m so, you’re so—”

“Kacchan,” Izuku breathed out, blinking up at the wash of sunrise watercolor staining the ceiling, his cheeks aflame, his body arching into Katsuki’s frantic groping, the hand fitting between their already sweating bodies to clutch both their cocks in one hold. “Ah! Kat-Kacchan, are you—are you alr—”

“I’m burning,” Katsuki gasped into Izuku’s mouth, tongue plunging past Izuku’s lips without grace, rushing to devour him, lick him out, taste the back of his teeth and suck on his tongue. They ripped apart just long enough to stare at each other with equally wide eyes, Katsuki’s expression not only wild, but emotive; eyes damp, lips swollen, sweat beaded across his brow and wilting his wild spark of hair.

“I’m—” Katsuki licked his lips, his gaze flicking from Izuku’s mouth to his eyes, then back to linger lower as he continued to trip over his words. “I’m, I dunno what the fuck’s wrong with me, but I—but fuck, you smell so good and I’m gonna, I need to fuckin’ mate you, I need, I need—”

“Kacchan.” Izuku hissed between clenched teeth as Katsuki released their erections, hand shifting to smoothly drive one long finger right into the sopping heat that had already begun to leak and overflow. “Fuck, fuck, stop, I can’t think, I—”

“Hurts.” Katsuki actually whimpered, his face firmly pressed into Izuku’s gland where pheromones bled through like glistening oil now, smearing across Katsuki’s face as he inhaled and exhaled in a near state of hyperventilation. “Hurts—I gotta, I gotta fuck you, need t’fuck you, beautiful, need t’break you open and eat you from the inside out.”

“Holy shit,” Izuku choked out, wet lips parted wide as he clung to his Alpha and mindlessly bore his hips down on the fingers spearing him open, spreading him wide and fucking him in a hasty fury. A brief spark of realization illuminated the dark, drowning thoughts that chocked off everything but the mating instinct, and suddenly he realized—

“K-Kacchan, you’re in rut.”

“What?” Katsuki barely sounded like he was listening, his voice muffled where he mouthed at Izuku’s gland, teeth pricking and grazing the tender, hypersensitive spot as he drove Izuku higher with furious fingers, his heavy Alpha cock a persistent, grinding weight against Izuku’s hip. “‘Zuku, Izuku, need you, Omega, my Omega—”

Something was rising within the tight swell of Izuku’s body, like a beast struggling to burst from beneath the skin, the unwelcome thing with sharp teeth and a carnivorous appetite that always attempted escape at every damn heat for as long as Izuku could remember. He grit his teeth against it and resolutely palmed the back of Katsuki’s head, pushing his face hard into the curve of Izuku’s neck, Alpha teeth pricking at his tender throat.

“Alpha,” Izuku whispered, his lips buzzing, his skin humming, his thighs quivering as he felt Katsuki’s jaw drop wide to encompass the whole of his gland. “Alpha, you can. You can. Mate me.”

Without hesitation, the bite sunk in sharply, a cascade of hormones and pleasure-pain-pleasure-please rushing through Izuku’s veins like a drug, like a foreign  hallucinogen to which he’d never once touched his tongue.

And then, in a bright flash-bang bomb, Izuku’s senses smashed and blinded against the force of Katsuki’s kaleidoscope of emotions, feelings; a transference between their bodies that branded the imprint of his one true mate into his bones, into his soul. In the same moment, Katsuki drove his cock into Izuku with a snarl, his bloodied mouth still latched to Izuku’s throat as he split Izuku down the middle, filled him tight, and fucked into him with a hand clamped on the back of Izuku’s knee, holding him wide open and prone to the onslaught of Bakugou Katsuki’s devastating, devouring mating. 

Thought and conscious decision screamed from the room and Izuku could only cling to Katsuki, nails cutting crescents in vast shoulders, powerful thrusts driving him into the merciless floor, Izuku’s other leg pressing back against his body, knee hooked over Katsuki’s shoulder as his Alpha seemed to outright suck and drink the blood and hormonal slick that flooded from Izuku’s neck. Katsuki was roaring in Izuku’s ear until Izuku realized it wasn’t Katsuki making that sound at all—it was the roar of rushing adrenaline in his ears.

Izuku kicked out of Katsuki’s hold on instinct, the hungry, many-toothed thing rising up his ribcage and clawing up his throat as he ripped himself from Katsuki’s arms. Katsuki snarled, all beast and barely any man. His lips and chin dripped with blood, his eyes eclipsed into black, copper-stained teeth bared and sharp—but he did not pummel Izuku back to the ground, nor did he do anything but scramble to his feet in time with Izuku.

Before Katsuki could form a question, Izuku knocked him back onto the couch, following in turn with hands fisted in Katsuki’s hair to straddle his Alpha’s lap and sit down on that huge, slick-glistening cock with a loud curse. Katsuki swallowed the swear, his tangy tongue meeting Izuku’s in a heathen’s attempt at a kiss, nothing but licking at each other’s lips and faces and necks, the wet, sloppy sound of their mating like a triumphant chorus to their rabid hunger noises.

Language bled out of their bodies as Izuku bit down on Katsuki’s gland, his own teeth not entirely sharp enough as he felt the strong sinew and muscle crunch and squelch in his mouth like a fresh kill. Again, an onslaught of entwined emotion, thought, and memory assaulted him in blinding tandem, lighting up every dark corner inside of him, shock and awe spilling over tears to soak Izuku’s cheeks as he went mad with it. 

Without warning, he pinned Katsuki against the couch, riding his Alpha’s cock like death was on their door, and attacked Katsuki’s chest and shoulders with his teeth. So long, for so long he’d wanted this. To free the raw, ragged beast within, to let it bite and claim and mark and mate as much as the other half of Izuku wanted to be mated in turn. The power coursed through him as Katsuki only kept a bruising hold on Izuku’s hips, fucking up into him, body heaving with harsh breaths and full body tremors as Izuku ate him alive. 

When they came it was like a punch in the gut, an almost painful pummel of emotion and release as they encompassed each other in a tangled embrace, Izuku blindly searching Katsuki’s lips with his bloodied own, the both of them grinding into the knot that swelled and threatened to split Izuku from the guts outward. Izuku sobbed, outright wept as he clung to his Alpha, hips shifting into the overfull push and pull of the giant knot and the rapture flooding through him.

 

Izuku awoke to the sound of his own whimpering as Katsuki softly fucked him into the couch with long, slow strokes. When his eyes shot open, Katsuki’s were there, still black and watchful, those calloused hands gentle on his thighs, one palm pressed to Izuku’s stomach to feel the drive of his sinfully big cock moving inside his Omega. Izuku’s mouth flooded as his blurred attention fell to Katsuki’s chest, and the rather than shame or horror at the murder scene printed into Katsuki’s skin, Izuku only glowed with pride. 

Katsuki kept his easy, torturous rhythm, snapping his hips in tight at the end of each stroke, filling Izuku hard and sharp and startling a cry from him every time. They came with their eyes locked, shuddering in tandem, Izuku’s hole flooding over with slick and too much seed, a full body tremor rolling through them both as Izuku held tugged in Katsuki by the hair and kissed him into bliss.

 

Izuku groaned and crawled on his hands and knees across the floor until he could waver into a standing position. He peered over his shoulder, lips curved and eyebrows raised in humor as Katsuki glared up at him from his sprawl on the floor. At some point they’d returned to the hardwood, and for now, Katsuki had stopped sweating like a man running through the jungle. Izuku’s own bloodlust seemed to be at a simmer for now, too. 

“We should shower,” Izuku said, grinning as he lightly toed at Katsuki’s shoulder.

“Fuck you,” slurred the entirely unsurprising reply.

Izuku rolled his eyes and walked off.

“Fine. I’ll shower by myself.”

Izuku hadn’t even heard Katsuki stand before a strong hand clamped Izuku’s wrist, the heavy pulse of Katsuki’s overwhelming heart drumming through their hypersensitive connection.

“No.”

Izuku looked over his shoulder with a questioning smile.

“No, what?”

“You can’t shower.” Katsuki’s stern expression didn’t crack in humor, nor did he move at all. Gloriously naked and marked by half a dozen violent red moons of Izuku’s teeth, he looked like some kind of greater god cast in precious metal and jewels—ominous and omnipresent in every aspect of Izuku’s life. The weight of his stare made it hard for Izuku to inhale a single breath as he held Katsuki’s solid stare. “You can’t.”

“I can,” Izuku murmured, if only to test the waters. He’d promised he wouldn’t, but he was afraid part of his personality would always be to push back, to forgo the status quo, to take a bite out of the world and watch as it scrambled to figure out just what to make of him.

If there was anyone who could bite Izuku back as well as him, it was Bakugou Katsuki. His Alpha, his mate, for now and forever. 

“No—” Katsuki yanked him in and just as Izuku playfully struggled to be free, his laughing mouth was cut off by a fierce kiss of lashing tongue and teeth, a snarl as Katsuki gripped Izuku’s jaw and shoved a copper and salt thumb in to pry him open and lick him inside, all sloppy desperation and desire that instantly pooled anew between Izuku’s legs. “You can’t.”

When Katsuki’s free hand wound around back to knead at Izuku’s ass, two fingers shoving into his ass in a sloppy, eager fuck that churned and slopped gobs of cum from his twitching hole and down his thighs, Izuku could only melt and moan into Katsuki’s kiss, lips parted wide as they could go from Katsuki to tongue-fuck his mouth and pump three fingers in his ass all at once. 

Overwhelming, too hot, too needy, too desperate to give and take in equal turn, Izuku keened high and writhed his ass back into Katsuki’s hands, needy for those long fingers to fill him, but not enough, not what his brazen body truly desired. 

“Kat—” Izuku shrieked in a breath as Katsuki ripped away from Izuku’s mouth only to latch teeth onto a previously bitten span of Izuku’s shoulder and bite anew. Pain screamed down his arm and melted to a syrupy need deep in his balls, dizzying him, leaving him ravenous for his mate in ways that shouldn’t be fucking possible. “Kacchan, Kacchan, I—”

“You don’t fucking shower —” Katsuki hissed in Izuku’s ear, using one hand to spread Izuku’s asscheeks for his busy hand to fuck him harder, palm slapping merciless to Izuku’s most sensitive skin, fingers filling and curling, grazing the swelling spot inside of him, “unless I say you can, Omega. D’you understand?”

“Hah—” Izuku couldn’t breath well enough to reply. His cock was drooling over itself, begging for touch, his mouth wide and gasping against Katsuki’s sweat damp chest, arms wrapped tight around his waist as if he would drown.

“All of this?” Katsuki said, voice dropped down low in a threat or something equally thrilling. “It’s mine. Like you, and everything inside you. From your heart to your guts to everything I put inside you to mark you mine. D’you understand, little Omega?”

“What,” Izuku could only gasp, hiking a thigh up over Katsuki’s hip to lean into his solid frame, capturing their erections together in a maddening lack of friction.

With a shocked yelp, Izuku’s world upended, the hardwood floor meeting his bones with a solid crack as he boggled up at the image of Katsuki looming over him, holding both thighs open wide. The split second their gazes crossed was flint to spark, then a fiery roar consumed Izuku’s ears as Katsuki shoved Izuku’s thighs back, knees to Izuku’s trembling stomach, and ducked his head between Izuku’s legs to inhale deeply.

The image and realization that Katsuki was fucking smelling him in the most intimate place where Izuku was sticky with his mate’s cum and begging for more—the knowledge was wholly too fucking much.

“Yours,” Izuku whispered, kiss-numbed mouth barely able to make the words. “Yours, Alpha. Yours, y—AH!”

Katsuki’s cock drove into him up to the slowly swelling base of his cock, Blindly, Izuku grappled for his legs, hands cupping behind his sweaty knees to hold them closer to his chest, and Katsuki’s moan of pleasure as he fucked into him with maddening slowness enough to have Izuku choking on a cry, tears falling unbidden into the wet curls at his temples. 

“That’s right,” Katsuki thundered, except he wasn’t yelling at all. As he slowly buried himself into Izuku’s sopping hole, looking down to were Izuku’s ass greedily sucked in his hefty width, Katsuki’s voice took on a two-tone quality, like a hum under Izuku’s skin that threatened to split him at the seams. So deep, so low, an Alpha’s Command like a greatsword sheathing sharp and beautiful inside Izuku’s body, where it belonged.

“You’re mine. This body, too.” Katsuki scratched blunt nails deep and slow down the backs of Izuku’s lily-white thighs, razing fire trails in Izuku’s skin that only had him ineffectually shifting his hips up in hopes of coaxing Katsuki into a faster fuck. This was torture. The sound of their bodies, so loud and sloppy, every gland on Izuku’s body bursting and full, his skin too tight over his body as Katsuki seated his thick cock deep in, rocked in deeper, a feral grin sharp and hungry and cocky as hell as he met Izuku’s half-mast eyes. “And when I cum in you, little Omega, you damn well fucking keep it. You’ll shower when I tell you, eat when I tell you, sleep when I let you —”

Izuku should have been fucking terrified. Should have, could have, would have if it were anyone else but Katsuki.

Instead, all Izuku heard through their connection was:

I’ll take care of you forever. I’ll worship you forever. I’ll be here, with you, forever.

Izuku came, bright and hard and brain-busting, screaming as Katsuki slow-fucked him through it with eyes like a predator, fangs bared in snarl as he leaned, folding Izuku in half, and licked an entirely possessive stripe from throat to jaw to cheek and up into his hair. 

Izuku might have seen God—turned out they looked a lot like Bakugou Katsuki, which should have been a worry, but—

Katsuki quickened his pace now, thoroughly fucking Izuku in a frenzy now, quickfire bullet hips, fingers burning brands into Izuku’s flanks as they viciously breathed into each other’s open mouths and locked lips when Katsuki came with his knot buried deep in Izuku’s quivering asshole.

Delirious, desperate, and wholeheartedly in love, Izuku thanked his Alpha a dozen times over, kissing a cooling rain upon shoulders and cheeks and that beautiful snarling mouth of his.

 

They did shower. Eventually. 

Katsuki slung Izuku into his arms like a princess, stoutly ignoring Izuku’s protests and curses with rolled eyes as he padded to the bathroom and set his Omega down on the toilet seat. Izuku muttered about being babied, but it was nothing more than embarrassment from being cared for that sat queasy and unfamiliar in his stomach. His partners had never doted on him like Katsuki did—even with that sharp tongue and even sharper edges, Katsuki’s care was an open book for Izuku, and the papercuts were worth the story the pages held.

The shower was less a shower and more sudsy exploration of bodies, Izuku’s nails biting into Katsuki’s scalp as his Alpha dropped to his knees to explore each soft, sensitive, sometimes fuzzy crevice of Izuku’s crotch. Izuku breathed a broken laugh as he heard Katsuki inhale deep, his nose buried in the crease of thigh and hard cock.

“Can’t smell that good,” Izuku drawled, drowsy from the shower drumming on his chest, lids sleepy and lips loose in an easy smile as he swept fingers through Katsuki’s hair, slicking it back from those glass shard features, more sharp edges despite the soft, somehow awed look Katsuki aimed up at him from between Izuku’s legs.

“You piss me off,” was all Katsuki said before he flattened his tongue along the thick, stark vein threading up Izuku’s cock. Water rushed into Katsuki’s hair and into his eyes, clinging spikes to stubby lashes, his gaze the color of dry blood, copper spilled on hard brick. With a rush of adrenaline that Izuku couldn’t tell was his own or Katsuki’s, Izuku bit back a moan and watched Katsuki take his thick length with enthusiasm, sloppy and determined to taste every inch. 

My Alpha, the new creature crooned from the heaving cradle of Izuku’s ribs. My Alpha is an altogether different beast.

And, as if Katsuki had heard the words fall from Izuku’s own lips, he popped off Izuku’s cock with a feral show of teeth and dragged Izuku to the tile with him. Conscious thought fell dead and swirled down the drain as Katsuki licked his own cum from Izuku’s twitching hole, only to slip smoothly inside him, cock already swelling for the knot as he fucked Izuku into the floor.

Izuku cried out at the increasing pressure, his cheek flat to the tile, breath sputtering into the pooled water and his own spit, drooling as Katsuki gripped him by the shoulders and fucked his growing girth into into that slick, squelching hole, his breathing devolved into snarls and gruff growls on each merciless thrust.

Too much, it was too much, the friction of his Alpha’s knot just barely pulling out only to shove right back in with a brutal slap of hips, balls smacking wetly against his ass, Izuku was going to split in half, he—

Katsuki pummeled into him with a harsh yell, his hot, wet body blanketing Izuku’s in a blissful weight, and teeth—sharp teeth sunk into the barely congealed mating bite crowning Izuku’s gland. 

The pain that scorched through Izuku spurted from his cock in a blaze that whited out his vision and muffled his ears to the hoarse sound of his scream. Katsuki held on, his entire fucking frame buzzing with a full-body growl Izuku could feel in his bones. Each hot streak of seed that pumped into him hit exactly where it should with a force it absolutely shouldn’t as a second wave overlapped the first, all white noise, all static vision as Izuku sobbed and shuddered against the tile.

 

Much to Katsuki’s low growl of disapproval, Izuku insisted he walk to the bedroom himself. It was a matter of pride—what little Katsuki hadn’t fucked out of his system, anyway. Izuku kept a wary, narrow-eyed distance from Katsuki as he used the wall for leverage to make it to the bed.

Katsuki tsk’ed his displeasure the entire way.

“You really do piss me off,” Katsuki muttered as he critically watched Izuku tuck himself beneath the silky black blanket like an old man getting ready for bed. The fact that it was probably nine in the morning or—god, Izuku had no concept of time any longer. Anyway, it didn’t matter. Izuku wanted to pass out for life. 

“So you said.” Izuku smiled into his yawn, bare arms rising from the covers in a languid stretch. When he opened his eyes, Katsuki was still standing bedside, gaze fiercely intent on Izuku’s face, his hands fisted lightly at his sides. Stark naked and standing in the morning light, he once more looked  like some unattainable deity carved from ruby and gold.

It gave Izuku a selfish sort of pleasure to know that beneath the veneer of gold-plated perfection were the same blood and guts as himself. Perhaps even some of the same insecurities, in a way. 

The thought made Izuku’s lips curve, warm and welcoming as he sat up and reached out, one hand loosely holding Katsuki’s as they locked eyes. 

“What is it?” Izuku said softly.

“I—” Katsuki’s brow scrunched and his lips twisted in that oddly ugly way he had when he didn’t seem able to translate his own feelings into words. Izuku wondered what his brain looked like. How it felt.

And yet, through their fledgling bond, and the touch of Katsuki’s hand, Izuku could feel—

Izuku huffed a laugh.

“Again?”

Katsuki’s gaze narrowed, his considerable Alpha cock filling against his thigh as he threaded his fingers with Izuku’s.

“Is this rut? I feel like I’m on fire if I’m not fucking you.”

Izuku couldn’t help but laugh as he flopped back into the cloudy embrace of the bed.

“That—yes, that sounds about right. I’m—me too. But I don’t think I’ve ever had a heat where I was so, well, um, satisfied. I didn’t know what it felt like until now.”

When Katsuki still didn’t move, the veins in his arms and neck starting to stand stark beneath his skin, his cock rising slowly but surely, Izuku couldn’t help the cloying, sticky heat that began to pool between his legs and in his heart. He swallowed and licked his lips slowly, watching Katsuki watch him.

Intoxicating. His mate was a drug, and the feeling was mutual. The desire was shared, deep and dense and burrowed into the bones. 

Izuku couldn’t believe he’d ever run from it.

Once more, he held out a hand.

“Come here, my Alpha,” Izuku murmured. “Let me show you.”

Katsuki frowned but complied, automatically getting on hands and knees, crawling over Izuku to cover him with a body built for saving, killing, and conquering. Izuku hummed his dreamy approval as Katsuki nosed and sniffed at the necklace of teeth marks he’d left around Izuku’s clavicle, pausing to lap and love over the truly tender mating mark that no doubt continue seep the scent of sex into the air. 

Izuku whined, a soft plea for his Alpha’s mouth; a high, bright sound of approval as Katsuki’s mouth met with his, tongue moving in time with his own, a push and pull, a groan and the ridge of teeth sinking into Katsuki’s bottom lip until Izuku’s tasteless tongue went tangy with a lick of blood. 

Through the barrier of blankets, Katsuki ground down, hands quickly growing frantic, fisting in Izuku’s damp curls to hold him tight into a deep kiss, brutalizing Izuku’s mouth like a punishment or maybe a plea for something more. Izuku couldn’t barely breathe now, barely keep up with the way Katsuki could ravage his mouth like it was his final meal. Feeling his slick already soaking into the sheets beneath him, Izuku keened and threw arms around Katsuki, writhing his chubby cock up against the smooth blankets, both eager and frustrated beneath the weight of Katsuki’s body.

“Behind me,” Izuku breathed into Katsuki’s mouth, his chest heaving when Katsuki finally allowed him a moment to speak, their lips smeared into each other. “Come lay behind me, now now n—”

“Bossy,” Katsuki snapped, but he was already flinging the blankets back and clinging his considerably larger body against Izuku’s trembling frame. Spooning Izuku like this, Katsuki wasted no time sneaking an arm behind Izuku’s nape and pulling him against Katsuki’s chest. One arm shackled across Izuku’s throat, and Izuku held onto that big, thick forearm with both hands, nails digging into flesh as Katsuki eased Izuku’s legs open, lofting one over his hip so the head of his cock could squarely bump against Izuku’s greedy, aching hole. 

“Now look at yourself. So greedy for my cock, aren’t you, little Omega? What’s this?” Katsuki snuck his free hand down, three fingers circling and slopping around the entrance to his dripping, needy asshole. Izuku knew he sobbed, knew how pathetically he shifted his hips in hoping he’d get something thicker, deeper. His cock dribbled back against his stomach, and laying out nearly on his back, his body covering Katsuki’s, he was bared for all to see. “Can you hear how wet you are? Can you hear how fucking slutty this hole gets for me, hmmm? Unbelievable. Never knew a mouthy Omega like you would suck in my cock with a single word of argument. Turns out you needed my dick all along, haaah?”

What—what the hell was this? Katsuki didn’t get mouthy during sex, he got—he got fierce. Viciously intense. Not this, this narrative hell-sent to devolve Izuku into a stuttering mess. Was this his Alpha in rut or was this Katsuki the gifted motherfucker learning just what he could and couldn't get away with during sex?

Izuku didn’t fucking care. His teeth were sunk into Katsuki’s forearm, drooling over the flexing muscle as Katsuki dipped fingers in only to the first knuckle, spreading his fingers and teasing the rim into a stretch that he didn’t let up until Izuku’s thighs were quivering like a dog desperate to mate. Izuku’s body was both exhausted and keyed up in the extreme. He was vulnerable, fucked out, and, apparently, not fucked enough. 

“What do you need, little Omega?” Katsuki murmured, his breath hot and humid against Izuku’s ear, sparks down his spine, firecrackers popping red in the blood. “Go on, use that mouthy fuck hole you love to put me in my place with. Smart-ass all the damn time until now, hah?” Fingers shoved in to the hilt once, a low, visceral squelch before he yanked them out just as quick, back to their easy tease of Izuku’s shivering rim. Izuku didn’t even know what fucking sound he made. His consciousness had lofted to the highest rafter, his skull all clouds and cotton wool.

“This?” Katsuki’s voice sounded like ground up glass, more sharp edges, so many corners to cut oneself on, but all Izuku felt was the heavenly high of the blood draining from his brain to his dick. The blunt, burning hot head of Katsuki’s erection thumped at Izuku’s ass, and Izuku thought back to their first time in the ski resort changing room where he’d cum all over himself while biting down on Katsuki’s hand for dear life. 

That really had only been a tease of what was to come.

Izuku could taste the tang of copper and metal flooding past his teeth and slicking over his tongue, his bite now a desperate hold on Katsuki’s arm as he rolled his hips back, hiccuping a wet sob as he managed to wiggle the crown of Katsuki’s cock inside. Fuck, fuck it was so much better than anything, anything; he needed everything, needed it all—

“You cryin’ for it now?” Katsuki had the goddamn audacity to press a kiss to Izuku’s ear as he gently shifted his hips just enough to inch in, just a little more, a little more. “Poor proud Omega. If you’d only just say—”

“Please!” Izuku’s voice was torn and wet, his lips smearing against the mixed blood and tears soaking Katsuki’s arm. “Please, god, please, Alpha, Kat-Kacchan, please fuck me, fuck me, fuck—”

Katsuki’s rasping, confident laugh was just about the sexiest thing Izuku had ever fucking heard, until he stopped hearing altogether as Katsuki’s arm tightened around Izuku’s throat and his free hand gripped Izuku’s thigh wide apart from the other for free range to fuck up into him like a wild, uncontrollable beast. 

“Look at you,” Katsuki rasped, the barest whisper at Izuku’s ear as he brutally pummeled Izuku’s slick-sopping ass, a mess from head to toe, the arm beneath Izuku’s chin minimally tightening until Izuku’s breathing came in wisps and a climbing white delirium. “Look at you, beautiful, holy fuck, holy hell, aren’t you the most perfect—”

Izuku came like a fucking comet. Harder than he’d ever been conscious of cumming, his own spend shooting off to streak across the  forearm around his throat. Katsuki fucked him through the stars, that thunderous voice skinning him down to the soul as their orgasm seemed to spark and entwine together like the trail of fire driving toward a dozen sticks of dynamite. Katsuki shot off inside him, knot seeming to inflate out of nowhere to catch and pull on Izuku’s hole, driving him into a second—third?—wave of screaming pleasure.

A curtain of blessed black draped over Izuku’s consciousness, an eclipse into exhaustion and bone deep peace.

 

Rain patter played a comfort tune against the window when Izuku next woke. Sweetly sore and stretched out in more ways than one, Izuku blinked up at the ceiling dappling in grey, watery light and breathed into the cottony soft quiet. A heavy, warm weight cradled Izuku’s gut, and slow realization bloomed into a loose, lazy smile as his hand ventured down to where Ground Zero, feared and admired across countries far and wide, had both wrapped arms around Izuku’s waist and laid his cheek upon Izuku’s chest. 

Izuku lightly carded his fingers through the dandelion fray of Katsuki’s hair, all bent out of shape from the shower, sex, and sleep—and marveled in the cuddly, baby chick fuzz feeling of contentment he sensed through their newly hatched bond. Still awed by its very existence, Izuku shut his eyes and pressed his fingertips more firmly against Katsuki’s scalp, massaging lightly and basking in the late afternoon sunshine glow that came not from the dreary weather outdoors, but from the inside of his Alpha.

Love. 

Was this what Katsuki’s love felt like from the inside out? Something as fiery and unflinching as the sun’s gravity? And what did Izuku’s love feel like? Was it a needy tangle of vines and deep, drowning lakes or something better, something with a chance to thrive when cast in the light of someone as blinding as Bakugou Katsuki?

For the first time in a long time, Izuku decided it might be time to simply trust the process. And the man.

“You’re loud,” Katsuki rasped, voice deep with lingering sleep.

“I didn’t say anything.”

“Didn’t say you did.” Katsuki cracked a yawn, his thick arms still banded firmly around Izuku’s waist. To Izuku’s mute shock—he knew well enough when to shut his mouth once in a while—Katsuki hummed and rubbed his cheek on Izuku's chest like a cat, all but purring before his frame seemed to go heavy and drop right back into sleep.

Izuku huffed a soft laugh from his nose and palmed soothing lines down Katsuki’s back, fingers pausing now and again at the gnarled flesh of a scar or two. It occurred to him that this was Katsuki’s first rut since he’d been, what, fifteen? Izuku couldn’t remember exactly, but he knew Katsuki had mentioned going on suppressants from his first rut onward. 

His body and sex drive had to be affected by that. And while Izuku was under no unclear idea that Katsuki was vehemently attracted to him, Katsuki had always made it evident that sex had been something far from his mind for the majority of his life. Had their childhood imprint upon each other somehow hindered Katsuki’s growth and desire to be around or with another partner, or was he simply not the type to desire a person unless he was emotionally invested in them first?

It was the very opposite to how Izuku had reacted to both his environment and genetic disposition. Sex had been something Izuku had used as both a comfort blanket and a distraction. Where some people might eat their feelings, he’d learned to fuck them out of his system. He’d never been at a loss for people attracted to his scent, his body. They’d rarely been attracted to him as a person. Izuku had preferred it that way, and vice versa. 

Katsuki was different. This was different. This was the best kind of different to ever happen to him. Izuku’s right side up had been turned upside down and the new gravity in his life had pulled him into an orbit he’d never imagined he’d reach in life. 

Izuku didn’t realize he was crying until the tears overflowed the sides of his face and dribbled into his temples and ears.

“Ugh.” Izuku wiped at his face and laughed wetly. He hated heats. Too many hormones, too many emotions, all of them left unchecked and wild with instinct. 

Izuku outright yelped in shock when Katsuki shot up, eyes large with confusion before they sharply narrowed in on the tears.

“Why—”

“I’m just happy,” Izuku managed with another damp, helpless little laugh. “Really. It’s—you know, with this time of the month—well, no, you don’t, but—”

“Yeah, alright alright.” Katsuki was already wrapping his arms around Izuku’s whole head, hugging Izuku’s face into the cushioned ridge between Katsuki’s defined pecs. “Don’t hurt yourself over it. Damn, freckles, you lose some brain cells or what.”

“I can’t breathe,” Izuku choked out, but he was laughing in earnest now, then crowing with indignity as Katsuki roughly hooked an arm around Izuku’s neck and dug knuckles into his hair like two dumb kids roughhousing. “Ow! Dammit, Kat—hey! Ow, I’m gonna bite—”

“Already did that, didn’t—” 

Katsuki squawked as Izuku elbowed him in the gut just hard enough for the grip to release. Izuku scream-laughed as he rolled right off the mattress upon his escape, stumbling to unsteady feet away from Katsuki’s outstretched hands and dashed out of the room. 

They made it as far as the kitchen before Katsuki bent him over the kitchen table to rut his cock in the crease of Izuku’s ass, hot skin on skin, eager hands riding Izuku’s tender, bruised hips, raspy tongue licking goosebumps up Izuku’s spine and shivering skin. Izuku was already wet and open and waiting, legs spread wide when Katsuki slapped his thighs open and pressed his cock inside, burying deep in the first drive forward. 

Katsuki fucked into him with a force that shoved Izuku further and further up the table, his own erection mercilessly smashed against the cold, hard surface while the sticky, swelling rise of pleasure mounted and spread from his sore, aching hole to flood through his quivering body. When Katsuki pulled out entirely, Izuku loudly cursed him, then quickly crumbled into needy cries as Katsuki dipped both thumbs in his sopping hole, spreading him open further and holding him in place like that as he slowly slid his cock in with an ungodly slurp of mingled slick and cum. 

Full, Izuku was so fucking full of his Alpha that he was still dripping from the last time, and now he could only white-knuckle the edge of the table as he writhed his dick against the unforgiving surface and let Katsuki mate him with torturously slow, wet stretches from that thick, swelling cock. Unrelenting, unforgiving, Katsuki kept up the excruciating rhythm, each deep seat into Izuku’s ass feeling fit to burst, to tear in half and spill out in a mess there was no coming back from. 

The orgasm rose like a choking heat, the air wet and humid with it, a slow dive and a drowning sensation that threatened every screaming nerve in Izuku’s body as he came with his face and body clenched and screwed up, shaking through the release like it damn near hurt to let go this fucking hard. His Alpha filled him deep and satisfying, fucking them both through the fill and tug of the knot, hissing and shifting his hips into Izuku as they both trembled through the shrill aftershocks. 

“S’never gonna be enough,” Katsuki drawled, lazy and dark in Izuku’s ear, collapsed on top of him, their bodies threatening the integrity of the poor piece of furniture. Izuku’s everything hurt, but he couldn’t find it in him to complain. 

“Just feels like that right now,” Izuku slurred in reply, licking his dry lips and shifting his hips a little as his back smarted. “It’ll fade in a day or two.”

“Don’t mean it like that.” Katsuki’s cheek was pressed to the pooled sweat between Izuku’s shoulder blades. He was so fucking heavy and yet Izuku would happily die like this. “Although that has been—yeah. Not what I expected. It’s a lot. But I meant it like—this, us. You can’t run away anymore, y’know. And I’m not gonna patiently wait for you to come runnin’ back either. We don’t work like that anymore.”

“No,” Izuku murmured, his heart fuller than any part of him could ever be. “We don’t work like that anymore.”

Katsuki seemed pleased enough with this answer, because he soon wrapped arms around Izuku and carefully slid back until he could slump onto a discarded kitchen chair, taking Izuku and their tied knot along with. Izuku whimpered, sparks sprinkling through him as he sat on Katsuki’s lap, knot squarely shoved up inside him even when he leaned back to recline against Katsuki’s wide chest. 

They may have dozed like that for a time before hunger and the depleted knot stirred them both. Izuku was too tired to care about the cum that drooled down his sweat and slick damp thighs—maybe even loved it—and so he simply sat at his own chair, face buried in his folded arms as drifted and Katsuki cooked. Despite being unable to taste, he was sick as hell with a fortnight of hospital food and the thought of eating one of Katsuki’s meals again sounded heaven-sent.

They ate in companionable silence, the exhaustion in the room laden in contented hormones and bodies fucked to the limit. But more than that, Izuku felt drained emotionally dry. 

His release from the hospital the day before felt a lifetime away. Sorrow, doubt, and neuroses had been a noose around Izuku’s neck as he’d refused a ride home or the help of Chisaki, his mother, and anyone else with his best interests at heart. 

His heart had only beat with hope. The yearning of a man who had traded his very life force for Izuku’s. From his spot curled in the cramped bed, body curled against Izuku’s fragile frame, they’d interwoven dreams and reality, red strings and red veins, entangled around their wrists and ankles, frayed around the sharp parts of each other’s hearts. Izuku had dreamt only in red in those weeks. Red eyes, red mouth, the ragged side of Katsuki’s face, the jagged tear of his poorly-healing ear, the blood beneath his nails.

And all the while, Katsuki had remained. Even when the truth had been flayed bare and the beast in Izuku’s breast had been butchered open and hung upside down to bleed all over his hero. Katsuki had remained. 

Until Izuku had been well enough to be out of the woods, at least.

Then Katsuki’s had closed off, an eclipse before the sun as he’d said something like, figure yourself out yourself, and slumped out of the room with a notable limp.

They hadn’t seen each other since. Not until Izuku had slept at his doorway and demanded entry. 

A lifetime away, and yet only yesterday.

“I’m sorry,” Izuku mumbled, a time later as he bundled in a nest of collected blankets and throw pillows upon the bed, eyes falling shut from the drug of simply looking at his Alpha. His attention lingered upon the apparent chunk missing from Katsuki’s ear, and knew that was his fault. 

Shinsou had relayed it to him a time later—Katsuki’s desperation, his abject, uncharacteristic terror. His ashen face and the wounds that wouldn’t heal quickly because he seemed to be afflicted with whatever hurt Izuku in turn. 

When Izuku’s primary doctor had arrived to confirm that he and Katsuki were almost undoubtedly a rare case of True Mates, the disbelief had hardened and crumbled Izuku’s hope for days. He couldn’t allow a hope like that to live. The disappointment of it not being true would have been too crushing, too powerful for someone as weak as him to withstand. To believe such a beautiful thing—it would have taken the whole of his heart to let it in.

And yet, here he was. Here they were.

“I’m really sorry,” Izuku said again, softly, eyes downcast, unable to look at the damage he’d left on his mate. 

“Stop,” Katsuki said, matter-of-fact with a huff and an eye roll as he slumped further into the nest and yanked Izuku in until his head could rest on Katsuki’s bare chest. “The fuck am I meant to say to all this sniveling? That stuff grosses me out. We’re past it. We’re past that. We got more important shit in front of us.”

You deserve better, Izuku nearly blurted out. You’re amazing and important and powerful and I’m—

“Right,” Izuku managed, curling his hand to a frustrated fist over Katsuki’s heart. “Okay.”

Poison was slow to flush from the body.. Izuku didn’t know when the feelings he had about himself would begin to ebb and flow out of his blood, but there was time. 

Time and support. Loved ones, kindness, community. It was about time he started to trust not just the world again, but himself.

“You deserve good things,” Katsuki murmured, his lips pressed into Izuku’s freshly washed hair. 

Izuku sighed and let his eyes fall closed.

“So do you.”

Notes:

THERE IS AN ONGOING PODFIC READING OF QUIET RAPTURE. CHAPTER 1 and CHAPTER 2 are currently up, read by Twitter's @the_bara_king or, if you know him here on AO3, 'loveatfirstsight' and the exemplary fic Long Sleeves. This guy's voice is like velvet and warm butter, I strongly recommend you not only listen to the recording of QR, but then hop on over to his fic (I linked it), because Long Sleeves happens to be a BkDk fic that also follows the line of delicate mental health issues. I love this fic.

Other than that: THANK YOU ALL SO MUCH for your support. Thank you from the bottom of my heart. Quiet Rapture has become the second most Kudos'd A/B/O-tagged fic on all of AO3, EDIT: Y'ALL HAVE MADE QR THE MOST KUDOSED FIC IN ALL 74,169 A/B/O FICS I AM SHOOK and that's down to all of you kind readers who have continued this journey with me for two and a half years. I appreciate all that you do, you're all outstanding.

Chapter 38

Summary:

The word ‘happy’ had never been something he’d thrown around. Katsuki was the square hole and that word was some star block, unable to angle and shift enough to fit into the slots he’d carved out for himself in this life.

But holy shit, Katsuki was happy. Maybe Izuku had carved a new space in him; a star.

Notes:

Songs For This Chapter:
I Wanna Be Yours - Arctic Monkeys | Spotify | YouTube
Still - Kailee Morgue | Spotify | YouTube
Everlasting Light - The Black Keys | Spotify | YouTube

“We got forty-five minutes, tops,” Katsuki said as Izuku pulled him into the apartment by the bunched collar of his shirt, hungry mouth already licking the end of his sentence. 

A happy hum was Izuku’s only reply, his scent a sweet summer breeze heavy with the promise of a sunshine shower, the skin on skin connection between their lips and hands and hips bursting bright at the back of Katsuki’s skull like sparklers. Every time they managed to meet in between Katsuki’s busy schedule and Izuku’s business, the concept of a True Mate felt less foreign and fleeting, more bone-deep and dependable.

This thing between them was here to stay. Midoriya Izuku was here to stay.

“Hold on,” Katsuki mumbled against Izuku’s lips, hiking Izuku into his arms by his sturdy thighs and quietly cursing at the thin workout shorts Izuku wore and the hot skin beneath. Izuku’s breathless laugh followed them through the small living area and into the bedroom that consisted mostly of bed. 

Katsuki hadn’t been lying when he’d told Izuku he loved this apartment. It was small and warm and smelled like his mate. And more—the bedroom was close. They had each other stripped of shirts in seconds, Izuku laid out and smiling in the plush, thick duvet pillowed around his flushed face and frayed curls. 

Shortly after his release from the hospital, he’d resolutely had his hair cropped short, moreso at the  sides, while the top remained a bit untamed. When Katsuki had grunted at the sudden change and inwardly sulked about the lack of wildness to Izuku’s hair, Izuku had insisted that this was his summer cut and his hair was too thick and heavy to deal with in the hotter months. 

Like a dog, Katsuki had said.

Izuku had bit him hard enough that Katsuki didn’t think it wise to ever equate the guy to a housepet unless he wanted to lose any assortment of important extremities.

“You didn’t clean off all your eyeliner,” Izuku said, youthful grin lighting his soft features as he smeared a thumb beneath Katsuki’s lower lashes.

“I told you.” Katsuki bit at Izuku’s fingers to shoo them away. “It ain’t makeup. It’s greasepaint. I was in a rush.”

“Sure.” Izuku’s smile only stretched. “Well, it’s sexy. I like it.”

Katsuki flicked a brow and pointedly slid away and off the bed, taking his Omega’s shorts with him. 

“Forty minutes, freckles.”

Izuku’s joyful laugh was everything, the way it echoed between their bond like the ripples across a placid pond. 

“Yes sir!”

“Smart ass,” Katsuki said through an answering grin, crawling on all fours to loom above his mate, his desire growing long teeth behind the mask of humor. He caught that clever mouth with his own and sank into the sturdy, strong angles and curves of his Omega, drinking in the lush lake and forest fragrance of him.

Laughter and sunlight painted the small room in washes of peaches and cream, sweet and indulgent midday seduction like nothing Katsuki had ever dreamed or known. The silky shift of sheets beneath quivering, freckled thighs as Katsuki seated himself deep, the sweat and slick slap of their hips pressing flush in unsteady rhythm. The husky rasp of Izuku’s staccato breaths in time with their frantic mating in pools of sunshine and mingled forest fire scent. 

The desperate pitch of Izuku’s body into his felt like a battle, a parry of limbs for which Katsuki could barely keep up, even when he was the one driving into his Omega like a monster on a warpath. His mate would never be tamed, and he was fucking beautiful for it. 

They came in a white hot sear of mind and form fused together, Katsuki’s trembling body crushing Izuku into the bed as they burned up in the pyre of their bed.

Perfect, was all Katsuki’s brain could drum up in the wake of any one of these meetings. Perfect, this was perfect, and he was so goddamn happy.

The word ‘happy’ had never been something he’d thrown around. Katsuki was the square hole and that word was some star block, unable to angle and shift enough to fit into the slots he’d carved out for himself in this life. 

Perfectionists didn’t allow themselves to be happy.

Being happy or content with one’s life insinuated, deep in the back of their brain, that they were lazy. Complicit, plateaued. Perfection did not come from sitting still or taking the long, scenic way home instead of the efficient shortcut. Perfection demanded everything, all at once, and that left very little space for genuine happiness to fit.

But holy shit, Katsuki was happy. Maybe Izuku had carved a new space in him; a star.

Despite the passing days apart since Izuku’s release from the hospital and their rabid bonding, Katsuki got the distinct feeling that Izuku was beside him even when he wasn’t. The unwelcome, inexplicable loneliness that Katsuki hadn’t realized existed in him was laid to rest, soothed into peace by the thrum and hum of his blood and Izuku’s own in his ears.

Katsuki shivered at the skim of Izuku’s fingertips down the damp dip of his spine, melting into him with a sigh. When Izuku finally swallowed and spoke, his ravaged voice was a velvet drawl that gave Katsuki goosebumps despite himself.

“How many minutes now, boss?”

“Shut up,” Katsuki managed, his throat parched and face muffled in the blanket beside Izuku’s head.

“Have you eaten?”

“This is fine,” Katsuki mumbled, his loose limbs like nothing his professional masseuse could accomplish.

Izuku’s frame shook with laughter, and Katsuki could only grunt at the shove he got to the shoulder. Working the night shift was part of a series of punishments straight from that smiley fucker himself, Mirio, both for Katsuki’s behaviors in the office, but the ruckus of the hospital incident. Third shift was reserved for night-owl freaks like Shinsou, or newbies forced to forfeit their social lives for their new, brutal occupation—but Katsuki was determined to make it work. He would take his reprimand on the nose and climb back into the spotlight of day shifts and good publicity. 

And if that also meant coming off graveyard shift, rushing across the city to see his mate for a morning roll, before rushing back to various offices for meetings, the occasional talk show, and magazine shoot—

Well, he would excel. He wasn’t a fucking complainer, and Izuku was worth any cost. Of course, it would be infinitely easier if the little fucker moved in with him already, but if there was one thing he’d learned about his mate, it was that no one changed Midoriya Izuku’s mind until the man himself had reached a conclusion his own damn self.

Meanwhile, Izuku had the keys to Katsuki’s door, in more ways than one. He could walk in whenever he chose.

“Come on, big guy.” Izuku grunted with the effort to heft and roll Katsuki aside, only raising his brows as Katsuki’s flopped onto his back, cock out and all. “Truly, a hero for the ages. Put your dick away and I’ll reheat some of the curry Hitoshi brought around yesterday.”

“He sees you more than I do,” Katsuki said, zipping his fly and pointedly pretending he did not sound like a whiny little bitch.

“He lives closer,” Izuku said, raising his voice as he padded out of the room. “And I’m pretty sure he thinks if we go two days without seeing each other he’ll find me starved and dead on the floor with Natsume eating my body.”

Katsuki scowled, deep and without reserve as he crossed the living room toward the bathroom, pointedly meeting the judgemental yellow eyes of his one true nemesis. That fucking cat spread out across the couch, all four feet of him, like he owned the place. 

Did he pay rent? Did he have a job? No. His occupation consisted of eating expensive cat food—which was fucking ironic since it was about the only thing Izuku ever splurged on—and laying in wait to swat at Katsuki any time Izuku told him to pet the monstrosity. 

There was an ongoing war between the two Alphas in Izuku’s life, and Katsuki wasn’t about to lose out to some asshole who didn’t even have a Wikipedia page like him. Did Natsume have brand deals? No. A fan page? No. Well, maybe. Katsuki hadn’t asked. 

“Eat,” Izuku said, setting a heaping plate of curry and rice on the small kitchen table beside a bottle of sports drink.

“This isn’t even the brand I do commercials for,” Katsuki said, grinning at Izuku’s withering look before he guzzled half of the ‘blue flavor’ bottle in one go.

“These are cheaper.” Izuku settled himself in the creaky chair across the table, his cheeks sweet and rosy from their tumble. “Just how I like it.”

Katsuki chewed thoughtfully, eyes flicking to the framed photo he’d only recently noticed on the wall, amid a dozen other sentimental photos of Izuku’s loved ones. The tall, emaciated blonde gentleman laid a large, fatherly hand upon a young Izuku’s shoulder. Izuku beamed, his face a little rounder, dressed mostly in black but for red high tops and red hoodie, his arm in a cast cluttered with signatures and cheerful doodles. Katsuki couldn’t place Izuku’s exact age, but by the look of him, he couldn’t have been far out of high school. 

“Why do you live like this?” Katsuki said, reserving what little tact he had for the meetings he had to bear this afternoon. “That guy, the owner of Parchment before you—he left you money, didn’t he?”

Izuku didn’t blink at Katsuki’s straight forward inquiry. He did frown, though, his nail-bitten fingers tapping out an SOS on the table.

“It never felt right to use it for personal desire. It’s—he left me with a considerable sum, but—” Izuku’s smile was both sad and kind in tandem. “He was a good man and I only want to do kind things with it. I renovated the floors and shelves of the shop. I invested in a website for Parchment, too—an ordering system for lesser known works, should people want them. And recently, Kouta’s schooling and lodging, his future.”

Katsuki continued to eat for a moment, face scrunched up as he thought. 

“You should be a little more fuckin’ selfish,” Katsuki said finally, meeting Izuku’s quizzical smile with a frown. “He’d have probably wanted you to go on a vacation or some shit. Buy some dogs. Be happy or whatever.”

“I am happy,” Izuku said, his smile blooming honest and true. 

“Yeah, yeah.” Katsuki waved him off, ignoring his own heated cheeks. “What I mean is, he’d want you to take care of yourself—”

“You talk like you knew him,” Izuku said, leaning across the table with a smile. “What do you—”

“You’re an idiot,” Katsuki said flatly. Leaving Izuku sputtering, Katsuki sighed and unearthed his phone from his back pocket. He didn’t have many photos in his album—he wasn’t the stop-and-smell-the-roses kind of dumbass—and filled the screen with a photo alarmingly similar to his mate’s. He presented the phone across the table. “Here.”

Izuku’s froze, eyes glued to the image. He didn’t reach for the phone. 

“What—”

“I guess the difference is pretty big when you’re not used to it.” Katsuki set the phone on the table, flicking past photos of him and his friends, plus more than a dozen of Izuku in various states of dress and domesticity. He settled on another, one much older and much covertly loved, of All Might in his full glory, forcing a UA-era Katsuki into an embarrassing selfie. Izuku’s gasp was audible over Katsuki’s words. “Your father figure was mine too, y’know. Didn’t know how to tell ya, I guess. Wasn’t sure if I was supposed to or not. That old man had a life even I didn’t know about, so maybe I should be respecting it or whatever, but—”

Katsuki thought of that fateful day at the cat cafe. Of Aizawa, of his lack of surprise at Izuku’s existence in All Might’s life, and his following words.

“You should tell him,” Aizawa had said, his all-seeing, hooded eyes watching Izuku stick his face in one of the tree holes to say something to a cat. “About Toshinori. He’d have liked that in the end, I think.”

“But I think…” Katsuki found himself intent on Izuku’s still expression, and the way he’d come to cradle the phone in his hands to stare at the image of his childhood idol. “I think he’d probably be happy, too. About us, or whatever. I think it’s okay for those worlds to finally merge.”

Izuku looked up so suddenly that it gave Katsuki a start, a surge of panic needling through him at the flood of tears streaming down pale cheeks. 

“This—this is for real, right? It’s not a trick or—”

“I wouldn’t fuckin’ lie,” Katsuki snapped on automatic, snorting in derision. “They’re the same person, for fuck’s sake! You’re telling me you never had a clue?”

“Why would I?” Izuku said, voice small, an impatient hand wiping at his red-rimmed eyes. “He was just. . .a nice man. The first time I met him, I was still in high school, and he’d started to change my life even then. The second time we met, I needed more saving than I could even admit. And he took me in, treated me like I was—” Izuku shook his head, lips curving, his gaze hooded and lowered on the photo. “I don’t think I can get my mind around this. Not yet. It’s too surreal. Before I’d given up on being a hero, All Might was—he’d been my image of victory, of justice. By the time I learned that justice didn’t exist like I dreamed, All Might was a figment of a life left behind. And then—then, Mr. Yagi, h-he reminded me that there were things in this world worth saving, and that maybe I was one of them.”

“‘Course he did,” Katsuki murmured, wanting to reach for Izuku but unsure if his mate was upset with him or not. The waves of their bond lapped at Katsuki’s consciousness with a bottomless, deep blue sea of wistful longing, an ache that sunk from Izuku’s heart and into Katsuki’s. “That’s who he was. What he did. He made you feel like you could change the world.”

Izuku looked up, dark lashes choppy and stuck together with drying tears. Sometimes the green of them bled into so much blue, it was hard to tell them apart. Mood-ring eyes, tropical storm eyes, summer lake eyes. 

“Thank you.” Izuku held out the phone, his hand steady. “I guess that makes us a little like brothers.”

Shock streaked through Katsuki as he pointedly dropped his phone in the fucking curry. 

“Motherfucker!” 

In a chorus of curses paired with Izuku’s guffaws, they cleared the table and cleaned the phone, Katsuki growling with menace each time he caught a giggle from that little shithead. By the time they’d sorted themselves out, it was nearly time for Katsuki to run.

Izuku flopped onto the only corner of the couch that Natsume’s body allowed, leaving Katsuki standing there, hands on hips, making dismal eye contact with the giant, blonde feline. 

“Just shoo him,” Izuku said, smirking.

“I got a photo shoot today. I’m not letting that hulking hairball scratch my face.”

“But you’ll sport two black eyes to that press conference last week?”

Katsuki was still a little sallow and yellow around his left eye from that. 

“That’s different. I earned that. This is just abuse.”

Izuku grinned, eyebrows raised as he made a point of lounging back in comfort while the feather duster of Natsume’s tail flicked and slapped upon his lap in obvious distaste at Katsuki’s presence.

“You really get off on this shit, don’t you?” Katsuki said, still making no move to shift the cat. Everyone in this room very well knew they were at a stalemate, and Katsuki wasn’t about to fling the cat across the room. He wasn’t an asshole. Not like that, anyway. “You’re the worst Omega.”

Izuku smiled wider, and it was a testament to their burgeoning bond that he didn’t think to take offense, only humor. His scent filled the room, fresh and bright and clean of sadness or doubt. 

“Maybe so. Seems like that’s the kind of shit you get off on, though.”

“Oh, for fuck’s sake.” Katsuki was already dropping a knee to the couch, settled snug between Izuku’s thighs as he drifted in to take Izuku’s jaw in his roughened grasp, kissing Izuku’s smile first before delving in with hungry tongue and an instinctive moan of pure, instant pleasure. 

Firm hands cradled the nape of Katsuki’s neck, a truly Omegan croon rising from Izuku’s throat as they strained toward each other. Katsuki had little warning before Izuku surged forward, arms wrapping around Katsuki’s neck, yanking him lower to taste and devour, filling Katsuki’s mouth with his quick, clever little tongue and the earthy, damp taste of his mate. 

When Katsuki attempted to pull back, the dutiful side of him hearing an alarm clock at the back of his skull, Izuku came with, murmuring silly convincing nothings against Katsuki’s swollen lips and pressing his strong, stocky body against Katsuki’s nearly vibrating one. 

“Kacchan,” Izuku murmured, the use of the nickname going straight to Katsuki’s heavy, filling cock all at once. Izuku’s bare feet stood atop Katsuki’s socked ones, going to tip toes, their thighs pressed flush as Izuku peered up at him with bedroom eyes that could bring a man to his knees. “I’m going to miss you.”

“So stay with me,” was Katsuki’s answer, and was ever his answer since his proposal during their heat and rut. “Stay with me and we’ll never stop seeing each other.”

“Mmm. . .” Izuku dragged his throat across Katsuki’s, scenting him in a way few Omegas would dare do to their Alpha. But Izuku was Izuku; he was himself and he was perfect and frustrating and enticing and infuriating, and he’d do whatever he damn well wanted. And Katsuki couldn’t imagine him any other way. He relished the looks of shock both coworkers and bystanders gave him when they caught his Omega-heavy mingled scent.

“Are you even listening to me?” Katsuki asked, laughing despite himself. He found himself laughing a lot these days. Izuku, too. Katsuki pointedly peeled his Omega off, keeping firm hands on Izuku’s shoulders to ensure a safe distance. “Hey, dumbass. I gotta go.”

Izuku’s scrunched his face, the short snub of his freckled nose unbearably cute. 

“Right, okay, okay. Fine. I just—it’s so weird now. Even though I can’t smell you, I can feel you around me and it’s distracting.”

Katsuki’s feral grin was entirely without sympathy.

“Welcome to my world.”

Despite it all, Katsuki found himself standing in the open doorway of Izuku’s Omega-exclusive apartment building, filling the hall with horny Alpha stink as he kissed Izuku goodbye. Inhaling deep into Izuku's curls, Katsuki accepted the tight hug and murmured into his shorn hair.

“You’re gonna get evicted before you decide to move in with me already.”

Izuku chuckled into Katsuki’s chest and pulled back, hands stroking up and down Katsuki’s waist, eyes sparkling with good humor.

“Alright already. Let me think about it.”

“Think harder,” Katsuki said, eyes narrowed.

Izuku stepped back into his apartment with a mock salute.

“If there’s one thing I’m good at, it’s thinking hard.”

Katsuki rolled his eyes.

“Bye, freckles.”

 

 

Approaching Katsuki’s high-rise apartment building with dreams of passing out naked after a hellishly long night and day, the last thing he’d ever expected or wanted to see was a tall, slim figure in obnoxiously tight skinny jeans and high-fashion coat with the collar flicked up. Upon Katsuki’s arrival, amber eyes cut a glare from over the black face mask, and Katsuki didn’t have to smell the haughty fucker to sense he was fuming. 

“I’ve been waiting for over an hour,” Chisaki said, the chill in his voice bringing the spring evening down a couple degrees. 

“I didn’t know we had a date,” Katsuki tossed back, pausing a good few feet away, his fisted hands pocketed to keep him from acting out like a thug. 

While he was no fan of the notorious anti-Hero activist, undoubted Yakuza family member, and Midoriya Izuku’s unofficial stone cold guardian gargoyle, Katsuki also didn’t want to get on his bad side. Not because he was scared—fuck no—but because he was important to Izuku, and Katsuki wasn’t about to take one step forward just to take two steps back. 

So, instead of telling Chisaki where he could shove it and losing his foot half-way up the Beta’s ass as he sent him packing, Katsuki only waited, ready and watchful.

“Get in the car,” was Chisaki’s only reply, jerking his chin toward the nondescript black sedan waiting just down the street.

Katsuki’s feral grin carried no welcome or warmth. Only teeth, sharp ones. 

“We can talk here. What d’you want?”

“Get in the car and I’ll tell you,” Chisaki said, gaze flicking aside to the busy sidewalks and bystanders. Katsuki would just love intel on what Chisaki got up to that made him such a suspicious fucker.

“Why?”

“It’s about Midoriya.”

Katsuki’s eyes narrowed, the rivers and running waters that bound his bond to Izuku rushing like white-capped rapids in all directions in search of his mate’s presence. Distant thought he was, his Omega’s mood bobbed happily in and out of the horizon, cheerful and unbothered.

“He’s fine,” Katsuki said flatly, earning a rise of thin, manicured eyebrows in return. “The fuck do you want? Talk or I’m headin’ in.” 

Chisaki’s jaw seemed to shift beneath the thin mask, the clench of teeth in the moment before he sprung forward, all lanky limbs and lithe animal movements. Outstretched in his gloved hand was his phone, opened to some garishly-designed ‘news’ site that pandered to teenage fans and dumbasses who didn’t check sources.

“Have you seen this,” was all Chisaki said, clipped and brittle as he shoved the screen in Katsuki’s face.

Is Ground Zero’s Criminal Boyfriend Damaging His Career?

Katsuki felt the surge of blood straight to his skull in a dull, growing roar.

Leaked police files reveal Ground Zero’s recent romantic link and springtime fling, unknown Omega, Midoriya Izuku (25), hides a more insidious past than simply a few run-ins with the law in his teenage years. Deeper digging has brought to light not only multiple overnight stays in jail in his youth, but a past romantic relationship with Bubaigawara Jin, a now-defeated member of The League of Villains known by the alias Twice. Their university relationship ended in blood when—

“Get in the car,” Chisaki snapped before turning on his heel and stalking away. 

Ears still ringing with the rage of adrenaline coursing through his veins, Katsuki tore his gaze from the phone and followed. 

Sliding into the backseat alongside Chisaki, the plush leather seats urged Katsuki to sink in, and reminded him how rundown he felt from the past two weeks. But his brain—his brain ricocheted like bullets behind his eyes. 

“What—” Katsuki began, unsure of what Chisaki even wanted of him yet. Were they going to collaborate to make the author of this article disappear or something? Because, growing fury aside, Katsuki was not about that. Although a nice friendly visit to their workplace and a little conversation wouldn’t be beyond him.

“Finish reading it and then we’ll talk.” Chisaki’s features could have been carved of marble, emotionless but for the silent reproach and barely banked fury in his molten eyes. Briefly, it occurred to Katsuki that all Chisaki needed to do was remove one glove and place the hand of god on him before he crumbled to dust at Chisaki’s pristine white sneakers. 

Keeping up his guard despite the growing concern burning wakes through his calm, Katsuki stayed quiet in the stifling car and continued.

Their university relationship ended in blood when an altercation broke out between the two. Details are not known, but one of Twice’s doppelgangers was found murdered beside Midoriya, who suffered blunt force trauma, sexual assault, and, according to records, attempted murder. A restraining order was placed on Bubaigawara, although his whereabouts remained unknown until his emergence within the LoV. Who started the incident remains unknown.

Additionally, Midoriya’s several run-ins with the Omega Killer, former top Omega Hero, Maboromicamie, led to a hospitalization which seemed to incite shocking and unseemly behavior from Ground Zero himself. Sources confirm his feral state upon crashing through a third story window of the hospital and harassing staff, including inflicting Alpha Commands on innocents. 

Is this the Ground Zero our country has known since his emergence within UA eleven years ago? Is this the Bakugou Katsuki whose unwavering devotion to heroism has left no room for missteps or relationships or—

The rest of the article was clearly written by an impassioned Ground Zero fan, lamenting his recent behavior and attesting his every action to the fault of someone who didn’t deserve the slightest. Not to mention that this past assault from Izuku’s university years was something Izuku had never been comfortable enough to reference in detail with his own mate, let alone the world hearing about his deepest trauma in such a flippant manner.

“What the fuck?” Katsuki was rarely speechless, but rarely had he encountered anything as baffling and infuriating other than the man himself for whom this article was written. “Run-ins with the Omega Killer? They make it sound like he was practically involved. Not that he fucking saved—”

“You don’t have to tell me that.” Chisaki plucked the phone from Katsuki’s hand, no contact made between their fingers, even with Chisaki wearing the slim black leather gloves. “The entire article reads as a damnation and you are the victim of his very presence when in fact you are the catalyst who threw him into the spotlight.”

Katsuki was too distracted to make a comment on the accusation.

“Who the fuck leaked—”

“Who leaked isn’t important so much as what you’re going to do about this.”

“What the fuck am I supposed to do? These vultures find their prey in the most defenseless people.”

Chisaki’s eyes narrowed.

“He’s hardly defenseless. However, we are at least both in agreement that this situation is entirely your fault.”

Katsuki blinked, mouth wordlessly working until a snarl cut through the tension in the car.

“My fault—”

“If you knew a single thing about Midoriya Izuku,” Chisaki said crisply, picking at an invisible speck of lint on his jeans, “you’d know that the last thing he has ever wanted for himself is the life you are giving him. A life under the thumb of an Alpha, a man who abuses his power, manipulating his environment to his will and whims. A life beneath the microscope inherently designed to enlarge the perceived flaws of male Omegas. A life removed from the comfort of a home he has worked so hard to cultivate for his safety, his well-being, his betterment.”

Chisaki pinned a dangerously-still Katsuki with an icepick stare. 

“Bakugou Katsuki. Do you really find yourself so vastly important in this world that you refuse to consider that yours might not be the one for a man like him? Is this article not a big enough taste of the venom that will undoubtedly poison our mutual interest one day? Is the poison not already seeping into him?”

Dread and panic soured Katsuki’s mouth and churned at his stomach, the nausea of Chisaki’s words sickening him, frightening him.

“We’re bonded,” Katsuki snapped before any coherent thought could take hold. “We’re bonded, you self-important piece of shit, and you can’t fucking have him anymore.”

Chisaki recoiled as if slapped, the color climbing his cheeks, up past the stark line of his mask. 

“Have him? No, I don’t want—I’m—you’re not bonded. You’re not bonded. He wouldn’t—”

Katsuki bared his teeth in a simile of a smile.

“Looks like you don’t know him as well as you thought. What, are you really that in love with him—”

“I’m not in love with him, you fucking meathead,” Chisaki shot back, leaning in, eyes narrow feline slits. “He’s family. He’s my—”

“He’s my family now, too,” Katsuki said, smiling wider, an intent to infuriate as he recalled Izuku’s words from this morning. “I guess that makes us brothers.”

The look of abject horror on Chisaki’s face was enough. Before he could recover, Katsuki leaned in, scenting the fragrance of expensive, delicate cologne and the distant tinge of copper. And maybe a little sweat, a little desperation.

“You ain’t his keeper anymore. He chose that for him. He chose that for us. And if you really think he’s miserable, maybe you don’t know him as well as you think anymore.”

“You self-important—”

“Midoriya told me something once,” Katsuki murmured, sulking back into the lush seat, arms  folded, body and soul weary from this day. “That while his body might be the same, he grew out of his old skin a long time ago.”

Chisaki clicked his tongue in displeasure and flopped back into his seat like a sulking child, but Katsuki continued.

“I’m starting to think my skin is different now, too. I think the first day I met him, that little fucker got hold of it and started peeling. Fuckin’ hurt, like he’s been slowly skinning me alive all this time. But I think—I know. I know it was worth it.” Katsuki met Chisaki’s eyes. “What about you? Or are you already so fuckin’ perfect.”

Pause thickened the air like ozone perfuming a heavy, incoming storm. Katsuki waited for the lightning strike, for the thunder and fury.

Instead, Chisaki kept their eye contact and spoke, enunciated despite the sudden grit in his voice.

“This article is condemning. He’s going to be upset. He’s going to take it to heart. He hates it when people think badly of him.”

“I know,” Katsuki said, glancing aside with a frown, focussing on the dark, neat hair of the mute driver sitting stoic in the front seat. “That’s—fuck. There’ll be no way to hide it from him. Someone will bring it up eventually. My PR will probably want to damage control. To interview him or—”

“You’d have to nail his feet to the floor to get him to sit and share himself with any kind of publication, reputable or not.”

Katsuki scowled, knowing Chisaki was right. Realizing the two of them had one very important thing in common, and it wasn’t so far off of a brotherhood, no matter how much each of them hated it. 

“The gala, then,” Katsuki said, mentally flicking through his options. How to present his mate in the most positive, deserving light possible. How to show him to the world, Katsuki’s deepest pride and greatest accomplishment. “The Heroes For Hope Gala, it’s next Friday. I’ll bring him, I’ll—”

“That’s your idea?” Chisaki laughed, harsh and dry. “Arm candy? Were you really top of your class or—”

“Anyone who's anyone will be there,” Katsuki snapped. “Including publicity, photographers, journalists, every important businessman involved in the hero industry. He’s not weak. You said it yourself. Letting him loose in there, to be himself and speak his mind and handle himself the way he damn well pleases—he’ll blow the world away.”

They stared at each other, a game of chicken between the two most stubborn men Midoriya would ever have in his life. 

“Don’t fuck it up,” Chisaki said. 

Katsuki grinned. 

“Have you met me?”

Something in Chisaki’s expression shifted, but behind the mask it was near impossible to tell. 

“Unfortunately.”

Eventually, Katsuki was freed from the clutches of Izuku’s guard dog and left to slump into his hauntingly empty apartment with a heaving sigh. He’d barely kicked off his shoes before his private phone buzzed in his pocket, and somehow Katsuki didn’t need to check the caller identification before he answered with a sole grunt.

“Katsuki?” Izuku said, sounding a little breathless. “Are you alright? I got this feeling—”

“Yeah.” Katsuki wandered into the kitchen and, finding himself more tired than hungry, wandered to his bedroom and the neatly-made black sheets. “Was just in some bad company. M’fine.”

“You’re sure? My chest felt all pinched and at first I thought I was having a panic attack, but then I realized it was you.”

Katsuki scoffed, switched the phone to speaker and tossed it to the bed as he stripped naked.

“I do not have panic attacks. What about you, you good?”

“Yeah, I’m—yeah.” Izuku didn’t sound convinced of Katsuki’s claim, but he changed the subject, anyway. “Are you getting into bed? It’s barely five.”

Katsuki flopped to the mattress, face-first and buck-naked as he’d intended. Face smushed into a pillow, he mumbled some kind of affirmative, his thoughts mulling through the muck of the day. He wouldn't mention the article, yet. Privately, face-to-face. Later.

“Hey,” Katsuki said, interrupting whatever Izuku was saying about heading out of the city to meet Auntie Inko for dinner. “There’s a fancy thing going on this Friday and you’re coming with me.”

“Fancy thing—Friday? Like, with your friends or—”

“It’s the yearly Heroes For Hope Gala. Be my date.”

The silence on the other end had Chisaki’s words echoing back at him. Katsuki had spent half a year convincing Izuku that they belonged together without giving a thought to how their worlds would collide. Katsuki had been, and still was, so convinced that Izuku could handle himself, could hold himself up against anyone and anything, that he’d never stopped to think whether or not Izuku would want to.

Katsuki waited.

“That sounds like. . .a lot,” Izuku finished, sounding small.

“Nothing scarier than the shit you been through.” Katsuki turned his head to better speak into the phone, frowning at the black, blank screen that reflected his unnaturally tired features. “I want people to know you,” he said quietly. “Not know your business, but you. Midoriya Izuku, the man. You’re mine, and I want everyone to damn well know it.”

More silence and a quiver of unease rippling across the distant bond.

“I—” Izuku exhaled, long and shaky. “I mean, I guess? I guess. I don’t think anyone will be as impressed as you wish they were, but—”

“I don’t need anyone’s fuckin approval,” Katsuki said, deep and strong and self-assured. “What I need is you by my side. In everything. In all things. The world doesn’t need to approve of us, they just need to know we are here, and we aren’t going anywhere.”

Warmth effused Katsuki’s hollow chest with such feeling, such a swelling tide of affection and joy that it swept the breath from his lungs. Lips curved, he knew the answer before Izuku even spoke.

“Alright, Mr Zero. Let’s show them we’re here.”

Notes:

Times are tough right now. Thank you SO much for the outpouring of love and kindness in the comments. They bring me smiles when on some days I feel like I don't have it in me to smile at all. I love to hear your stories, hear your life in reference to this fic. Of course, my heart aches for those of you who relate in this way or another to this work, but I hope it reaches you in ways that make a difference, even for a spark of a second in your day. All y'all's comments reach me like that, too. I treasure you all.

Chapter 39

Summary:

Izuku had to fight for what he was, who he was, and what belonged to him. More than ever in his life, he felt a purpose to his existence. This night only sharpened his intentions into crystalline clarity.

Notes:

Songs For This Chapter:
Since I Was Young - Wrabel | Spotify | YouTube
New Mood - LPX | Spotify | YouTube
Walk Across the Water - The Black Keys | Spotify | YouTube

“Please tell me you know what you’re doing.”

Izuku laughed with a high, nervous squawk as Hitoshi coolly, calmly removed the curlers from the top of Izuku’s head. Why someone who already had curls needed curlers was beyond Izuku’s realm of comprehension, but Hitoshi had assured him the was the way of things, and Izuku didn’t have any basis with which to argue.

Except that he end up looking like a fool in front of three-hundred important people.

“Your hair is not a beast I fear,” Hitoshi said with eternal serenity as he worked magic on Izuku’s wild mop.

“Don’t underestimate it. Everything about me is difficult.”

“Ha-ha. Just you wait, you’re going to be handsome as hell.”

Izuku critically eyed his best friend’s tall, windswept mane of lavender.

“As long as you don’t do mine like yours.”

“As if I would. My fans already emulate it to high hell. My hair is my brand, darling. It’s insured for more than my car.”

“I don’t want to know.” Izuku sputtered an incredulous laugh. “I don’t want to hear that. What a waste of money. Your hair?”

“Athletes' bodies are insured for thousands and millions, and so are ours. Did I ever tell you I’m not allowed to bicycle or ride a motorcycle lest I hurt myself off-duty?”

“What? No. That’s ridiculous.”

“Bakugou’s body is worth five million dollars, last I heard.”

“What? No way. No wonder he’s so full of himself.”

“He’s been considerably more grounded since you’ve been together. You’ve managed to kick his head out of the clouds.”

Izuku thoughtfully stared at Hitoshi’s pastel green frog shirt and got lost in the repetitive, cheerful pattern as he recalled the distressed phone conversation preceding dinner with his mother and her frantic discovery of the article at the same time as him. Katsuki had been so fierce, so aggressively supportive and loving that Izuku hadn’t been able to find it in himself to care as deeply about the judgmental article as he would have had he not had Katsuki at his side.

“Everything good between you two?” Hitoshi asked with obvious care, his hands covered in perfumed product as he swept them through Izuku’s hair. “Since the article and all.”

Izuku blinked out of his thoughts and offered a crooked smile.

“Oh! Sorry, yeah—I mean, yeah, completely. He’s wonderful, he’s—he’s really supportive and, I don’t know—”

“What is it?”

“It’s just—” Izuku scratched and picked at the hole in the knee of his jeans. “He believes in me so much. I feel like I’m lying to him or something, for him to think I’m stronger than I am.”

Hitoshi clicked his tongue with obvious displeasure, his low voice hardening to a no-nonsense cadence.

“He thinks you’re strong because he sees you better than you see yourself. He’s not flattering you, and he hates liars. In fact, his radar for the dishonest is about as sharp as mine, and that’s a compliment you’ll never hear me say to his face. But it’s true. He sees you, inside and out. That bond? It’s not a liar.”

“Yeah. . .I guess it’s hard to imagine a five million dollar lauded hero stepping out with me. I’m a mangy stray and he’s a purebred.”

Hitoshi dropped to his knees and placed his hands upon Izuku’s clenched ones, ducking his head until Izuku met his pale eyes.

“Izuku. You two are mated, aren’t you?”

“I—yes?”

“And, should your time in the hospital be any reliable indicator, you two are True Mates, aren’t you?”

“I—I mean. Th-that is, yes? I think so. We don’t have any frame of reference, but apparently you and Todoroki can’t actively exchange information with each other? Like, I know when he’s falling asleep across town, or he’s happy, or in a fight or—”

“No, nothing like that.” Hitoshi shook his head, his thumbs soothing long strokes over the tops of Izuku’s hands, urging them to unclench. “The average bond is through close contact, and for most people, exclusively felt through touch. Our cycles are in sync, and deep traumas can be felt, but again, only if Shouto’s nearby. You two have something beyond us all. So maybe don’t downplay it. You know more than most people that Heroes aren’t the epitome of a person’s worth.”

Izuku took a breath and nodded, turning his hands to link fingers with Hitoshi’s.

“Y-yeah. I guess maybe the article hit me harder than I let myself think.”

Hitoshi’s gaze narrowed and something of the fearsome, unnerving hero hardened his normally calm features.

“It’s okay to be angry. Your privacy was crudely invaded and, believe me, if I had a say, I’d have my own conversation with the publication. But they’re not worth it. The world will always look at Bakugou like an unattainable celebrity. I think the fact that he’s bonded with someone whom the public considers a lowly bystander undeserving of him makes them blind with jealousy. When in reality, there couldn’t have been another person built better to keep Bakugou not just in line, but happy.”

“That’s—” Izuku ducked his head. “You don’t have to say all that.”

“Well, I want to. Because, in case you forgot, I’m your best friend. And so is Bakugou. I’d have never paired you two in a million years, but apparently you both knew who was the one all along. You’ve only been waiting. Everyone before was just a journey.”

Izuku offered a wobbly smile.

“Hell of a journey. My mom was upset with the article.”

Hitoshi’s eyebrow flicked up and he stood, releasing Izuku’s hands but squeezing Izuku’s shoulder before shifting to finish his hair.

“I’d hope she would be.”

“She was upset that I’m so much trouble,” Izuku clarified, recognizing the old well of familiar bitterness roiling in his stomach. “That I can’t keep my business quiet. Like I was the one who leaked my fucking hospital records for, what, attention? She thinks I’m still fifteen and kicking down doors to prove a point.”

Hitoshi sighed.

“Izuku. . .”

“I don’t think she’s interested in knowing a single part of me that doesn’t align with the quiet, simple Omega life she feels I should have obediently walked into.” Izuku shrugged, feeling small in the oversized Ground Zero hoodie that he’d stolen from Katsuki’s apartment. “I think I’m starting to realize that even though she loves me, she loves the outline of me. She’s colorblind to the shades that fill me in.”

“Your family is more than just her. Don’t ever forget that, especially now. Your family is growing, and it's your kindness that tends them.”

Izuku laughed a little too loud because he didn’t know what to do with that or this conversation or the exceeding kindness he didn’t deserve.

“Stop being so nice. We’re going to a party, not spending the evening crying in your bedroom!”

“It wouldn’t be the first time.”

“And I’m sure not the last.”

“You know I’m a weepy drunk.”

“Don’t remind me.”

Hitoshi cackled and encouraged Izuku to turn toward the mirror.

“There we go. The hardest parts are complete.”

Izuku blinked at his strange reflection in the mirror, head cocked as he considered the oddly familiar person imitating him in return.

“Wow, it actually. It’s really good, Hitoshi. I look—the makeup looks like me but. . .better? Is that a thing? It’s nice.”

“Of course it’s nice. I know what I’m doing. Now, Shouto should be home soon with the suits, so let’s have a drink. Or several. These events drain me.”

Giving himself one last suspicious glass in the mirror, Izuku followed Hitoshi from their soothing, spa-like bedroom toward the kitchen. Their condo was even more enormous than Katsuki’s—mainly because both Hitoshi and Todoroki insisted on separate bedrooms for Hitoshi’s sleepless tossing and turning nights, plus his sheer inability to keep his belongings neat, while Todoroki preferred pristine simplicity. Hitoshi’s own bedroom was a warzone.

“Is it really that bad?”

“No,” Hitoshi said simply as he yanked open his fridge and ducked his head in as he spoke. “It’s nice to see old friends from school, people I worked with when I’d started off. But even better, the drama. The sexual tension. The not-so-sneaky hook-ups, the drunks, the husbands and wives making eyes at their old flames.” Hitoshi emerged with several beers in hand. Cracked the top off one and offered it with a knowing smirk. “So many sexy, fit, lowkey violent people in a vast room with the champagne flowing? Oh, it’s a soap opera, darling.”

“I can see how that would be simultaneously overwhelming, though.” Izuku clinked his glass with Hitoshi’s. “You soak up a lot from people.”

Hitoshi downed half his bottle in one go, then rolled his eyes.

“Shouto’s no help. He lurks in dark corners or the bar and expertly evades answering any one person’s questions. And don’t even get me started on Endeavor and Hawks.”

“Oh?”

Hitoshi set aside his beer to go for the soju he’d set out and poured them both a shot.

“You’ll see. They’re a walking disaster. Worst kept secret in the business. I don’t know why they even bother denying it.”

As if on cue, Todoroki squeezed through the doorway, three hangers slung over his shoulder, eyebrows raised in question.

“Tell him,” Hitoshi said, waving his shot glass emphatically. “About your dads.”

“Oh.” Todoroki nodded. “They’re the worst.”

“See?”

Hitoshi handed Izuku the other shot. Izuku laughed and took it gratefully.

“I see.”

They both took their shots and, as if newly refreshed, Hitoshi jumped to his mate and swept all three suit bags into his arms.

“Come! Let’s check the fit.”

Nerves jangling a little less with the padding of booze, Izuku smiled absently at Todoroki and followed Hitoshi back down the hall.

“Thank you again for getting me in your. . .suit person or whatever. I know it was short notice.”

“No one would say no to a Todoroki. It wasn’t a problem.”

Izuku frowned as he watched Hitoshi reveal the luscious, deep green velvet suit meant for him.

“I still think this is too fancy for me.”

Hitoshi aimed a droll stare his way.

“It’s a gala. Everyone’s fancier than they have any right to be. Embrace it. Hey, is your ear still pierced?”

“Wh—no, it grew in.”

“Damn. I’ve got some silver cuffs we can put around the cartilage, anyway. You’ll have Bakugou on his knees with his tongue out. Trust me.”

Izuku laughed in earnest and was deeply thankful for his friends and his life.

“I’m beginning to trust you a little too much.”

Todoroki popped his head into the room, his frown more pronounced than normal as he cut into the conversation.

“Midoriya, could you—”

“What? Oh, sure, coming.”

Curious, Izuku trailed Todoroki into the hall and met his mismatched eyes with his own look of concern.

“Is something wrong?”

“I visited my brother today.”

Izuku’s stomach dropped, the instant prickle of sickly sweat pooling at his back and behind the knees at the very mention. Struggling not to look as horrified as he instinctively felt, Izuku offered a small smile.

“Ah. . .I-I mean, that’s great! I’m happy for you two.”

Todoroki rolled his eyes and leaned against the corridor wall, arms folded as he hefted a sigh.

“I don’t love it, either. But I want—I’m trying to understand him, I guess. Mom wants me to try. Him and Mom, they’ve been doing better than any of us with it all. But Touya, he—”

“It’s okay,” Izuku said quickly, not sure who he was reassuring. “I’m okay. I didn’t think I’d be okay, but I am.”

Todoroki stared at him with the most deadpan, fed-up expression of disbelief in his excessive repertoire.

“He wants to see you, Midoriya,” he said flatly. “I asked him what the hell for, but for once he didn’t endlessly talk about himself. When it comes to you, he’s weird.”

Cautiously, Izuku nodded. Just listening, taking it in. Thinking.

“Anyway,” Todoroki shrugged. “You can say no. I’d say no if I were you. Fuck him. But he wanted me to ask, so I’m asking.”

“I’ll see him,” Izuku heard himself say, almost distantly, as if having an out of body experience. “I’ll see him.”

Todoroki’s face scrunched up in either distaste or surprise or both.

“Seriously?”

And then Izuku realized something, and he let himself breathe.

“I’m serious,” he said softly. “I’m—I’m not scared like I used to be. And I’m not alone. So, yes. You can tell him yes. Text me with details and I’ll make the time for it. “

Todoroki continued to look dubious, but carefully nodded.

“Okay. You can back out any time. He’d deserve it. He’s still an insufferable shithead.”

Izuku cracked a smile.

“He wouldn’t be an older brother if he wasn’t.”

“Well.” Todoroki seemed to struggle with something before he surprised Izuku with a firm hug. “Thanks,” Todoroki said against his shoulder. “You’re too kind with my family for your own good, but I’m happy for you. I’m glad you feel safe.”

“Safe,” Izuku murmured, squeezing him a little tighter. “Yes. I really do feel safe.”

Hitoshi’s voice hollered from the other room with dramatic indignance.

“I’m looking gorgeous in here and there’s no one to see! Do I need to take an entire limo for myself?”

“Coming,” Todoroki replied obediently, his mouth curved and eyes warm as he seemed to walk a little faster to the bedroom.

Whatever Izuku had expected, it hadn’t been this. Histoshi was a silver and lavender sight, his fitted suit a deep slate grey threaded with a delicate silver shimmer that caught light like a lunar deity. Long and lean, the miles of moonlight leg suited him right up to the lavender dress shirt clasped at the neck with a silver brooch cinched with a creamy opal moon. Slim fingers of one hand were adorned with silver rings on each finger, all attached with a jangle of delicate, spindly chains. His ears sparkled in a constellation of piercings as well.

“Wow,” Izuku said, broadly smiling in wonder. “Wow!”

When Todoroki made no sound, Izuku flicked a concerned look his way. And grinned wider.

Todoroki’s face was flushed up to the ears, the line of his jaw working tight, veins stark along his neck as he watched Shinsou slow, sinuous turn for effect. Izuku didn’t need a sense of smell to catch the waves of dark intensity radiating from Todoroki’s normally relaxed, easy countenance.

“You look amazing,” Izuku said warmly. “And I think I’m going to get another drink.”

With that, he quickly evacuated the room and pretended his expert hearing didn’t catch Todoroki murmur, I’m going to eat you alive, or Shinsou’s husky laugh before a pointed, full silence.

Pulling out his phone, Izuku quickly shot off a text to Katsuki for lack of anything better.

>>> How’s it going?

The reply was fairly instant, which meant either Katsuki was bored to tears by his crew getting ready at his condo, or he knew it was Izuku texting without having to check his phone. Izuku was experiencing similar bizarre phenomena from time to time, as well.

<<< I’m going to strangle all of them. Preferably at once, with a very long rope.

>>> I’m sure you’ll find something creative.

<<< You okay? We both hate texting.

Izuku huffed a laugh and held up a new beer in mock cheers to absolutely no one, and took a long drink.

>>> I’m fine. Shinsou did my hair. And my makeup.

<<< MA kEU P ?

Izuku grinned, his cheeks heating at the erratic text. Excitement finally began to pop and fizz in his tummy, bubbles of mischief rising to the surface.

>>> Hitoshi says you’ll fall to your knees when you see me.

<<< I’d do that anyway.

Izuku swallowed, licking his suddenly tingly lips and breathing a shaky laugh.

>>> In that case, maybe when you see me tonight you’ll be my good dog.

The reply was immediate and, while Izuku couldn’t be entirely sure, he could swore he felt a spike of heat drive through the depths of their bond. For a brief second, it was enough to steal Izuku’s breath and make him wonder at the reaction.

<<< I’d be a very good boy for you.

Oh. Oh. Now that was interesting.

Izuku was so busy marveling at his screen, rereading the short parry of words and finishing his beer that he jumped when his friends entered the room, both decked to the nines. Todoroki’s suit was a shock of white with black lapels and tie, a stark and harsh look beside his ethereal mate.

They were gorgeous and Izuku was suddenly utterly aware of his stocky build, his height, his freckles, his face.

“You’re both beautiful,” Izuku said earnestly, smiling.

“We know,” Hitoshi said with a delicate wave of his hand, his grin giving away the joke as he approached and looped his arm in Izuku’s. Every movement he made, sparkled. “Now let’s get the little forest nymph into his suit, shall we?”

“Oh, god.” Izuku’s stomach dropped out, his laugh a nervous, high thing. “Don’t talk like that. I’m going to die tonight, aren’t I?”

“Only if you let the big bad wolves eat you up,” Hitoshi easily replied. “And I don’t think you or Bakugou will let that happen. But believe me, tonight you’ll be the star. There won’t be a person in that building who won’t be looking for Ground Zero’s one and only mate.”

Before Izuku could berate himself out loud, Hitoshi turned him in his arms, hands firm and sturdy on Izuku’s shoulders as Hitoshi leaned in, his smile self-assured and filled with mischief.

“Trust me. You’re going to bring them all to their knees. And it won’t be because of the suit.”

“I—”

“But the suit will damn well help.”

Izuku allowed Hitoshi to dress him with care. He felt almost too scared to put on the costume by himself. And it was truly a costume, in the sense that when the pieces were finally in place, Izuku looked at himself and saw a man he’d not yet met.

The suit was a rich, luxurious velvet in a green so deep it was nearly black until the light hit right. The lapels shone in fine black silk, the black shirt beneath buttoned up to the top with a neat black bow tie that did nothing to distract from the subtle makeup that tilted and smoked out his eyes or the supple glimmer at his mouth.

As good as his word, Hitsohi decked one of Izuku’s ears in a cuff of silver leaves that looked to organically climb and grow up the cartilage. On one hand, the ring of a grand stag head winked with sparkling emerald eyes and ornate antlers.

The man who looked at him in the mirror looked mysterious—beautiful, even. The delicate, tawny smudge of eyeliner or shadow or whatever Hitoshi had used had seemed a little out of place when Izuku had sat there in the mirror with a beer and a hoodie, but in the suit of lush, green velvet and the climb of black up his moon-pale neck brought the subtle artistry of his face to life. Whatever shadow Hitoshi had insisted upon the hollows of his cheeks brought a severity to his face, a sharpening of jaw and cheekbone.

If Izuku didn’t know the broken kid in scuffed red sneakers hiding underneath these clothes, he would assume this man was supremely special.

“Thank you,” Izuku managed after a time longer than was probably appropriate. Luckily, his friends flung propriety aside as well as him, too.

Hitoshi’s only reply was a pair of stupid finger-guns on and a clicking noise of recognition.

Instantly, the tension in Izuku’s frame dissolved into laughter and he was himself again, forest finery or not.

By the time the limo arrived, the three of them had shared more than a few shots of soju and Izuku felt like he might just be glittering from the inside out like Hitoshi’s suit.

“I’ve never been in a limo before,” Izuku said, unafraid to share his awe as he gazed from a tinted window to the sounds of Hitoshi popping champagne.

“I need a bottle for myself,” Todoroki said, already half-way to the morose stupors he fell into upon overdrinking. “My father is going to be there and he’s going to want to kiss me or some shit.”

“He loves you,” Hitoshi said easily, handing Todoroki the entire bottle without qualm. “He’s an asshole and he loves you. And yes, he’s probably going to kiss you. Many times.”

Todoroki groaned into the mouth of his champagne bottle and chugged. Izuku winced and accepted the glass from the second bottle that Hitoshi had opened.

“I watched the live coverage two years ago, I think,” Izuku admitted, glad for the darkened car to hide his blush. He’d been so anti-Hero, anti-Alpha for so long, allowing himself to sink into Chisaki’s bias because it gave him a reason to feel bitterness and hate against the life that rejected him, that talking about the times he’d sat in front of the television and gawked at the heroes of his dreams, plus his best friends, seemed almost shameful to say out loud now. He’d been so misguided. “Everyone was so glamorous. I don’t know how some of those dresses fit through the front doors.”

“Just remember,” Hitoshi said, sipping on champagne with one hand, his lavishly adorned hand gently squeezing Shouto’s knee. “Everyone there is just as fucked up as everyone in this limo. And then some.”

Exchanging a dubious look with a bland-faced Todoroki told Izuku enough. He knew they were both similarly filled with doubt, but it was nice of Hitoshi to keep up appearances for them.

Pushing aside intrusive thoughts for the night, Izuku aimed a rueful smile out the window and marveled at the city lights freckling the tinted windows as they headed for Katsuki and his crew.

Kirishima was the one to tear the limo door near off its hinges with a hoot of excitement, all but diving into the limo head-first. His suit was a deceptively plain black, because up close the lapels were studded like a leather jacket would be. His acid purple shirt was a shock up until Ashido Mina—who admittedly still intimidated the hell out of Izuku—dipped inside clad in a skimpy tube dress of the same shock of purple, her black heels towering and adorned with the same black studs as her husband’s jacket.

Sero followed, cackling like a hyena, his hair styled handsomely and his suit a tasteful black on black. Jirou followed, stinking of sweet and skunky weed, her black lipstick stretching a bright smile of greeting as she ducked inside wearing some kind of skintight, sequined catsuit made of midnight. Denki pushed on her butt to make way, his outfit a blaze of shimmering gold and black.

Everyone was riotously finding their spots and demanding champagne when Katsuki’s gruff voice announced his arrival as he stepped inside.

“You dumbfucks ain’t gonna last a full night with the amount of pre-gaming you—holy shit.”

The tidal wave of volcanic, molten desire stormed Izuku’s bond in one searing blast.

Katsuki’s eyes widened, his jaw slightly dropped as he paused, half-in in the limo, one hand clenched on the open door. Hot eyes raked over Izuku in the poorly lit space, devouring Izuku’s frame in the dim darkness.

The pressure swelling from their bond was so oppressive, so hungry, Izuku could barely fucking breathe beneath the weight of Katsuki’s unyielding attention. Izuku could hardly swallow, his mouth flooding with spit, his crossed legs growing quickly uncomfortable with the thick, honeyed weight filling between them.

“Hi,” Izuku all but breathed, the space between them pressing in with the thundering harmony of their twin heartbeats.

“You’re right,” Katsuki murmured, still half-in the doorway, his face open with a raw vision of awe that the Omega in Izuku preened and fluffed and spun, dizzying delirium in pleasing their Alpha.

“About what?” Izuku whispered, leaning forward, entirely forgetting everyone around them.

Katsuki climbed inside and shut the door, ignoring the hoots and hollers of joy as he slid onto the free seat beside Izuku.  Their thighs pressed flush, the contact between their bodies lighting up Izuku’s senses so intensely he swore he could smell the ghost of him, the fire tang at the back of his throat.

Distracted by the bond overload he seemed to be assaulted with every time they were together these days, Izuku startled rabbit-still when Katsuki’s mouth brushed the shell of his ear, the silver cuff around his cartilage heating up with the flush of his skin.

“I’d fall on my knees for you.”

Izuku gasped and shivered, his hands fisting atop his thighs as he faintly leaned into the barest press of Katsuki’s lips to his temple.

“Kacchan,” Izuku breathed, his skin keyed up, muscles fighting the tension to simply loft onto his lap and tear at his neck with hungry, marking teeth. Something dark and dangerous sat on its haunches, caged behind the curve of his ribs, long teeth hungry for something Izuku had never allowed himself to consider.

“Let’s toast!” Kirishima hollered, breaking the spell and heeling Izuku from the slow, unconscious baring of his stubby fangs. “To a night of fun! And, more importantly, to the night of Bakugou and his kickass Omega!”

“To Izuku,” Hitoshi said, lifting his glass with a smirk. “The only man in existence to tame this dog.”

This provoked a riot of screams, shouts, and laughter; a familial joy so vibrant it threatened to blind Izuku’s longtime dark, safe little cave. And despite Katsuki’s curses, he still drank to the toast, expression sweetly sulking.

Nerves for the gala dissolved in a sea of champagne bubbles and laughter, Izuku finding himself pulled left and right in conversation, welcomed as ever like family, like he belonged despite being nothing like a hero at all. So, when they finally arrived at the vast, white carpet that welcomed heroes and the high-class alike to the party, it was with little anxiety that he stepped proudly from the limo with one arm firmly hooked around Ground Zero’s.

Because here—here, his mate was the golden flame of the Hero world. He was not Bakugou Katsuki. He was Ground Zero. And somehow, without ever having been around Katsuki while he was in uniform, the way Katsuki suddenly held himself upon arrival, his broad shoulders straightening, wide chest puffing forth, sharp chin angled with a feral grin, told Izuku that this was exactly how he walked the streets as a Hero.

And it was only then, against the bright sparks and explosions of paparazzi and the screeches of fans, did Izuku finally get to see his partner in the full glory of his outfit. The car ride had been so intense that Izuku hadn’t looked anywhere but Katsuki’s starkly striking face.

Katsuki’s fitted suit was cut in deep, almost mahogany blood red. A faint pattern glimmered within the fabric among the matte material, something undoubtedly royal, a brave print nearly hidden in the cloth. His shirt and tie were black and, somehow like Izuku, Katsuki wore a simple cuff of gold at his ear. His hair was expertly, thinly braided at the sides, close to his skull in the manner of some kind of conquering warrior of old, with thin gold threads interwoven so his hair shot sparks each time a camera flash echoed in their faces.

“Oh.” Izuku tripped up, coming to a stop by Katsuki’s light pull on his arm as they waited for their friends to spill from the limo and debut as well. “Katsuki. You’re beautiful.”

Katsuki balked, blinking in obvious surprise at the sudden compliment.

“What? Shut up.”

“Are you embarrassed?” Izuku asked, incredulous and already laughing as their bond and Katsuki’s reddening face confirmed it. On instinct, Izuku’s hand snaked down to interlace fingers with his Alpha’s, a pleasant hum at skin-to-skin that was quickly becoming addictive.

Izuku beamed up at him as they began to walk into the depths of the event’s white carpet area, only smiling wider when Katsuki gave him a hungry stare in return.

“You’re really mine, aren’t you?” Izuku found himself saying beneath the roar of yelled questions and catcalls.

Katsuki paused, his expression gone more firm and assured as he met Izuku’s gaze with his own stern one.

“There could never have been anyone else.”

Izuku didn’t know to which of them he was referring with the statement, and yet it felt true on both sides of the coin.

“Ground Zero, hello, over here!”

Izuku looked over in time with Katsuki, and stayed silent when Katsuki greeted the woman with shark teeth and entirely black eyes and hair. She seemed cheerful enough with her microphone printed with Tokyo’s number one news source, but the great, bulbous eyes of the recording cameras surrounding her gave Izuku the chills.

“You two look like a pair of deities! Such power, such beauty! I admit I’m a little intimidated,” she said, not looking the least bit.

“You are too kind, thank you,” Katsuki said, his Japanese as gracious and polite as Izuku had ever heard, but the annoyance was already simmering beneath the placid lake of their bond. Izuku’s lips curved in muted humor he knew Katsuki would feel.

“And Midoriya Izuku! That is your name, correct?”

She very well knew it was, but Izuku smiled thinly all the same.

“Yes. It’s a pleasure to meet you.”

“The world has been absolutely dying to meet you!”

“I hope not. I’m lately not a fan of hospitals and neither is my mate.”

The interviewer blinked for a split-second, the surprise in the implication of Izuku’s statement registering before she laughed, bright and practiced.

“Oh my goodness, you are a clever one!”

“He’s graduated university with honors,” Katsuki said, his hand releasing Izuku’s to rest at the small of his back. “He’s smarter than most of the Heroes here. We are rarely allowed to attend university, as you know. Busy dying for the cause.”

“And we owe you our lives for it, Ground Zero! All that you do is an achievement, day in and out. Our universities are safe because of you!”

“Let’s not go that far,” Katsuki replied, the polite veneer already beginning to thin. “It’s a delight to be here, however, and I look forward to the proceeds from the gala going to those whose lives are most painfully affected by the presence of villains in our country.”

Izuku really had to ask about Katsuki’s PR team. They must be miracle workers to drive such a speech into his thick, stubborn skull.

“Of course, of course!” The interviewer’s smile had tightened as well, and it was then that her black eyes shifted to Izuku. “And you, Mr Midoriya—what do you think of such a grand charity event? Surely you’ve never seen anything of the sort in a life so far from a Hero like Ground Zero’s.”

Nerves snapped out an instant under the implication that Izuku was somehow less. If he’d learned anything from the Hero next to him, it was how much more he was than he’d ever imagined.

“I have spent a good portion of my childhood glued to the world of heroes and villains. As a young adult I spent a great deal of time under the wing of a major contributor to the well-being of those in need and in more dangerous parts of our city. I have put in my share of work, as best as a Quirkless citizen can. Charity events as grand as this one may not have been in my lifestyle, but helping those who need it has always been in my heart and my actions.” Izuku was smiling in earnest now, his eyes sharp and bright on the shark’s beady gaze. “And yourself?”

The reporter’s smile cracked and faltered in the split second before an attendant swiftly directed them along the white carpet. Katsuki barked a laugh and grinned, feral and unpracticed over his shoulder as he led Izuku away by the waist.

“Enjoy your evening!” he called and cackled. Then her turned, leaning into Izuku’s stylishly curled hair and murmured, “I’m gonna fuck you senseless tonight.”

“Are you?” Izuku shot back on instinct, his mood all prickles and power as he jut his chin forth and eyed a group of heroes who quickly looked away as if they hadn’t been staring. “Try it.”

Barely did he notice the flush to Katsuki’s cliffside cheeks or the inherent dominance in his throwaway statement. He absolutely did not notice the trill of interest through the humming bond, so intent and intense was he on lifting his chin and walking tall through the crowd of whispers and wonders.

Fuck them all. He wasn’t beneath them. Not tonight—not in these clothes or with this man. He wouldn’t let himself allow it.

The grand entrance to the hotel was overwhelming. As the fans and reporters were left behind the gilded glass doors, the lobby toward the celebration hall was a vast sea of glittering jewels, bizarre heroes in one shape and the other, extravagant entourages and vibrant laughter with crystalline chandeliers twinkling overhead like a new world of constellations.

The reporter had been correct, of course. This was nothing like Izuku had ever known, but without the watchful eyes of the press drilling into his back, he allowed himself to gaze around in pure, wondrous joy.

“There’s so many people I recognize,” Izuku said, nearly vibrating out of his velvet suit as he spotted Lemillion in the distance greeting some staid men in boring suits. “Isn’t he the understudy of All Might?”

He still couldn’t say Mr Yagi. Could probably never, not in terms of All Might. It was too overwhelming, too incomprehensible. Could he have been All Might’s student, if life had opened for him a different path? Could they have—

“That's my boss,” Katsuki said sourly.

Izuku gaped ahead now, noticing Suneater at his side as well. He and Katsuki of course spoke of work from time to time, but they often ended up talking about other things like books or something interesting they found out about, or just exchanging anecdotes from the past for each other’s pleasure. The last time Katsuki's actual employer had come up was on their wall-climbing date a lifetime ago, and since then it hadn’t felt important enough that Izuku remember it.

Interestingly enough, after a lifetime of mooning over heroes, then rejecting them entirely, when it came to dating one, Izuku found that the least most important thing about Katsuki was his profession. Just as Izuku was not his condition or his gender, there was so much more to both of them than what everyone saw. And, in each other, they found that “seen”-ness they’d neither known they were looking for.

Dazed beyond his ability to pull himself out of it, and swimming in glamor and famous faces, Izuku let himself get dragged along and introduced to one face after another. Some he recognized from the news of years past, while others were newbies to the Pro-Hero world and looked just shy of screaming from nerves at being introduced to Ground Zero.

Katsuki seemed to take the lot in stride, though. While his general distaste for the socialization required with this event was evident and made Izuku chuckle to himself, Katsuki’s attitude was more gracious and patient than Izuku had ever expected of him.

It was really only then that it occurred to him how much patience Katsuki must have learned over the years, how often he had to implement it in his daily life, and how much that attitude had trickled down to dealing with Izuku himself. Katsuki was truly… amazing. He really was. Izuku found himself looking at Katsuki like a fan, too.

“Hey,” Izuku said between introductions and verbal parries with the more acerbic, dubious guests. He tugged in Katsuki’s sleeve until Katsuki flicked a sharp brow and leaned in, nicely bringing his ear to Izuku’s. “You’re kind of amazing, aren’t you, Mr Zero”

Katsuki looked briefly startled, turning his head so they were nearly nose to nose, Katsuki looming over him with a steadying band upon Izuku’s shoulder. Then he smiled, his golden boy smile full of fangs and confidences, and his palm skimmed up Izuku’s shoulder to cup the side of his throat, one long thumb stroking Izuku’s jaw.

“You just noticed? You don’t know half of it yet, freckles.”

And despite the showboating of the statement, Izuku found himself gazing up in awe. Damn if he didn’t believe him.

“Boys,” Hitoshi drawled as he promptly shoved his face between theirs, arms slinging over one tall and one short shoulder. “Aren’t you two making a statement. We love to see it.”

“Who’s we?” Katsuki’s snarled, ducking from Hitoshi’s hold and promptly bumping back into Todoroki. “You’re still here? The buffet is in the next room.”

“Hitoshi says I have to personally greet fifty people before I’m allowed,” Todoroki said despondently.

“As you should,” Hitoshi drawled, his arm still firm and comfortable over Izuku’s shoulder.

Izuku had a sneaking suspicion that Hitoshi was only doing this to exhibit the sight of a pack for the people. Without saying or doing anything aggressive or threatening, Hitoshi demonstrated to the world that Izuku was off limits to everyone but them. It was a clever strategy and very Hitoshi in execution.

“You hiding behind me?” Katsuki demanded suddenly, twisting to look over his shoulder where Todoroki peeked out.

The sight was fairly comical, considering Todoroki was the taller of the two of them, and just as sought out by public, heroes, and businessmen alike as Katsuki. Possibly more, as Todoroki often made a point to never sign publicity deals, do excessive interviews, or anything extra involved with being a hero aside from saving people.

“Ah. . .” Hitoshi said, dragging the sound in a telling way. Katsuki and Izuku looked in the direction of his lavender stare and spotted the hulking figure and a pair of tawny wings standing in the frame of the dining room doorway. “Daddy’s here.”

“Where the fuck is the open bar,” Todoroki deadpanned from his spot behind Katsuki, his chin dropping to settle in disappointment upon his wide shoulder. “I’m tired.”

Katsuki rolled his eyes but didn’t shrug his friend off. Despite the looming presence of no one’s favorite person, he had to smile at them. Todoroki was rarely free and easy with anyone, but Izuku imagined their lives together had forged some kind of brotherhood that even Izuku couldn’t understand. In a way, it made him happy. Not the pain or suffering they may have experienced in their youth, much too early and undoubtedly traumatizing—but that they had each other. That Katsuki had people who cared for him and, clearly, vice versa.

“You have to pass your dad to get to the bar,” Hitoshi said, eyebrows rising slowly, expectantly. “Let’s bite the bullet and go for it, okay? We’re all here. He can hardly—”

“Let’s not underestimate what he will or won’t do in public,” Todoroki said flatly. For a moment, he and Hitoshi’s gazes locked in some kind of silent war before Hitoshi’s brow twitch, his lips quirking with some kind of obvious victory. Todoroki sighed. “Fine. Let’s get it over with. I don’t know why you’re always so insistent. He treats you like shit, too.”

“Only because I can’t give him grandkids,” Hitoshi amiably replied as the herd of them began to move as one. Todoroki leaned and bumped into Hitoshi’s frame as they went, a dreamy mirage of stark white suit blended into the silver moonlight shimmer of the other. “Otherwise, he loves me. Begrudgingly, yes, but most people love me that way. Right, Izuku?”

“My love is extremely begrudged,” Izuku said, grinning despite himself.

“That must be your signature,” Katsuki added, his pinky catching around Izuku’s as he smirked down at Izuku.

“My love for you is not begrudging, you’re just obnoxious.”

“So is Shinsou!”

“No, he’s always right about pretty much everything and that’s why my love is begrudging.”

“Hah? I’m always right about everything too!”

“Debatable.”

“SHOUTOOO!”

Izuku nearly leapt out of his stylish black shoes at the boom of Endeavor’s approaching voice. Eyes large, he half-shielded himself behind Katsuki, one hand tight around his mate’s wrist as an unexpected jolt of panic stung at his nerves.

Big Alpha, Big Scary Alpha. Omega doesn’t like that, we don’t like him.

“Hey,” Katsuki murmured in a low, soothing tone, although he seemed to instinctively step a little further in front of Izuku anyway. Warm, lapping waves soothed at the frayed edges of their bond, quieting. “S’fine. S’okay.”

“Shouto!” Endeavor broke the crowd like some kind of legendary titan of old gods and blood sacrifices, his stern visage somehow more frightening without the Hellfire flames licking from his facial features. He swept a limp Todoroki up in his tree trunk arms and squeezed, swinging his full-grown son just enough to make him look like he might snap. “I knew you would come! What a delight, what an evening to spend with my favorite son! I made sure we’re seated at the same table, you know.”

“I don’t want t—”

“I have my ways, you know.”

“I wish you didn’t.”

“Now, let me look at you. Let me see you, Shouto.” Endeavor let Todoroki to his feet, his eyes all and only for his beloved son. Izuku had never seen them together in action—had only heard stories over the past six or so years of friendship—but the doting dad energy Endeavor gave off was not exactly. . .expected.

“I’m exactly the same,” Todoroki sad flatly. “Promise.”

“Hey hey, don’t hog him.” Hawks promptly shoved Endeavor aside with the force of one wing, blatantly ignoring the glare from his not-lover as he beamed and opened arms for a hug. Despite his stature, Hawk’s presence exceeded that of perhaps even Endeavor.

He was a Beta and yet seemed somehow ethereal, illuminated from the inside out; angelic in appearance until one reached the eyes. They appraised Todoroki, Hitoshi, Katsuki, and himself in quick, sharp-shooter succession even as he slung an arm around Todoroki and yanked him down to his height for an obnoxious kiss on the temple.

“Hi,” Hawks said, plain and simple.

And then Izuku realized that he was looking at him.

“Me?” Izuku squeaked, struggling to find the confidence he’d developed within the costume of mysterious, deadly Omega he’d contrived for himself tonight. “I mean—hi! Hello! It’s a pleasure to meet you Mr Hawks.”

“Hawks is fine.” Hawks was openly inspecting him now, a lazy sweep of golden gaze that did nothing to detract from the piercing, perceptive nature of the scrutiny. “You’re Katsuki’s mate.”

“Midoriya Izuku,” Izuku replied, rather than snapping: I do have a fucking name.

“Shinsou,” Endeavor said sternly, interrupting whatever Hawks was going to reply. “You look well.”

“I am perpetually well,” Hitoshi replied with a Sphynx-like smile, unreadable to even Izuku. “Thank you. And yourself? You seem excited for the evening to begin.”

“As I am on the board of management for this event, I damn well better look forward to it,” Endeavor said, and somehow Izuku got the impression that he was intentionally not greeting Izuku at all. “And what of you? I hope you have been doing your part for the publicity in which my son refuses to take part. Holding up your end of the relationship with such a prestigious family is paramount to—”

“If anyone is making this family look good,” Todoroki interrupted, eyes narrowed, “it’s my mate. Father. So if you could kindly fuck off—”

“Ground Zero,” Hawks cut in with an easy drawl that reminded Izuku of Hitoshi’s purposefully slow mouth and sharp mind. “It’s been a while. You’re not gonna greet your old Uncle Hawks?”

“Whose uncle are you?” Katsuki said, looking actively disgusted at the thought. “Old? You’re practically my age.”

“He sure is,” Todoroki sing-songed, side-eying his father, whose expression darkened in a shadow of Dabi’s.

A spike of alarm cut through Izuku’s core and Katsuki quickly looked over his shoulder, his brows screwed up in question as he must have felt it through the bond without understanding.

“And how did you find pretty little Mr Midoriya here?” Hawks asked as if no one else had spoken at all. Those shrewd eyes were edged with humor and curiosity, but the deeper intent to know was clear. “You own a bookstore, don’t you?”

“And that’s how we met,” Katsuki interrupted before Izuku could speak. “You’ve figured it out, congratulations, what a great mind of our time you are. Can we go get booze now?”

Izuku knew if Katsuki of all people was asking for the alcohol, this was a situation where it was best they escaped.

“Yes,” Todoroki said, “Let’s find—”

“Are you going to introduce me or not?” Endeavor snapped, his beefy arms folded across a chest so large it seemed to threaten the seams of his strictly cut tuxedo. “Shouto. Your guest.”

Todoroki’s jaw tested, his eyes flashing gunmetal grey and flaming blue on Izuku and then his father.

“As you heard, this is Midoriya Izuku. My friend.”

Cold blue eyes looked down a strong, handsome nose, a tower of muscle and masculinity housing a hundred horror stories fed to Izuku through Todoroki and Hitoshi and even Dabi over the years of their various relationships. Izuku managed a small smile as he edged out from behind Katsuki, letting go of his head to step forward and face him fully.

“Mr Endeavor, hello. It’s a pleasure to finally meet you.”

“Is it?”

“Of course,” Izuku replied instantly. He wasn’t about to have it out with the King of Todorokis here and now. In fact, he didn’t want an altercation whatsoever. Despite Todoroki’s lamentations of his father's disposition, Izuku sometimes got the inkling through errant stories that Endeavor felt his own sorrow in his past actions and was paying for them accordingly.

“Bakugou!” Everyone whirled at the woman’s voice hollering over the crowd. Her hair was a pink riot and her tuxedo shirt was left scandalously unbuttoned to the point of her hefty cleavage nearly spilling from their thin confines. The woman in thick black glasses grinned as she bounded forward. “Bakugou, hey, hey! Great timing, great, I wanted you to meet the CEO of this startup tech company who I’d told you about at your last costume fitting. Remember, the ones who can use your sweat to—”

“What the fuck, Mei? I’m literally in the middle of—”

“It’s okay,” Izuku kept his smile brave as he waved at his mate. “Go ahead, do your hero thing. I’ll find you.”

Katsuki scowled.

“But—”

“Go,” Izuku urged with a laugh. “It’s me, remember?”

Katsuki’s frown deepened, but he only nodded and turned to follow the bouncy, bubbly Mei into the crowd.

Genuinely smiling from Katsuki’s concern, Izuku turned to further speak with Endeavor.

“I’m sorry I—” Izuku frowned with the realization that he and Endeavor were alone in the conversation now. He looked around, inwardly startled by the disappearing view of Hawks ushering his friends into the dining room and into oblivion. “Wait, wh—”

“You don’t look special to me,” Endeavor said, close to him now, voice low and deep and eerily like Dabi’s. “Plain, if anything.”

Izuku blinked, his brain shorting out, the light of his confidence going dark as quickly as he’d lit it just hours ago.

“E-excuse me? We just met, sir. I would never claim—“

“You don’t have to,” Endeavor said, sniffing in obvious derision. Those cold-yet-hot eyes seemed to scour Izuku’s face. For what, Izuku couldn’t know.  “You’re the one, aren’t you? The one who managed to entice two of my precious sons. Heaven forbid you ever meet the third.”

Izuku felt his face burn up to his ears, mingled shame and horror as realization climbed up his throat like a noose.

“Entice, sir? I’m hardly—”

“You don’t think I had him watched, all those years ago? The surveillance photos of you two together are damning, Omega. I don’t know what you told him back then to convince him to wreck such havoc after your being the last one to speak to him before he went through with it—”

“I—I didn’t!”

Endeavor loomed in closer, a malevolent deity in his own right.

“I have eyes, don’t I? I won’t be fooled. Seeing you up close, I can imagine how you managed to seduce them both somehow.”

“Seduce?” Izuku squawked, much too loud. “Sir, excuse me, but I think you’re mistaken. Whatever you think you know—”

Endeavor had closed in on him faster than Izuku thought possible for a man of his stature. His presence was oppressive and Izuku quickly found it hard to breathe as he found himself looking into the identical eyes of Dabi.

“Look at you. Enchanting little thing. The entire room is looking at you. I suppose—”

“Am I enchanting or am I plain, Mr Endeavor?” Izuku snapped, flaring with indignance. Size difference or not, father of his best friend and ex-lover or not, Izuku refused to wilt any longer. He was powerful here, in this costume, behind his makeup. He was so much more than lesser. And he certainly wouldn’t be blamed for the crimes of one Todoroki or the close friendship of another. “I may not know much about you, but if there is anything I did learn from your sons, it was that you don’t know either of them. Equally in turn.”

“You insolent—”

“Perhaps,” Izuku enunciated, his fists shaking at his sides as he held Dabi’s eyes and channelled the fury, “you are simply jealous that I've been a more vital part of them than you’ll ever be. Friends, confidants, family. In whatever way one can imagine, you fail.”

Endeavor’s eyebrows flared in a Hellfire flame so quick that Izuku recoiled a step in surprise.

“How dare you—”

“Izuku!” said a voice he didn’t recognize at all. “There you are—I’ve been looking for you!”

“Uh—” Izuku caught the flash of dark, sparkling eyes and a dashing smile before a thick, meaty arm entwined with his to drag him away. “S-sure.”

“Sorry. Mr Endeavor. Take care of yourself, your family, all that. Goodbye!”

“H—hey, wait, wait—” Izuku was dragged and wedged through the crowd, gaze wide and intent on an impressive set of shoulders and a riot of black curls.

Through the wide open doors of the dining room they swept, and just like that it was as  jumping into a soft, iridescent bubble of classical music and sparkling champagne, crisp white table clothes and crystal glasses surrounded by the elite of the hero world and all its machinations. Laughter and beauty sang from every angle, like turning a multi-faceted diamond in a palm and finding no flaws. The glamor of the dreamy dimmed lights and effervescent lilt of conversation was awe inspiring to someone who spent their teens in back alleys and warehouses, getting in fist-fights with his boyfriend until he fucked him up against brick walls or next to dumpsters.

And then his savior turned with a sharp, dashing smile and dark, clever eyes, and for a moment, Izuku was a just a little dazed by it all.

“H-hello,” Izuku managed. The stranger—he had to be a hero with a build like that—was still holding his hand, albeit gently, like Izuku was something fragile when he was mostly made of broken bones and glue. “I’m, um—thank you?”

“You’re very welcome, Mr Midoriya,” the person replied with excessive manners. “You looked like you needed a little saving.”

“No, I was perfectly fine on my—”

“How about a dance?”

“A dance?” Izuku squeaked, but he was already being pulled into the center floor, marble tile beneath his feet and chandeliers sprinkling light above his head. “Wait! Who are you?”

A large, strong hand pressed at the small of Izuku’s back as the man took the lead and turned Izuku in a graceful sweep, his easy smile unrelenting. He really was handsome, in a dark prince kind of way. Alpha? Beta?

“My apologies, how rude of me. My name is Shindo Yo and you’re the only person I wanted to meet tonight?”

“Me?” Izuku asked, obviously incredulous as he shook his head and laughed it off. “Believe me. There’s nothing you’ll get from me that’ll be particularly exciting. Or that the news hasn’t already reported on me ad nauseum. So if you’re looking for me to give you something, you’ll have to leave empty-handed, Mr Shindo.”

“Just Shindo, please.” Shindo pulled Izuku a fraction closer in their dancing embrace, and Izuku found it remarkably easy to keep time with him even when he himself wasn’t a particularly good dancer. “We’re practically friends with all of the mutual acquaintances we have.”

“Oh?” Izuku’s instincts were rising with each turn of the dance floor, and while the part of him that enjoyed a dangerous man—most likely Alpha—the wiser, older portion of himself began to watch and listen closely. “In my limited experience, the hero world seems more like a highly dysfunctional, incestuous family rather than a pack of close friends.”

Shindo paused mid-dance and burst into a laugh, sweeping Izuku back into the steps as he grinned down at Izuku with delight.

“You’re not wrong, Mr Midoriya, you’re not wrong. Certainly we are not a perfect group of individuals. Can you ever forgive us?”

Despite himself, Izuku laughed lightly and shook his head, his palm comfortably cupped in Shindo’s giant one.

“Since I’m mated with one, I suppose I’ll have to. My pack as well.”

“Your pack?”

Izuku inwardly cursed himself. His motormouth always got the best of him, even when he was trying not to give himself away. No reporter had ever gotten wind of his deep, life-long involvement with some of  Japan’s most prestigious young heroes.

“Nevermind. Are you going to spin me around this room until I swoon for you or something, because I promise it won’t happen.”

Shindo blinked, his dark eyes sparking with genuine humor as he laughed again and squeezed Izuku’s hand in their dance.

“You’re funny. I like you. I really do. She would have too if she’d have given you a chance.”

Smiling in turn and just a little at ease in Shindo’s dance, Izuku cocked his head.

“Who?”

“Camie,” Shindo said, his mouth going hard, the light in his black eyes dropping like an iron gate. “She really would have liked you. I can tell.”

Izuku stopped dead in the center of the ballroom floor, his feet weighed down like lead, his gut sinking like a stone. He didn’t move, didn’t attempt escape. The smell of copper and Camie’s hysterical laughter projected behind his eyes like some distant horror film.

“You mean the Omega Killer,” Izuku said hoarsely. His throat and the healing scar tingled and ached with a phantom pain. “The one who left me bleeding out in an alley.”

“Not her best moment,” Shindo said in an offhand way that showed very little empathy, if he was even feeling any. “I mean, none of it was. She’s got a shitty personality sometimes.”

“Sometimes,” Izuku echoed numbly. “She was a murd—“

“She was my best friend,” Shindo said simply. Despite the lack of inflection in his voice, his hand tightened around Izuku’s and his dashing features sunk into some shadow of sadness that Izuku recognized. Loss, failure. “I suppose I wanted to meet the guy who beat her.”

“I didn’t beat her,” Izuku said quietly.

“Twice, actually.”

Izuku flinched automatically at the name—word, not name, but didn’t shy from Shindo’s secret sad eyes.

“Why are you talking to me really, Mr Shindo?”

“Shindo, please.” And then Shindo was whisking him around the floor once more, his sparkle and charm renewed as if it had never gone. “Can I tell you a secret?”

“I doubt it’s much of a secret if you’re telling me, of all people.”

“Oh, but you’re the safest person to tell. No one will ever listen to you.”

Izuku laughed even though he recognized the truth of the statement.

“Alright, go for it. I’m here, after all.”

“Camie’s jealousy was what motivated her to kill you. Not her original agenda against Omegas.” When Izuku opened his mouth to object, Shindo only shook his head. “She didn’t tell me. I never had an inkling until her arrest. But I know her and I know Bakugou, and I know she went for you because she wanted what you had.”

“Why are you telling me this?” Exasperated, Izuku finally shook himself from their literal and metaphorical dance, turning to escape.

“Because—“ Shindo spun Izuku by the shoulder, his expression stern and serious once more. “Because I needed to see for myself, too. What was so special about you.”

“Why?” Izuku stressed. “Because you wanted to secure him for her needs?”

Shindo’s smile was still and serene.

“No. Because I wanted to see if I still had a chance with him.”

Izuku blinked. Waited for a further explanation. Got none. Boggled.

“I’m—sorry, excuse me. Aren’t you. . .” When Shindo didn’t reply but continued to enigmatically smile, Izuku blew a breath of frustration. “I mean, aren’t you an Alpha?”

Shindo’s eyes wrinkled with genuine glee. He approached and Izuku kept his ground, more flabbergasted than insulted at this point. Very slowly, as if approaching with great care with the thought of Izuku’s comfort in mind, Shindo leaned in, his hand lightly placing on the lush velvet of Izuku’s shoulder as he spoke directly in his ear.

“Haven’t you heard the kind of fun Alphas can have together, little Omega? And we both know who the most coveted Alpha is in this room.”

“I can’t say that I do know,” Izuku said firmly. “This place is fucking overrun. Someone needs to call the pound and pick up their strays.”

Shindo’s laughter was as rich and luscious as the deep forest fabric of Izuku’s suit. He released Izuku from the light persuasion of his hold and wiped a tear from his eye as he considered Izuku’s cross expression.

“Alright. Alright, I get it now.”

Izuku frowned, his ire lost as quickly as it came.

“What?”

“Why he’s yours,” Shindo said, quiet and serious all of a sudden.

“Mine?” Izuku could barely keep up since the moment Shindo tugged his hand and took him for a ride. “Bakugou? Why is he mine?”

“You.” Shindo’s mouth curved faintly, and that well of shadow darkened his eyes once more before he smiled anew. “Just you. Neither Camie or I could ever be you, could we?”

“I hope not,” Izuku said with a shrug. “The world doesn’t need that.”

Shindo’s dark, manicured eyebrows shot up.

“Maybe it does.”

“Hey!” The instant comfort of Hitoshi’s approaching voice slumped the tension from Izuku’s shoulders as he turned with a shaky smile of relief. Hitoshi skimmed between the ground like some ethereal being carved of silver, pearl, and opal, his lips curved in one of his Mona Lisa smiles as he offered out one of two champagne glasses he held. “There you are. I’m sorry we lost you. I think Hawks already had a mission from Big Daddy to give the two of you some space. Was it as awful as I can only imagine it would be? I spent years being drilled at the dinner table before he’d even greet me at the door on visits.”

Izuku accepted a glass and peered over his shoulder to find Shindo gone, melted into the sea of shimmering elite. He looked back with a grateful smile and took a long sip of his champagne before he spoke.

“Let’s just say Endeavor knows more about me than I ever imagined he’d care to.”

“He wants to know everybody’s business. He’s a lonely busybody with too much time on his hands. His kids barely let him in into their lives, so he forces it.” Hitoshi’s pale eyes narrowed, taking in Izuku’s countenance. “He shook you up, didn’t you. What about?”

“Uh. You know. My past and whatever.” Izuku frowned into his drink, his brows bunching in recollection. “Come to think of it. He seemed especially upset about, well. . .Do you remember the night he and Dabi had the stand-off in the middle of Tokyo? The casualties, the destruction—”

“Who could forget?” Hitoshi mirrored Izuku’s expression of concern. “What about it? You weren’t even there.”

“I, well—” Izuku downed the rest of his champagne and wished it went to his head a little more. His tolerance was too high, even after all these years. “I wasn’t, that’s true. But the day he went out and did—I was with him. The night before and uh, into the day. You know.”

Hitoshi didn’t speak. Only tilted his head and listened. Izuku inhaled shakily.

“I don’t know! I don’t know. That day, it felt almost like any other day. He’d been a little off, but fuck. I was, what, seventeen, newly eighteen? I had no idea what he was going to do! He never talked to me about anything really important. But I was maybe the last person to see him, to interact with him, and apparently Endeavor knew that all along. I think that he thinks—”

“If he thinks you would ever have anything to do with actively, purposely hurting another person, he’s more of a bitter, obtuse asshole than I ever dreamed.”

Izuku sighed and placed his glass on the silver tray of a passing waiter, aiming pleading eyes up to his best friend.

“I don’t—I don’t know. It was a lot. And then Shindo—”

“Shindo?” Hitoshi’s features hardened. “What about him? What did he do to you?”

“Nothing.” Izuku shrugged, unconsciously bringing his thumbnail to his mouth and quickly bringing it down and pocketing his hands. “He was fine. It was fine. Hey, where is everyone?”

It was Hitoshi’s turn to elegantly shrug a shoulder.

“Scattered to the winds. Shouto is at the bar. At least it’s easy to find him that way. Last I saw Bakugou—”

Someone standing at the wide, sweeping stage overseeing the immaculately dressed table settings spoke into a jarringly loud microphone, calling everyone to find their allotted table and name cards. Izuku gathered the speeches, dining, and show portion of the evening was about to begin, and he was eternally fucking grateful for it. That meant no one would be allowed to talk to him for at least an hour.

“I’m going to miss you,” Hitoshi said with exaggerated sorrow. “Send out a prayer to the fickle gods as I spend the evening dining with Endeavor and Hawks.

“Hawks doesn’t seem so bad,” Izuku said, smiling now as they ambled toward the tables. “Scary in the eyes, though. Reminds me of you.”

“Thank you,” Hitoshi said graciously. “And yeah, he’s fine. But when the two of them are together, the eye-fucking alone could fog up every pair of glasses in the room. It’s not exactly my idea of viewing pleasure, but it is what it is.”

Izuku scrunched his face in commiseration and wished him luck. Hitoshi was already gliding away when he felt the increasing pressure of Katsuki’s approach before he heard or saw him. Izuku turned around with a smile on his face just as Katsuki reached out to spin him.

“Hi,” Izuku said, anxiety melting to appreciation as he took in the sight of his mighty mate anew. The artful braids trailing from his temples reminded him of their first kiss. New Year’s Eve. Karaoke. The snapping cold, the almost desperate frustration in Katsuki’s eyes, the fireworks. His cold lips and the fear in Izuku’s heart as he’d jumped off a steep and deadly cliff. His hair had been similar to this—Mina probably did it both times. He’d have to thank her somehow. “You’re so handsome.”

Katsuki recoiled at the compliment, his cheeks flushing with another shock of shyness that left Izuku intensely delighted. Did he really compliment Katsuki so little that when he now did, it elicited such a sweet reaction? Izuku needed to test it through the night.

“Shut up,” Katsuki snapped, taking Izuku by the wrist and dragging him to their table. “You’re embarrassing. Come meet some assholes.”

“That seems to be the theme,” Izuku murmured drolly as he followed.

Luckily for him, it didn’t seem like anyone at all from their table was an asshole. Katsuki’s agency co-workers were all there, partners in tow.

Togata Mirio, the famous smiling successor of All Might’s tutelage, and at his side the visibly anxious Amajiki Tamaki. Izuku had always been curious about him, as he had with any male Omega hero. He wondered if anyone had ever interviewed them all and written a book about their life experiences. What a joy that would be for young boys across the world.

Kirishima was joyfully present with Mina at his side, and Izuku found himself wedged between Bakugou and her, which made him seven levels of nervous. There was something so inherently intense about her that he was sure most people found simultaneous addictive and awe-inspiring. He’d only ever heard brilliant things of her from Hitoshi over the years, and her television show alongside Kaminari Denki had been a guilty pleasure of Izuku even during his rebellious years.

Finally, seated at the round table was a cheerful, purple-haired hero named Nejire, who Izuku quickly recalled was part of The Big Three back when Izuku had still been a pre-teen with pitiful hopes to become a hero himself. Her mate, Haya Yuyu, was the most approachable of the table, in Izuku’s opinion, and he found himself wishing he’d been seated beside her calm, genial demeanor.

Not that there was anything wrong with anyone here! But the riot of high emotions in this building were a little overwhelming for a person who’d spent the majority of five years keeping his socialization to a specific minimum.

“Finally!” Mirio exclaimed. He’d insisted on a first-name basis around the table and Izuku was charmed enough to agree. “We meet the infamous captor Bakugou’s heart! What a joy, what an honor, thank you for coming!”

Overwhelmed already, Izuku felt his face go up in flame as he laughed nervously and struggled not to run his hand through the artfully tousled curls Hitoshi had concocted atop his head.

“That’s not necessary. It’s a pleasure to meet you all. Everything feels like a dream. All of you are so—” Famous. Important. Better than me. “A-accomplished,” Izuku finished weakly. Katsuki held his hand beneath the table.

“Don’t sell yourself short,” Ashido said from beside him, a glittering visage of vibrant fabulosity as he held his gaze with those depthless black and gold eyes. There truly was something of an Alien Queen about her, and it wasn’t entirely her looks, but her attitude and the way she carried herself. “You saved yourself without the help of a hero, and not many can say that for themselves. Just as importantly, you saved a world of Omegas who might have befallen a less lucky fate than yourself.”

“Luck ain’t nothin’ to do with it,” Katsuki all but growled, his grip tightening on Izuku’s hand as he shot daggers at just about everyone at the table, as if they’d dare disagree. “If anything, this guy is unlucky as fuck.”

“Gee, thanks,” Izuku muttered,  catching Yuyu smiling at him with a glint in her eye and smiling back.

“Seriously,” Katsuki stressed. “This guy is half-way to a hero in his own right. We’ve all met some half-assed heroes that weren’t cut out for the job no matter how much they wanted it. This one’s got what it takes.”

“But you’re Quirkless, aren’t you?” Nejire said with a harmlessly curious expression. The malice or judgement was not present, and Izuku found his stiff shoulders minutely relaxing.

The drinks arrived and appetizers were settled before everyone as the conversation lulled. As the waiters dispersed, Katsuki cut in again.

“Quirkless or not. He’s got what it takes.”

“I don’t,” Izuku said quickly, laughing nervously as he fiddled with the stem of his wine glass. “I really don’t, but I’ve gotten a fair few punches through to Katsuki’s face that he just might believe it now.”

For a split second, the entire table slowed in stilled, six pairs of eyes fixed on him as they took in the information of an Omega actually hitting one of Japan’s most revered Alpha Heroes. And then they all burst into a riotous laughter that turned curious heads from other tables.

“S’not that funny,” Katsuki grumbled with a distinct sulk before he stuffed bread into his mouth. “Shut up.”

“I think it’s cute how supportive he is,” Yuyu said, meeting Izuku’s blushing face. “It’s hard to be a Hero’s partner when we’re not one ourselves. It’s two different worlds. But Bakugou believes in you, and that’s the best support there is.”

Izuku’s agreement was drowned out by the louder, more enthusiastic supporters of this—namely, Mirio and Kirishima.

“Very rare, very rare indeed,” Mirio said with a series of nods. “Even more rare is having a table with three male Omegas together! Tamaki, isn’t it rare? What do you think? Is it exciting?”

“Exciting?” Amajiki echoed softly, his dark, sweet expression freezing as he seemed to realize everyone was looking at him. “Exciting, um, that’s—it’s very different. It’s different.”

“I’ve looked up to Suneater and Red Riot for a long time,” Izuku admitted, mentally wishing the fire in his cheeks would finally die down. But he wanted to save Amajiki from his apparent discomfort and so jumped into the spotlight. “Heroes like you too, they give the world hope. Especially when it seems like the world is so actively against us that our lives are threatened.”

Izuku felt Katsuki stiffen at his side, no doubt with the insinuation of Camie, and quickly decided to backtrack from that line of conversation too.

“How did you two find your lives before UA?” Izuku asked; a genuine question he’d been hoping to have the chance to discuss.

“Scary,” Amajiki said at the same time Kirishima said, “Challenging.”

Empathy and sadness coursed through Izuku in a deep wave of understanding, each of them nodding to each other with a soul-deep level of solidarity no one else at the table could comprehend. There was more than they could ever say in one simple dinner.

“The three of you are so different, though,” Nejire said, sounding delighted by this information rather than condemning any one way a male Omega ‘should’ be. “Tamaki has always had a sweet kitten heart, hasn’t he, Mirio?”

“Yes,” Mirio said with obvious adoring warmth. Ignoring Tamaki’s slumping form and bowed head of embarrassment, he smiled and rested his head upon Tamaki’s shoulder with a happy sigh. “He’s perfect.”

“Kirishima is a relentless dog,” Katsuki said flatly, but both the hero in question and his mate laughed heartily at that and exchanged adoring looks.

“And what are you, Midoriya?” Nejire asked, her hand covering Yuyu’s upon the pristine table cloth.

“A stray mutt,” Izuku said, not finding it in him to laugh or blush. It was true, after all. He was a ragged mix of fight and flight, more than one gender and persuasion, scavenging what scraps the world had offered him over the years.

“No!” Kirishima cut in, “You’re not, you’re—”

“Strays fight twice as hard as any housepet,” Katsuki said, sliding a sidelong glance at his mate. “And mutts live twice as long as a purebred. I don’t see the problem.”

Izuku’s breath hitched, his smile blooming swiftly, their bond floating like parting clouds and sunshine over still waters.

“He’s worth it,” Mirio said, more mellow than his previously jubilant declarations. When Izuku finally tore his gaze from his mate, he realized Mirio was speaking to Katsuki. “I can see it now. He was worth it all.”

All the trouble Katsuki had gotten himself into. The desperation, the mistakes, walking the thin line of judgement from the press and his profession. Izuku watched Katsuki nod with the full weight of sobriety and felt his heart clench.

How much had Katsuki been willing to give up for him in this past half year? How much effort and adoration, struggle and strife, had he withstood from not just Izuku himself, but his peers and the rest of the world?

And yet he sat here with Izuku at his side, defending his stray mutt not as an owner, but as an equal.

“I love you so much,” Izuku murmured in Katsuki’s ear when dinner was served and the speeches began. “More than you’ll ever know.”

Katsuki stilled, stern as stone, staring ahead at nothing, eyes blank  while the bond between them churned and rioted in splashes of tangerine and red, colors of a sunrise over the swelling sea.

He didn’t reply. But he didn’t need to. This was the foundation of their love story.

As the speeches and short films droned on about undoubtedly important matters, like the well-being of the underprivileged in areas of high crime, funding for rebuilding areas destroyed by Hero-Villain battles, and so forth, Izuku found himself thinking only of Chisaki Kai.

They’d met at strange times in each other’s lives. Upheaval and upset, deception and uncertainty. Kai had been rising through the ranks of the criminal underworld with the specific purpose of finding who had kidnapped Eri, and Izuku had been plunging himself into dangerous waters just to see how good it would feel to drown.

They’d been on different paths, but even then, Kai had kept him close. He’d been the one to save Izuku from the two Alphas who’d been beating him to a pulp in an alleyway. Sure, Izuku had been fighting tooth and nail and loving every second of the reckless release, but he’d been losing.

Kai had disintegrated a grown man’s arm like he’d been flicking a fleck of lint off of his coat. Sixteen year-old Izuku had watched in tandem reverence and terror.

After Eri had been found, Kai had committed himself to the community. The fear and power he’d fostered in his time in search of Eri had brought respect and accord, and quickly he’d turned his affairs toward the community. Those on the outskirts, forgotten or lost or devoured by the system so inclined to save only the ‘worthy’ and praise heroes who carelessly destroyed businesses and homes in the midst of their fights for greater glory.

If anyone should be here—if anyone should be at the center of a grateful speech, it should be Chisaki Kai.

But pride was one of Kai’s fatal flaws. Pride and his extremely specific, exclusive ideals against Alphas and heroes and current societal norms. Izuku had been much the same before Katsuki had set his life aflame like a cleansing prairie fire, leaving only new fresh roots and growth. Izuku’s own change of heart had been a slow development, nurtured by Katsuki’s words and actions.

To change his way of living and thinking hadn’t been, and still wasn’t, easy. Changing one’s mind meant changing an outlook, and changing one’s outlook changed how a person viewed the world. And then your world changes.

Even the brave, brazen Chisaki Kai would be scared of his world turning upside down. A new right-side up.

Perhaps there would also be someone who could hold Kai safe and firm as the axis of his world turned.

“Don’t look so sad,” Ashido’s voice shocks Izuku from his deep thought. “You're muttering to yourself. Tonight’s the night to make your impression on the world. I’m rooting for you.”

“Y-yes!” Izuku sat up straighter, grabbing for his third—fourth?—glass of wine and drinking down to calm his parched throat and nerves. “Thank you!”

Ashido was right, though. This was the night to leave everyone doubtless of who he was and of what he was capable. He didn’t need photos taken of him slouched in his chair, twisting his bottom lip as he pondered the disparities of equality and justice in the world. Even though that was technically what the gala was focused upon. Ironies and whatnot.

With the wine finally buzzing in his blood and loosening his limbs, Izuku realized he needed to pee. He stood as quietly as possible, ignoring the watchful eyes on his back, and whispered to Katsuki where he was going. Katsuki met his eyes in dimmed lighting, the film on the big screen before them flickering a kaleidoscope of color across his striking features.

“I could go with you,” Katsuki murmured, husky and deep and full of intention.

Izuku’s blood surged in reply.

Haven’t you heard the kind of fun Alphas can have together?

Shindo’s velvet insinuation drifted to the surface of Izuku’s thoughts without warning. Izuku’s gaze narrowed on Katsuki’s open, trusting face—and something inside him licked it great, pointed jaws in secret, seductive desire.

Izuku could tell the moment Katsuki noticed it, because his eyes widened and his breath caught briefly in his throat before it shuddered forth slowly.

The entire exchange happened in the manner of seconds.

“Later,” Izuku said, briefly skimming his thumb across one jagged cheekbone. “Handsome.”

Without looking back, Izuku strode from the ballroom and into the sparsely occupied hallway. He inhaled deep, drinking lungfuls of fresh air that wasn’t simultaneously shared with three-hundred other people.

“Oh boy,” he said to no one. “Oh boy.”

In the vast, echoing bathroom of pristine white and gold ornate fixtures, Izuku spent some time staring at himself in the mirror, searching his face for the change he felt sure was happening within.

The magic of Hitoshi’s makeup remained in full play. The smudge of shadow tilted his large eyes and enhanced their deep, shifting greens. His brows had been faintly darkened and straightened further out, adding to the seriousness and masculinity of his normally more youthful face. His suit was still immaculate and striking.

If no one knew better—and all of Tokyo very well knew better—one might say he was a somewhat striking Alpha.

“Is that what you want to be?” Izuku found himself asking his reflection. What did it mean to be not one or the other? How much Alpha was he really, and why did spending increasing time with his own Alpha make his inner a Alpha snap and snarl for release?

“Who are you really?” Izuku murmured.

His unfamiliar reflection did not answer.

“Oh,” came a voice from the bathroom entry. Izuku spun to spot a pale blonde. . .man? Person. A person with good-looking if not indistinguishable features and wide, bleached blue eyes. Possibly Beta, more likely Omega, definitely not Alpha. “It’s you. The felon, right? From the news.”

“Excuse me?” Izuku quickly began to retreat, approaching them with the intent of sweeping by. “I don’t know who you’re talking about, but—“

“Oh please, don’t play dumb Omega,” the person said with a derisive laugh. “You give us a bad name. Moreso than you already have, I suppose. I mean, at least you’re not a hero. That’s the only way it could have been worse.”

“Do I know you?” Izuku snapped, rounding on them with an open snarl. “Or are you going to introduce yourself?”

They smirked with lazy, half-mast eyelids, pointedly looking down on him in every way possible.

“My, my! No need to get riled. You could ask a little more politely. The name’s Monoma Neito. You probably know me much better as the lauded hero, Phantom Thief. I—“

“I’ve never heard of you,” Izuku said flatly,  because it was true. “Do you have something you need from me? I don’t tend to conduct business in the bathroom. Maybe that’s your thing, though. I won’t judge.”

“You’re so awfully lucky to be here at Ground Hero’s side,” Monoma sneered, hands on his hips as he leaned in and lowered his voice, almost goading for a punch. “No one would give you the time of day otherwise, you know that right? So you saved a kid from the Omega Killer. Us real male Omega heroes are out there doing five times as much and you’re the one lauded as some kind of dynamo? Don’t make me laugh.”

“Neither of us are laughing,” Izuku said, eyes narrowed. “But if it makes you feel better, let me tell you a secret that even the papers haven’t caught wind of.”

Monoma blinked those heavy blue eyes, suddenly alert and blessedly silent. The guy truly thought he was convincing enough that Izuku would offer up anything incriminating about himself.

Izuku leaned in and whispered conspiratorially:

“I really really don’t care what you or anyone in that room thinks of me. I didn’t survive attempted murder twice in my life for the people in that room, or to impress my fellow Omegas, or to fall into the arms of m Ground-fucking-Zero, you jealous, self-important asshole. If you want glory, don’t step on others like us to get there.” Izuku met Monoma’s frozen expression. “Unless you’re another Utsushimi Camie? Is that what you’re telling me? Maybe I need to talk to Ground Zero about—“

“Y-you really are as sneaky as I thought you’d be,” Monoma sputtered, but was already backing quickly out of the bathroom. “This won’t be the last you hear from people like us, Omega. We don’t want you representing us when you’re just—“

“I’m a stray,” Izuku said casually, arranging his shoulders back and tilting his chin in a show of dominance as he strolled forward, fisted hands pocketed. “And let me tell you something, Mr Ghost Thief—

“Ph-phantom!”

“Dogs like me are more bite than bark.” Pulling up mental notes from Katsuki’s book, Izuku slicked his tongue across his abnormally pointed fangs and mustered a grin as Monoma continued to fumble toward the door. “So watch how close you get to me when I’m not leashed.”

Monoma gaped.

“You’re fucking crazy.”

Izuku didn’t need to reply. Monoma was already bursting out the exit  and gone in a great bluster of offended sounds.

Izuku stared at the door until he was sure no one was going to come in before he released a great exhale and all but collapsed onto one of the gilded sofas that had no business being in a bathroom. He tipped his head back and stared at the ceiling, simply breathing in the way his therapist had taught him years ago.

Breathe in for four seconds two three four—

Hold for seven seconds five six seven—

Slowly release for eight seconds seven eight—

“Fuck!” Izuku shot up from the couch, his skin and soul vibrating with unshed energy. He wanted to take it out on something, something, but fuck if he knew when or how or even why he was letting himself get so damn riled.

It wasn’t like the article wasn’t going to reach this world. It wasn’t like he could expect to fit in or belong somewhere or—

“H-hey—“

Izuku screamed in surprise which called Amajiki to scream in surprise and quickly they were both standing their with their hands clamped over their mouths in equal shock from the sounds they’d just made at each other.

“Um,” Amajiki mumbled behind his palms. “I just—I wanted to see if you were, were okay.”

Izuku loosely let his arms fall with an easy, breathless laugh of relief and shook his head.

“I—yeah. Fine, I’m fine.”

Amajiki mimicked Izuku’s motions, but glanced warily over his shoulder and back like he was expecting someone to jump out at him.

“Bakugou, he—he looked upset for a moment. Something about your bond. I didn’t, well, sometimes things are harder when an Alpha gets in the way.” Amajiki slowly met Izuku’s eyes and quickly glanced away at nothing. “Y-you know?”

Izuku paused in silence before Amajiki’s genuine concern sunk in.

This practical stranger was worried about me. Another Omega like me, but not at all like the last one.

“Solidarity,” Izuku said, cracking a gentle, almost coaxing smile as he slowly approached the Omega. “Alphas really do stomp around like giants when sometimes tiptoeing is necessary.”

Amajiki’s drawn expression brightened instantly, his mouth quirking in an almost-smile of agreement.

“Like that, yes. So I, well, I just wanted to see. If you were, you know. Good.”

“I’m good now,” Izuku said in all honesty. “Thank you, Amajiki. I’m afraid I was starting to feel a little sorry for myself when such a gift has been presented to me today. Just being here—“

“You don’t always have to be thankful,” Amajiki said quickly. He hugged his own arms but held Izuku’s curious stare as he spoke with quiet assurance. “You don’t always have to thank them. Like we’re lesser. Like they’re doing us a favor by letting us into their world. You don’t. . .you don’t have to be nice and happy just because it makes it easier for everyone else to deal with you. You can, um. . .you can be sad.”

Izuku didn’t realize he was crying until the color drained from Amajiki like a sudden headwound and he rushed in, comforting soft hands cupping Izuku’s face, stuttering apologies as calloused thumbs swept his cheekbones and wiped away the sudden flood of tears.

“Sorry,” Izuku croaked in horror. “Fuck, I’m sorry. I’m sorry, I’m sorry, I—“

“Shhh, it’s okay, this is fine, it’s fine,.” Amajiki cooed, a comfort radiating from the slim, strong arms that enveloped Izuku like a safe, soothing cocoon.

Research confirmed the existence of comfort hormones only released between and for Omegas exclusively. Some kind of nesting instinct in action. Izuku had never experienced it phenomena in person, and as he couldn’t smell he didn’t know if this was that; but the ease of his anxieties was almost instant as he buried his face in the crook of Amajiki’s throat and sucked in shuddering breaths.

Izuku had no concept of how long they remained in the bathroom, or when they ended up on the couch, Izuku’s temple upon Amajiki’s shoulder as they both stared blankly ahead in comfortable silence.

“This isn’t my world,” Izuku murmured hoarsely.

“Me neither,” Amajiki softly said, his cheek pillowed in Izuku’s hair. “Sometimes it feels like the worst decision I ever made. But there are many Izumi Koutas in the world, needing to be saved. And there are many of us who need representation. I’m not the best example of a hero—“

“You’re amazing, you’re—“

“But I don’t want to live my life feeling like a failure. This—this being a hero thing. It’s the purpose I chose for myself, even if I don’t fit the mold. I made the mold fit me.”

Suddenly emotional all over again, Izuku sat up to say—

“ALRIGHT, FUCKERS.” Katsuki shoved through the door in a fury of fiery eyes and flushed cheeks, his teeth bared as he flailed his arms around and hollered. “I’ve been standing outside this shitty bathroom making sure no one came in for the last twenty minutes and I’m sick and fucking tired of being left on the other side of the door from you for the hundredth time in our goddamn relationship when I can feel how upset you are! Just what the hell—“

Izuku was already laughing as he stood and wrapped his arms around Katsuki’s slim waist to beam adoringly up at him.

“You’re so sweet. What a doting Alpha I have.”

Katsuki sputtered, his ears promptly flooding bright red as he worked for words.

“Wh-what—what have you two been—“

“Doesn’t matter,” Izuku said, smiling in earnest as he continued to admire his mate. “I’m good now. Great, even. Wanna dance?”

“Among the fucking urinals? No.”

Izuku grinned and gripped Katsuki’s strong chin in his hand.

“Not here, you asshole. Take me dancing. Show me off. Now.”

Katsuki’s eyes went to the size of saucers. He didn’t need to be told twice.

With Amajiki in silent tow, they wound their way back to the ballroom where speeches had ended and the real party began. The two open bars freely flowed and the music was more modern and peppy as Katsuki yanked Izuku to the dance floor and into his arms.

“You,” Katsuki murmured as he pressed the entire length of his hard, impressive body to Izuku’s, “are a pain in my ass.”

“Not yet,” Izuku said with a raised eyebrow, and proceeded to immediately blush at the insinuation. What was going on with him?

“I’d like to see you try,” Katsuki said with a cocky grin as his hand pressed at the small of Izuku’s back, their hips thrusting into each other’s.

A spark of challenge ignited in an instant. Izuku matched Katsuki’s toothy sneer and met that heated gaze head-on. When he spoke, it was with purposeful depth and sultry seduction.

“Did you say you’d get on your knees for me, Kacchan?”

Katsuki  hissed a sharp breath between clenched teeth and seemed to lean in unconsciously, his attention drifting and sticking to Izuku’s curved, wet mouth.

“Maybe,” he murmured. “Don’t remember.”

“Oh?” Izuku licked his lips slowly, for show. “Maybe I’ll have to remind you how it goes when we get home.”

“Not home,” Katsuki mumbled, still sounding and looking dazed as he seemed intent on Izuku’s tongue peeking out. “Here. A room, I got one upstairs. For you. Us. I’m—fuck, freckles, can’t we just—“

“No.” Izuku rugged on Katsuki’s black silk lapels and yanked him in close. Brushed their noses but edged back from a kiss and smiled at Katsuki’s high, needy whisper. “No, we can’t leave right now. Because you’re going to show everyone in this room that we’re here to stay. Together. Got that, Kacchan?

“Yeah,” Katsuki whispered instantly, intensely, gaze glued to the lips he wasn’t allowed to kiss. Between them their bond went thick and syrupy, hothouse stickiness on the skin and tongue. “Yes, anything, everything.”

Izuku hummed in delicious pleasure, almost a purr as he nuzzled his nose along Katsuki’s jaw and whispered in turn.

“Mmm, good good boy.”

The sound Katsuki made was somewhere between a choke and throaty, guttural growl as he bumped his temple against Izuku’s, seeming to forget altogether that they were meant to be dancing.

“Now,” Izuku said softly. “Dance with me, handsome.”

And they did. Izuku got everything he wanted and then some. As the night grew later, the music grew more frantic and haughty ideals were discarded along with fancy, uncomfortable shoes. The more dignified of the gala promptly left and the rest were left to their own devices—including the DJ.

Somewhere along the way, Izuku had lost his no doubt expensive bow tie, and he certainly would not admit to untying Katsuki’s as well and flinging it to the wayside. He would, however, take credit for having unbuttoned Katsuki’s black dress shirt to the third button, where his chest burst from the confines and sheened faint gold with the sweat of the night.

Knee deep in free-flowing drinks, Izuku smiled deliriously as he found himself caught in the thick, sweaty grip of his old friends, new friends, and all those in between dancing as one heaving crowd of mayhem and hormones. While Izuku was immune to the latter, he had a sneaking suspicion that his suppressants were sweating off and his scent was driving Alphas toward their mates and the un-mated into the arms of someone equally thirsty. Like a siren or an incubus, but no one was allowed to touch him but—

Izuku stopped dead center of the dance floor, even nerve and instinct on fucking fire at the sight of Shindo Yo slinging an arm around Katsuki’s glistening neck to grin and whisper something in Katsuki’s ear.

“YOU.” Izuku cut through the crowd like lightning through black clouds, his skull sloshing with booze and his body bursting with the fanged, hungry thing that had been threatening all night. “Don’t touch what’s mine.”

“Midoriya!” Shindo did not remove his arm and only grinned like Izuku were some approaching puppy and not a wolf coming in for the kill. “Good timing! I was just suggesting to Bakugou that the three of us—“

Izuku’s viper-quick palm strike caught Shindo square on the nose; the devastating angle of Izuku’s height discrepancy only shattering cartilage up between Shindo’s momentarily terrified eyes.

“The three of us?” Izuku hissed was a crowd gasped, hollered, and gathered around as Shindo‘s tuxedo flooded with blood. “None of us. None! Shindo Yo—I don’t do warnings, so consider this your only one. Stay away from my Alpha or I’ll heel you with my teeth like a fucking puppy. Hero or not, I will drag you in ways you cannot begin to fathom. Because that idiot—“ Izuku jammed an accusatory finger at Katsuki, who was gawking at Izuku like he was a golden god. “That idiot is mine. Only mine. Forever. And I don’t take kindly to anything less than total respect.”

Silence but for the dance music filled the mostly empty ballroom. Shindo hadn’t spoken, hadn’t run either. Only stared, dark eyes huge and blood shot as he kept his pocket square clenched around his decimated nose.

“Do you understand?” Izuku snapped, the electricity of indignance and disrespect and jealousy coursing through his veins.

“You’re an Omega?” Shindo asked, his mouth muffled behind his handkerchief, eyes raking over Izuku’s coiled form. He looked to Katsuki, eyes bizarrely lit up with what might have been excitement. “Where the hell did you find this guy?”

Katsuki eyed Shindo’s injury.

“He punched me in the fuckin’ nose.”

Shindo’s smile was unmistakable behind the bloodied cloth.

“Damn, okay. I get it now.”

“You don’t know the half of it.”

“Is this a fucking sleepover or a fight?” Izuku demanded.

A soothing hand slid along Izuku’s tense shoulders and lightly gripped the back of his neck in a soft, soothing heel as Hitoshi spoke.

“I think the fight’s over, champ. Maybe it’s time we all start heading to our rooms. You’ve proved yourself in spades.”

But even as Shindo dispersed and people began to chatter and laugh and discuss the drama of the evening, Izuku couldn’t ease the tension twisting and turning like a screw in his gut. He was ramped up and vibrating under the skin. He hadn’t been overtly challenged so many times in one night since he was a teenager out on the streets looking for trouble, and despite the veneer of glamour glittering over every scene of the night, the premise was still the same.

Izuku had to fight for what he was, who he was, and what belonged to him. More than ever in his life, he felt a purpose to his existence. This night only sharpened his intentions into crystalline clarity.

“Kacchan.” Izuku strode up to his mate, who was speaking in low tones to Kirishima before they broke apart and both looked at Izuku with owlish eyes and silly expressions. “I need you. Now. Let’s go.”

“I need to—”

“No.” Izuku dragged Katsuki close by the low, open collar of his shirt. His Alpha looked beautifully disheveled, like some fierce and war-torn angel with fiery eyes and frayed hair from the wild night. Izuku could swear he could nearly smell the heat waves rising off his body, but it was probably the searing bond between them that made the air seem to waver and hum with the weight of Izuku’s desire. He wanted to watch Katsuki writhe; wanted to claim him and keep him so no one would dare go near him in a lifetime and the next. “Now.”

All at once, Katsuki seemed to realize the distinct desire Izuku was relaying to him here, in front of the milling crowd and anyone to overhear. His gaze went dark and his cheeks bright as he shuddered out a struggling breath and swallowed hard.

“H-holy shit. Okay. Now.”

Notes:

I feel obligated to make a note here that both Endeavor and Shindo are actually some of my favorite characters in BNHA. I adore Monoma too LOL. In fact, the only fandom keychains on my keys are Endeavor and Shinsou! Please do take my characterizations of them with a grain of salt--considering the climate and society of this world, plus their canonical natures.

Also, Shindo really just wanna get laid. It happens.

I hope you enjoyed! This chapter was 16,000 words and the longest in all of Quiet Rapture! I can't wait to hear what you think!

Chapter 40

Summary:

Izuku smiled wider and felt the Alpha inside rustle within the captivity of its darkened den, long glistening teeth and bright green gaze in the black. No one had ever looked that particular beast in the eye and said: Come here, boy.

The man in front of him, however. . .

Notes:

Once more and more, I thank you from the bottom of my heart for reading, for interacting and comment, for sending your kind thoughts and feelings, your empathy, through the vast journey of this fic. Quiet Rapture's THREE YEAR ANNIVERSARY is coming November 22nd and I would never have got here without your support. As the poem goes: I carry you in my heart! Enjoy!

Songs For This Chapter:
Blow - Ashnikko | Spotify | YouTube
nasty - Ariana Grande | Spotify | YouTube
Ride - Lolo Zouai | Spotify | YouTube

Izuku unbuttoned Katsuki’s shirt on the elevator ride up. Surrounded by mirrors on every side, Izuku glanced between Katsuki’s simmering coal eyes to their joint reflections and admired them through the heatwaves of lust radiating from their sweltering, swelling bond.

They were beautiful together. Izuku, spreading Katsuki’s pitch back shirt open, idly tugging the fine cloth from the waistband of his expertly cut trousers. Katsuki’s head was bowed to him, almost in supplication, in reverence to him—and Izuku was admiring them both, absorbing the look of them, and the way it was he who appeared in control of the situation.

Katsuki’s hands were at his sides, lightly clenched while Izuku continued to soak in their reflection, skimming palms up the sculpted plains of Katsuki’s stomach, lightly squeezing the succulent, supple rise of his chest. The Alpha’s heart felt like a wild beast trapped behind bone and blood, rioting against this human body to jump into Izuku’s hands.

Still watching them, Izuku took firm hold of Katsuki’s sharp chin and turned his face in the same direction.

“Look at us,” Izuku murmured, barely recognizing his voice, like it was coming from a different throat, an Alpha’s hard-ridged tone rather than his own sweet lilt. “Look at you. Who looks in charge here? It’s me, isn’t it? You look like you’re going to faint.”

“F-fuck you,” Katsuki managed, but the rebuttal was weak and his eyes gleamed like the burning cherry end of a cigarette as he met Izuku’s eyes in the mirror. “You’re mine. Mine.”

Izuku felt the sear of the statement into his soul, like they were cauterized together by the heat of this roaring desire. He nodded, but squeezed his Alpha’s jaw tighter in his hold and, with his free hand, palmed the thickening bulge straining against the unforgiving blood red suit. In the dim, relaxed lighting of the elevator, the underlying jacquard pattern stamped into Katsuki’s suit shimmered with each ragged breath he took. The effect was like a man stripped of skin, pure muscle and blood rippling with movement as Izuku continued to palm his lover's cock with a firm, almost too hard hand.

“Yes,” Izuku agreed, releasing Katsuki’s jaw only to slide his hand down his throat to lightly hold it in his steady grasp, pressing in just enough to knock Katsuki’s head against the wall. Katsuki gasped, his shoulders startling as he shuddered out a breath, his eyes now back on his mate before him, the firebrand gaze demanding that Izuku look at him, too.

Izuku didn’t.

He couldn’t look away from the tableau they’d created. One of them tall and imposing, god-like in appearance, golden and vibrant with life while wearing the blood of his enemies in a mask of finery. The other small but no less strong; mysterious, smoky eyes that darkened and flickered like deep lakes in the dead of night and forests where fanged beasts crept in wait. 

The one wearing the luscious green velvet controlled this situation. Anyone could see it to look at them right now. The way the warrior in braids and gold jewelry tilted toward the other with a harsh swallow, that wide, bare chest uneven with breath, and the pale, tightening fingers seized around his throat.

Physically, the Alpha looked like he could escape. In reality, there was no earthly way he would.

With an almost detached level of triumph, Izuku gloried in the knowledge that this mysterious man—this man who was himself but not himself, or perhaps more himself than he had ever allowed himself to be—was in full control of this night. Of himself. Of his mate.

“I’m in control,” Izuku said, watching his faintly glossed lips say the words. Then finally, finally he turned and looked to his lover, and said again, with dark shadows in his voice. “I am in control.”

Katsuki’s eyes widened, pupils dilating those blood moons into black eclipse.

“Izuku,” he rasped, leaning in to press his throat further into Izuku’s firm grasp. “You always were.”

The elevator dinged and Izuku whirled in surprise, releasing a shaky breath when he saw no one waiting to get in.

“Oh my god,” Izuku said with a relieved laugh as they filtered into the hallway and Katsuki pulled a keycard from his pocket to frown at the room number. With his shirt splayed out, the long line of his tempting body open for the taking, Izuku only blinked owlishly when Katsuki told him the number.

“Oiy, freckles.” Katsuki waved the keycard around, his grin back to fanged and feral, the bond between them preening and pleased. “My eyes are up here.”

“Dick,” Izuku said, smiling.

“Nah, that’s lower.”

They were giggling like idiots, bumping into each other’s sides as they ambled down the quiet hall. Katsuki was at entrance of their room, swiping the card, when the door opposite theirs whipped opened with a flurry of male voices and—

“Just eat the fucking chicken from room service!” Endeavor had his big, beefy back to them as he ducked his head out of the doorway so not to catch it on his brow. “They have a four star kitchen, for fuck’s sake.”

“Babe,” purred Hawks, but he was small enough not to be seen even though his amused voice sounded directly before his mate. “You know I can’t stand that shit. It’s gotta be the good stuff, from the stalls. Made by very tired people who live, breathe, and sleep chicken. What does a chef know about fried chicken?”

“Plenty, I’m sure. It’s the middle of the goddamn ni—”

“Oh.” Hawks' face peeked around Endeavor’s arm. His fair hair was a riotous bedhead or, more likely, sex hair, his cheeks pleasantly flushed and his eyes cut sharp as amber. He smiled slowly, and Izuku was once again reminded of Hitoshi and his deceptively lazy mannerisms. “Hi again.”

Izuku didn’t flinch from Hawks' stare. He was long used to matching wits with those who thought to test their mettle on him.

“Hello.” Izuku flicked a quick, amused look to Katsuki when the Alpha theatrically groaned and flung the door open. He turned, just as Endeavor did the same. Those blue fire eyes widened and narrowed on Izuku, nostrils flaring as he seemed to scent the air for weakness. Izuku only cocked his head. “Mr Endeavor. Always a pleasure.”

Katsuki slung an arm over Izuku’s stiff shoulders and when he spoke, seemed to really lay on thick the disrespectful hooligan in his demeanor.

“Old man. Rent boy. Got a problem? Wanna start shit tonight ‘cause I am revved the fuck up. Let's go.”

“Alright, alright Ground Zero,” Hawks drawled with a blithe smile, one hand surreptitiously gripping Endeavor’s thick wrist in what Izuku immediately processed as a warning to stay calm and collected. Interesting. From the short amount Izuku had seen, Hawks, a complete Beta, seemed to have a hold on his Alpha too. “I just want food. You all have an extremely enjoyable night.”

Katsuki snorted.

“Sure. Whatever. See ya.”

Katsuki turned and disappeared into the room while Izuku loitered, unable to be the first one to look away from Endeavor’s granite stare.

Endeavor glanced away briefly, clearing his throat.

“You as well. Have a pleasant evening.”

Izuku’s attention flicked between Endeavor and Hawks, lingering on the latter and the way his thumb stroked the side of Endeavor’s hand. A careful, delicate control. More like a suggestion than anything. The cogs in Izuku’s skull continued to turn.

Without replying, Izuku turned and shut the door with a quiet click. Something petty about ignoring Endeavor’s comment made him feel better. He was allowed to be a little underhanded too, sometimes. Right?

He slipped out of his shoes and placed them beside Katsuki’s, sighing with pleasure at the freedom to feel the carpeting beneath his socked feet. And then he looked up and took it all in with a wondrous gasp.

“Wow!” Izuku beamed, already scampering through the expansive living area and through magnificent glass double doors into the bedroom, then back out. A neat, white kitchen was attached to the main room, and one full wall window displayed Tokyo in a vibrant sparkling blanket of jewels. “Wow, it’s like a whole apartment! A house!”

Katsuki chuckled and approached, idly removing his gold cufflinks and pocketing them, then taking Izuku’s wrists to do the same as he spoke.

“You get excited like a little kid over this stuff.”

“We haven’t all grown up in the lap of luxury, you know.”

“I’m not complaining.”

“About living in luxury or—”

“About you,” Katsuki said simply. He slipped Izuku’s cufflinks in his own velvet pocket, his palm resting warmly on Izuku's hip. “I’m not complaining. You appreciate shit. I guess you remind me to appreciate it too or whatever.”

“Or whatever,” Izuku echoed with a playful grin. In the same moment, Katsuki’s expression went sober and he leaned in for—

Izuku ducked out of the way with a laugh and dropped to the plush, creamy couch with a sigh of relief. He felt cradled and safe here, with his mate. He felt. . .something. And he wouldn’t be content until he finally explored it.

There was a hunger in his belly, and it wasn’t food that would satiate this newfound flavor.

“Come here, handsome.”

“What?” Katsuki balked, gaze glued to Izuku’s hands placed upon his thighs. “Where?”

Izuku smiled beatifically, almost innocently. He lightly patted his legs and Katsuki made a strangled noise at the back of his throat.

“If you think I’m sittin’ on your lap, you’ve got—“

“It’s still the high ground, you know.” Izuku stood then, palm outstretched to take one of Katsuki’s, tugging them together, Izuku’s head tucked beneath Katsuki's jaw. He murmured into the open collar of his Alpha’s throat while some ghost scent of a blown out candle floated between their bond. Scent memory? “See. You’re so much bigger than me, aren’t you, my Alpha.”

Katsuki grunted in reply, but his nose nuzzled Izuku’s curls, big hands riding up Izuku’s flanks and hips, gripped the sturdy lines of Izuku’s waist.

“And powerful,” Izuku crooned, wedging his hands between their chests to splay open his undone shirt down to the belt. When Izuku flattened his palms to Katsuki’s muscular stomach, the skin prickled with goosebumps and quivered to touch. “And so much stronger than me.”

Katsuki’s shaky exhale thrilled bright and sharp through Izuku, light sparks of sunlight awakening something long cast to shadow and cold. Izuku smiled into Katsuki’s throat, grazed his teeth against the tender flesh as he slid his hands up that warrior’s body to shrug the shirt and jacquard jacket past broad shoulders and to the floor. They fell with a whisper and a sigh, or maybe the latter was one of them.

“But,” Izuku murmured, tilting his chin to find Katsuki’s clouded eyes. Lips curved, Izuku palmed the growing interest between them, firm and then harder until Katsuki groaned deep in his chest, dipping his head for a kiss from which Izuku swerved. “But I’m strong too. And you love that. Don't you, Alpha.”

“Izuku—“

“Don’t you?” Izuku gripped Katsuki’s jaw, then gripped it tighter when Katsuki snapped his jaws on automatic, going for Izuku’s wrist with nostrils flared. Izuku bared his teeth in turn, keeping a tight hold until Katsuki’s narrow eyes grilled into Izuku’s. With one hand nearly at Katsuki’s throat and the other at his aggressively pulsing cock, Izuku spoke low and clear. “I’d forgotten how strong I could be until I met you. And then you showed me I could be more. Now, I think I am. Stronger.”

Katsuki moaned, his eyes aflame in the half-light of the room. Izuku smiled wider and felt the Alpha inside rustle within the captivity of its darkened den, long glistening teeth and bright green gaze in the black. No one had ever looked that particular beast in the eye and said: Come here, boy.

The man in front of him, however. . .

“Here,” Izuku said softly, biting back a laugh when Katsuki seemed to jump  at Izuku’s spoken word. He'd obviously been somewhere else for a moment.

Looking up with heavy-lidded bedroom eyes, Izuku released his hold on Katsuki and took a step in retreat, the back of his knees hitting the long, luxurious couch. Without looking away, Izuku began the lazy journey of unbuttoning his own shirt, pausing to work open the fly of his lush forest velvet slacks. His coat drifted from shoulders to join Katsuki’s on the floor, but Katsuki seemed intent on the moonlight pale stretch of freckled skin exposed by the midnight black shirt.

Grinning at the raw hunger howling the wind and sea between their bond, Izuku merely rolled up the sleeves of his dress shirt and decided he'd keep it on. Katsuki always seemed to like him in black.

“Good?” Izuku said, smiling wider when Katsuki’s predatory stare snapped to his. “Kacchan?”

Katsuki’s snark ransacked Izuku’s authority as he cut the space between them with preternatural speed and shoved Izuku to the couch.

“Smart ass mouth,” Katsuki muttered and dropped to his knees, directly in between Izuku’s, and began to work Izuku’s pants down his hips and thick thighs. Nose scrunched with a look of disdain that did nothing to mask the heat in his eyes or the tent in his own trousers, Katsuki worked away the article of clothing as he continued to speak more to himself than anyone. “Some fuckin’ Omega you are. Mouth like a goddamn defense lawyer. Could talk the pants off an Alpha in the middle of the street. Thank fuck you don’t use that talent with--”

Katsuki made a choking sound as he tossed the slacks aside, eyes saucer large, face flushed deep with blood  as he gawked at Izuku’s shapely calves.

“What. Are you wearing,” he whispered.

Eyebrows raised, Izuku crossed his legs. The pure black garters were clipped to his simple, snug boxers of the same shade, holding up dark, semi-sheer stockings that would have appeared to be simple thin socks to anyone who’d caught a flash of his ankle. Izuku hadn’t been sure about the entire set up, but Hitoshi had been insistent. And, admittedly, Izuku had wanted to see how far a simple pair of stockings and garters would affect his big bad Alpha.

Apparently, the answer was: A fuckload.

“Kacchan?” Izuku only said in reply. “You’re staring. Don’t you like—”

Katsuki’s high whine shocked Izuku still as his Alpha launched forward and frantically began to scent-mark Izuku’s legs, rubbing his throat and cheek up a muscular calf and scarred knee, hands fervidly trailing along. Izuku’s ankle propped upon Katsuki’s shoulder like a footrest as Katsuki palmed Izuku’s meaty, softly furred thighs and groaned, sounding halfway to tears.

“I love it, holy fuck, I love it.”

Flabbergasted and immensely turned on in one, Izuku gaped at the display. Katsuki had mentioned how much he liked Izuku’s legs once or twice, but he hadn’t expected—

Izuku yelped and laughed when Katsuki hiked both stockinged knees over his hulking shoulders and wedged himself in close, mouthing up the sensitive, creamy skin of Izuku’s inner thigh. Giggles quickly devolved into whimpers and moans as Izuku’s fingers found Katsuki’s hair and gripped tight, draping his own head back against the couch as Katsuki sucked and licked at Izuku’s straining cock through the thin cloth.

“God, fuck.” Katsuki’s muffled voice came from between Izuku’s quivering thighs, smashed between them as he lightly scraped teeth up the length. Their bond sloshed over, messy and sloppy, oceans flooding with thick, molten lava that hissed as it met the sea. “You smell like—fuck, you have no idea. Sin. The death of me.”

Fighting the instinctive reflex to submit, to spread his legs and invite his Alpha in to eat, Izuku lifted his head from the couch and loosened his thighs grip only to cup Katsuki’s red-hot cheeks and meet his feral eyes.

“What would you do for me?” Izuku rasped, that unusual velvet depth returning to his voice. “What would you do for your Omega, Alpha?”

“Anything,” Katsuki instantly answered. His palms gripped Izuku’s thighs, kneading in what seemed like an unconscious gesture. He licked his sharp teeth. “Anything. You already know. You know.”

Izuku cocked his head, his tongue travelling the width of his bottom lip, feeling a dent in the flesh from where he’d unknowingly bitten down.

“Yes,” he said quietly. “But I wanted to hear you say it. Now get on my lap.”

The second time around, Katsuki did not falter. He stood and—

“Wait,” Izuku said, one hand flat on the flexing muscles of Katsuki’s stomach. Their eyes clashed, held, more sparks flaring into the red sea. “Undress first.”

Katsuki relented without hesitation, his athletic body cut in violent contours from the meager room lighting, all sharp shadow and sculpted edges. Izuku’s mouth watered with the sight. Despite the intimidating figure Katsuki wielded, Izuku often forgot to appreciate the physical aspects of him when he was so consumed by that shrewd, acerbic mind and the rioting wealth of emotion that boiled beneath the surface of volcanic eyes.

The third time, Izuku didn’t have to ask. Katsuki stalked forward with a singular, dark gleam in his gaze as he vaulted one long leg and the other over Izuku’s, bracketing his thighs, easing down until Katsuki’s bare, reddened cock ground flush against Izuku’s clothed one. They both groaned in tandem, the bond between swelling voluptuous and sticky, pressing hot and humid from the inside out as Izuku gripped Katsuki’s hips and encouraged their slow, languid roll.

Katsuki was so much larger like this, looming over him like some predatory deity, yanking at Izuku’s crown of curls to bare his throat and present his face up to meet his Alpha’s. Then Katsuki surged forward, taking Izuku’s lips in a fury of teeth and tongue, plunging forth, purging thought and intent from Izuku’s skull as he took Katsuki’s face in his hands and urged him in deeper, harder, punctuated with ragged breaths.

Quickly, it wasn’t enough. Katsuki was writhing into him, the weight of his powerful frame crushing Izuku into the couch, the intensity of their hasty hands and brutal mouths battering at the thinning barrier between the Alpha prowling in Izuku and the Omega that left the cushions sopping wet below them.

“Wait wait wait—”

Katsuki snarled so suddenly that Izuku startled, didn’t have the time to defend himself as sharp teeth sank into the original mate mark, a searing brand of pain and pleasure shrieking through Izuku’s blood like liquid fire, molten gold cast in daggers straight to his heart.

Then he bit back.

The soft, supple flesh of Katsuki’s prominent pectorals gave easily to his meager fangs and blunt teeth. Blood tanged tasteless and thick at the back of Izuku’s tongue as Katsuki roared and yanked awaywith lips peeled back to reveal a blood-stained maw.

“You—”

“Stay,” Izuku snapped, grabbing Katsuki by the cock that seemed all the harder from the bite and working the throbbing length in firm, almost painful strips of his fist. Katsuki eked out a curious noise Izuku had never heard before and promptly slumped in, brow resting atop Izuku’s curls as he gripped Izuku’s shoulders for stability and relented to Izuku’s demands.

“See.” Izuku stroked the sweaty length of Katsuki’s back with his free hand, pausing to skim and dip his fingers around the inexperienced hole awaiting him. Katsuki’s entire frame jolted with a sharp inhale upon each idle whisper of fingertips, but Izuku always paused, palming a hip to calm and ground him before starting anew. “See, see how good just this is, my Alpha? It’s better than you can imagine.”

“Not made for this,” Katsuki muffled into Izuku’s hair, but consciously or not, he’d begun to dip his hips down to meet Izuku’s fingers.

“You’d be surprised,” Izuku murmured.

Briefly, he stopped his subtle exploration to reach between them both, to sneak a hand into his own underwear and ruthlessly shoved two fingers into his hole. He moaned too loud, and the scent of his copious, flooding slick must have risen to Katsuki because his Alpha began to shake.

“Don’t move, don’t move,” Izuku rapidly whispered, unsure how much he could hold back if Katsuki started on him anew. Because fuck if the beast in him was clawing at his insides, hungry for blood, hungry for a power Izuku had always been too terrified to chase.

Some distant, good boy part of Izuku felt like he should be embarrassed as he coated his hand in his own syrupy slick, cupping his fingers enough to encourage more to fill his palm. It was almost too easy with how unbearably wet he got around Katsuki. The Izuku of five or ten years ago wouldn’t have thought it possible for an Omega to reduce to this—certainly not outside of a heat.

But here they were. And here he was, reaching around his indomitable, intimidating Alpha mate and slipping a slow, curious finger right into him. Katsuki hissed, wiggling his hips as he seemed to attempt the accommodation, but when Izuku looked up to him in the shadows, Katsuki’s teeth were bared and he was looking down at Izuku like he was the straw house Katsuki was about to blow down.

Menace radiated from his trembling frame and, wide-eyed and spiking with instinctive panic, Izuku released his constant hold on Katsuki’s erection and reached up to yank at Katsuki's nape to bring their throats together, crooning and chirping in soothing reply, even as he used his thumb to paint slick, wet circles along the faintly stretched skin where Izuku’s one finger remained.

Katsuki grunted and rubbed his cheek against Izuku’s, then switched to press against the other side of his Omega’s face, the movements agitated and jerky. He was clearly fighting something—had been since they walked into the room and the reality of what Izuku desired to do had set in.

And Izuku—shit. Izuku was fighting tooth and nail not to rail Katsuki against the wall. He’d never felt so empowered, so self-expressed as he did in his moment, with his True Mate offering himself up like prey when he was, in fact, the most deadly of predators. The knowledge was intoxicating; headier than any illegal substance, the pull of Izuku’s appetite leaving him ravenous to take ragged bites from his Alpha from which he would never heal.

Was this how Katsuki felt about him all the time? No wonder the man would walk through glass and fire for him. Izuku felt it now. He knew it now. The depth of their bond, in the way that his Alpha felt it. Izuku knew.

“You really would do anything for me, wouldn’t you,” Izuku repeated from earlier, taking the moment to secret a second finger inside, shushing and murmuring calming platitudes as Katsuki dug nails into Izuku’s shoulder blades. At some point, his dress shirt has had slunk down his arms. “You’re so amazing, Kacchan. So amazing like this. Now, everyday, always.”

A full body shiver ramped through Katsuki and he growled—a warning or wordless agreement? Annoyance at Izuku’s sweet words? Izuku dragged open mouth kisses up Katsuki’s throat and jaw as he worked his fingers deeper, a patient thrust that seemed to make Katsuki’s thighs quiver despite himself. And, before even thinking of adding the third finger, Izuku reached between them a second time and slicked up his free hand, cooing as he brought two fingers to Katsuki’s mouth.

Katsuki’s moan was broken and cracked, nearly devastated as he gratefully accepted the offer and sucked on them with messy, frantic abandon. For a moment, Izuku forgot what he was doing in the wake of wonder, simply watching in awe, relishing the shine of pleasure that broke the storm between them like violent cracks of lightning. Izuku forgot to breathe.

As if sensing the audience, Katsuki’s eyes snapped open and Izuku gasped. Incendiary. Combustible. A demolition of any barrier Izuku had been holding up, and Katsuki was launching the fire. And then, control crumbled.

Fucking Katsuki’s mouth with the inebriating scent of slick, Izuku shoved in a third finger and curved them just so—

Katsuki lurched forward so fast he choked on Izuku’s fingers, tears bursting to life down his cheeks, eyes wide and sightless as he held onto Izuku’s hair like a harness, gripping on for dear life as Izuku pressed and curled his fingertips against a prostate Izuku was immediately sure Katsuki had never discovered.

“Hold on,” Izuku whispered, evacuating his fingers from Katsuki’s mouth to attend to his huge, weeping cock, violently red and shiny at the crown. “Hold on, handsome. Fuck, look at you, you’re amazing, aren’t you? Gonna do more for me, won’t you? I know you can.”

“Shhhuttup,” Katsuki hissed between his teeth, apparently unable to say much more and Izuku only hummed, barely hearing him, barely aware that he was smiling something hungry and predatory as he looked up to Katsuki’s stressed, flushed face. The bond between them was taut, coiled abusively tight, ready to spring and snap and draw blood.

Izuku wanted blood.

“Relax.” Izuku tilted his face, nipped at Katsuki’s chin, lapped at the corner of his lips until Katsuki groaned and ducked his head to lick into Izuku’s mouth. His frame seemed to sag with the connection, his muscles going further lax around Izuku’s stretching, searching fingers. They ate into each other like animals, messy with hunger, without grace or reason, only looking to sate that which could not be sated simply by Izuku’s hands. Not for either of them, not now.

“C’mere,” Izuku slurred, drunk on the hulking body above him, and how it bent to him like he was the sun instead of some forever new moon, rarely sighted or appreciated by anyone or anything. But Katsuki saw him, had always seen him. Had shone a light into the darkness that Izuku was learning to reflect back.

Manually shifting Katsuki’s waist and hips forward, Izuku encouraged his Alpha to kneel high enough to line his cock up with that waiting, ready hole. Looking Katsuki in the eyes, Izuku guided Katsuki's hand past the underwear shucked down Izuku's thighs and cupped Katsuki’s hand as Katsuki fucked long fingers into Izuku’s ass, drawing out twin moans when Izuku clenched needy and wanting around him.

But that wasn’t for tonight. Not right now.

Katsuki seemed to know what to do from there. He coated Izuku’s straining erection with his own slick and gasped a little as Izuku suddenly widened his thighs, forcing Katsuki’s legs further apart in turn. The crown of Izuku’s cock bumped Katsuki’s hole and Katsuki made that same curious noise Izuku had never before heard. It ran amok through Izuku’s nerves, effectively severing control and conscious thought until Izuku could only gawk at the luscious sight before him, a top Alpha prostrating himself for his fucked up Omega.

“Amazing,” Izuku echoed. He shook his head, searching and failing to find clarity as he placed steading hands on Katsuki’s waist and said, “You’re in control now, Kacchan. Take your time.”

The words seemed to incense and infuriate Katsuki like a bomb with a short fuse, because he snarled some unintelligible curse and began to take Izuku’s cock with a single-minded concentration and intent that knocked the air from Izuku’s lungs like lightning to the chest.

“Oh my god, ohmygod, oh—oh—” Izuku choked on the words, drowning in the tight heat of his mate, flooded with wave after wave of previously unknown pleasure.

“This is not—” Katsuki exhaled sharply as he dropped down to take the dick in full, shifting his hips with a wince and bit-off moan. “N-not a forfeit.”

Izuku blinked, bleary and barely comprehending Katsuki’s words beyond watching that beautiful, swollen mouth move with delicious flashes of tooth and fang.

“Forfeit?” Izuku rolled his hips, snapping them taut to Katsuki’s once, twice, again until Katsuki shouted and slammed back down to meet them. “No one’s losing here, Kacchan. No one is less.”

“Damn right,” Katsuki bit off, as if it needed to be said. Maybe for him it did.

Izuku smiled in a daze, but the way Katsuki’s eyes widened in reply had Izuku distantly wondering just how fearsome or otherwise he looked right now. When he spoke, his voice hardly sounded like himself.

“You’re gonna feel like such a winner when this is over, Mr Zero.”

And then Izuku snatched Katsuki’s slim waist and fucked up into him with the fury of mutually bared teeth and ragged breath, the slick, wet slap slap slap of sweaty skin; nails scraping shoulders and chests, merciless, unrelenting movements of bodies in tandem as their gazes clashed and held, kept holding, never looking away as Izuku fucked Katsuki higher and higher toward those stiff, high noises cutting from him like pieces of escaping soul.

Izuku saw the moment Katsuki realized he was going to come, because his entire body startled still, his breathing halting altogether before he burst into a flurry of motion, fucking himself down on Izuku’s cock with abandon, finding that one spot of bomb-bright release deep in the center of himself. Then Izuku put his hand around Katsuki’s steadily leaking erection and the bond between them detonated in a crash and flash of blinding, deafening assault.

Whichever one of them screamed, Izuku couldn’t tell, but their arms were around each other in a tight, shuddering embrace as the waves wracked through them both to the bone. Neither of them could speak, could move but for the sudden, violent shudder that would come over one or the other in a sudden fit, the pleasure of their orgasms near painful, near ascendant as they both began to fall down to earth, to float on the soothing sea of their calming bond.

Izuku was fairly sure he lost consciousness. Slept. Whatever. Because when he woke up, he was splayed out in a king size bed of white on white, silk pressed to his cheek and entirely nude body as he cracked open his eyes and found himself looking out the high-rise window of the hotel.

Deliciously dazed in a velvet haze, Izuku’s lips weakly curved as he absorbed the skyline of sleepless millions. In the far distance, the sky stained deep ocean blue, the color a slow rise of approaching sunrise.

Izuku’s faint smile melted to an absent frown as he realized something had shifted. Not in the external world, but within. The dark, vast cavern that had held so secret and heavy and solid in the pit of his guts felt aired out, open for the world. It wasn’t fear or anger that had been released, nor some horrific, shameful aggression.

He simply felt. . .himself. Utterly.

Katsuki padded into the room with a towel slung around his shoulders, his hair slicked back from an obvious shower. The light from the bathroom doorway haloed around him, leaving his face in shadow as he paused there and silently stared.

“Hi,” Izuku softly ventured. He sat up in the moonlight pale pool of a bed, unconscious of his nudity as he cocked his head and offered a smile. “How are you?”

“Still standing,” Katsuki said wryly, then seemed to come to a decision as he strode toward the bed and settled on the side.

“What an achievement.” Izuku scooted across the mattress to sling arms around Katsuki’s neck and prop his chin upon a shoulder, his thighs bracketing Katsuki’s own. With his bare chest pressed to Katsuki’s back, their hearts aligned and Izuku hummed with the gently jostling sea between them. Sunshine on the horizon here, too. “Aren’t you a Hero? A little extracurricular activity can’t take you out.”

“Obviously.” Katsuki reclined into Izuku’s embrace, turning his head to press his cheek to Izuku’s. “You couldn’t take me out in any physical capacity—”

“You let yourself think that—”

“But you get into my fuckin’ head,” Katsuki finished, a little quieter than before. “Don’t know how you always do that.”

Izuku considered apologizing. He sighed and kissed Katsuki’s cheek.

“The feeling is mutual.”

“Little shit.”

“Grumpy asshole.”

“Know it all.”

“Takes one to know one.”

Katsuki barked a laugh and proceeded to lean his entire weight back onto Izuku and crush him into the mattress, unrelenting and unmoving as Izuku squealed and clawed for freedom.

“How much do you even weigh.” Izuku huffed a breathless laugh as he struggled and failed to wiggle out from under his deadweight.

“Enough to throw you around like a sack of rice.”

Izuku twisted Katsuki’s earlobe and smiled at the sharp curse.

“Flattering comparison, thanks.”

Katsuki finally rolled off, his feral grin all charming and sharp at the edges. After all this time, Izuku’s heart skipped a beat.

“Come on,” Katsuki said, ruffling Izuku’s hair, then making a grossed out face from all the styling product and sweat matted the curls. “Nasty. I ran a bath. S’big enough for the both of us.”

Izuku took Katsuki’s outstretched hand and placed a kiss on his inner wrist. The thrum of life beneath the thin skin felt like gold currents in the rivers and tributaries that bonded their hearts.

“Lead the way,” Izuku said.

 

With a long, low moan, Izuku sunk into the vast, bubbling jacuzzi tucked into the corner of the cream and gold bathroom. The dimmed lights soothed his sore nerves, and the distant, folksy guitar music from the television in the other room echoed off the chamber of ceramic and porcelain. His legs knocked Katsuki’s and overlapped comfortably as Izuku slumped down to his chin, the jets from the tub kneading the small of his back in ways that turned his extremities to jelly.

Eyes shut, Izuku basked in the radiance permeating his body like liquid sunlight. The Alpha in him preened and shook itself off, casting away the heavy, lingering hibernation coat he’d been buried with, so cold and unyielding beneath the eternal winter of Izuku’s long-buried secret self. Izuku’s arms and legs felt longer, his shoulders broader, his soul unfettered and free for the first time in a lifetime.

For the first time in Izuku’s life, he felt like a whole person.

Izuku opened his eyes and found Katsuki watching with an expression he couldn’t entirely parse. The singular intensity of his Alpha’s stare left most cowering or differing to him out of respect for their biological superior, but Izuku only curiously returned the look. His foot stroked Katsuki’s fuzzy thigh beneath the water, and through the touch he sensed a plunging abyss of endless dedication, unwavering loyalty, consuming passion. It took Izuku’s breath away, quite literally.

“You okay?” Izuku asked softly, inwardly surprised at the hoarse crack of his voice. He felt like he hadn’t spoken in years. Or like this was the first time he was using a new tongue, new mouth.

Katsuki tsked and lofted both arms up over the sides of the tub, sloshing water over the side. His shoulders were a magnificent, sculpted range that Izuku already wanted to climb. Those arms could hold him up or simply hold him—take him away, take him anywhere.

“I ain’t a pansy.”

Izuku sputtered a laugh, smiling in earnest as he flattened his foot against Katsuki’s steel-cut stomach and gave a little push. Katsuki kicked lightly at Izuku’s knee, Izuku kicked back a little harder, and seconds later the bathtub’s rowdy waves splashed amok as they kicked and kneed and grappled with grunts of effort and exasperated laughs. Izuku’s ankle was yanked up and Izuku’s shriek cut off as he slipped under the water, his free feet jamming mercilessly at Katsuki’s thigh, hip, his—

Coming up sputtering, Izuku had enough time to watch Katsuki go dead white from the dick-shot before his face flared in fury.

“You little shit!”

“Oh no,” Izuku eked out and as he smuggled back a laugh. “I’m so sor—”

But Izuku was already scrambling and flailing from the jacuzzi, interrupting his own apology as Katsuki dove for him with a roar. Scream-laughing in hysterics, Izuku slipped the minute his wet feet hit the floor, dropping to his hands for a moment before he pushed off with powerful thighs and shot from the room with Katsuki in chase.

“Get back here you fucking shithead!” Katsuki screeched as grabbed at Izuku’s arm. Their skin was too slick, though, and Katsuki could keep purchase as Izuku squealed and streaked through the room, leaping over the bed with a delighted laugh, his heart racing with the chase. “You’re gonna make sure this shit is in working order before I’m done with you!”

Izuku shot through the extravagant double doors, bursting into the living area and running atop the length of one ornate couch. Ground Zero was fast, but Izuku was—

The wind knocked out of his fucking soul as he went down hard, the lush carpet doing little to muffle the blow as Izuku gasped for a breath and attempted to roll out from the solid, wet weight of strong, infuriated Alpha atop his back.

“Caught you, little rabbit,” Katsuki murmured deep in Izuku’s ear. He sounded out of breath—not from exertion, of course, but something else. Something more exciting than the chase.

A shiver of excitement shimmered down Izuku’s back as he inadvertently arched back into his Alpha, turning his cheek to the carpet so he could peer over his shoulder with wild eyes. Katsuki was grinning; showing sharp teeth in a feral approximation of a smile, his pupils flared to a fiery eclipse, his slicked back hair cutting harsh, merciless angles of his cheekbones and tilted eyes. His chest heaved against Izuku’s shoulder blades and a blatant hardness dragged heavy at the dip of Izuku’s spine.

“Everything—” Izuku swallowed, caught his breath. “Everything seems in working order. No damage done.”

Katsuki’s laugh was a short, hot breath on the back of Izuku’s neck. The big bad wolf at the door, asking for entrance.

“Let’s find out.”

Izuku squirmed for freedom on principle of the thing, but the sudden hand at his nape was iron, shoving his face into the floor as Katsuki shifted his weight enough to brutally thrust two fingers into Izuku’s already sloppy, waiting hole. The sound Izuku made was inhuman as he gritted his teeth and writhed into the carpet, ass struggling to rise beneath his Alpha’s weight, thighs trembling to further spread.

But Katsuki only laughed as he fucked his trembling Omega with sodden, sticky fingers that squelched too loud in Izuku’s ears. White noise was closing in like static, like electricity, like the sheer voltage of their bond, their adrenaline, their bodies clashing and creating a new crackling atmosphere around them.

Senses overwhelmed too hard and too fast, the exhilaration of being hunted and caught and carved up from the inside out all too much, Izuku drooled into the carpet, a throaty too-high keen cracking from his parched throat when Katsuki knocked Izuku’s thighs apart and shoved that thick, weighty cock into him and stuffed him to the hilt in one, unyielding thrust.

“Fuck,” Katsuki gritted out, his hold shifting to fist Izuku’s curls and keep his head down, ass up in pure Omega breeding position. Izuku swayed his hips and Katsuki seated deeper, but not enough to plug the swelling knot into Izuku’s ass. Not yet. He slowly pulled out, leisurely inch by inch, and Izuku clamped down on that cock and cursed, whined, begging for Katsuki to come back even when they’d barely begun. “Fuck. Fuck, you’re so tight. So good for me. Look at you, look at how you’re made for me, little rabbit. Gonna split you open and fill you up ‘til you’re more me than you.”

I am, Izuku thought restlessly, but the words wouldn’t come in the wake of lightning and thunder tearing the sky of their bond, ozone flooding his nose and mouth, primordial oceans churning new beasts to life between them. We are each other.

Izuku wailed as Katsuki popped the crown of his cock from his hole and slammed the length back in with one fell thrust. The sound of suction drowned out beneath Izuku’s sob of frustration, his own erection leaden and leaking, hanging swollen and untouched, electric with sensitivity. Katsuki’s fingers tightened in Izuku’s curls, sparks shooting through his scalp to bright bursts behind his eyes as Izuku moaned, unabashed and needy while his Alpha used his hair for an anchor as he fucked into him with increasing violence, rising urgency.

Harsh breaths rattling Izuku’s ribcage with each feral slap of hips, Izuku dug nails into the carpet and felt his cheek scrape against the grain, sure to leave a stark red slap across his face and rug-burned knees. Katsuki’s body was like a fucking machine, unrelenting and designed for the stamina and destruction. The loud, sloppy sound of Izuku’s greedy ass taking that dick with greater, faster fervor climbed with Izuku’s desperate sobs and Katsuki’s husky grunts and growls of effort; a cacophony of their mating loud enough to drive Izuku wild and reckless with it.

“Yeah, yeah—” Izuku swallowed hard, his throat burning, mouth muffled into the carpet until Katsuki ripped at his hair, yanking his head up, bringing him to hands and knees, back outrageously arched to accommodate the angle from which Katsuki fucked him, pummeled him ruthlessly. “Fuck! Kacchan, Kat—like that, fuck me. You hated how good I fucked you back, didn’t you—”

Katsuki’s snarl shook Izuku to the bones, wracked a shudder of triumph and exhilaration through him as he fought against the hold on his hair to look over his shoulder, tears streaming from pleasure, spit glistening on his swollen lips. And Katsuki—Katsuki looked half beast, his shoulders straining, bulging veins branding his arms and neck, eyes luminous like deep fire coals, skin glimmering in a sheet of sweat.

“Gonna show me who’s Alpha, handsome?” Izuku managed around punchy moans, his relatively small frame trembling in full from the onslaught of Katsuki’s feral thrusts. The jiggle from Izuku’s thick ass rippled right through him, through his steadily dribbling cock, leaking the thoughts half out of Izuku’s ears before he could keep a slippery hold on them. “Who’s the Alpha, huh, Mr Zero? Who is it? You opened for me so well.”

The arm that locked around Izuku’s chest and pulled him up and back against Katsuki’s body knocked the air from Izuku’s lungs and left him wordless when seated knot-deep atop Katsuki’s pulsing cock, the sudden stretch shocking his thoughts to pure white. And when Katsuki emitted a growl that had every Omega instinct cowering in subservience in fear, Izuku could only whimper a pathetic answering reply, lift his arms up and back to grip Katsuki’s hair and ride against him like the good little slut he’d begun to learn he was.

“Talk too much,” Katsuki seethed in Izuku’s ear, one hand finally finally clasping Izuku’s feverish erection and working it in time with the curve and roll of their hips. “Too damn much. One day I’m gonna get that mouth around my dick and knot it ‘til you learn a lesson.”

Too much. It was too much. Izuku sobbed as he came, body decadently arched beneath his Alpha’s hands, the words still echoing in his skull, drawing out the onslaught of pleasure. Katsuki bit down a second time that night, teeth reopening the mate mark with a fire that took the consciousness from Izuku in one screaming swoop.

Only seconds must have passed, because Izuku’s quivering body was being rolled onto his side. Katsuki followed close, breathing hard, the knot between them tugging on tender skin and making coursing a fresh spray of sparks through Izuku’s quaking frame. Izuku lay there like a dead man, exhaustion like a pregnant inner glow so heavy he could do nothing but bask in its ethereal weight. He sighed and dozed.

“I love you,” Katsuki said, seemingly out of nowhere. He sounded so far away. It was strange to hear the words from him. Not because Izuku didn’t know it, but because it wasn’t necessarily common to say it. Although Izuku had been saying it a little much himself this evening.

“I know,” Izuku slurred, reaching behind him to pat Katsuki’s hair. He patted Katsuki’s face instead and snorted a laugh.

“Little shit,” Katsuki grumbled, but Izuku could feel the smile pressed into his curls.

“Yours, though.”

“Mine.”

“Didn’t have to bite me so hard to prove it, though,” Izuku said, smiling as he snuggled back into the arms of his Alpha. One long thigh hiked up to cover Izuku’s hip. “But I understand. Re-asserting your dominance and everything.”

“You think so much that it hurts my fuckin’ skull. No wonder you got anxiety.”

Izuku sputtered a laugh and reached back, smacking Katsuki’s face this time.

“Oiy! Oiy, what Omega hits their fuckin’ Alpha while they’re still attached—”

“An Omega who won’t put up with your shit.”

With that, Katsuki settled once more, and so did Izuku. The contentment in their bond rose over the sea in mango and raspberry sky stains. Izuku hummed.

“Anyway,” he mumbled. “Thank you.”

“For?”

“You.”

“Stop with the compliments,” Katsuki griped as he skimmed a warm hand along Izuku’s waist. “S’ givin’ me the creeps.”

“Oh, okay.” Izuku wiggled his hips, testing the knot and gasping when it remained full and taut. “Sorry about that. Compliments cancelled for the next twelve months. I can’t wait to watch you wither away without your Omega’s adoration. What a show that’ll be.”

“Yeah, yeah.” Katsuki yawned and promptly placed a loose hand over Izuku’s mouth in an unsubtle sign. “Quiet now. Wanna sleep. You exhaust me.”

“Me?” Izuku sputtered from behind Katsuki’s palm. “Me, exhausting. What did you just—”

“G’night.”

“We’re still on the floor!”

“I’ll move you later.”

“I’ll move me later. I’m not—”

“Goodnight,” Katsuki repeated. And this time, he pointedly did not reply to a single thing Izuku said.

Izuku fell asleep smiling, and inside him, the wolf also peacefully slept.

Chapter 41

Summary:

"I wanted to fix him. I thought I could. That love can stitch another person’s pieces together. But healing doesn’t work that way. A person does the stitching for themselves and love is the healing balm. I could sew him together time and again like some bloodied battlefield surgeon, but if he kept ripping out the stitches himself, there was only so much I could do.”

Notes:

HELLO ALL! I might have Covid and I'm getting tested today as an 'urgent patient' due to being severely immuno-compromised (kidney transplant patient), so ummm. YAY NO COVID! Before I feasibly forget to update my chapter, Imma do it. I hope you enjoy this and let me suck the life-giving properties of your comments. Sending my love!

 

Songs For This Chapter:
stay4ever - Powfu ft. Mounika | Spotify | YouTube
10/10 - Troye Sivan | Spotify | YouTube
Daydream - Milk & Bone | Spotify | YouTube

Shoved into the corner of a hole-in-the-wall Thai restaurant that served noodles to burn a man’s lips off, Katsuki watched his mate animatedly talk to the younger shadow of himself.

At least, that’s what Katsuki could figure from the brotherly—fatherly?—way Izuku seemed to fawn over Izumi Kouta. When they’d picked the kid up from the train station, Izuku had launched himself at the short, stocky Omega and looked just shy of tears as he rubbed his cheek over the top of Kouta’s red baseball cap in an unsubtle scenting of, well, family.

Because whether Katsuki could understand it or not, the two of them were irrevocably bonded, and Katsuki wasn’t about to dissuade either of them from it. Not that he could. Omegas exhibited familial bonds through their own pheromone releases and scent marking. Katsuki had zero experience with it; neither of his parents were Omegas.

Izuku and Kouta’s clandestine living situation had obviously cemented their regard for each other. Even the most oblivious person could look to their table and see the way they leaned into each other, eye contact strong and stable, their gestures mirroring each other in the way Omegas tended to do within their packs.

They smelled nice together. Wryly, Katsuki supposed it wasn’t something he’d ever say out loud, but it was true nonetheless. While Kouta smelled more classically Omega—vaguely floral with sweet tones, like rose water, he seemed to have absorbed some of Izuku’s fragrance through proximity and touch. He smelled fresher, more clean than the heavy weight of most Omega scents.

Kirishima smelled like a goddamn carnival of candy, sunshine, and popcorn. Shinsou reminded him of herbaceous candy, like lavender, sweet tea, and mint.

“Your dormitory looked so lovely!” Izuku exclaimed,  twirling the straw of his drink between nail-bitten thumb and forefinger, gaze bright and intent on Kouta. “Are you excited to finally start?”

“The sooner the better,” Kouta said, taking a moment to shovel noodles into his mouth. He chewed, looking into the distance with those bullet dark eyes. He nodded, swallowed. “Good riddance to home. It had stopped being that a long time ago, y’know?”

“I do,” Izuku said quietly.

“New city, new life.” Kouta grinned and reclined in his seat, tipping back on two chair legs with a wide, toothy grin. “All I needed to do was get half killed for it.”

Katsuki’s attention flickered to the scars across Kouta’s throat, then to Izuku’s. In the early summer warmth of May, they both wore loose, lightweight t-shirts that did nothing to hide the violence carved into their frames. Maybe on purpose, maybe not. The two of them were twins in their tragedy.

“Stop,” Izuku said tightly, his smile straining, eyes flickering to Katsuki’s as their bond quivered like a too-taut string. Over the days and weeks, Katsuki had learned to tune into Izuku’s melodies more and more. His anxiety nearly always remained, brittle strings waiting to be plucked and snapped at any moment. “Don’t talk like that. Let’s look forward to the future.”

“Actually, I prefer the present,” Kouta said simply, looking to Katsuki with sober eyes that spoke to older years. “I’m not complaining. Just stating. Shit happens for a reason, I guess. More than I thought it would for someone like me.”

“Then don’t fuck it up,” Katsuki said, meeting Kouta’s level stare. When Izuku kicked him under the table, Katsuki merely smirked and cocked his head. “This guy is paying for your ride, kid. Don’t forget it.”

“Kacchan!”

“Do I look stupid?” Kouta fired back, eyes narrowed. “I’d never forget. Anyway, if anyone is prone to fucking shit up, it’s you, Ground Zero.”

“Why you—”

“How’re those popularity ratings going?” Kouta asked, humor high in his voice, his grin toothy and feral as Katsuki sputtered. “Rough, huh? Well, that can happen when people realize you’re more of an asshole than just your image.”

“You little shit—”

“Both of you!” Izuku cut in, laughing in exasperation as he scrubbed a hand over his eyes, down to his mouth and away. “If the both of you would stop one-upping each other for more than thirty seconds, you two might actually get along.”

“This is us getting along,” Kouta said, and fuck if that I Dare You stare of his wasn’t the mirror of Izuku’s. “Isn’t it.”

Katsuki bit back a curse and struggled on the slippery hold of control he’d spent years developing. If his control were a muscle, the combination of Izuku and Kouta would turn him into a goddamn bodybuilder.

“You’re a fuckin’ delight, kid,” Katsuki bit off. Izuku’s warm palm covered Katsuki’s fist upon his thigh, squeezing softly in an approval that lapped through their bond. Katsuki breathed out slowly and, seeing Kouta’s smartass grin and recognizing himself in turn, found his own lips twisting in earnest amusement. “I know you won’t fuck it up. You’re a smart kid. Fuckin’ brat, but smart.”

“I know,” Kouta said, his expression very obviously smug and goading.

Katsuki shoved noodles into his mouth to give it something to do that wasn’t swearing.

“Do you have thoughts about after high school?” Izuku asked. His fingertips absently played with the frayed hem of his shirt. With summer on the rise, he’d seemed to unearth an entirely new wardrobe of more plaid and stripes.

At work he lived in button-up, lightweight shirts with the collar open and the short sleeves rolled over supple biceps, dark plaids switched in favor bolder red, white, and yellow colors. Outside of his job, he strayed toward t-shirts just a little too tight, speaking to how little Izuku shopped for himself that he still wore shirts from his scrawnier years.

Katsuki didn’t complain. Didn’t say a damn word about it. If he mentioned how much he loved the way the thin fabric clung to the sturdy muscle of his waist and strong hills of his shoulders, Izuku might go back to wearing his baggy winter clothes just to spite him.

“After?” Kouta frowned, looking down as he fiddled with his chopsticks. “I don’t know. Not Hero work, obviously. I mean—”

“D-don’t stress yourself!” Izuku fumbled quickly, a placating hand landing on Kouta’s scrawny shoulder. “I was just wondering what you’re passionate about. Your Quirk is powerful, strong enough to stave off the Omega Killer—”

Katsuki didn’t flinch, but he found himself staring at his sweating glass and the way the ice cracked and shifted in small, hairline fractures. He hadn’t spoken to her yet. He had every ability and opportunity to do so, but. . .

Some things in life would never have the closure they deserved. Acceptance of this fact was important to peace of heart and mind. Or so the occupational therapist of their agency reported.

“I was thinking of firefighting,” Kouta said slowly, like he was measuring every word before he said them. “They’re always looking for water Quirks. But I don’t—I don’t know that they’d let me—”

“You’ve got time,” Katsuki said, meeting Kouta’s suddenly wide, almost hopeful gaze. Katsuki was beginning to learn how hard it was for people like Izuku and Kouta to hold on to hope in a world seemingly designed to break it down. “And you’ve got the attitude. Your gender isn’t who you are, y’know, but it’s people like you that have to show everyone it’s true. Shitty facts, but when the world isn’t ready for you, you gotta make them ready.”

Kouta looked at him, his young features unbearably serious. Again, somewhere between the blurred lines, Izuku seemed to shine through.

“Yeah,” he croaked. “I know.”

“Anyway,” Katsuki said breezily, waving a hand as he slumped back into his seat with a self-satisfied grin. “Have you met me? I’m connected. My condo has a private gym and shit. I’ll hook you up. Train you and whatever. Shit on Heroes all you want—”

“Oh, I plan to.”

“—but I got hookups you couldn’t dream of. And I’d be willing to give them to you, if that’s what you want.”

“And what?” Kouta shot back. “What’s the catch?”

Katsuki scowled.

“Nothing. There’s no catch. What the hell would I want from a scrawny punk like you?”

Izuku cut in just as Kouta’s face screwed up in annoyance.

“There’s no ulterior motives here, Kouta. Not from me or Katsuki. As shitty at communication as he is—”

“Oiy!”

“—what he’s saying is true. Both of us, we want to help you. We want to be here for you. We carry no expectations for you but your happiness.”

“That—” Kouta’s voice seemed to dissolve to water as he swallowed thickly and slouched over his plate, clicking his chopsticks against the ceramic when he seemed unable to speak.

“Kouta,” Izuku murmured, his voice warm and trustworthy and true. Katsuki’s chest constricted with a painful spike of love. Izuku rested a large palm on the nape of Kouta’s neck in a grounding gesture. “Found family is still family. Your pack can be your people, if you let them. So, let them. Let us.”

When Kouta didn’t speak, only leaned into Izuku’s touch with a shuddering breath and shining, damp eyes that he kept lowered, Izuku sighed, his mouth gently curved.

“You know,” he said quietly, “I spent so much of my life thinking that the world owed me. Owed me a dad, owed me a mom who loved me like the birthday card commercials showed me. Owed me a better house since I didn’t ask to be born into that, owed me friends who understood me, owed me my Alpha status, owed me a Quirk like most of the world had.

“I was furious. I wanted to tear the world apart at the seams, but in doing that, I tended to hurt myself more than anyone else. And, beneath all of that, I was sad. Just really. . .” Izuku laughed, a little helpless, his shoulders sagging. “Really sad, you know. Anger doesn’t come from anything else but that.”

Katsuki remained still, some animal part of his brain imagining that if he moved he might scare the Omegas away. Izuku so rarely spoke candidly of his past; this felt like a rare sighting, and Katsuki didn’t dare ruin it by making his presence known.

“The world had taught me to hate myself,” Izuku said, now petting the hair sticking from the back of Kouta’s hat. “And I fell for it, big time. I looked in the mirror and I saw someone unworthy of being alive, just for being alive.”

Kouta silently nodded and Katsuki marveled at how much pain these people held and still kept smiling. Izuku, especially. When he forgot to be a nervous wreck, he was pure sunshine. Clever, accomplished, caring—not an ideal Omega, but an ideal human.

“But my family,” Izuku continued. “My found family changed my world. Shinsou showed me to follow my heart over all obstacles. Chisaki demanded I hunt down the goals that mattered most to me. Todoroki taught me not to care how the world viewed me when I had my own ideals to follow. My old boss reminded me that kindness isn’t weakness. Hell, even the worst people in my life—the people I thought I loved, like people love their drugs despite the addiction—they made me realize I can survive anything.”

Then Izuku’s eyes were on Katsuki’s. All crystalline, clear summer green lakes, and their bond was suddenly awash with adoration, fresh and cool and calming, like drifting on your back and looking to the sky.

“And Katsuki showed me how much I can fall in love with myself while falling in love with another person.”

Katsuki felt his face go up in flame. He didn’t say a word.

Izuku blinked at him softly, slowly, how a cat does to tell you they love you. Then he turned back to Kouta, who might have been looking at Izuku with the same wide-eyed adoration as Katsuki.

“We don’t want anything from you but you,” Izuku said, letting his hand slip down Kouta’s shoulder and arm to squeeze at his wrist. “So lean on us a little, yeah?”

Kouta swallowed, his adam’s apple going wild as he nodded sharply in the affirmative.

“Great!” Izuku said cheerfully, clasping his hands together as he beamed at them both. “Well, why don’t we finish our food? It’s getting late and Kouta needs to be in his dorm by five.”

I love you, you crazy bastard, Katsuki thought.

Izuku abruptly looked at him with big, blinking eyes, his smile confused and curious.

“Did you say something?”

Katsuki raised a brow.

“No.”

 

The early May wind whisked across their faces as they strolled down the street hand-in-hand, watching street lights flicker to life like distant fireflies. Izuku’s eyes were shut even as he walked, his chin angled to catch the breeze and ruffle his lush curls, his scent all fresh rain and new grass.

Katsuki glanced at the wide collar of Izuku’s simple red t-shirt, gaze skimming the matte pink moon of his mating scar, and the way Izuku’s freckles seemed to fade into the surprising tawny his skin had turned in the recently sunny weather. Katsuki had really assumed Izuku would turn into one giant freckle, but the freckles actually multiplied in a layer over Izuku’s browning skin.

Distracting didn’t begin to cover it.

Unfortunately, looking at the symbol of their union automatically brought Katsuki’s gaze to the opposite side of his throat, where three sleek tears of flesh were also healing, might never stop feeling like an accusation of Katsuki’s failure as an Alpha. Visiting Camie would never bring the closure for which he was truly searching.

“On Tuesday,” Izuku began, jolting Katsuki from unsavory thoughts, “Kai is driving Eri to see Kouta. Where he’s staying and everything. The two of them have been talking every day since Kouta has been gone.”

“They should be concentrating on school,” Katsuki mumbled.

Izuku slid a slow, growing smile Katsuki’s way and shoved into him as they walked.

“Don’t be such an old man. Young love is nice, let them have it. It’s good for the soul.”

“Distracting, more like.”

“Boy, your pack wasn’t kidding, were they?” Izuku said, outright grinning now, night lights shining in his dark eyes. “You really were the most boring high school student.”

“I had goals,” Katsuki said with a sniff, angling his chin high and proud as he increased his speed and dragged Izuku along. “Shit like that never crossed my mind. If anything, watching people pair up seemed like the biggest hassle on the planet.”

“Oh yeah?” Izuku asked, his voice lilting and playful as he jerked Katsuki back to his pace, his arm firmly encircling Katsuki’s. “Then I must be the hassle of a lifetime.”

“Undoubtedly,” Katsuki agreed easily. “You’re a fucking menace.”

“And yet you courted me so doggedly.” Izuku sounded delighted and Katsuki wanted to bite him, heel him by the neck until he was moaning instead.

“Yeah, well.” Katsuki flicked a glance to Izuku and found them standing suddenly still, caught up in each other, in the bond that streamed through them like an unending body of water. “My priorities then were not my priorities now. And anyway, I never expected you.”

“Right back at'cha,” Izuku murmured, a little breathless as he looked up to Katsuki like he was more than just a Hero.

“How am I doin’, anyway?” Katsuki all but whispered, barely sure he was speaking aloud.

Izuku swallowed and licked his lower lips, his attention dropping to Katsuki’s mouth.

“Doing what?” he breathed.

“How’s my courting going?” Katsuki said, grinning with the swell of power at being able to so thoroughly distract his mate.

Izuku blinked and cracked a smile, seeming to pull himself out of it.

“Well,” he rasped. “You started out the gate pretty rough.”

“And now?”

“And now. . .” Izuku’s gaze dropped, his hands sliding up between them to lightly grip at the collar of Katsuki’s shirt, pulling him in just a little. Bystanders passed by them like spirits, like their world was individual from the plane on which Izuku and Katsuki existed. “I don’t want to move in with you, Kacchan.”

Katsuki blinked, his stomach dropping out.

“Wait, what—”

“I want us to move into our own place,” Izuku said, smiling kindly. “Together.”

Katsuki’s eyes bugged out and his knees went liquid, a  great gust of a relief heaving in a sigh as he dropped his brow to Izuku’s shoulder and shuddered a breath.

“Holy f-fuck,” he managed, shook to the core from the adrenaline of fear Izuku had instilled with a single simple sentence. “Okay. Okay, holy fuck. You piece of shit, you scared the hell outta me.”

Izuku’s frame vibrated with muted laughter, big hands skimming the length of Katsuki’s back in soothing strokes.

“Oh no,” Izuku said, clearly choking back a laugh. “I’m so sorry. I didn’t mean to scare you.”

“Like hell you didn’t!” Katsuki hollered, shoving his face in Izuku’s rosy-cheeked mirth. “A fucking terror. No one believes me when I tell them what a goddamn nightmare you are.”

“Is that a no to finding a new place?” Izuku asked, the very picture of innocence.

Katsuki glared.

“That’s it.”

Izuku’s screeches of indignance could be heard for blocks as Katsuki scooped him up and threw him over his shoulder. Stomping down the street with Izuku’s fists pounding on his back, Katsuki could allow himself to smile like a fucking maniac all the way home.

 

They fucked in the black pool of Katsuki’s bed, Izuku splayed out and soaked in luscious rainforest fragrance, his lazy bedroom eyes heavy lidded and irresistible to Katsuki as breathing. In the shifting shadow, Izuku’s pale, powerful frame was contoured in sharp grey, but he smelled supple and green as he wrapped around Katsuki like vines. They inhaled deep of each other, Katsuki sinking into the sweltering heat of him, his teeth fixed to the cord of sinew in Izuku’s neck as he tipped his head back into the sheets and gasped.

In the quiet dark, there was only the midnight moans of his mate and the shallow thrust of their bodies against each other, Izuku’s legs locked right around Katsuki’s, heels digging into the meat of his ass to keep their slow, rolling rhythm. Izuku’s lips smeared against Katsuki’s open mouth, gasping into each other rather than kissing, too lost in the tumultuous dark tide of their bond.

Sturdy bones and soft skin, old healed moons in the crease of damp thighs, the healing shrieks of scarring tucked in the crook of throat and neck. Katsuki treasured them all, worshipped them all with mouth and hands and heart. Met Izuku’s gaze in the dark and saw cherished gold, lost for so long and now found.

Red, red behind Katsuki’s closed eyes when they came together, always fire, always sparks spraying into the sea,  Izuku gripped at Katsuki like a lifeline, trembling to the bones as he kissed him and kissed him, fingers flexing in his hair as crimson soaked into orange and mellowed to buttery yellow. Katsuki couldn’t remember what it was like to only see color instead of feeling it. Izuku painted his grey world like nothing and no one else.

The hour was dragging its feet across the floor, heavy sleep on the edge of Katsuki’s consciousness as he threaded fingers through Izuku’s curls and relished the heat of his Omega curled at his side, head upon his chest. But when Izuku spoke, his voice was surprisingly clear, completely without sleep.

“Todoroki contacted me the other day. I’d agreed to see Dabi a little bit ago and now there’s, y’know, a solid date and—”

Katsuki shot up in bed, every nerve and muscle on alert, his instincts snarling even as he himself bit off every word like raw meat.

“The fuck’re you talking about—Dabi? See him? You told me you didn’t want to forever ago. You said—”

“I know what I said,” Izuku shot back, his voice tight and restrained as he sat up, rubbing his arms even though he could hardly be cold. “And it was true at the time. Now. . .I don’t know, Katsuki. I know it’s my own job to find closure within myself, but I think. . .I-I think that Dabi might want that too. For both of us.”

“And if he doesn’t?” Katsuki rumbled, his voice dropping deep and foreboding. “If he wants to take you for a new ride? He hurt you—”

“I’m not excusing his behavior,” Izuku said, sounding more calm by the minute where Katsuki’s blood worked up to a boil. “But if he’s working to reform himself—”

“Bullshit.”

“—and I’m at the point in my life where I’m willing to give him the benefit of the doubt. At the very least, to test my own bravery. Or, even better, testing my own heart’s ability to forgive. I’d like to be able to forgive, even if I’m not done forgetting or healing.”

“He’s a fucking criminal.”

“So was I.” Naked with the black sheets skimming his waist, bare to the world and bare to Katsuki, Izuku’s eyes glittered with ferocious truth. “So was I. I know you don’t know everything—”

“Because you won’t tell me shit most of the time—”

“But I was never perfect. I made stupid decisions and I hurt people so they would hurt me back. Even Dabi, I—” Izuku scrubbed hands over his face and dropped them limp to his lap, staring at them as his voice went soft. “Look, there was nothing healthy about us. I was so wrapped up in him—”

Katsuki growled, sudden and threatening beneath the taut skin of the conversation. As if on instinct, Izuku helplessly keened in return, ducking his head in a classic Omega placation that startled Katsuki from his rising snarl.

“Kat—”

Katsuki tugged Izuku in, bringing his Omega’s back flush to his chest, the rapid rabbit heart in Izuku’s ribs running beneath Katsuki’s embrace. With a deep sigh, Katsuki flattened his cheek atop Izuku’s head and paused, both of them seeming to sniff the air for signs of a fight.

“I’ll shut up now,” Katsuki managed, even if he sounded like a bitter asshole about it. “S’better when I don’t talk and you don’t end up clockin’ me in the face.”

A slight vibration of shoulders signaled the barest silent laughter from his Omega.

“You really are a remarkable learner.”

“Fuck off.”

Solidarity melted the harsh edges of the atmosphere, softening back to black night and safety in the silence. Izuku sighed and snuggled back into Katsuki’s arms, his sweet, lilting voice riding the rasp of sleepiness.

“The first time him and I, well, I wasn’t even seventeen. At that point I was starting fights all the time. Or, to put a finer point on it, I was accepting all the fights other people tried to start with me. And there were plenty. I couldn’t walk down the street without being leered at, touched, or followed. I barely interacted with my Alpha classmates because they always assumed I’d defer to them, and when I didn’t, they’d mercilessly bully or ostracize me.

“Dabi looked at me and liked me. I really believe that he liked me. Either that or I’ve always had to tell myself that to make everything feel less. . .” Izuku didn’t finish that sentence, just swallowed and started again. “He saw the violence in me and he smiled. He didn’t hate me for it, he embraced me for it. You’ll hate to hear it, but you did the same. In the best way possible, I mean. You looked at me and thought my strength was something appealing about me. So did Dabi. He was never the kind of guy to enjoy bullying a wilted flower. He wanted someone who would fight back.”

“Did you? Fight back.”

“I’ve been fighting back my entire life.”

Katsuki nodded at the truth of his, his cheek smushing into Izuku’s riotous hair. His Omega smelled like them, like a forest fire, all consuming, encompassing, sucking the oxygen from the environment just for themselves. They hadn’t been together for any solid length of time in the grand scheme of things, but already their love felt somehow. . .selfish. Possessive. Did everyone feel like their mate controlled the gravity of their reality?

“And then?” Katsuki asked in the long, albeit comfortable silence.

Izuku sighed, lacing his fingers with Katsuki’s upon his lap.

“Then I wasted a year of my life getting royally fucked up. It was addictive—not just the drugs or whatever, but him. He reflected the worst parts of me and made me feel like they were okay. Which, as an adult I now realize we all have shitty, selfish, self-destructive parts of us. But we aren’t meant to. . .to weaponize them for use against the world, no matter how much we feel like we deserve to wield them.”

Katsuki, who was arguably a living, breathing weapon that the government essentially cashed out on, could only utter a short grunt of agreement.

“How did it end?”

“There was nothing spectacular about it,” Izuku said, almost conversationally, like the emotions didn’t touch him anymore. “Looking back, I feel like I should have known something was off. You see, um. . .that final public standoff between Dabi and Endeavor—”

“Sure. I was there.”

Izuku sat up from Katsuki’s hold, whipping around to meet his eyes in the dark, all wide shock and awe.

“You were?”

“Yeah.” Katsuki shrugged and leaned back against his hands. “Was mostly down for the count, though. I barely remember being there.”

“Oh, okay, well.” Izuku worried his bottom lip with thumb and forefinger, eyes flickering in the dark from the bed to Katsuki’s face. “I was the last person to see Dabi before it happened.”

Katsuki blinked in quick succession.

“Hah?”

“I mean, I’d spent the night at his place and the next morning, he left to go do. . .that.”

Katsuki faintly shook his head, barely comprehending the bizarrely fate-driven road the two of them had been hurtling on towards each other over the course of years

“Holy shit. Fuck. What was he like?”

“Doling out more words of wisdom than usual, but he always loved to listen to himself talk, and I was like a puppy who was always happy to listen, so we worked well like that.”

“Gross.”

Izuku lightly kicked a bare foot at Katsuki’s gut, and Katsuki only grinned and held onto the foot until it rested upon his lap.

“Shut up. Anyway, he was mostly normal. I got the impression he was getting ready to break up with me, but at that point in our relationship we were more ash than the fire, and I was ready for the winds of change to blow me away, even if I hadn’t been conscious of it at the time.”

Katsuki could never really understand. Izuku was and would always be his only personal experience with a relationship and he couldn’t fathom their forest fire ever burning out.

“That’s a lot.”

Izuku heaved a sigh, a great weight in his voice.

“Yeah. And at, um, at the gala, Endeavor, he—he seemed to think I was involved in, I don’t know, goading Dabi on or whatever. I guess he’d been monitoring Dabi from afar for a while and I was caught in the crosshairs.”

“That old man will never see past his own mistakes. Even when he does, he’s powerless to reach his kids in any way that matters anymore.”

Izuku frowned in the way he did when he disagreed, but didn’t seem interested in chasing that thread of conversation.

“Maybe. I couldn’t say. I-I mean, I could say, and I did say to him some not exactly complimentary things—”

“I’m fuckin’ shocked.”

Izuku snorted, his sweet features a little strained, the pooling shadows beneath his eyes pronounced in the deep night.

“Yeah.” His smile faltered, hands driving into his hair to scrub and scratch nails at the scalp as he seemed to shake himself off. Something about his small, choked out laugh clenched around Katsuki’s heart. “Ugh, I’m tired. Can’t remember where I left off.”

“Come here, for fuck’s sake.” Katsuki swept his Omega into his arms and flung them to bed, smiling against the back of Izuku’s neck at the squawk of protest. For a time they simply found the fit for the bodies, Izuku’s head pillowed on the thick expanse of Katsuki’s arm, his free on slung over Izuku’s waist, one thigh sandwiched atop Izuku’s muscular leg. Katsuki sputtered and spat as Izuku’s hair invaded his nose, but finally found a place to rest where he wouldn’t be so assaulted. “Now,” he said with a sigh, “you and the burnt chicken nugget broke up.”

The sleepy drag of Izuku’s voice edged with his smile.

“I mean, we never technically broke up. He just went away.”

Katsuki viciously dug tickling fingers into Izuku’s ribs and pitched his voice above the screams.

“You tryin’ to say he’s still your boyfriend, hah, shitty nerd!”

“No no no!” Choking on laughter, Izuku reached back and pinched Katsuki’s leg until they found a truce and Izuku could catch his breath. “Anyway. I got better after that. I thought I did, anyway. Yagi was a growing positive force in my life, I was thriving in university—”

The solid black punch of emotion ripped a hole in their bond like a real life sledgehammer to the gut, winding Katsuki on contact as shadow swarmed his throat and threatened to choke. He wheezed, blinking into the night, hand frantically searching Izuku’s to knot their fingers and ground them through the onslaught of impending doom that so suddenly seemed to overtake the bond between them.

Shock was an understatement.

The horror of this trauma, of this drowning swamp of sorrow and guilt, was that Izuku wasn’t reacting the same way as Katsuki. He was so fucking still, so quiet, the only sound in the room was Katsuki’s shuddering stops and starts of breath as he waded through the insidious muck that threatened to flood his throat and take him under.

This. Katsuki had never experienced the likes of this. Not even in his world of blood and violence, loss and revenge, broken bones and funerals. This was not the kind of trauma he could have ever understood until now, until this brief glimpse into the beyond of Izuku’s brain.

This was self-hatred and shame, disgust and pity; all directed inward like a black mold, an insidious necrotizing virus that ate a person from the inside out until the hollow shell of them capsized.

The horror ripped Katsuki’s lungs and heart right from his body.

“It’s okay,” Izuku soothed, turning in Katsuki’s hold to shush and croon and stroke hands through Katsuki’s hair. “It’s fine, I’m fine. I’m right here, aren’t I? With you, together. I’m lucky, I’m so lucky.”

Katsuki hadn’t realized his face was wet until Izuku wiped palms across his hot, wet cheeks. The knowledge startled him into a snarl that had Izuku startling in his arms and keening a high, apologetic Omega noise from the depths of instinct.

Realizing the minor fright he’d given his mate, Katsuki snapped from his distraught state and embraced Izuku so tightly he could feel Izuku’s humid, shuddering breath dampened his chest, could feel the skim of eyelashes as Izuku clenched them shut.

“You shouldn’t have to feel fucking lucky to have someone love you,” Katsuki whispered harshly into the dark, his voice gritty and used up as he clutched his Omega impossibly close. He could smell the acrid, rotten fruit scent of distress seeping from Izuku’s skin and desperately, impossibly wished Izuku could scent him enough for the Alpha hormones to sooth. “You shouldn’t have to feel like you’re some goddamn stray I picked up off the street out of pity. I don’t pity you and I don’t think you’re broken in any kind of way that makes you less than me or goddamn anyone. Like that shit you said to Kouta? You’re not unlovable just for existing, Izuku. Hell, if there’s anything to get out of all this, it’s that even the goddamn villains love you. Everyone loves you. Who the fuck doesn’t? I’ll tear their throat out.”

Izuku’s wet laugh betrayed the tears that had been smearing between Izuku’s face and Katsuki’s chest, but Izuku only jabbed Katsuki’s shoulder with a feeble punch and sighed.

“I don’t have anything good to say to that.”

“So what, shut up. Talk more if you want. Don’t talk. I don’t care. We got, like, forever or whatever to talk about shit.”

“Hmmm.” Izuku sniffled and snuffled into the soft spot below Katsuki’s chin and this time Katsuki didn’t dare swipe the ticklish curls from his nose. “Big talk.”

“Fuck off. I always say dumb shit around you for some reason. Pisses me off.”

“Likewise.”

“I piss you off or you say dumb shit around me?”

“Both. Absolutely both.”

Katsuki grinned and idly massaged long, soothing strokes of palm down Izuku’s back and sides. For a while, they said nothing, and Katsuki would have thought Izuku was asleep but for the uneven waves between their bond and the stormy sky reflected above.

Eventually, Izuku cleared his throat and spoke against the pulse of Katsuki’s throat.

“Then I met. . .Jin. You probably know him as Twice. He wore the mask, but I saw him on television sometimes. In the news. And I knew. Fuck, the villain name he chose was the name I gave him. I made the villain.”

Katsuki’s mouth thinned, his hand shifting to flex in the muscle of Izuku’s nape.

“You’re not stupid enough to believe that.”

Izuku made a tight, dismissive noise.

“Part of me is and part of me isn’t. I don’t know that it’ll ever be black in white in my brain. I’m all grey matter up there.”

Another extended pause in the breathless black encroaching on their joy. Katsuki swallowed against the rising bile of forced empathy the bond gave him.

“You don’t have to say anything else,” he managed, voice clipped and curt against the onslaught of foreign feelings. “We should sleep.”

“I loved him,” Izuku whispered, and Katsuki’s stomach dropped out with a sickly splat. “In all the ways that I could love a person at that point in my life. With hope. I had so much hope after Dabi, because I was healing. I was so sure I knew what was good for me. Jin made me. . .he made me laugh. He was funny as hell and he was adoring. He was clever and quick and he took up a room when he walked in. When he was good he was so good and when—when he was bad. When he was bad, it was. . .bad.”

Izuku’s voice took on a quiet strength, the one Katsuki was more familiar with over the months.

“I. . .I wanted to fix him. I thought I could. That love can stitch another person’s pieces together. But healing doesn’t work that way. A person does the stitching for themselves and love is the healing balm. I could sew him together time and again like some bloodied battlefield surgeon, but if he kept ripping out the stitches himself, there was only so much I could do.”

Izuku flung himself from Katsuki’s hold and splayed upon the bed, staring up at the ceiling with a dark, subdued profile Katsuki couldn’t read in the dark.

“Sometimes. . .” Izuku licked his lips and swallowed. “Sometimes I wish you’d known the me from before. Not—not the me from my Dabi years, but the me b-before—before him. I was. . .that was the better version of me. My insides were still a pretty house. Maybe in need of some renovation, but I wasn’t totaled yet. Not torn down to foundations and rubble. You shouldn’t have to be a builder or an architect.”

“There’s no better version of you,” Katsuki said, quiet and stern. He didn’t touch Izuku but for stretching out a long leg, his toes brushing the top of Izuku’s foot. “It’s all you. You’ve just been levelling up. Sometimes to renovate you have to knock down a few shitty walls first.”

Izuku laughed out loud, though Katsuki couldn’t be sure why. But Izuku was rolling to his side now, hands pillowed beneath his cheeks like a child, his mouth softly curved and more like the man Katsuki fell for.

“Yeah, I think—I’ve been starting to think you’re right. Between you and the therapy, I—yeah. I’m starting to think that this me might be okay.”

Katsuki tsk'ed and kicked at Izuku’s shins.

“I wouldn’t stick around for okay, you goddamn nerd. I stick around for fuckin’ exemplary.”

“Exemplary?” Izuku sputtered a laugh. “And what am I an example of? I can hardly imagine. I’m a shitty Omega and a failed Alpha. Too passionate, too timid. Too smart, too gullible. Nothing about me has ever added up.”

“Of a human.”

“Of a human what?”

“You’re exemplary of a human,” Katsuki said, dragging his words like Izuku was an idiot. “Of humanity. Of a good person. You don’t have to be perfect to be human. To be perfect would then make you a shitty example of a human, because ain’t nobody like that. Not for real, anyway.”

When Izuku only stared, dead silent and doe-eyed, Katsuki growled in frustration and waved a vague hand at him, nearly smacking Izuku across the nose.

“You’re just. . .your flaws make you, don’t they? And so do your best qualities. The two of them together made someone who, for the first time in my entire life, I think—the first person who’d ever made me stop and notice them. Like, really fuckin’ notice. Really look past. . .past myself. Or whatever.”

Silence and Izuku’s still expression prevailed.

And then Izuku smiled. It should have brought the sun up early.

He scrambled across the bed and draped himself over Katsuki’s frame like a lazy cat, folding his arms upon Katsuki’s chest with his chin propped up to grin down at his Alpha.

“Wow! Who would have thought the great and powerful Ground Zero would be such a sap? How embarrassing for you. How—”

“You little shit!”

They wrestled like children, albeit naked and frisky and playing far too fucking dirty, and they’d both have the bruises to prove it by morning. Izuku’s laughter filled Katsuki’s apartment in a way he could never have fathomed possible, and the ache in him spread deep and sweet to find a nest for themselves that wasn’t this place, but their place.

One day. One day soon, dammit.

When they were both finally exhausted and spread like stars across the bed, limbs overlapping and dreams blurring the edges, Katsuki drawled,

“Fine. Go see Dabi. But I’m scent-marking the fuck outta you so hard he’ll question if you were ever Omega in the first place.”

Izuku hummed in languid, lazy amusement, but didn’t shift a muscle.

“Thanks for the blessing, but I was never asking your permission.”

Katsuki smiled into the dark.

“Glad you’re back to your senses.”

 

Chapter 42

Summary:

Many things had aired out today. What they were to each other and why—those indistinct measures of a relationship would never be fully cleared of ash and smoke. No one could clean up a fire that burnt the entire house down, but sometimes the foundations remained to piece through.

Keepsakes they may not have lost in the fire.

Notes:

Recently, I've been reading the first couple of QR chapters and it really has settled in my bones how wonderfully these two have progressed, and where the story has gone, and how deeply thankful I am for you all who have travelled thing big road with me. Your comments, your stories, and your support truly inspire me to keep writing and sharing with you, even during times in the last three years when I felt like I should simply drop my writing altogether.

I've been waiting to write this specific chapter for three years. I hope you enjoy it and I look forward to your feedback. Sending you all my love! Stay safe, warm, and healthy.

PS: If you're looking for some good 'you're real fuckin bad for me, you sexy asshole' songs, the ones below just might hit the spot for you.

Songs For This Chapter:
Broken Wings - Danielle Durack | Spotify | YouTube
Baby - Bishop Briggs | Spotify | YouTube
Clean - Hey Violet | Spotify | YouTube
Weak Heart - Miriam Bryant | Spotify | YouTube

“Ow.” Izuku grimaced, his bare legs spread as he cocked his head to eye the swollen, cauterized burn searing his inner thigh. “Hurts.”

“Uh huh,” was Dabi’s only reply as he wiggled into skin tight black jeans and slouched from the bed without buttoning or zipping them over his slim hips. The crease of his ass peeking over the waist of his studded belt, Dabi shambled toward the tiny fridge of his ramshackle studio apartment.

Dropping to a squat, Dabi dug out two beer cans and tossed one across the small room. Izuku caught it neatly and frowned at the label.

“Put that on it,” Dabi said, cracking the top of his own and taking a long swig. His discolored jaw flexed against the brutal staples as his mouth worked.

Wincing, Izuku tentatively tapped the sweating beer bottle to angry, searing circle tucked near the crease of his thigh.

“This is going to hurt for weeks when I walk.”

“Complaining?” Dabi didn’t sound like he cared either way, or that he was even amused by the situation.

“Well, I—”

“If I didn’t do it you’d have found someone else to do it, anyway.”

“Like hell,” Izuku lied. His cheeks burned when Dabi talked like that, like Izuku was staying with him just for the addictive torture of it all.

Dabi strolled over, the dull, metallic teeth of the open zipper at his fly the same color as the staples riding his lean hip. He paused at the end of the mattress and grinned down at Izuku, sitting small and numb in the sheets.

“What do you know about hell, kiddo?”

Izuku glared.

“It burns.”

Dabi smiled, smug and all-knowing as he dropped beside Izuku on the bed.

“You haven’t the faintest. This isn’t hell. It’s your special little safe space where you can control just how much you hate yourself.”

Izuku groaned and flopped back to the mattress, naked and comfortable with it after more than a year together doing little else but fucking.

“Oh, shut up already. I never asked you for it.”

Dabi hummed in that goading way of his, pausing to drink his beer while those searing blue eyes slowly dragged over Izuku’s skin, lingering at the collection of scars between Izuku’s legs.

“You do and you don’t. But you’re Mr Scholarship—figure it out yourself.”

Izuku aimed a narrow look at Dabi, which went ultimately ignored because Dabi was picking up his cracked phone from the cum-stained sheets and staring down at it with a strange look. Sometimes Izuku would ask who Dabi was texting, but he’d always smile and say something stupid like: Does Little Red need more attention? Come here, give your big bad wolf a kiss, and Izuku would be as grossed-out as Dabi had intended and leave him be.

One thing Izuku did know, though, was that Dabi was alone in this world. Same as Izuku, but for obviously different reasons, even if Izuku didn’t have concrete details.

“How long have you been on your own?” Izuku asked quietly, folding his knees up against his chest and keeping his eyes on the beer can he attempted to balance on one bony knee, then the other. He couldn’t look like he cared too much, because it made Dabi act weird.

Dabi looked up from his phone, his distant expression sharpening like icy, cutting glass on Izuku.

“Since when do you care?”

Izuku frowned.

“I’ve always cared. I wouldn’t be here if I didn’t.”

Something strange and unknowable flickered across Dabi’s lean face and he huffed a laugh, maybe genuinely amused.

“You do make me laugh, Red.”

Izuku pouted before he could stop himself. What was wrong with wanting to get to know his own boyfriend? After all this time, shouldn’t they at least keep trying to bond? Wasn’t that what normal Alpha and Omegas did?

Although, neither of them were the definition of any kind of normal. So, there was that.

“So, how long?” Izuku urged, scooting closer to Dabi on the bed, nearly toppling his beer until he remembered to nip it from his knee and set it aside on the floor. He propped his chin upon Dabi’s shoulder, peering up at him with pleading, curious eyes. “Longer than me?”

Dabi glanced down at Izuku, and this time the curl of his mouth was not of amusement.

“Since when have you been on your own? Don’t invite me to your little baby pity party—I got bigger fish to fry. You still live with mommy—"

"I live in a dorm now, ass—"

"My family thought I was dead up until a couple of years ago and that was only because I bothered giving dear old dad an extremely warm welcome.”

Izuku perked up with the new information, entirely ignoring the jabs. His arms snaked around one of Dabi’s, clinging.

“Your family? You have one? Are you on speaking terms now?”

Dabi barked a laugh, humorless and hollow of emotion.

“If you knew what being alone really meant, you wouldn’t ask a question like that. Keep playing behind mommy’s skirts, kid.”

Izuku shoved at Dabi, sending Dabi’s beer spilling across a corner of the bed.

“You’re an asshole,” Izuku mumbled, standing up to search out his pants. He yelped as strong arms came around both legs and sent him toppling to the bed. Dabi’s lithe, scarred body was climbing over his, hand pinning Izuku’s wrists above his head with more force than was comfortable.

Izuku felt like a moth pinned behind a frame, quivering for freedom after his wings had long stopped working.

Dabi leaned in, his breath stinking of menthols and hops.

“You love it.”

Izuku didn’t know how to answer when it was both true and not. He sighed, searching Dabi’s gloating demeanor for a crack where the light would shine through. Once in a while he would catch it—the clever, funny, talkative guy who carried passion like a torch instead of throwing it onto pyres he made of peoples’ emotions.

“Would it hurt to let me in,” Izuku asked quietly, “ever?”

Dabi’s frown was sudden and genuine as he abruptly sat up, straddling Izuku’s stomach.

“S’not worth it, Red. You’re cute and you’re fun to play with, but what could you ever do for me that I couldn’t do for myself?”

Izuku chewed on the inside of his cheek, squirming a little from the weight of the Alpha keeping him in bed.

“I don’t know,” Izuku murmured, feeling small beneath the force of his self-consciousness. He could feel his face go up in flame. “Acceptance.”

Dabi’s grin could slice through glass. With a flourish, he took Izuku’s wrist and pressed a dry kiss to the pinked scar that had destroyed one of his scent glands.

“That’s what you get from me, not vice versa.”

Izuku glared and swiped his hand back, clutching his wrist protectively to his chest.

“I. . . I accept you.”

Dabi laughed and swung off of Izuku’s body, his voice dismissive as he turned his face away from Izuku’s view.

“You don’t even know me,” he said, scooting back to the edge of the mattress to retrieve his abandoned beer. Izuku sat up with a huff and bunched the sheets atop his naked lap, pointedly glaring at the back of Dabi’s neck and hoping he’d feel it.

“And whose fault is that?”

Dabi’s shoulders were stiff, scrunched near his shoulders with the gargoyle slouch he kept at the end of the bed. He drank for a moment, then smacked his lips and glanced over his shoulder with a joker’s smile.

“Is that question meant to put me into a state of deep thought? Am I meant to experience some grand revelation? You get an arm’s length just like everybody else, kid. Don’t cry about it. We’re not on the playground anymore.”

Izuku felt his body flush hot from chest to ears. Dabi always threw his words back at him so easily, and Izuku never felt like he could keep up. Would it kill Dabi to slow down for him just a little. Were all Alphas so callous and uncaring? Izuku felt like a kid dragged along by a leash down the street.

“I’d never cry over you.”

Dabi’s smile lengthened and grew teeth, but the fire in his eyes warmed as he reached out with his free hand and gripped the scruff of Izuku’s neck, yanking him in for a sloppy side hug and a kiss on the curls.

“Good boy.”

“Fuck you,” Izuku mumbled, unconsciously nuzzling at the line of Dabi’s throat, a stupid, shitty Omega seeking comfort from a wild, lone wolf.

“Leave that one to the Alphas,” Dabi said, an obnoxious smile clear in his voice.

“Double fuck you.”

Dabi hummed with theatrical thoughtfulness, his arm still slung around Izuku, keeping him close as Izuku ducked his head and instinctively clung to his Alpha.

“Remind me how you got that scholarship again?” Dabi yelped when Izuku bit his shoulder. “Kidding —I’m kidding! You’re a goddamn scholar among fuckboys.”

Izuku jerked his head up to properly glare.

“I’m not a fuckboy, either.”

Dabi rolled his eyes and patted Izuku’s head.

“Yeah, yeah, I know. You’re too soft. Look at you,” Dabi said, that gloating sing-song back to his voice as his hand trailed a line down Izuku’s spine, leaving goosebumps. “You’re really attached to me, aren’t you?”

Izuku froze, but releasing Dabi altogether would make him look too guilty of the crime.

“N-no.”

“Well,” Dabi said softly. “Wishful thinking, then.”

He drank long from his beer and Izuku’s brain whirled with the implications of his Alpha’s words.

“Do you—can I ask,” Izuku said softly. “What’s your real name?”

Dabi sighed through his nose and stood, shaking off Izuku’s hold in process, leaving him naked and cold.

“You already know my name,” Dabi said simply, leaving the empty beer can on the junk-cluttered counter and returning to the mini fridge for another.

Izuku sat up straighter, eyes wide and intent on Dabi’s scarred, stapled frame. He was barely holding it together at any given time. That’s how it seemed to Izuku, anyway.

“I do?” Izuku said.

Dabi basically giggled, slightly manic as he popped the top of his beer and turned with dark eyebrows raised.

“Most people have heard of us.”

Izuku worried his bottom lip between his thumb and forefinger as he puzzled.

“Are you talking about your. . .your family’s name?”

Dabi ran his tongue across his yellowed teeth and stalked forward with a sudden air of burning intent that Izuku froze in the face of it, twin lances of fear and arousal biting through him with sharp teeth, drawing blood straight toward his cock. Dabi set aside his beer and dropped to his knees before Izuku, his face wolf’s mask once more.

“I’m done talking about anything at all.”

Their fucking was always one of two things. Surreal or viscerally real.

Izuku’s tongue was either a cloud in his singing mouth, his skin poprocks and coke, his pupils the night sky and his irises the rings of Saturn. When they fucked on whatever they were on that day, Dabi wasn’t a stranger, but a doppelganger or a twin grafted from Izuku’s scar tissue to show him how ugly he could be if he really really tried. Dabi split Izuku open, showed him his heart, and asked him if it hurt; and only when Izuku said yes were they both happy.

Other times they fucked like reality was a brutal, sharp technicolor. No music, no drugs, no shadow-night to tell them it was okay to look at each other. Dabi fucked into Izuku like he was only working toward the brief spark at the finish line, and Izuku zoned out of his body and zoomed in on the spider cracks in the wall and the thread of the tatami beneath his screaming knees.

This time it was the latter, and Dabi was looking at Izuku like he hated him, like he could cry if he wasn’t so dried out on the side of the road, a fire having long sucked every drop of oxygen from its environment. Izuku gritted his teeth against the onslaught of Dabi’s ferocity and felt the scratchy sheets chafe against his back as he distantly remembered he hadn’t eaten today and where he should stop on the way home.

When it was over, Izuku hurt, but not in the way that used to do anything for him anymore. Nothing about this life was doing much for him anymore. Every time he pushed or pulled, Dabi reacted in the opposite. He was too clever and fast for Izuku to anticipate; impossible to catch.

“Hey,” Dabi said, facing away from Izuku as he zipped his pants and searched through a chair piled high with old laundry. “I’m not always gonna be around to punish you for whatever naive nonsense you feel guilty of in your sheltered little life, you know.”

Izuku did a little hop as he pulled the shorts over his ass. His glare was half-hearted, because Dabi was always saying shit like this, like Izuku was stupid or something.

“Fuck you.”

“Won’t always be around for that, either,” Dabi said, and the way he said it sounded weirdly. . .final. He turned but didn’t look directly at Izuku as he wobbled on one leg and pulled on a holey sock. “And what then?”

“What then what?” Izuku shot back, feeling mouthy and annoyed after another day of his boyfriend giving him the runaround.

“Then you’ll have a choice,” Dabi replied, his tone unusually measured and calm. “ Move on to a new me or get your life together. The choice is yours Mr Scholarship.”

It was Izuku’s turn to heave a sigh as he winced from thigh burn brushing cotton.

“You really do sound like a big brother sometimes.” When Dabi didn’t rise to the jab, Izuku frowned at his Alpha’s departing back. “Dabi, are you going somewhere?”

“To take a leak.”

“No!” Izuku trailed after him like a dumb puppy, full well aware of it but unable to stop himself as something felt off even without being able to scent it. “I-I mean—are you, um. You’re not going away, right?”

Dabi took a piss with Izuku standing in the doorway, waiting, holding his breath. After he’d washed his hands, Dabi turned and reached out to dry his hands off on the front of Izuku’s shirt. Asshole.

“You really do care, don’t you?” Dabi said quietly, an odd, unsettling smile cracking his hardened features. “Well, here’s some big brother advice, direct from me to you. One day, when it comes down to it, get rid of anybody who threatens to bring you down. Incinerate them.”

Izuku’s felt his face twist up in pure confusion from where that came from.

“Does that include you too? Am I meant to hurt you until you’re gone?”

Dabi’s hand cupped Izuku’s face, eerily gentle, utterly unnerving as they met each other’s searching gazes.

“Kid,” Dabi rasped, “I’m already gone. I always have been.

Izuku regretted walking back to Parchment, the chafing burn between his thighs spreading like fire down one leg as he winced all the way there. The unrelenting heat of summer didn’t make it any easier to bear. Hours later, when he stepped out of the shop to head home from the night, he smelled fire in the air and didn’t think a thing of it.

In the future, he’d think a hell of a lot more.

 

“Can you stop rolling around my clothes like a prehistoric beast now?” Izuku asked with a wry smile, his arms folded across his bare chest as he stood in his bedroom and continued to watch his mate practically hump and grind his clothes upon the bed. While Katsuki had claimed he’d be scenting Izuku to high hell before his meeting with Dabi, this had not exactly been Izuku’s expectation.

Katsuki starfished out on the bed, splaying out in only his boxers with a face like sour lemons. Beneath laid the crush of Izuku’s outfit for the day.

“That burnt-ass french fry better get the message is all I’m fuckin’ sayin’,” he said to the ceiling with an unrelenting glare.

Izuku barked a laugh and tossed himself onto the bed—smaller than Katsuki’s but with three times the pillows for delightful nesting purposes—and promptly crushed a wheezing Katsuki beneath his muscular weight.

“Fuuh—” Katsuki managed the half-curse before the wind was knocked from his gut.

“Like I said.” Izuku pinned Katsuki to the bed, big hands clamping around the ever-surprising delicacy of Katsuki’s wrists above his head.  “If anyone can take care of me, it’s me. Sorry to break your sensitive hero ego.”

“Who’s sensitive?” Katsuki snarled, bucking Izuku off with hips and legs alone. It was Izuku’s turn to swear as he went soaring off the side of the bed and thumped onto the hardwood. “Shithead. You sound like that goddamn beak-face all over again.”

Izuku popped up from the edge of the mattress, unperturbed and grinning.

“He makes good points. You can’t fault him there.”

“Can’t I?” Katsuki said, promptly chucking Izuku’s black jeans across the bed and smacking Izuku in the face. “Dabi was one of Chisaki’s men in the first place.”

“I wouldn’t put it like that,” Izuku mumbled with a thoughtful pout as he stood and began to hop into the too-tight, ripped jeans. He actually was starting to get a bit too muscular for most of his old clothes, these days. Especially in the ass and legs.

But Izuku would rather eat dirt than go clothes shopping, so that was a big old nope on the to-do list of life.

“Kai was only gathering those kinds of guys and climbing through the hierarchy so he could catch word on who had kidnapped Eri. In fact, Kai actively warned me against Dabi the night we met.”

“You were a real fuckin’ peach of a kid, weren’t you.”

Izuku rounded the bed and yanked out from underneath Katsuki’s stubborn ass the simple black t-shirt printed with, ‘I Like Big Books And I Cannot Lie’, in white English lettering. The majority of people in the city never stopped to read it, or could read it at all, and even if they did, the cultural reference was pretty lost on them. His English teacher back in university had thought it was hysterical, though, and Izuku had never been one to pass on a stupid shirt.

Yanking the threadbare tee over his head, Izuku grinned at Katsuki’s scrunched gremlin face and leaned in to kiss him loudly on the head.

“About as much as you were, from what I can tell.”

Katsuki scoffed.

“I was a goddamn prodigy.”

“If history has taught us anything,” Izuku said as he picked a pair of mismatched, crumpled socks from the floor and sat bedside to tug them on, “it’s that prodigies are not only to be feared, but their genius often outweighs their sanity. Especially Alpha prodigies. You know, I once read this article about early death rates—”

“Oh my god, shut up.” Katsuki’s arms belted around Izuku’s waist and, ignoring Izuku’s shrieks of laughter, Katsuki rolled them onto the bed until Izuku was breathing hard and his mate was spooning him from behind with a grip of iron. “I’ve never met an asshole with the need to have the last word more than you. And fuckin’ Shinsou. Who taught who?”

“I’m pretty sure we’re just kindred spirits,” Izuku said, laughing still as he squirmed with the intent to leave. The last thing he wanted was to be late; to feel rushed or out of sorts upon arriving. “Did I ever tell you how we met? He helped beat up some guys with me.”

“He’s a fucking nightmare,” Katsuki said, his face pressed against the nape of Izuku’s neck, which he had already scented enough to overpower a an entire candle store of smells. “I mean, literally, I’ve had nightmares about that creepy fucker.”

Izuku’s shoulders shook with faint laughter, the warmth of friendship suffusing his limbs.

“You know—” Izuku licked his lips, thinking back, almost eleven years back now to being a First Year. “You know, when him and I first met, he introduced himself to me. And then I introduced myself and I told him that no one had ever heard of me. Someone like me, y’know, a nobody, a nothing. No one will ever know me, hear of me, feel that I made a difference in the world. I didn’t say all that, obviously. But in reply he just said, with total confidence in his voice even though he’d just seen me punch the tooth out of some guy’s mouth—he said, ‘not yet, anyway’.”

When Katsuki didn’t reply, probably didn’t know what to say, Izuku shrugged and sat up from the now-loose embrace of Katsuki’s hold. Peering over his shoulder, Izuku offered his love a half-smile.

“He said ‘not yet’, like he already knew I was going to be more than I could have ever imagined for myself. He believed I had more inside of me than just the blood I was spitting onto the pavement from a shattered nose.”

Katsuki’s frown was unmoving, his expression severe and unreadable, waiting. He’d learned how to wait so well for Izuku. He really was a prodigy in ways people didn’t even know.

“That’s—” Izuku mulled his words around, nodding to himself, eyes unseeing of the present. “That’s how I feel about Dabi, I think. He’s been, I don’t know, he’s been getting the shit kicked out of him by life, too. He’s shattered bones and spit blood, too. But I—I want to be a person who can tell him with confidence, my own version of ‘not yet’. My own belief in him. Because maybe one stranger is all that it takes to change the course of a life.”

For a while, they were both quiet, considering each other in the afternoon light, dancing motes of dust freckling the air. With a sigh, Katsuki folded his arms behind his head and rubbed his lips together, thoughtful before he spoke.

“You’re a kind person, Midoriya Izuku. Don’t fuck yourself over. I don’t gotta tell you this, but some people aren’t born all cute fluffy puppies and shit. Some people are just born wolves.”

Izuku smiled, a sense of calm washing through their bond like a new tide in the summer sun.

“Wolves need a pack more than anyone, handsome.”

 

Izuku walked for over thirty minutes, but it wasn’t far enough to get where he needed to go.

The crippling fist of anxiety clenching around his heart wanted to walk to the edge of the earth, over the side, and float off into the nothing where no one could place a flame to the wax wings he was slowly trying to craft for his confidence. He wanted to fly just far enough where the burning heat of shame and regret and simmering, under-skin sadness could no longer melt what he was trying to make of himself.

The other half of him stopped before the brightly lit, friendly building where they were meant to meet and hoped, prayed, begged for whatever scraps of luck that the world might have thrown into the street for him.

Half a year ago, Izuku would have collapsed beneath the stress. Would have reverted into fury and self-loathing; may have even made some violently poor decisions like a feral animal lashing out at a world that kept abandoning him and beating him today.

Today, he was different. Midoriya Izuku wasn’t alone—in truth, he had never been, but—but now, he knew it.

With the hands of a dozen good, kind, strong people holding Izuku steady on his feet, he took a centering breath and entered the cafe.

With some level of miracle, Izuku heard the woman behind him call a greeting over the roar of adrenaline and blood in his skull. He felt lightweight, a little detached, his instincts rising up to disconnect from his conscious brain to tuck itself at the back of his brain and watch out from the familiar, cushioned safety where nothing could touch him. Scanning the crowd of patrons with a rising thunder of his pulse through his limbs, Izuku wet his lips and exhaled, soft and shaky with either disappointment or relief when he realized he didn’t see anyone who remotely looked like Dabi here.

Izuku had arrived first.

An inner shriek of released tension quivered through Izuku’s body, trembling right down to his jelly knees as he unconsciously pressed a hand to the glass door he’d come from, searching for balance, for stability where there was absolutely none.

Izuku had arrived first and he could set the scene. He could be the one to wait and smile graciously when Dabi arrived. He could be the one to—

“Hey, Little Red,” rasped the dangerously handsome dragon voice of Izuku’s dreams, and the room evacuated entirely of oxygen as Izuku slowly turned in hollow horror. “Look who actually came.”

Shrinking. The world was shrinking into a pinprick, a sharp, fractured bullet hole with one person in the center, and Izuku might as well have been shot for all the pain that cut through his ribs.

“D—” Izuku couldn’t find the words. Couldn’t do anything but look. Some fragile, faraway little boy part of him that had leaned into this man, had depended on him to warm the nights or challenge his ideals even when it might not have been for the best—

That part of him so long ago attached to Todoroki Touya, to Dabi, to the dragon in his nightmares, absolutely surged with recognition and relief. The pleasure centers of Izuku’s brain lit up like seeing family after the longest time, the emotion sparking through Izuku with such a shock that he shorted out and stilled entirely and simply soaked up the vision before him.

Those ever-burning bunsen blue eyes evenly met Izuku’s wide ones, an unfamiliar, stubby fringe of silvery-pale lashes framing the cool gaze. Purpling, necrotic scarring had healed to matte pink, textured and stretched across his sharp lower jaw but was significantly paled down to a skin tone that one might not even instantly noticeable upon passing on the street. The lean, rakish set of his face was still rawboned and striking, his nose pierced twice in a silver stud beside a small hoop, his ears an increased array of more silver and what looked like ostentatious icy diamonds and twinkling sapphire.

But it wasn’t simply his face that punched Izuku to the gut with familiarity, it was the hair. The pure, clean white, artfully spiked in all directions left Izuku reeling with too much, his nerves scrambling for full understanding, full peace of mind when staring in the face of this man who had changed the course of Izuku’s life by teaching him how to burn bridges with magnificent bitterness.

“You’re—” Izuku tried again, his voice a whisper as he simply stood in the foyer of the stupid cafe and made an outright fool of himself. “You—”

“You look good,” Dabi said, and then he grinned; that sharp, viciously charming thing that had sliced Izuku at the knees from day one, and Izuku wanted to cry.

From what emotion, he didn’t have a fucking clue.

“You look—” Oh god, oh god, his voice was cracking. Inwardly panicking, Izuku pressed his lips tightly together and looked around frantically, suddenly hyper aware of the crowd and his placement at the forefront of the store.

“Hold on,” Dabi said, and then there was a hand on his back, leading him off to the side. “There’s a garden up top,” Dabi drawled in a slow, unbothered tone, as if he wasn’t going to shove a knife of sarcasm in Izuku’s gut for almost bursting into tears at the drop of a hat. “I saw you arrive from up there. How long were you going to stand on the sidewalk and stare? Come on, Red, aren’t you grown up yet?”

Oh. There it was.

Izuku burst out with a watery laugh.

“Fuck you,” Izuku mumbled, sniffling back a wash of emotion. “I’m not scared of you. I’ve seen your pale, skinny ass too many times.”

“Oh, he has sharp teeth now, hmmm?” Dabi's cigarette-scarred voice exuded amusement, though it had been and still was hard to tell if he was laughing at or laughing with. “Cute.”

“And are your teeth filed down now?” Izuku said, trying for casual but probably coming off more bitter than he’d like. Dabi had once had a habit of bringing that out in him.

Dabi hummed, as if in thought, as he eased Izuku toward a table that overlooked the street. With a direct view a floor down to where Izuku would have been standing for ages, it really was a wonder Izuku hadn’t noticed being watched. He’d been too tangled in his head. Still was.

“Drink?” Dabi said instead of replying, his pale, silvery eyebrows raised and expectant as Izuku took his seat. For a moment, Izuku could only stare up at him. The midday sunshine cut right through Dabi’s newly white hair like a blinding spotlight freezing Izuku on the spot.

That sure explained all of the mascara Izuku had once found in the cutlery drawer of Dabi’s kitchen, though.

“Coffee,” Izuku said, scrambling for any kind of coherent answer when he was still battling through the shock and awe of what was happening. “Black.”

There was that easy grin again; not friendly but predatory in its charm, more big bad wolf in fluffy white sheepskin.

“Be right back.”

Izuku watched Dabi go—damn well couldn’t do anything else, could he? The swagger of his slim hips were the same, the almost affected way Dabi had about his movements, like he was the star and the world was his stage. His slim black jeans and leather studded jacket hadn’t changed despite the years, and Izuku couldn’t judge because the jeans he was wearing right now were circa age twenty or something.

With a frown, Izuku propped his elbow upon the rickety metal table, set his chin upon his fist, looking out at the city, sight unseeing.

Had Izuku been the last one to enter and leave Dabi’s apartment that day? Had Endeavor gone back to ransack his things long after Dabi has sent his father and side-kick to the hospital with life-altering burns to their bodies and faces?

During that time period in Dabi’s obviously devastating life, who had been the one to give Dabi in his loneliest times? Had he ever had someone be there for him like Izuku had people in his pack?

Why did it all suddenly matter now? Why did meeting Dabi after all this time suddenly churn to the surface every sadness, insecurity, and curiosity Izuku had cultivated around the man and their crash-and-burn relationship? They’d been together for longer than a year. How much of it had been a bed-warming game for Dabi and how much had Izuku actually made a difference in his life back then?

And, again, why did it matter?

“Now,” Dabi said in a low, intimate tone that left Izuku scrambling for semblance of self-control, “isn’t that an ugly face.”

Izuku offered a glare in return, meeting Dabi’s eyes and noting the way the scarring crinkled at the corners with the subtle smile he offered as he sat and set down the coffee. With a start, Izuku’s attention dropped to Dabi’s slim wrist and the thick, unflattering steel cuff clasped around it.

When Dabi caught him staring, Dabi heaved a theatrical sigh and leaned back in his seat. One slim leg crossed over the other, showing off calf-high boots neatly laced. But Izuku’s eyes were on Dabi’s hands, which Dabi raised up both like he was at gunpoint, and then—

Then he simply smiled, too-wide and too-stupid as he shook his hands with spirit fingers, sending the two heavy, Quirk-nullifying bracelets glinting in the light.

“Oh, Dabi. . .” Izuku murmured, his heart dropping heavy in his gut. “I’m sorry.”

When Izuku didn’t laugh, Dabi scoffed and folded his arms across his chest, rolling his eyes to the sky.

“Where’d your sense of humor go, Red? You should be loving this shit.”

“Are you loving it?” Izuku said, stubbornly mirroring Dabi’s sitting position on some deep-seeded automatic. “If it’s what you think is best for you, then sure, I’ll laugh at you for getting collared later.”

“Wow.” And now Dabi was smiling in earnest, none of that clown stuff. “Did the Alpha all over you teach you to talk like that?”

“I always talked back to you.” Izuku reached for his coffee but only ended up turning the hot cardboard cup in his hands.

“Sure,” Dabi said, the fingertips of one slim hand faintly tapping upon the table. “But now you actually mean it.

Izuku glanced up and found those eyes on him, watchful and forever burning through everyone’s bullshit. All except for Dabi’s own.

“What’s that supposed to mean?” Izuku asked, hating himself for walking into the web.

Dabi smirked, the scarred skin around his mouth shifting like a pale mask.

“You talked back to me because you wanted to impress me,” Dabi said simply, as if it were a textbook fact. “You’re different now. Looks good on you.”

Izuku didn’t know how to reply to that. Releasing an aggravated exhale, Izuku sat back in his seat and momentarily looked to the sky, a clear springtime blue of new beginnings.

“Why,” Izuku began, then realized he had a dozen questions that began with the same word. Over and over, why why why. When Izuku looked to Dabi again, it was to catch the edge of a frown on his firm mouth and tightness to his jaw. Izuku sighed softly, his shoulders sagging a little as he dropped his guard enough to be totally candid. “Why have you been trying to see me? I was a blip in your life. A fun fuck and what? Somebody to build up your ego and be your soundboard when you wanted to monologue. So, why me? Why see me?”

Whatever Dabi had been expecting, it apparently had not been this, because the flash of surprise on his face was not an expression Izuku had seen in his life, nor was the way Dabi’s lips curved almost warmly as he glanced away, over the side of the building toward the busy streets below. The wind ruffled his hair; his strange, distracting, stark hair.

“I burned a lot more people than I ever meant,” Dabi said, his hoarse smoker’s voice lowered for just the two of them, a familiar cadence of many nights spent on his bare mattress shooting shit and talking about the world. “Most of them I still don’t give a fuck about. Most people shouldn’t be playing with fire in the first place.”

“And me?” Izuku managed, unsure of his words. Dabi’s profile was so very like Todoroki’s, but drained of softness, all hard-worn edges and sun-bleached hair and skin abandoned in the sun for too long.

Dabi didn’t move, his body language still facing away from Izuku, but his eyes flicked back, a spark to blue blaze that took Izuku’s breath.

“You were just a moth drawn to a very dangerous flame,” he said quietly. “And you were so soft, so pretty and sweet that I wanted to keep you, even if it meant burning off the wings a little bit.”

Shock was not the word for it. The gaping maw that swallowed Izuku down and changed the entire known scenery of his late teen years warped everything Izuku had thought he knew.

“Me?” was all Izuku could say, breathless and hushed.

Dabi tsked and waved Izuku away with a slim hand, his gaze downcast as he brought his own cup to his mouth for a lingering drink.

“You were easy,” Dabi said, and Izuku’s heart panged only because he knew it was true. “Easy to catch and easier to keep. Didn’t matter what I said to you or how I hurt you, it was like you thought if you could find one good thing about me, it would be worth staying for or some shit. It was cute as hell. Annoying sometimes, but entertaining mostly.”

Izuku had been Dabi’s little toy. This was no surprise to him, but to hear it out loud, and back to back with the almost tender admittance that Dabi had become attached to him on some level was giving Izuku emotional whiplash.

“Good to know you’re still an asshole,” Izuku mumbled, taking a sullen sip of his coffee and pointedly not meeting Dabi’s stare. He could feel Dabi looking at him now, with that brutal blue fire searing through.

“Did you?” Dabi asked.

Despite it all, Izuku met Dabi’s eyes, but couldn’t read them. Izuku frowned.

“Did I what?”

“Find anything?” Dabi said quietly.

Izuku’s lips parted in question when the thread of conversation found the sharp needle of Dabi’s actual question.

It was like you thought if you could find one good thing about me, it would be worth staying for.

“Oh,” Izuku said, voice thick and heartfelt with the empathy of knowing exactly what that felt like. To not feel good enough. To feel out of place and abandoned, rejected by the world or loved ones. Now that Izuku knew who Dabi was and what family he belonged to, more and more about him made sense. “Oh, Dabi, of course I did. I—you—“

“Cool,” Dabi said, grinning with a wink that nearly had Izuku choking on his own spit. “I knew you liked me. You were too needy not to. Although when I came back and found out you were practically packmates with my little brother, my first thought was that you hate-fucked him to get back at me. Or because you missed me. A little bit of both.”

Izuku gawked.

“What the heck is it with you Todorokis?” he managed, totally flabbergasted. “Between you and Endeavor thinking that I’m some—some—“

“You spoke to him,” Dabi said, his voice crystallized to sharp, brittle ice. Izuku couldn’t smell his scent, but his Omega instantly eked out a short whimper of meek questioning at the drop of levity.

Dabi cocked his head sharply, the pinpricks of his pupils swelling at the sudden sound, his gaze lingering on the matte pink mate mark peeking out from Izuku's t-shirt collar.

A heat swelled beneath Izuku’s shirt, unbidden and unwelcome. He could feel himself blush and cursed it. Although Izuku recognized this feeling as something linked to the instinctive attraction of an Alpha and Omega who had once been partners, and some wolfish instinct recalled the burning white moon scars between his thighs, the attraction was not coming from a conscious part of Izuku.

Katsuki had everything and all of him, even the scars others had left upon him like warning symbols on a treasure map.

“He—“ Izuku swallowed, the hairs on his arms standing on end as he watched Dabi watching the bob of his adam’s apple. “He approached me. Well, I was introduced to him at the gala—“

“You looked edible,” Dabi said, voice a coarse scratch across Izuku’s sensitized skin.

“I’m taken,” Izuku snapped. “As you very well can tell. And unless you want to end up back where you came from, you’ll take care not to mess with what’s his.”

Dabi’s eyes flashed to his, that slow, smug smile following.

“You think I’m scared of Mister Boom Boom Boy?” Dabi folded his forearms upon the rickety, creaking table and leaned across the surface, and up close the white of his eyelashes was even more ghostly and unnerving. “I beat the shit out of him that day. He was already pathetically weak by the time he arrived to the party—busy with a few of my friends—and when he got there it didn’t take long to leave him charred on the pavement with the rest of the casualties.”

Izuku was baring his teeth before he knew it, his fingers clutching the edge of the table to keep from leaping across and pummeling Dabi like the old Izuku might have done. Instead he snarled and leaned in, nearly nose to nose with the man who once had it in him to own Izuku like a pet.

“Instead of him,” Izuku rumbled, “maybe you should worry about me. You wanted to know what Endeavor said, didn’t you? He implied I was a slut, just like you did. The apple doesn’t fall far, Dabi, and if the story of your life has anything to show for it, it’s that you two are both rotting on the ground, side by side.”

“And you found another big bad Alpha to fill up all the empty, needy holes the world drilled in you,” Dabi fired back with that infuriating smile. “So maybe neither of us have changed as much as we’d like to think.”

“Bakugou Katsuki isn’t like you,” Izuku said quietly, unmoving. In his periphery he noticed two people scamper away like they were on fire. “He doesn’t hurt people to feel better about his own failings. And since you’ve failed so spectacularly at just about everything, I can now understand why you tried to hurt so many people.”

“You have no fucking idea how the world has failed me,” Dabi said, his eyes narrowing to menacing slits. Neither of them backed down from the face off. “What that shitbag who calls himself a father did—”

“Did he make you feel worthless, Dabi?” Izuku asked, his mouth hurtling ahead of his brain. “Did he make you feel small and insignificant? Did he turn you against yourself until you couldn’t look in the mirror without feeling like you had to rip out of your skin to meet the expectations of another person? Because yeah, I’ve been there. We didn’t have the same path, but we sure ended up in that same damn warehouse, fucking on the same dirty mattress until we both felt something that wasn’t disappointment in ourselves.”

Izuku reached out to Dabi’s shocked still face and felt the fury melt from him as he traced the jagged line of fading, mangled scarring across his cheek, from the corner of his mouth up toward his ear. Dabi released a shaky breath, his gaze dropping away from their stare-off. Izuku sighed and spoke softly, tentative with what words to choose.

“You. . .you’ll never be able to rewind time. You’ll never be able to take back words or actions. You’ll never be able to escape the people that made your life hell. But you can make it so no one else experiences the same hell as you. That’s on you.”

“Maybe I want them in hell” Dabi said, blue flame flickering back to burn Izuku with the raw truth. “Wouldn’t you like to see the people who did you wrong suffer—just a little?”

“I don’t know,” Izuku murmured. “How does it feel? Have you suffered enough for my retribution? Where does it end—what’s the limit? How much would I like to see you hurt simply because you hurt me? Where is your guideline for revenge, Dabi? When does it start being simply pathetic?”

The both of them sat back in tandem, eyes trained on each other. Dabi’s expression was stiff, his jaw clenched, his graceful hands going twitchy and erratic upon his lap, then on the tag of his jacket zipper.

“You went and grew up on me, Red,” Dabi said, his smile a bare curve of lips, more a grimace.

“And did you?” Izuku asked evenly. “Or was rehab just another joke for you?”

Dabi smiled in earnest now, a little manic on the edges and all too familiar.

“Who knows?” he said airily. “I suppose only time will tell.”

Izuku didn’t want to begin unpacking that. Dabi wasn’t his job anymore, he reminded himself. Everyone had to work on themselves individually. Support was good, but holding up another person wasn't healthy. Izuku couldn’t act as Dabi’s punching bag, nor his therapist. Izuku rubbed his lips together, considering Dabi carefully.

“Dabi. . .”

Dabi raised pale eyebrows, fluidly gesturing with a hand to get on with it. Izuku cracked a smile despite himself and rolled his eyes.

“I did. . .find something.” When Dabi’s smile faded to a thin press of lips, Izuku continued. “That’s worth keeping. A lot of things, actually. You were—you would talk literature with me like most people wouldn’t. I could and did listen to you for hours talking about plays and poets you loved and hated, books you felt were overrated and why.

“You’re so smart, Dabi. I think it sometimes eats you from the inside out. I—I have that too. It feels like a tornado that’s constantly spinning, constantly analyzing and destroying what I build inside myself. It—it destroys things that I try to keep stable and leaves me too dizzy to make the best decisions I probably could otherwise.”

When Dabi didn’t reply nor make any kind of expression that shared his opinion on Izuku’s rambling, Izuku tripped over himself with more, his tongue forever getting away from himself.

“And—and you’re funny. Funny even when you’re being an asshole, and yeah, you’re more overbearing than anyone I’ve ever met when it comes to talking about the evils of the world or the disparities of society, but you’re interesting. You have so much to say and no one to listen to you. Sometimes, I—”

Izuku chewed at his bottom lip and looked away, over the side of the building to the busy sidewalk. The sun was casting shadows and Izuku couldn’t gauge how long they’d been sitting together.

“Sometimes when you’d drink too much, you’d start to talk. And talk and talk, and I’d start to get annoyed, but at the same time I felt. . .I felt sad? Because it felt like you must have grown up with absolutely no one to listen if you’d chosen a stupid kid like me to talk to.”

“You weren’t stupid.” Dabi said, his smoker’s voice dropping down to a low, sober hush. Izuku stiffened and sharply looked to the Alpha across the table. Dabi was working his jaw, like he was chewing on something he couldn’t quite spit out. “You weren’t stupid. You were naïve and desperate, but you were never stupid. I wouldn’t have kept you around if you’d been—”

“Did it ever occur to you,” Izuku murmured, his lips subtly curved, “that it was me who kept you?”

After all, it had always been Izuku who came to Dabi’s apartment. He could have stopped coming at any point and Dabi would have had to sit and wait for a person who never returned. But Izuku had always come back, down to their very last day together.

Dabi blinked and then smiled, a flash of cigarette stained teeth as he heaved a dramatic sigh and threw his hands up.

“Who knows?” he said again, an actor’s portrayal of a carefree man, even as the Quirk-nullifying bands glinted dull and heavy around his wrists.

“Who indeed,” Izuku said, hiding his grin behind his coffee cup as he glanced aside.

Many things had aired out today. What they were to each other and why—those indistinct measures of a relationship would never be fully cleared of ash and smoke. No one could clean up a fire that burnt the entire house down, but sometimes the foundations remained to piece through.

Keepsakes they may not have lost in the fire.

At the very least, Izuku felt he carried a clearer picture in his pocket now. He couldn’t be sure that he ever wanted to repeat this rendezvous, but only time and healing could tell. For now, this would be enough. It would have to be enough.

“What now?” Izuku asked after they’d fallen into a comfortable silence somehow reminiscent of old times. “I’ve been hesitant to ask Todoroki himself. What are you going to do now?”

Dabi shrugged a shoulder, sober expression raising to the clear spring sky.

“Purgatory,” he said dryly. “A bigger prison than the one before until the big man upstairs feels I’m safe enough not to burn off the other half of his face.”

Izuku’s heart clenched and, on automatic, he reached out, his fingers glancing over the back of Dabi’s hand.

“You’re going to make it through this, Dabi. You’ll come out of this a better—”

“Just what,” Katsuki’s voice burst through their bubble like shrapnel, “the actual fuck are you doing? Izuku.”

Notes:

Psst... check that chapter count.

 

Edit: So I don’t have to copy-paste this explanation to every comment mad at Bakugou, I’ll leave this here.

Please keep in mind that Katsuki can feel everything Izuku feels, including his attraction to Dabi, among other things. And that Katsuki has never been in a romantic relationship in his life, regardless of age, so anxiety over a newly established relationship is still very normal for anyone of any age, let alone someone who can feel their partners possible attraction & affection for their ex 💞

Chapter 43

Summary:

"You’ve only ever been my only one, Izuku. But I haven’t been yours and I—I hate it.”

Notes:

Happy Valentine's Day, my lovelies! I am so thankful for the love, kindness, support, and warmth you all bring to my life with your interactions, comments, kudos, and chat on Twitter. You have made this difficult Covid time much easier to make it through, with you. I hope you have a wonderful day and remember, to love and cherish yourself and to trust and believe your friends when they say they love you too, is the best Valentine's gift you can allow yourself.

Songs For This Chapter:
Wolf Like Me - Local H | Spotify | YouTube
Church - Aly & AJ | Spotify | YouTube
Learn To Let Go - Kesha | Spotify | YouTube

The anxiety made sense. The fear was reasonable.

Katsuki could feel them strung taut between their bond, tight ropes tied high with a gut-sinking dread of falling. Standing in the locker room of his agency, Katsuki couldn’t help but jump and startle with each locker slam and or rowdy shout. His neck felt stiff, shoulders bunched when he didn’t pay mind to keep them loose. Izuku hadn’t broadcast his emotions like this since talk of Twice.

Katsuki had never been run through the ringer of emotion like this in his entire life. He could barely reign in his own, and now Izuku’s cut through their connection, a wire slowly strangling Katsuki’s ability to carry on with his day.

He wasn’t pissed about it. An ignored, more immature part of him said he should be; should be annoyed that Izuku’s anxiety was fraying his own nerves, interfering with his work life and whatever. The majority of him kicked that specific part in the face and stepped on him as he walked away from the line of thought without a look back.

If anything, Katsuki wanted to go to him. Go to Izuku and throw him over his shoulder, smile at Izuku’s instant displeasure at being carried anywhere. Wanted to cover his face with distracting kisses until the sickly, roiling fear they shared in their guts all but melted away with the warmth of their shared strength. His Omega, his partner, his other half shouldn’t be suffering, not when his Alpha saved people for a living. It wasn’t fair at all.

But since the entire scenario of being Izuku’s savior was less likely than Godzilla coming to life and smashing the city, Katsuki relegated himself to brooding. Brooding and stomping around the block while inwardly planning just how he could make Izuku forget this entire day.

And if he kept checking his phone in case Izuku needed them, then what of it? He could check his phone if he damn well wanted to. He didn’t have to explain himself to anyone. And if he sent a text to his own damn mate, what of it? Fuck everybody.

>>> You’ll be fine.

Pocketing his phone, Katsuki fell into a slouch and pockets his head hands, glaring at those who even greeted him, just walking and wondering.

The spike of shock and horror came first. Katsuki could taste the copper on his tongue, like blood, like biting a lip too hard. He clenched his teeth and kept walking. He tried to think happy thoughts, hoping they would maybe reach Izuku.

Them on the ski slopes, kissing behind the bathrooms like teenagers. Them in the rain, Izuku in his leather jacket and rain beading his hair. Sitting on the floor in Izuku’s apartment because Natsume had taken the length of the couch, Izuku tucked in the vee of Katsuki’s thighs and bundled in a blanket as they watched Mina and Denki on a variety show. Kissing in the shower, brushing hands over shoulders in passing through the kitchen, Izuku’s fingers softly scratching the nape of Katsuki’s neck, the way Izuku scrunched his nose when he smiled and snorted at something especially funny.

Izuku, Izuku, Izuku—

The heart throb of relief and recognition swelled in Katsuki’s chest like a balloon filled to burst, and it wasn’t Katsuki’s.

Katsuki startled to a stop, looking around as if somehow someone else would have felt that. His chest felt warm, a feathery, floaty happiness rising up his throat to nudge at a smile.

What the fuck.

Was that—was that Izuku’s reaction to Katsuki’s great push of good sentiment or was it—or was it Dabi?

Stupefied and a little apprehensive with an anxiety that was entirely his own, Katsuki kept walking. He walked and did not see or stop, did not think for thinking of his mate meeting the man who had been important to him. The scumbag who shaped him, who had hurt him.

Dabi looked at me and liked me. I really believe that he liked me.

Sick. Katsuki felt sick. He exhaled in a shudder, dark red clouding the edges of his vision, his fists tightening at his sides as he stomped forward. Keep moving forward, don’t stop. Don’t stop, don’t think.

Katsuki checked his phone on automatic, even when they weren’t meant to be on their phones while on the job. No reply, of course. The bond had eased and smoothed out to that thin quiver of normal anxiety he’d been feeling from Izuku before. With a sigh, Katsuki texted again and pocketed his phone.

>>> I’ll be there if you need me.

A blue sink of sadness dropped in Katsuki’s gut like a stone, smooth and deep and not Katsuki’s own sadness, which was more like an ember from an old fire, burning and crackling over itself, eating away at an empty fire pit, no wood left to burn.

Katsuki scowled and kept walking.

Distantly, Katsuki recalled his conversation with Mina a lifetime ago. Back when he hadn’t understood their connection or what it would mean for them—had barely understood his feelings for Izuku past their immensity. Mina had said that her and Kirishima’s bond was like a song stuck in her head, something in the background that shifted and changed depending on emotion and environment. Something that faded in and out according to physical proximity.

If Izuku were a song, he would be a crashing, volatile symphony in surround sound. There was nothing ‘background’ about their bond. Their bond was like standing in the center of a mosh pit with electric guitars and stamping feet and flailing bodies and people falling from stage right into unexpected shoulders and hands. Their bond was Izuku pulling Katsuki into a  whirling dance neither of them knew the steps to, but fuck if they didn’t try.

But Katsuki didn’t have the mouth words to express any of that as such. And, to be honest, right about now he was miserable and pissed off with the connection they shared.

Gritting his teeth and fisting his hands, he kept on walking.

A sprinkle of pink amusement prickled in Katsuki’s tight chest, then evened out. He kept walking. A flare of annoyance; again not his own, because Katsuki’s annoyance was much more simmering spicy red while this was a tart lemon yellow, and even that left a bitter taste on the back of Katsuki’s tongue as his stride grew in length and speed, his breathing gone shallow as he blindly turned a corner.

The afternoon sun nearly blinded him at this angle, blaring directly in his face as his head pounded with a panic that was all his own and a burning heart that was his too. Izuku’s internal broadcast had soothed down to a static murmur again, but Katsuki’s skin was buzzing along with his brain.

Izuku, with the man he used to love. Because Katsuki wasn’t stupid. When Izuku had spoken of Dabi, he’d spoken with love, or some form of it.

But Katsuki couldn’t—he couldn’t understand it. He could not. His—his heart and his head did not work like Izuku’s, never would. He could listen to Izuku in the dark, could hold him through the growing aches and pains, could sympathize in the way a person could feel sad for someone without knowing what that sadness felt like. But he could not fucking understand.

How did a person love many people? Romantically. Sexually. How could a person want the hands of many different people on them? Katsuki didn’t know any word for what he was—had never looked into it, and still would never, because it wasn’t important—but he hadn’t felt anything for anyone until Izuku. He’d never wanted to touch or be touched, kiss or scent or cuddle or fuck.

Izuku was a dumbass, but he wasn’t stupid. He was undoubtedly more academically intelligent than Katsuki, not that Katsuki could ever admit it out loud. But, like a dumbass, he’d walked into shitty relationships time and again, with the intent to forget, to forget himself and the world by placing himself at the mercy of another. None of those relationships had been love first, but physical. Katsuki did not understand.

Izuku was a person with experience in relationships of all kinds. He had fallen in love more than once, more than twice. And now he was with Katsuki, forever. Forever. But what did it mean that he’d wanted to see Dabi? What did it mean that he felt happiness and relief and joy and annoyance and pleasure during his time with Dabi in the same ways that he did when he was with Katsuki? Was it the same? It felt the same.

Katsuki didn’t understand. Relationships, romance, the run of said relationship into the ground but the remaining emotions left behind in each other’s hearts. How did it work? Why? Was Katsuki supposed to be understanding when he didn’t understand it in the least?

Fuck. Fuck fuck fuck.

The sharp lightning strike of anger surged through Katsuki’s core and struck hard, black sky and searing, electric green to the bone. Katsuki startled in the center of the crosswalk, causing a grown man to flinch out of the way with large eyes as Katsuki stared out at nothing. Izuku’s wrath warred across their bond in a whirl of approaching darkness, and Katsuki had broken out into a run before he recognized he was running.

A flash of surprise splintered through his consciousness, the realization that he’d been magnetically walking toward Izuku the entire time, that he was already in the same area as the cafe without intention, that he barely knew the address but there he went, sprinting down the street without focus for the bystanders who flung themselves aside in his wake.

Izuku was furious and Katsuki couldn’t just stand around when his mate could be in danger. Because, no mistake, when Izuku was in trouble he was rarely scared—he got pissed.

Blocks flew by and Katsuki barely breathed, even when he felt Izuku’s emotions level out and go grass-green anew, pastoral and kind and sweet again. That didn’t mean Katsuki shouldn’t be there. That was his mate. He should be there.

The quaint little cafe came into view and Katsuki tripped to a halt, gaze drilled into the back of Izuku’s head on the second floor, the open cafe roof in the sunshine looking entirely placid and without drama. Katsuki couldn’t see Izuku’s face, but his strong back and posture were relaxed, maybe a little slumped as Izuku leaned in across the table, the glimpse of his partial profile showing his mouth moving.

Katsuki felt the sturdy concrete beneath his feet careen as he found himself staring into the face of Todoroki Touya, and fuck, he looked so much like Katsuki’s own Todoroki that the shock of it left him swaying on the spot. They weren’t the same, obviously, but the resemblance was unmistakable, uncanny.

But it wasn’t just the look of him—it was the way he looked at Izuku. The Omega had his head down, differing to the table as he said something, and—and while Izuku wasn’t looking, Dabi looked at him with the saddest expression of longing Katsuki could ever imagine on a monster like him.

The only reason he recognized it as sadness was because he’d seen it on Todoroki Shouto a million too many times in the last ten years.

Panic-stricken and flooded with displaced fury, Katsuki burst through the doors, ignoring peoples’ gasps of the one and only Ground Zero in full uniform as he stomped up the side steps and emerged on the roof garden.

In the same moment, he watched Izuku gaze at Dabi like a lover and graze his fingertips across the back of one heavily scarred hand.

Katsuki’s guts plummeted like a step off a building.

“Just what,” Katsuki spat, his snarl growing meaner as Izuku whirled to gawk at him, “the actual fuck are you doing? Izuku.”

“Katsuki!” Izuku jumped from his seat, color rising to his cheeks as shock leapt through their bond. “What—wait, what’re you—”

“What the fuck were you doing to him?” Katsuki demanded, unmoving, seemingly glued to the spot with—with something, he didn’t know. He only knew he couldn’t move like he moved in battle, couldn’t think clearly like he could in tactical situations. That bare touch of his Omega to another Alpha had sent his skull skidding out of control and he couldn’t find his balance. “What’re you—why were you touching that freak?”

“Gee,” Dabi said dryly as he continued to lounge in his chair, seeming to make a point as he reclined even further, knees spread and arms folded behind his head in the picture of relaxation. “I do love a warm welcome.”

“Die in a fire,” Katsuki snapped, “you burnt out piece of bacon. Izuku, are you oka—”

“What the hell are you doing here?” was the last thing Katsuki expected to hear in return.

“Me?” Katsuki stressed, fists clenching at his sides as he stomped forward to loom over into his Omega’s space, crowding him with the superior weight of his body until Izuku nearly had to bend back to defiantly meet his eyes. “What the fuck are you—”

“I’m doing exactly what I said I’d do!” Izuku yelled, hands flailing out as he spoke, exasperation knocking between their bond. “I’m meeting my stupid ex-boyfriend—”

“Hey now,” Dabi said, smiling from behind Izuku, still relaxed and reclined.

“—and you should be at work. Are at work, by the looks of it! What—you’re in uniform for fuck’s sake! Why—”

“I couldn’t just leave you alone with him,” Katsuki said, baring his teeth as he snarled in Izuku’s red face. “He’s—have you met him?”

Izuku narrowed his eyes and suddenly Katsuki recalled the man from half a year ago, prickly and full of barbs and sharp comebacks to keep the world at bay.

“Intimately,” Izuku said, lowly.

Katsuki couldn’t be held accountable for what happened next. He was only a man after all, and an Alpha at that with a mate who seemed absolutely fucking intent on play with fire. Without a word, Katsuki bent and scooped Izuku by the legs, slung his screaming frame over his shoulder, and turned for the stairs.

“You motherfucker!” Izuku hollered, pounding on his back and trying but failing to flail his knees and feet. “What the hell is wrong with you? Ground Zero! Ground Zero, you put me the fuck down unless you want—”

Resolute, Katsuki stomped down the stairs and out the door. He could fucking smell Dabi following, his Alpha scent sharply spicy and itching at Katsuki’s nose.

“Dabi!” Izuku yelled, his body straining away in Katsuki’s hold, the gesture feeling like Izuku holding out a hand.

“Come on, Little Red,” Dabi drawled, dry humor in his cracked voice, and suddenly Izuku was being tugged. The shock of the thing halted Katsuki enough that Izuku could elbow Katsuki in the back of the head with a pointed curse and before he managed to struggle from Katsuki’s hold and to the concrete.

“Wh—” Katsuki whirled, fury hiking higher as he watched Dabi take Izuku’s hand and help him to his feet. “Don’t you fucking touch my mate—”

Dabi went from slack and loose to directly in front of Katsuki, shorter but no less menacing as he sneered a wide, toothy smile in Katsuki’s face, one hand pressed to Katsuki’s heaving uniform.

“What if,” Dabi said, quietly, too quiet for Izuku to hear, and fuck if his eyes were the most unholy glow of blue, “he wants me to, hmmm? I have to say, Ground Zero, I’m not exactly impressed. I thought you’d be more, well, mature. You know Izuku here likes guys who are a little more grown than he is. But you’re just a kindergartner, aren’t you? And he’s attached himself to you already? A shame I didn’t arrive sooner.”

The punch came as a surprise to no one, but Dabi didn’t go sprawling in any kind of satisfying way. Only stumbled back a few steps, shifting his jaw with a smile as he rubbed at his flushed cheek, only smiling wider when Izuku cried out and rushed to his side.

“Dabi! Dabi, are you okay? Fuck, I’m sorry. I’m—I didn’t think he’d be like this. I—he was fine when I left—”

“DO I LOOK FINE,” Katsuki roared, stomping into their horribly, unbearably intimate space, the Alpha in him clawing to tear the competition apart. He could feel himself slipping, sliding back into the dark of his thirsty, vicious hindbrain.

Omega belongs to Alpha. Omega is claimed and mated and mine.

“You look like an idiot!” Izuku yelled, stomping over to shove at Katsuki’s chest and shove again when Katsuki didn’t budge, only breathing harder, panting with the strength it took from ripping a grinning Dabi’s throat out with his teeth. “Just what—I have no idea what’s going through your mind right now! You—you’re an adult, Mr Zero! You’re a whole-ass man and you’re out there acting like—like this is the middle ages and Alphas still scruff their newfound Omegas and drag them into the forest to have their way with them!”

“Ohhh.” Dabi had slumped into the conversation, coming up behind Izuku to slide up a hand over the Omega’s hip as he sandwiched Izuku between them and smirked over Izuku’s shoulder, right into Katsuki’s wide, shell-shocked eyes. “That sounds like fun, doesn’t it, Mister Zero. Should we race for him?”

“Dabi,” Izuku hissed, elbowing him right in the ribs. “Stop, you’re—”

Katsuki saw red and breathed fire. The air wheezed loudly out of Izuku’s lungs as Katsuki jolted forward without thought, crushing Izuku between the two of them with the sudden force of his body, reaching out to claw at Dabi’s face.

“This is the worst threesome ever,” Izuku muttered before he promptly kneed Katsuki in the balls and jolted his head back to knock his skull against Dabi’s nose with a resounding crack.

Thanks to jock straps, Katsuki recovered first and lunged at Dabi with full teeth, eyes already on the prize of Dabi’s throat. He’d rip it out and paint the fucking sidewalk in blood. He’d—

“KACCHAN!”

Everything happened. Dabi was before him, bleeding over his wide, smiling teeth, stalking forward to meet Katsuki head on—and then Izuku was there, between them again, and Katsuki’s teeth caught on Izuku’s raised forearm, sinking in with sickening squelch of muscle and flesh.

For a thin, screaming second, their eyes locked in mutual horror.

The anguish and collapse happened fast. A high, plaintive keen that wasn’t Izuku’s carried between their bond like a snapped high wire, dropping Katsuki’s guts as the fight drained and he unhinged his jaw from the bite. Izuku didn’t fall to his knees but Katsuki fucking did, big goddamn hero that he was, so struck with shock as he was.

Face raised to Izuku’s pale, gaping expression, the loathing set in like a black slick, swallowing Katsuki whole as his tongue still salivated behind his teeth with the taste of his mate’s blood.

“Shit,” Katsuki rasped, his animal brain slinking back into the shadows like a beast kicked in the ribs. “Shit, ‘Zuku, shit, I—”

Strong, bloodied arms wrapped fiercely around Katsuki’s head, pulling him close to Izuku’s center, cheek pressed against Izuku’s stomach, where Katsuki could hear the thunder of Izuku’s blood and feel the uneven shudder of his lungs. With a whine, Katsuki lurched into him, on his knees for him, encircling his waist in a tight, unrelenting hold as he breathed in the scent of his mate and battled for calm.

“Dabi,” Izuku said, sounding strained, and Katsuki’s shoulders tensed anew, steel spiking down his spine as he automatically turned his head to scent the air for the opposition. Izuku shushed sharply, firmly jerking Katsuki’s face back against his stomach, burying it there with fingers flexed in the back of Katsuki’s hair, shoving his unwieldy mask askew. “Dabi, go. I’m—this isn’t obviously how I wanted it to, but—I’m sorry. You just—my life doesn’t have space for this right now, okay? I—another time, maybe. One day.”

Quiet prevailed, and Katsuki bit down on his cheek and fought the urge to tear from his Omega’s hold and give chase, pin the Alpha, scar him, marking him as the losing suitor. Old blood, old instincts, old traditions that he couldn’t abide by if he wanted to keep his perfect, perfect Omega.

“Well,” Dabi said, his hoarse voice holding a tone Katsuki couldn’t parse, “you know where to find me, Red. I’m not goin’ anywhere fast.”

“Right,” Izuku said, short and quiet. “Goodbye, Dabi.”

“Seeya around, Izuku.”

Another stretch of silence, Izuku’s hand too tight and brutal in Katsuki’s hair, and the thick metallic scent of blood stenching up the fragrance of Izuku’s unhappiness, old wet mold and moss.

“Bakugou,” Izuku said, his tone low and stiff, and instinctively Katsuki made a small, plaintive noise in reply to his mate’s displeasure, “there are people watching. Taking pictures too. We need to move, alright? Are you calm?”

Not trusting his mouth, Katsuki nodded against the soft, warm material of Izuku’s shoulder, inhaling deep before fisting his hands at the small of Izuku’s back, bunching the fabric, and rising to stand.

Several things came to the forefront at once, an assault of truths. Izuku’s forearm carried his bite, raw and deep and swollen red, weeping still with blood, a wound that would undoubtedly scar. A crowd had gathered on the other side of the street with several cellphones out, resolutely watching. The day remained glaringly bright, sunny like a mockery of all that had clouded Katsuki’s coherence.

And Izuku was looking up at him with an indistinguishable frown, like he didn’t necessarily recognize him. Katsuki felt his shoulder’s slump as he flicked a cowed gaze to his mate, then to the crowd, and back, resting and waiting.

Izuku seemed to be thinking, his plush lips pressed in a thin line as he considered him in that quiet, thoughtful way he sometimes got when he was reading a difficult passage in a book, laying in bed beside him some nights.

Finally, Izuku sighed and gestured with a hand.

“Come on,” he said quietly, not sounding angry. The bond between them felt like muddied water and Izuku smelled similarly, murky and damp. “I want to wash this thing.”

Frowning and following, Katsuki followed Izuku back into the cafe, which was now utterly empty. The wrathful pheromones of an Alpha on Alpha fight would do that. Izuku offered a tired smile at the single barista, a Beta frozen in fear behind the counter.

“Do you happen to have a first aid kit?” Izuku asked, his customer service voice put on with bells. “Would you mind if I used it for a moment? Thank you, I’m in your debt.”

Drained and numb from the encounter and the shame of hurting his mate, Katsuki mutely followed Izuku into the bathroom, which was a one-toilet deal decorated in the kitschy seafoam green and rose gold decor that Katsuki saw everywhere and fucking hated.

Izuku sat on the toilet seat, heaving a sigh as he opened the kit on his lap and began to dig.

“Wait,” Katsuki said, sharp and too quick, hissing softly when Izuku jolted at the sound of his voice. “Sorry, sorry, I’m—just, just let me do this,” he finished, dropping to his knees once more, setting the kit aside and fitting between Izuku’s spread legs.

Izuku’s brow creased with the frown when Katsuki held out his injured arm.

“Kacchan, what—”

Holding Izuku’s concerned gaze, Katsuki brought his Omega’s forearm close and licked a slow, wide strip over the wound with the flat of his tongue. Izuku blinked, his lips quivering like he would speak, but instead he flushed and presented his arm firmly forward, unflinching.

With a grunt of pleasure at the assent, Katsuki dipped his head and began to lap at the full moon of red teeth, warm and wet and patient in his cleaning. With each broad, cautious lick, Izuku’s tight frame seemed to unwind, bit by bit until his shoulders were lax and he exhaled, long and relieved.

Afterward, Katsuki dug out individual disinfecting wipes and set about wiping down the wound and dressing it. The movements were rote and familiar from a life of violence, and as he worked he unearthed his voice.

“I hurt you,” he said, gruff and deep, the emotion in his voice betraying him.

“Yes,” Izuku said softly, the bond humming with an underlying tension.

“I—” Katsuki’s mouth screwed up as he searched for the words. “I didn’t—I told myself I’d never scar you like they did and then I did. I—”

“No,” Izuku whispered, pausing Katsuki’s bandaging to cup his cheek, easing Katsuki’s jaw up to look. Katsuki’s heart caught in his throat, the Alpha in him shifting uneasily with the unexpected warmth in Izuku’s eyes. “No, you didn’t hurt me on purpose. You never have, never. Even when you’ve hurt my heart, it has never been with intent. I know the difference, Kacchan. Believe me, I do. Today was—you were so—”

“You were touching him,” Katsuki snarled, baring teeth, and the hand which held his cheek shifted so Izuku could thumb over Katsuki’s sharp canine, feeling the tip that had only just recently punctured his flesh. “And—and it wasn’t just that. I could feel—I could feel through this fucking bond how you felt—how you felt about him. And I—I didn’t know how you could still, after all this time—”

“Hey,” Izuku’s command was sharp and abrupt, his hand tightening on Katsuki’s chin. Their eyes clashed and held, warred between the bond that surged and fell between them in white-capped waves and cutting currents. “Look at me, Bakugou Katsuki. Really look at me. Feel me. What do you feel now?”

“You know what I feel,” Katsuki whispered harshly, because it was love. Of course it was love. It was so much love that Katsuki still couldn’t understand how this heart was the same heart he’d always had. Couldn’t understand how this heart, the one so tired and callous from a lifetime of fighting, so grayed out and lacking empathy after years of empathizing and suffering and struggling for a thankless world—how this same heart could be the heart that felt in color, now. Felt not just his own emotions, but those of another soul outside of his own body.

But feeling didn’t mean understanding.

“You know what I feel,” Katsuki whispered again, unable to repress the reproach that crept into his voice as sent a heated look up to his Omega. “And I know what you feel. But I don’t understand it. You’ve only ever been my only one, Izuku. But I haven’t been yours and I—I hate it.”

Izuku’s lips twisted, his face scrunching before it smoothed out and he leaned back against the toilet with a sigh, releasing Katsuki and gesturing generally at his arm for Katsuki to continue. Silently, Katsuki bowed his head once more and continued to carefully bandage.

“You are my only one,” Izuku said, clear and assured. When Katsuki only flicked a quick look at him, then back down, Izuku sighed. “In the ways that matter, you are. I’m—for a long time I looked for love in any way I could get it. Everyone has always loved you, Kacchan. You can’t understand and I don’t expect you to. I don’t begrudge you that. But you have to understand that I grew up being told I was worthless, that I didn’t have a place in the world, that I was only worth what was between my legs because I couldn’t get pregnant, but that also what was between my legs was exotic and taboo for anyone to accept unless in secret. That I should be someone’s secret.”

Katsuki looked up then, serious and still, watchful as he met pleading, deep green eyes and all the secrets that seemed to threaten a flood. With Izuku’s arm safely bandaged, Izuku hunched forward to simply hug him, arms around Katsuki’s neck, face thrust deep in the crook of Katsuki’s shoulder.

“I proved them wrong in every way I could,” Izuku muffled into Katsuki’s pulse. “I made my body a weapon, I made my body desirable. I made myself bigger and louder and not a secret at all. And anyone who would give me that validation. . .I’d—I’d run right into their arms. And yes, I felt for them, I connected with them in ways that only fucked up people can connect with other fucked up people, but—”

Izuku pulled back just enough for their noses to brush, their eyes nearly crossed for looking at each other, and Katsuki’s heart clenched as his Omega’s scent flooded his mouth, soft and saturated and earthy, like walking barefoot in the mud after a deep rain.

“But you—” Izuku huffed a laugh, soft breath through his nose against Katsuki’s mouth. “You refused to make me into a secret. That day after our date, after the 7-11—you came to my door and said you’d told your PR team to basically go fuck themselves.”

“No,” Katsuki said, “I literally told them to go fuck themselves.”

Izuku smiled, pressed his forehead to Katsuki’s, the bond between them blooming green and climbing toward the light.

“It was after that—after that I think it really hit me. You wanted me in the light. You wanted me broken and scarred, anxious and secretive, happy or sad, annoying and stubborn and a stray. You didn’t care who saw me because you saw me. And what you saw was enough. I was enough.”

“Of course you are,” Katsuki snapped, pulling back to glare at Izuku’s lopsided smile. “You’re my Omega, aren’t you?”

“I am,” Izuku murmured, leaning in to press a soft, dry kiss to Katsuki’s lips. Warmth suffused Katsuki’s limbs in gold, gilded him from the inside out as he tilted his head to deepen the kiss, open and welcome the tentative flick of tongue and gentle exploration. Izuku sighed into Katsuki’s mouth, their bond melting, dripping down to pool between them. “I am yours,” Izuku mumbled against Katsuki’s lips before he pulled back again, his gaze a hazy, dreamy green.

“Please trust me,” Izuku whispered, bracing Katsuki’s face in both palms now, serious brows bowed in concern. “Please. I’m sorry that I—I’m sorry it ended up like this, but I promise you I was coming here for closure. What I might have felt were flashes of old things, like a forgotten memory box of trinkets you open and kind of delight at for a moment but put them back in the box and shove them under the bed. Reliving memories isn’t the same as living, and my life is attached to yours now. Always. It’s a choice I’ll never regret, and I hope my clumsy actions never make you regret it either.”

“Never,” Katsuki replied quickly, throwing his arms around Izuku to crush him in a fierce embrace, inhaling deeply of his fern and clover scent. “Never.”

A knock at the door startled them both apart and—

“Get the fuck out of the bathroom,” Todoroki’s voice sounded from the other side, deep and just this side of menacing. “Right now.”

They complied quickly, even Katsuki not wanting another incident with another Todoroki under his belt in one day. Izuku was the one to open the door, talking right over Todoroki’s open mouth.

“It’s not as bad as you—”

“Did you fucking bite him?” Todoroki snapped, looking Katsuki dead in the eye, his cheeks colored with fury. Of course, Todoroki was the Alpha of Izuku’s little pack. He would be the one to rush in when social media undoubtedly when into seizures over the scene in the street. “Bakugou, did you fucking bite—”

“Why are you asking when you already know,” Katsuki said, keeping his posture tall and steely as he moved to brush past the other Alpha.

Todoroki was fast, faster than Katsuki, even if he wouldn’t say it out loud, and quickly Katsuki was pinned to the wall with an arm trapped across his neck, the both of them baring teeth in rising snarls rupturing the air between them.

“Just what,” Todoroki bit out, rage surging from his scent like arctic wind and harsh, burning smoke, “the hell were you doing facing off with my brother in the middle of the fucking street? And letting a civilian get in the middle of it like some rookie—”

“Excuse me,” Izuku said, hands fisted on his hips as he glared at the back of Todoroki’s head. “I’m not just a civilian. I could kick your ass on a bad day. . .probably. Anyway, let him go, Todoroki. It’s handled. We’ve talked—”

“You attack my brother,” Todoroki said, putting weight on his arm despite Katsuki refusing to make a sound of discomfort, “and you attack my packmate. You’re on duty, in uniform, and you’re losing your shit across the city, Bakugou! What the fuck? What the fuck is going on with—”

“Hey!” Izuku smacked Todoroki upside the head like a mother would a child, but it was apparently enough to jolt Todoroki from his tirade as he stepped off instantly, sending one seething look Bakugou’s way before considering the Omega.

“Are you okay?” Todoroki asked, stern and simple.

Izuku rolled his eyes and smiled, showing off his bandaged arm a little.

“Perfectly fine. It probably looked worse from a camera phone. Is it really everywhere already?”

“Yes,” Todoroki said tersely.

“Look,” Katsuki said, setting his uniform to rights and clearing his throat from the surprisingly strong choke Todoroki had put him in. He wasn’t even mad at this point, just fucking annoyed and exhausted from the fight and the other fight and everything in between and since. “PR will deal with it. He’s my mate, I’m his Alpha, it’s in my right to—”

“Except you bit your own Omega in public, didn’t you?” Todoroki snapped, heat flashing in his steel and sky eyes. “It looked like Midoriya was protecting a different Alpha. The press are going to have a field day.”

“Let them,” Katsuki said flatly, and Izuku came to his side, wrapping his good arm around Katsuki’s with a solemn nod. “I don’t care.”

“You should,” Todoroki shot back. “Or is your popularity not important to you anymore?”

Katsuki paused at that, looking at Todoroki hard. Todoroki stared back, waiting for something.

“Maybe it’s not,” Katsuki said slowly, the knowledge settling into his bones like a newer, better body. “Maybe I don’t fuckin’ care so much anymore. I’m still a great Hero and I’ll keep being one after all of—all of this shit evens out.”

“That’s right,” Izuku piped up, nodding and squeezing Katsuki’s arm a little harder.

Apparently that was exactly the answer Todoroki had wanted, because he quirked a quick, small smile and nodded.

“Good,” he said, his frame relaxing. He eyed Izuku’s bandaged arm briefly, then looked between the two of them, resolutely side by side. “You two should go home. I’ll clear the area around here.”

“You should check on your brother too,” Izuku said softly.

Todoroki blinked, then flashed a second wider smile, and for a moment it reminded Katsuki of Dabi’s bloodthirsty one.

“No way. Fuck him. I’m glad you busted his nose.”

“It’s a specialty of his,” Katsuki said dryly.

“Just paying it forward,” Izuku added cheerfully. “You know, ‘cause of my nose and all.”

“If what Shinsou tells me is true,” Todoroki replied slowly, “you got your nose broken out of your own accord.”

“So did Dabi,” Izuku said flatly.

Todoroki nodded.

“Fair.”

They said their goodbyes and quickly agreed to get a ride instead of walk, arguing over where to drop Izuku for the rest of the day and if Katsuki would head back to work after the debacle.

“You’ll have a lot of shit to wade through,” Izuku said earnestly, squeezing his hand in front of Parchment’s wide window display of fairy tales. “It’s best if you finish your shift. I planned to take on the rest of the shift here tonight and that’s what I’m going to do.”

Katsuki scowled at Izuku’s arm, knowing he’d already lost that argument. Izuku would take care of himself and his business before anything, regardless of what his Alpha had to say. His tenacity and work ethic were something Katsuki appreciated about him, so he couldn’t very well go back on it.

“I’ll see you inside,” Katsuki said, heading for the door.

“Nonono!” Izuku said so quickly it nearly gave Katsuki whiplash with how hard his hand got pulled back. “That’s—Kai is in there and when he finds out—”

“He has already found out,” Chisaki’s clear, enunciated voice said as the door dinged open.

Izuku whirled around with a short noise of distress, his cheeks already flushed, a panicked look on his face as he eked out a smile at the cold figure framed in the entrance. Chisaki’s black mask only highlighted the unholy amber gleam in his eyes as he speared Katsuki with a look.

“K-Kai, hey, hi!” Izuku rushed in, all fluffy cloud Omega fretting and green grass scent as he stood between Chisaki and Katsuki’s stand-off, flailing his arms a little as if that would distract him at all. “That is—there’s nothing for you to—we made up! It was an accident and—”

“You didn’t even tell me you were seeing him,” Chisaki said, cool and brittle and aimed entirely at Izuku instead of Katsuki.

Oh. Katsuki watched as the two of them exchanged hushed words and—oh.

This wasn’t about Katsuki’s assault on Izuku at all. Chisaki looked worried. Pissed, but concerned. Izuku said something quietly, plaintive by the tone of him, and Chisaki’s eyebrows bunched and dropped; with half his face concealed, the genuine hurt on his face was still evident, even to Katsuki.

“Come on,” Katsuki said, making an executive decision as he realized PR would have to wait and Izuku’s pack absolutely could not. The little shit was so loved that his people came running at the drop of a hat. No wonder Izuku kept his business close to the chest. “Let’s all get inside. I’ll make tea.”

To Katsuki’s abject shock, Chisaki actually turned on his heel and headed inside, his shoulders and back straight and stiff. Izuku cast one concerned look over his shoulder to Katsuki and rushed to follow. Katsuki sighed, shut the door behind him, and switched the sign to CLOSED.

“—wasn’t supposed to contact you at all,” Chisaki snapped as Katsuki firmly walked right past them and made a line for the office for tea. Unfortunately, he could hear them even with the door closed.

“You’ve seen him?”

“Of course I’ve seen him. I told him to fuck off and forget you existed. Who do you think I am?”

“I don’t know, one of my best friends? Someone who would have told me if—”

“If what? If he got out? Just because he was released from his five year vacation doesn’t mean he’s a better person, Midoriya.”

“He is a better person,” Izuku stressed, and Katsuki couldn’t help but sigh as he sat in the rickety desk chair and watched water boil in the electric kettle. “I can tell. I can—”

“This is why I didn’t tell you,” Chisaki replied crisply. “I knew you’d forgive him. I knew you’d let him walk over you again like—”

“I’m not eighteen fucking years old, Kai!” Izuku yelled, and Katsuki clenched his hands upon his thighs, willing himself not to move, not to run to him, to fight his battles for him. “Hell, I’m not twenty with Jin, either. I’m not any of those people anymore, but you still see me like, like your stupid little brother—”

“You’re not my brother,” Chisaki said. “You’re—”

“If you tell me I’m like a son to you I swear to fucking god. I already have enough daddy issues—”

“—hence your choice in men—”

“—that I don’t need to purposely trying to parent to me when I need a friend—”

“Maybe you need a single fucking parent in this world who actually gives a shit about you—”

“Don’t you dare talk about my mom like—”

“Who? Never heard of her.”

“Asshole! Where are your parents? Where’s your grandfather? Maybe you’re trying to be my dad because you’ve had to be your own parent most of your life—”

“At least I can take care of myself—”

“What do you call this? My work, my home, my mate. If anyone is failing on those fronts, it’s you.”

An icy silence crusted over the edges of the air as Katsuki blandly emerged from the office with a mismatched mug in each hand. He’d learned negotiation tactics in school, and although he was absolute shit at it, he’d at least learned that sometimes it actually was best not to speak.

Approaching the front of the shop, Katsuki considered the Omega and Beta standing on opposite sides of the counter from each other. Chisaki’s hands were flattened on the surface, arms outstretched to take up the entirety of the space, making him taller and bigger than he was. Izuku stood there, arms folded across his chest in a familiar expression of defiance, his chin thrust forward as if asking for a punch.

“Tea,” Katsuki said, placing the mugs on between them.

“And you,” Chisaki said, apparently deeming him worthy of looking at. Fucking awesome. “You knew about this?”

“It wasn’t my decision to make,” Katsuki said, wishing his uniform had pockets so he had somewhere to hide his fisted hands.

“See,” Izuku said, sounding every inch the eighteen year old he claimed not to be.

“And yet you went to him anyway.” Chisaki wasn’t moving, wasn’t altering his dominating position. Briefly, Katsuki had to be thankful that this guy never ended up Alpha. “The videos are everywhere, Ground Zero. What part of Izuku’s decision involved you going out for blood?”

“I shouldn’t have,” Katsuki said, biting back any one of his dozen reasons. “Made it all worse, didn’t I.”

Chisaki’s eyes narrowed, feline slits. With a huff, Chisaki’s figure draped down, no longer posturing as he made a point of sitting at the stool behind the counter and taking a mug in hand.

“Look,” Izuku said. “I’m sorry I didn’t tell you—”

“There’s not much you do tell me at all these days,” Chisaki said, and once more, even Katsuki could catch the hurt churning beneath the thick ice.

“I’m not—” Izuku’s stubborn countenance dropped, his hands loose at his sides, shoulders slumped as he met Chisaki’s gaze with a gentle frown. “Kai. . .I’m not scared anymore. All these years, practically ever since you knew me, I was either scared or angry, and you were—are—good at handling me at both. Keeping me steady. But I feel steady on my own these days. I feel. . .safe. With myself. With Katsuki. It’s not that I purposely withhold from you. It’s that I’m—I’m happy. Happy and confident. You know?”

Chisaki considered him quietly, glancing away as he deftly removed the mask from his mouth and nose, sliding the loop around his wrist so he could take a sip of tea.

Katsuki felt a little freaked out about it, frankly. Seeing Chisaki in person without the mask made him feel like he was looking at the guy in the nude, but okay. The fact that Chisaki was somehow dangerously, sharply handsome gave Katsuki the extra creeps. Today was a day of many surprises.

“That’s good,” Chisaki said, his tone mild and his face extraordinarily still as he evenly met Izuku’s gaze.

Katsuki couldn’t tell if Chisaki meant it or not—didn’t know him well enough to read him like that, and absolutely did not want to get close enough to be able to read him as such. But Izuku seemed to cheer up at that as he closed the space between them and leaned a hip against the counter, taking his own tea to cup his hands around but not drink.

“Thank you,” Izuku said, smiling. “It is good.”

Katsuki looked between the two of them. Was the argument over? They went from one to one-hundred and back again.

“What the fuck,” was Katsuki’s contribution to the conversation.

Green and gold eyes zeroed in on him in tandem.

“As for you,” Chisaki said.

“Oh no,” Katsuki said, holding up his hands. “Leave me out of this.”

“Thank you for stepping in,” Chisaki said, and Katsuki felt his face drop.

Instantly, he scowled and sneered.

“The fuck’s your game, asshole. Say what the fuck you mean to say instead of being a snarky lil’ bitch. I hurt my Omega, I fucked it all up, blah blah—”

“The fact,” Chisaki cut in with precision, his pale lips unnerving to look at after being secreted away for so long, “that you stepped in at all speaks volumes. Right choice or wrong, missteps or not, you felt it imperative that you be there and you pursued it with an apparent and flagrant disregard for your profession.”

Katsuki blinked.

“So you’re sayin’ that I risked my entire reputation to be a fuck up for my mate and that’s what makes you cool with me.”

Chisaki merely raised a sharp, slim eyebrow and drank his tea, looking away once more in the most dismissive manner possible.

“He just hates Dabi a lot,” Izuku said with an eye roll, but he was smiling. “You two finally have something in common.”

“No.” Chisaki flicked a knowing glance to Katsuki once more. “We agreed some time ago that we have more in common than we imagined. For better or for worse.”

“Wow.” Izuku stared between them with big, almost childlike eyes. “That’s terrifying.”

“So,” Katsuki said, refusing to shift from one foot to the other. “What now?”

“Now,” Izuku said with a merciless smile, “you go back to work.”

Katsuki bit back a groan of dread. He wasn’t a fucking pansy. He wasn’t scared of work. But he didn’t want to spend the next three hours getting reamed and forced to make some kind of official statement that weren’t even his real words anyway.

“Fine.” Katsuki stopped toward the door. “After work I’ll—”

Izuku took his hand and spun him around with a soft, wait, and went to his toes, gripping the nape of his neck to pull him down to height. Their lips met like perfection, like warmth and reassurance, like dripping sunset colors staining into the sea. Katsuki sighed into, one gloved hand at Izuku’s waist, squeezing, reveling in the sturdy knowledge of his mate’s permanent space in his life.

“I’m,” Katsuki managed, a little breathless as they parted, damp lips still touching as he spoke, “I’m probably gonna fuck up a million times for as long as we’re together.”

“Me too,” Izuku murmurs, kissing the corner of Katsuki’s curved mouth. “A million trillion times.”

“That’s okay,” Katsuki breathed out, sliding his hand around to the dip of Izuku’s back, urging him closer, soaking in that body heat, that electric feel of him. “That’s okay.”

“Yeah,” Izuku said. “You too. Keep making mistakes with me.”

Katsuki laughed into Izuku’s mouth.

“You got it, shortstack.”

Notes:

Bakugou really said Demi Rights in this chat today.

Also! Please do check out You Swallowing Matches, the completed TodoShin one-shot accompaniment to Quiet Rapture!

Chapter 44

Summary:

"There’s not a stupid thing about you or any human’s heart. Only a feeling thing. Sometimes the feelings simply get tangled and require a gentle unknotting. Tug on them too hard, and they only get tighter, don’t they.”

Notes:

Songs For This Chapter:
Overwhelmed - Royal & the Serpent | Spotify | YouTube
Piece of You - Shawn Mendes | Spotify | YouTube
Switch - FLAVIA | Spotify | YouTube
Content Warning: There is a car accident not involving the main characters, where people are stuck in a life-threatening situation until rescued.

“It’s nice,” Izuku said.

“I swear to god,” Katsuki said, “I will throw you out the thirteenth story window if you keep lying like a goddamn liar.”

“If you die, I die,” Izuku shot back, ignoring the increasingly pale visage of their real estate agent.

“That’s the plan at this point.” Katsuki heaved a dramatic sigh, which was always funny because he was so very serious about it, and slipped his sunglasses down to his nose as he stared out the sunshiney floor to ceiling windows. “Living with your miserable ass on the street since we can’t find a damn house will barely be living. You’ll probably say the dumpster is nice in the same way you said this fuckin’ palace of an apartment is nice.”

Unperturbed, Izuku merely hummed and sidled up beside his mate, slipping an arm around Katsuki’s beefier one, leaning into him as they gazed out at the busy midday Sunday streets of the city.

“At least a dumpster would have character,” Izuku mused aloud. “These palaces are all the same.”

“Uh, if by ‘all the same’, you mean fuckin’ lavish and everything you could ever need at your fingertips, then yeah. All these buildings have had restaurants, gyms, daycare—”

“The day you knock me up is the day I finally give up my body to science—”

“—laundry service, cleaning service—”

“Isn’t it all a bit too easy?” Izuku said, keeping his voice low as he spotted their agent in the reflection turning away and tapping on his phone. “Or, I don’t know, boring?”

“Izuku.” Katsuki turned then, his mouth grim and so serious that it really was almost laughable, because here they had weathered the worst that life could have ever thrown at them, but they couldn’t agree on a single living space. “Do you realize who we are? Life is never going to be boring. Let someone do your fucking laundry for you.”

“Kacchan,” Izuku replied with a patient smile and voice he might give to a misbehaving child during afternoon story time at Parchment. “Have you ever considered that doing normal people things is what will keep you, y’know, grounded with normal people? The very same people you save day in and out? Maybe it’s time to get down on the ground with the rest of us. It might even be good for you.”

“Good for me?” Katsuki repeated, as if Izuku had asked if he wanted a shit sandwich for lunch. “What I need is an easy life so I can live the hard parts without worrying that I’ll have clean underwear or—or a neat apartment when I get home or—”

“Hey.” Izuku cupped Katsuki’s cheeks, smiling up into those dark wells of sunglasses, seeing his own soft, distorted reflection smiling back. “I’m going to be home when you get home, remember? I’m going to be home for the rest of our lives. I’m not exactly the ideal homemaker Omega, I know—”

“I’d rather die than be stuck with one of those—”

“Can we not equate all things with dying today? You’re extremely dramatic today, handsome.” But Izuku huffed a laugh, basking in the warm beach glow between their bond, fingers linking at the nape of Katsuki’s neck. “My point is, our home is going to be something we make together. Something we keep and clean and care for like a family member. And I want our family member to have personality and life and hell, maybe a little defectiveness to match me too. And, more than anything, I want it to feel special to us, not just another empty box flying in the sky, surrounded by a stack of other same boxes.”

“But—”

“Do you remember where we ate on our first date?” Izuku murmured, even though the event had only been some five short months ago. May had frolicked in and left their long, dark December days of first meetings far behind in her whirling, springtime breezy skirts. “I’m a 7-11 boy. He’s the same one you fell in love with. Let him stay that way, okay? I don’t want a palace—I want you and me and Kouta in a place that fits us like we fit each other. Okay?”

Katsuki blew from his nose like a bull but shrugged, turning away from Deku’s loose embrace, but reaching out to ruffle Deku’s hair with a slim hand and push him playfully away.

“You’re a pain in my ass,” Katsuki muttered, but his cadence was loose and easy as he turned to address the agent. “Scrap the other shit on today’s list.”

“But sir—”

“This guy will email you with what he wants. Whatever he says goes, got that? Try and weasel him into something he don’t want and you’ll be looking for a new job, got it?”

“Y-yes!” Izuku had to turn away to muffled a laugh as the guy practically prostrated himself before Ground Zero with several halting bows. “Of course, of course, Mr Bakugou, nothing less you for you—”

“Him.”

“F-for him, for your Omega, yes, of course, absolutely!”

Izuku managed to keep his shit together until the two of them bunched into the elevator, burning a laugh into Katsuki’s bicep and feeling Katsuki’s chest puff up with pleasure.

“How close was he to peeing his pants in fear, you think?” Izuku said, once he’d pulled himself together and the glowing numbers ticked down toward the ground floor.

“Dunno,” Katsuki said, “but now that he’s tasked with you, he’ll understand true fear.”

“I’m not scary!” Izuku sputtered a laugh as Katsuki slid his sunglasses down his nose to stab him with a disbelieving stare. “I just know what I want.”

“Uh huh.” Katsuki righted his glasses, slung a heavy arm over Izuku’s shoulders, and led them out the doors as they dinged at the expansive marble and chandelier foyer.

God, this place was ostentatious. Izuku was relieved he’d worked up the nerve to say something. Katsuki was so used to the best of everything that Izuku wasn’t sure he knew how to live normally.

And, if anyone asked Izuku and he felt them worth telling, he’d inform them that what Katsuki needed more than anything in his life was a good kick from his high horse, right into the stables. It would do him some good and would leave the two of them on more equal footing. Their worlds had to merge somewhere, somehow.

And, if anyone asked Izuku how he’d secretly imagined his life to be, and Izuku trusted them immensely enough to tell them, he’d share his dream of a small library. Of open floor plans and light, gleaming hardwood. Of knickknacks and silly things collected from a life worth living, coffee cup rings on the table, a blanket slung over the back of the sofa covered in cat hair, a bed unmade that still scented of lovemaking and the faded scent of a lover’s shampoo. Photographs on every wall, memories documented on every surface, a keepsake box of a house that would keep Izuku safe for the rest of his life.

If Katsuki asked, he’d tell him too. Maybe not in so many words, but somehow, Izuku would make it known.

Ideally, though, he’d simply get to show him. They’d share the key to their keepsake box house together.

“Food?” Katsuki asked if they stepped into the fresh air.

“7-11?” Izuku replied, turning with a mischievous, knowing smile.

The car hurled through the glass of the building like a comet, shooting shards of glass like bullets in all directions.

A hard body covered Izuku’s crouched one, big and hot and encompassing as Izuku ducked and Katsuki coated him like a second skin. Screams tore through the sunshine, steel and concrete crunched and groaned and crumbled around them, vicious sounds, death and destruction sounds like Izuku had never felt in the flesh.

Then Katsuki was fumbling hands over him, rushed and frantic, palming hard and squishing Izuku’s cheeks as he wrenched Izuku’s face up to see. Katsuki’s shades had fallen away, and for one heart-throat throbbing thump in time, Izuku saw red-raw fear in those wide, wide eyes.

“Run,” Katsuki rasped, fingers digging into Izuku’s skull. “Run.”

Panic nailed sharp and bloody into Izuku’s heart. He reached out, grabbing Katsuki’s wrist.

“Wait, no!”

Katsuki wrenched from Izuku’s grip and whirled on him with a snarl.

“Run!”

And then it was fire, pops and blasts from Katsuki’s dynamite palms like Izuku had never seen up close, never seen in action. Katsuki was already roaring, a deep Alpha bellow as he stalked into a street piled-up and burning like an overflowing ashtray, grey flecks falling like snow into his thorny crown of hair.

Izuku couldn’t run, couldn’t do anything but sit on the pavement and stare in fear and awe at his mate, the wide breadth of him, the altered way he held himself, the purposeful swagger and stride as he stalked toward the blown open doors of a prominent business building across the street.

Then someone started screaming and Izuku was on his feet, looking out, spotting the car still half-way through the high rise bottom floor window. The hood was smoking, filling the foyer with black smog, and as Izuku bolted toward the vehicle, he noted the dead cab driver, face resting on the wheel. The back doors of the cab were flush with the hole in the glass, the thick panes unyielding as the family stuck inside screamed and shoved body weight and bloodied fists against the trapped doors.

Izuku took a running jump toward the trunk of the car, using the bumper as leverage to climb up onto the back, already scrabbling and punching the rear window in an attempt to crack it open.

“Don’t worry!” Izuku hollered through the window. “I’m here!”

But his fists wouldn’t shatter the glass, and the smog from the hood was doubling back into the car in a toxic haze that left mother and teen daughter hacking and streaming tears. Izuku bit back a scream of frustration and stood, stomping down on the glass to no avail.

“Pop the trunk!” Izuku yelled, pressing his hands to the glass to face the sobbing mother. “One of you has to pop the trunk!”

The teenager was already clambering over the center console of the cab, weeping as she was forced to ease the dead driver’s head back against the headrest so to slouch over his form and fumble beneath his seat for the latch. A fire kindled beneath the crunched hood and Izuku slid off the trunk and to his feet, turning just as the back end popped.

Izuku immediately tore the suitcases from the trunk, diving into the the recess and feeling around for the line of seating that would normally fold inward. This time, when he threw is body-weight into it, the backseat followed suit and collapsed. Coughing and tearing up with the fiery burn of smoke in his eyes, Izuku pulled the teenager through first and struggled second with the hysterical mother.

“It’s okay, it’s okay,” Izuku murmured, unable to tell their presentations but making a great mental effort to his releasing his calming pack pheromones, an distinctly maternal Omega scent that Izuku just hoped he still had as the two women clung to him and cried. “It’s okay, let’s step away, come on, the ambulance must on it’s—”

The cracking pain between Izuku’s ribs felt like a gunshot to the gut, and Izuku wailed with the sudden, searing shrapnel feel of it just below his heart. He collapsed to his knees, weakly shooing the women away and thankful when another brave soul jumped into the fray to sweep them from the battle. When a second person offered Izuku their hand, he only aimed a weak, wobbly smile their way and shook his head.

“Sorry,” he whispered as the car only feet from him caught full flame and people kept screaming and rushing from the rotating doors, getting stuck and fearful and infuriated for it. “Help those people get out. Now.”

Izuku didn’t pause to see if they obeyed, but struggled to his feet, clutching his side with one hand, breathing through the steady pulse of pain in that specific spot.

With a grim, soot-stained face, Izuku turned and began to walk. The debris of crashed cars was a maze that Izuku chose to crawl and jump over, utilizing his powerful legs to vault trunks and hoods as he kept an eye on the building entrance still eking out employees.

Another scream ripped from Izuku’s throat as an impact struck him upside the head, dizzying him into nausea and migraine prisms at the back of his eyelids. He collapsed to his knees again, gagging on the vomit that threatened, but pushed off the rubble pavement anyway, using a lamppost for balance as he took a moment to breathe through the worst.

Whatever was happening in there, Katsuki was getting the shit beat out of him, and Izuku would not stand for that. They had a house to build and a long, long life to live together.

The foyer was nearly empty but for a few people keeping to the walls and scooting their way from the building.

“Where?” Izuku snarled, catching the eye of a bland-looking business sweating buckets. When the man halted, holding his breath with wide eyes, Izuku bellowed, “WHERE ARE THEY.”

“B-basement level three,” the businessman whispered, bloodshot eyes cutting to the elevator. “The—the vault.”

Izuku didn’t waste time. He took the stairs. His stomach and lungs were heaving with the sickly beat in his head, but he kept spiraling down, down until he burst through the door and dashed into the hall. The corridor was short with few doors, and it was easy to tell what was where when a door blasted from its hinges lay dead on the floor.

Katsuki went flying through the entry before Izuku could get there, his back impacting against the far wall with an insidious crack, their bond taking the aftershock with a gut-dropping swoop and free-fall. Izuku’s own shoulders and spine screamed with pain as he fell to his knees once more, keening with the pain and crawling on fours now to where Katsuki was groaning and struggling to stumble to his feet.

“Kacchan!” Izuku screamed, hoarse and broken, reaching out with a hand. “Kacchan, let’s get out of here! The Heroes will be here s—”

“What the fuck are you doing here?” Katsuki wheezed, the dawning black of horror staining their bond like a virus. He looked so wrong here, unsteady on his feet in plainclothes and without the thin protective armor of his uniform or a way to call for backup. “Fuck. Fuck, Izuku! Get out, get out of—”

“I’ll get out if you come with me, idiot!” Izuku screamed, shoving to his own feet and holding onto a doorknob for balance. “This isn’t your fight today, you can’t just walk into this like—”

“This is my job, idiot!” Katsuki screamed back, louder and more impassioned. “This is my life! Now get the fuck out, you don’t belong here!”

Shocked into silence, Izuku only bolted forward to grab at Katsuki’s arm when he noticed his mate resolutely starting back toward the hollowed out doorway.

“No!” Izuku yanked futilely at Katsuki’s arm, failing entirely to drag him back into the hall. “Kacchan, don’t leave me!”

“GO!” Katsuki roared, flicking him off like a fly and turning, bounding back into the room with palms sparking.

Izuku went flailing across the floor, breathing hard for the pain in his heart and the the knock on his head and everything in between. Katsuki had to be feeling it even worse, and yet he still—

“Oh my!” a familiar voice exclaimed, and Izuku rushed to his feet and found himself staring at a grinning Hawks. For his easy demeanor, he may as well have been taking a walk on the beach. “Hello there, what a surprise. If you’re here, I’m going to guess your mate is just up ahead? No, don’t tell me, I can see the trail of destruction.”

“Hawks,” Izuku stressed, hoping to make his concern known through the name alone.

“Yeah, yeah,” Hawks drawled with a lazy smile, lightly waving him off with a limp wrist. “I’ve got him. No worries. Hey, Tokoyami, take care of this kid, will ya? See he gets medical attention.”

“Of course,” rumbled a deep voice, and Izuku outright yelped and recoiled when faced with the tiny bird man of black feathers and a nearby shifting shadow with watchful yellow eyes. “Sir, we need to get moving. My Dark Shadow will carry you. Please do not make this difficult, I don’t want you injured in the process.”

“But Bakugou—”

“If Bakugou is indeed here, then we are all in safe hands,” the man called Tokoyami said with a solemn nod. Beside him, his shadow held out a black static hand. “Now, let us find safety. Thank you, sir.”

Izuku wasn’t sure how he ended up being princess carried by a literal shadow, but life had thrown stranger things at him in the past, and he could handle this. If only he could be in battle instead.

Katsuki must have taken another punch because Izuku’s jawbone was stinging right up to his teeth. When the shadow left him at the open back doors of an ambulance, Izuku spat blood and winced as he tongued a loosened tooth. There was no coming back from that.

“Where are you hurt?” asked the EMT.

Izuku gave him a thin, brittle smile.

“Everywhere. But it’s not me, it’s my mate. My True Mate. He’s injured. Once he’s healed, so will I be.”

The EMT looked like Izuku had just admitted he was an alien from outer space, but eventually just nodded and glanced toward the ominously rumbling building and back to Izuku.

“Right,” he said. “I’ll just do some vitals, okay?”

Numbly, Izuku allowed the EMT to do his job without a fuss, only rolling his eyes a little when the guy told him he had a minor concussion and probably a broken rib. Aside from the wobbly tooth, Izuku wasn’t even bleeding anywhere, he was fine.

More responders were gathering on scene and the brightly colored uniforms of Heroes flitted in and out of his periphery. Izuku was admonished several times from trying to twist around the side of the open ambulance doors to catch sight of the building, waiting for that familiar swagger stride and cocky set of shoulders.

Through their bond, Izuku could feel Katsuki’s fury and fire, his unfailing determination. He couldn’t have been taking any major blows, because Izuku felt fine, existing injuries notwithstanding.

What hurt the most was his heart. The way Katsuki had dropped him at the first sign of danger to jump right in. How easily he walked into the gaping, black maw of danger and welcomed the teeth, knowing full well Izuku was irreversibly connected to him. The way he’d brushed him off in the basement, barely giving him a glance as he’d informed Izuku that this was his life.

Wasn’t Izuku his life too?

The more Izuku strewed in the mire of it, the more he simmered and boiled over, clenching his teeth against the drive to give that Alpha a piece of his mind. A Hero, an Alpha, everything Izuku had sworn off over the course of his life, and now he’d knowingly, willingly, lovingly tied himself to this jackass forever.

“Midoriya!” called a voice, and Izuku looked up to see Shindo fucking Yo jogging over to him in that ridiculous little vest that might as well have been a crop top and not much else. “Hey, are you okay?”

“I don’t want to see a single one of you jerks right now,” Izuku growled, clutching the shock blanket closer around his body like armor. “So turn around and walk away.”

Entirely unperturbed, Shindo only bounded up to him like an overgrown dog, grinning sharp and bright, those dark eyes assessing him quickly.

“You look like shit. Heard you saved some people, though—nice one, man. Those reporters over there wanted me to ask if they could interview you.”

“Interview?” Izuku frowned, glancing past Shindo’s ridiculous abs toward the police barricades where a crowd had gathered. “Why me? They hate me.”

“No one hates you,” Shindo said, and the way he said it made Izuku remember that this was once Camie’s close friend. “In fact, they love you. You make good news. And the Quirkless Omega mate of one of Japan’s beloved prime Alpha Heroes saving folks by the skin of his teeth? That’s a story.”

Izuku’s immediate reaction was to laugh and walk away. His second reaction was to consider this more carefully. After all the bad publicity he personally had received, plus the hits Ground Zero had been taking in the past months, down to the photographs of him biting his own mate—the scales of fortune had not been kind to their life choices.

With a resolute sigh, Izuku pushed off the edge of the ambulance and discarded the shock blanket.

“Fine,” he bit off, looking up and up to meet tall Shindo’s clever eyes and deceptively easy smile. “How do I look? Wait, like shit, nevermind.”

“It’s fine, it’s fine,” Shindo replied, reaching out to tame Izuku’s curls a bit. “Works for you. Sets the scene and all. You want me to come with you?”

Izuku considered agreeing, for solidarity, but thought better of it.

“Not unless you want Bakugou to castrate you. Thanks, Shindo. See you around.”

Resolutely, Izuku squared his shoulders and marched toward the barricade. The flurry of questions hurled over the barrier were instantaneous, the chirrup of camera lenses sounding in all directions like a sea of cicadas. Izuku was reminded of the gala and of how desperate he had been to present himself exactly as who he was, unapologetically. 

He still wanted that, but in addition to it, he wanted some good publicity for once. For the good of everything and everyone.

“Mr Midoriya!” cried one voice, half a dozen microphones and records shoved in his direction, enough to make Izuku take an instinctively startled step back. “Mr Midoriya, is it true you saved a young lady and her daughter from a blazing car!”

“Well, it wasn’t entirely on fire at the time,” Izuku said softly, managing a small curve of lips. He wasn’t shy by nature, but he wasn’t interested in attention, either. “I couldn’t exactly turn my back on them. I was the only one still in the area when the dust settled.”

“Ground Zero was there too,” said someone else. “Why didn’t he save them? Why would he allow a Quirkless Omega into such a dangerous situation?”

Izuku’s smile sharpened, but he kept his voice low and concise and nonthreatening, just how society wanted their Omegas to present themselves. Perhaps the correct delivery would get the message across to more people.

“Ground Zero doesn’t allow me to do anything,” Izuku said, ignoring the faint gasp toward the back of the crowd. Scandalized. “I am my own person, as he is, and you are and anyone listening to this. And he had already set his sights on whatever is going on in that building right now. I picked up the slack, just like any able-bodied person would do in my situation.”

“Aren’t you simply trying to make yourself look good to others?” asked a woman’s voice. “Since it’s no secret that you and Ground Zero hardly match up on paper.”

“We’re True Mates,” Izuku said tightly, keeping a harsh reign on his temper. “It’s been tested and proven by professionals ever since my survival of the Omega Killer. Fairy tales look good on paper, but they’re not real, so by logic of that, perhaps things that reflect poorly on paper make sense in real life.”

“But you can’t give him children,” said the woman, her gaze harsh and accusing. “Don’t you feel the least bit guilty for taking him from a more worthy Omega?”

“Do you know who thought they were a worthy Omega of my mate?” Izuku asked softly, taking that final step forward and watching some of the reporters lean in, rapt. “Utsushimi Camie. Any other questions?”

“How is your arm?” someone asked, sounding like they actually cared.

Izuku’s smile warmed, automatically running a palm down the circular scab and surrounding bruises. The memory of Katsuki’s horror and guilt momentarily softened him, reminding Izuku how desperately, albeit violently, his Alpha desired to protect him.

“It’s healing. That’s what I get for putting myself in the center of an Alpha stand-off. Bakugou was protecting me, after all.”

The same person’s voice came from the crowd, a gentle-sounding man.

“You don’t seem to need one of Japan’s top Heroes to take care of you at all. From escaping the Omega Killer twice, to the leaked record of your restraining order against the known villain Twice, to standing in between battles, and making your debut at the gala, to the events today. One might say you’re becoming an underground icon to male Omegas around the world.”

“What?” Izuku did laugh then, flabbergasted and amused at the very idea that anyone would ever look at him and see something worth following. “No. That’s—that’s too much. But I appreciate your seeing me farther than my presentation and my mate. Thank you.”

Izuku began to turn away with another mumbled, embarrassed thank you.

“Mr Midoriya!” another yelled, “What is Ground Zero like as a partner?”

Pausing abruptly, Izuku glanced over his shoulder and smiled, genuinely.

“About as challenging and rewarding as you would imagine.”

“Mr Midoriya! Mr Midoriya!”

“Mr Midoriya, what is your connection to known anti-Hero activist, Chisaki Kai?”

“Mr Midoriya, you seemed so close with Ground Zero’s inner circle at the gala—rumor is you’re in a pack with a few notable Heroes. Is that—”

“Mr Midoriya, why do you smell like that!”

“Oiy!” A strong arm cuffed around Izuku’s neck and tugged him in, pushing Izuku’s face into a familiar pair of cushioned pecs. “What are you, animals? For fuck’s sake, look at him—d’you think he needs your bullshit right now? Leave it!”

Izuku made a choking noises as Katsuki dragged him away, back toward the ambulance where he sat Izuku down with a firm face and two heavy hands on either shoulder. Izuku bounced right back up and slapped Katsuki’s hand away, glaring.

“What, now you’re coming for me?” Izuku said at Katsuki’s clueless expression. “Little late for that since you already got us both smacked around enough for the day.”

Realization flashed across Katsuki’s face like a guilty puppy who had pissed on the carpet, but was quickly overshadowed by a scoff and his gruff demeanor falling back into place.

“That was work and you got in the way. What the fuck was I supposed to do, escort you by the goddamn hand while I was busy fending off a baddie the size and weight of a tank? Thought you were smart.”

“Are you calling me stupid because I wanted you to let the actual on-call Heroes take care of this when we both took this day off explicitly to work toward building a life together? A day you purposely walked away from by telling me, and I quote, this is my life?” When Katsuki didn’t answer with anything but a fang-bearing sneer, Izuku shoved at the Alpha’s shoulder and stomped on the top of his foot for good measure, taking pleasure in the hiss of pain. “Because I am also your life, or did you forget? Did you also forget that when you die, I die? When you hurt, I hurt?”

“I don’t fucking know, Izuku,” Katsuki shot back, snotty and know-it-all in his voice like Izuku rarely experienced. “Seems like I’m the one feeling twice as much as you ever do between us. Just how much do you shut me out to keep yourself safe from what I feel, hah? Who is the real asshole between us, hah? Because—”

“Fuck you!” Izuku seethed, baring his teeth much in the same way any Alpha would and no natural Omega would dare. “Fuck you, Mr Zero, you self-important son of a bitch. I have opened myself up to you more than anyone in the world, more than I could ever have imagined I could, more than is safe for me to reasonably do. And it’s still not enough?’

Katsuki’s expression was twisted, eyes enflamed, mouth curled in a grimace as he leaned in and said in the quietest, most deadly tone,

“It’s still not enough.”

A thunderous pulse beat between them, their bond war drum and battle scream of dissonance as they faced each other head on.

“Fine,” Izuku answered, clipped and curt. “Fine. Of course it’s not. When would I ever be enough for anybody?’

“You are enough,” Katsuki whispered, leaning in too close, too intimate when Izuku wanted to relent to his baser ingrained instincts and sock him in the jaw. “But whatever’s scaring you? Whatever is backing you into the corner when it’s sure as hell not me, because I have laid my arsenal at your feet and you’re safe as houses with me—whatever makes you feel like you can’t be one-hundred percent with me—that’s what’s not enough. That’s what’s gotta go. Got me, smartass?”

Izuku wanted to scream. He wanted to cry. He wanted to shove Katsuki’s face into the pavement and write this entire relationship off as a mistake.

Instead he hissed, fuck you, turned on his heel and left.

 

 

“Who are you really angry at, Mr Midoriya?”

“What?” Izuku worked his bottom lip with forefinger and thumb, antsy glance flitting between the window to the city and to Ms Hayate’s calm, soothing demeanor. “Who?”

“We’ve been over this in the past,” she replied, not unkindly, simply a reminder. “Do you remember? Anger had once been a driving force in your life. But we are never truly angry at the specific person in that present moment, are we? We have an entire database backed up in our brains for all the ways we’ve been wronged in the past. The unfairness, the unnecessary cruelty, the abandonment—and they often stem from specific people or situations in our lives where, at a very young age, we were hurt. Made afraid, made small, useless, ugly, whatever we downloaded from that moment and time that then filters through our experiences of life.”

Izuku worried at the fray of his jean cutoffs, shifting Ms Hayate’s words into different angles, looking for the spaces where he fit into her assessment.

“I remember,” he said softly, unsure what more to say.

“Let’s start somewhere straight forward,” Ms Hayate said, pausing to take a sip from her very dented, very used thermos. “What about yesterday made you angry?”

“He just—” Izuku sputtered, feeling that familiar ire twisted with fear rising up and fit to burst. “He just walked away from us like it was nothing! Like we were nothing. He could—he could very well die and he just seems so fucking at peace with that and—and—and if he dies, I die! With the, you know, the True Mates stuff. He’s the one who went through it with me, so you’d think he’d remember, you’d think he’d be more careful. You’d think he wouldn’t just walk away like that.”

“You said, walk away from us,” Ms Hayate said in that clear, concise manner of hers. No gushing empathy fit to set Izuku into tears, no commiserating. She always cut straight to the bone like a surgeon. “But of course Mr Bakugou can’t walk away from himself. That’s impossible. But he can walk away from you. And sometimes he might, like he did yesterday. And he will do so again and again, won’t he? Every day he goes to work, he both literally and figuratively walks away from you.”

When Izuku didn’t answer, didn’t know how to answer, because that stung too deep, Ms Hayate only folded her hands neatly atop her lap and considered him with kind, dark eyes.

“Who was the first person to ever walk away from you, Mr M—”

“My father,” Izuku replied instantly, twisting at the knife that forever pinched between his shoulder blades at that. After all this time, it shouldn’t matter. With no memories of the man but for a few photos of a powerful man with a big smile and mussed white hair, what should it matter? It shouldn’t, it shouldn’t.

But fuck if it didn’t.

“Your father did leave you, yes,” Ms Hayate said. “He left you and he left your mother. One might say he’s as good as dead.”

That stabbed harder, right into Izuku’s sternum like the wind knocked from his lungs. Izuku absently toyed with the collar of his threadbare t-shirt.

“Y-yes, well. He—he made that choice. To leave us like that. In poverty and everything else. He never even stayed to find out my presentation. Or maybe he already smelled the failure on me. Who knows.”

“So,” Ms Hayate said in that quiet, indomitable way of hers, “you feel that every time your mate walks away from you, it’ll lead to his eventual. . .smelling of failure on you, and one of those times he will simply not return?”

“Well.” Izuku sucked in a watery breath, shocked at the unwelcome tears that spilled with absolutely no reasonable cause. Flabbergasted with himself, Izuku coughed a wet laugh and sniffled, digging the heel of his palm into one burning eye. “Yeah. But when you put it that way, it sounds stupid.”

“It’s not stupid,” Ms Hayate murmured, “it’s what you’ve downloaded as truth through your life experiences. How can it be stupid when you are such an intelligent, empathetic person? There’s not a stupid thing about you or any human’s heart. Only a feeling thing. Sometimes the feelings simply get tangled and require a gentle unknotting. Tug on them too hard, and they only get tighter, don’t they.”

Izuku didn’t know how long he cried with relief. Didn’t know how many times he apologized for it even as his therapist coaxed him into calm breaths and a clearer, more peaceful headspace. When he did eventually sooth, she nudged over the waste basket with her foot for the pile of used tissues across Izuku’s lap.

“Do you still feel angry at your mate?”

“No,” Izuku said softly, knowing it to be true. “I—I just. . .I don’t think I ever came to terms with what he does for a living. Not in a hands-on way. There’s a fear in that, of knowing how connected we are in ways I never wanted or asked for, but absolutely need now more than I need to breathe. To be dependent on someone like that is terrifying, and I’ve never had to be dependent on someone in my life. Not on an emotional level, anyway. Not deeply. Not like with him.”

Izuku thought of his mother, of his childhood. Listening to her cry. Finding old photos at the bottom of the back of her closet. Not recognizing the man until he was old enough to see his own face in that smile and the strong cut of his jaw. The thinned out meals, the small apartments, the tension of presenting Omega and despising the thought of growing into a needy, weak woman like his mother.

The anger had never come from rage, because the rage had first come from hurt and fear and sadness.

“I don’t want to end up like my mom,” Izuku whispered, the realization feeling light instead of dark and heavy. Felt like turning the page of a book and revealing a fresh chapter. “I just realized that for real. Just now. Right now. Mating, depending on someone, putting my everything into them with the forever opportunity that they might leave and then leave me like a shell. It almost happened to me before. If I’d have loved Jin just a little harder, Dabi just a little deeper, it could have happened. But realizing this is the real deal. . .I’m terrified. I’m not angry. I’m terrified.”

Ms Hayate allowed the hallowed silence of realization to settle before she nodded.

“And what would Mr Bakugou say to all that?”

“Oh.” Izuku looked up and found himself smiling through the fresh, welcomed wave of quiet, relieved tears. “He would say I’m a fucking idiot.”

“Ah.” Ms Hayate’s unpainted lips curved. “All things considered, I’d say he’s rather good at embracing exactly who you are. . .smells and all.”

Izuku laughed, soggy and pathetic and just a little happy with his unravelling heart.

“Smells and all.”

 

 

Izuku dialed Katsuki’s work number like a self-entitled douchebag, even though he’d promised himself forever ago that he’d never call Ground Zero’s nifty little phone earpiece like a needy Omega.

But, so what? So what if he was needy sometimes. Katsuki wanted him this way, didn’t he? And Izuku had to apologize properly, didn’t he? And he wasn’t going to wait a single second more.

“You okay?” Katsuki answered, gruff and short and sending fizzles and pops and pleasure at his instant answer despite yesterday’s fight and Izuku’s storming off.

“Are you busy?” Izuku breathed out, riding high on his breakthrough as he rushed through the masses of bystanders down the street. “Sorry, I mean, I know you’re busy. You’re probably on duty. You’re probably doing, like, super important stuff, but could I just—can I just—”

“I’ll ping you my location,” Katsuki said. Someone muffled spoke in the background and Katsuki clearly covered his ear with his palm because Izuku could only make out Katsuki snapping something sharp and biting in return before hanging right up on him.

Izuku didn’t care. He grinned like an idiot as his mate’s location popped up on his cell, staring at it lovingly for a moment. Seven months ago, if anyone had shown Izuku an image of himself mooning over a text message from an Alpha as he dashed to be at his side, Izuku would have accidentally tipped over a bookshelf and allowed it to crush the life out of them.

Impatiently waiting at a gigantic crosswalk, Izuku caught sight of his reflection in a building’s sleek, dark windows. His hair was awry with wild curls blown up by the spring wind, his neck a mess of a mate bite on one side and the healing tears on the other, his forearm sporting a stark, shiny pink round of Katsuki’s teeth.

A dozen other scars mapped his body in the journey his heart and soul had taken. And every single one was worth it if it brought him here, at these crosswalks, heading toward the one thing he knew was safe enough to give his entire heart to.

Out of breath with exuberance and the near-sprint he’d broken into on the way, Izuku rounded the corner and burst into a beaming smile. He had entirely forgotten that the Heroes from Katsuki’s agency had been obligated to attend the grand opening of a second branch of their business, this smaller extension focusing on taking in more interns and training new hires for the big leagues.

A white banner dressed the double doors of the building, one not mile-high in the sky like the agency’s headquarters in a skyscraper, but more accessible and stacked above some flashy gym advertised on the bottom two floors.

Katsuki stood there in full uniform, big arms folded and bulging against his wide chest, and Izuku’s mouth watered as he took the time to appreciate his man in the full Ground Zero presentation. Last time he’d actually seen Katsuki like this up close had been a whirlwind of a disaster with Dabi and all the rest. This time, from afar, Izuku could admire him for what he was. A top Hero in his prime and a powerful Alpha full of vitality.

That uniform clung to Katsuki’s wickedly nipped waist, black and skin tight, taut and straining across his barrel chest and mountainous shoulders, shoulders that Izuku had the exclusive rights to bite and lick and hang onto when Katsuki mercilessly fucked him into tears. Even the jut of his ass, the length of his legs, the climb of his hulking boots arrowed a shock of appreciative heat straight to Izuku’s cock.

All that, Izuku thought, his mouth salivating at the sight of Katsuki simply standing there in full uniform with hands that could kill—all of that is mine.

Katsuki whipped his head around, top lip curled in a silent snarl, nostrils flaring as he zeroed in on Izuku without a second of searching. Like he knew exactly where Izuku had been standing all along. The knowledge surged through Izuku, spreading liquid from limbs to fingertips. Katsuki’s eyes widened and narrowed in quicktime, their bond melting molten and red hot, gold dripping between the swelling, breathing thing between them.

Alpha, Izuku thought, unmoving, and then Katsuki was stalking toward him in strides that ate the pavement, his tanned shoulders gilded in the sun, hair like a crown, red eyes painted black and masked, their intensity growing as he approached.

Oh fuck. Izuku’s knees went to jelly, honeyed and loose as he waited on his Alpha’s approach, entirely pinned by the ferocity in Katsuki’s hot coal gaze. People parted for Katsuki like a sea and him a deity, and it was only when Katsuki stopped before him did Izuku realize he was whimpering, head tilted to bare his mated mark, presenting himself in an entirely Omega way.

“Kacchan,” Izuku murmured, his previous excitement all but drowned in desire now. Would it always be like this? So heady and distracting, so suddenly uncontrollable? Maybe his heat was coming. Or maybe this was simply the power of their bond the more Izuku allowed himself to feel it. “Kacchan, I’m sorry.”

“I know,” Katsuki said, his mouth stern, his sharp features beautiful. He didn’t touch Izuku, though. Simply loomed over him like something otherworldly, and hell, their connection was the stuff of legends, so maybe there was something to that. Maybe they were something even greater than this in a past life. Izuku had never believed before, but now? Now it didn’t seem so outlandish.

“Um.” Izuku licked his chapped lips, watched Katsuki watching, couldn’t seem to look away from the overwhelming severity of his mate. Distantly, Izuku realized he’d gone wet, wet and clenching and wanting in the middle of the street. “Um. Shit. I meant to come here with a big apology, but I want—I want—”

“‘Zuku,” Katsuki rasped, a ragged whisper, hovering so close, hands fisted at his sides. He was probably more aware of the public than Izuku was in this moment. “You should—you shouldn’t be—fuck, if you keep smellin’ like that—”

A shout and curse sounded in the near distance and Izuku tore his gaze from Katsuki’s to look over his shoulder, watching one businessman stop to shove and holler in the face of another.

“Fuck,” Katsuki said, his voice dropped deep enough to soundly wreck Izuku in a word. “‘Zuku, you can’t be out here like—shit, I’m gonna tear a fucker apart if they even smell you like this, you’re mine, I’ll kill—”

“Fuck this,” Izuku bit off, wincing as he heard another Alpha snarl his displeasure and yell something at an innocent bystander. “Kacchan, come.”

“Wait—”

But Izuku was grabbing Katsuki’s gloved hand, clenching the buttery soft material in his palm, and yanking him down the street and away from the grand opening, away from the fighting, leading him abruptly into the first alleyway he saw. Unfortunately it was filled with vendors and stalls and tourists and several heads turned in unison at, probably, the scent of Izuku’s lust.

“Hey,” someone hollered, “is that Ground Zero? Oh my god, it—”

Izuku brushed by them quickly, hand an iron grip on Katsuki’s, ignoring the startled protests towing behind him as they switched down a second, less busy street, then dashed into a thinner, empty alley.

“Oiy, freckles, what the fuck—”

Breathing hard and grinning, Izuku turned and shoved Katsuki into the receded alcove of building side entrance and pressed into his surprised Alpha, going to his toes and wrapping arms around those hulking shoulders to capture that snarling mouth in a sloppy, biting kiss. Katsuki’s shocked little chirp of sound only fueled him, Izuku tearing and licking into Katsuki’s mouth with long, thrusting sweeps of tongue as his hands skimmed and danced down flinching abs to frantically unfasten the heavy utility belt and work the zipper of Katsuki’s pants.

Then, with a long and throaty groan that fucked right into Izuku’s dripping heat, Katsuki got with the program. Heavy hands palmed at Izuku’s hips, tearing at the button and fly of his jean shorts and shoving roughly inside to knead and roll the muscle and fat of Izuku’s ass between his gloved fingers. Katsuki’s hands felt so much bigger and bulkier like this, spanning across Izuku’s trim waist and the round of his ass so wholly that Izuku felt his thighs stain with slick and begin to shake.

“Fuck me,” Izuku panted, dry and strained as he finally freed Katsuki’s long, thick length and began to pump the pulsing, hot cock, quick and harsh and high on the sounds ripping from Katsuki’s throat as he thumped his head back against the rusted door. “Fuck me, fuck me now, Alpha, mark me, keep me yours.”

“You’re always mine,” Katsuki hissed, and then Izuku was spinning, their positions reversed, his back slammed against the door.

Izuku gasped and Katsuki inhaled against Izuku’s mouth, taking the air back, breathing right from Izuku’s lungs as their bond spiked black and gold, racing heartbeats aligned, Katsuki dropping to his knees to yank Izuku’s shorts over his thick ass and thicker thighs. Briefly, their eyes met, Katsuki prostrate for his Omega, long tongue swiping thick and wet up Izuku’s dick, pausing to suck on the swollen head, Katsuki’s gaze like two red warning flags, daring Izuku to give him absolutely everything.

And then Katsuki was looming over him anew, crowding him into the door, pressing into him hard, dominating, domineering, deadly in body and mind, driving Izuku into desperate cries of shock and delirium as one gloved hand reached around to pull Izuku’s ass cheeks apart and the other driving into his dripping hole. The leather added girth and Katsuki wasn’t delicate, stuffing him deep and full until the familiar slick squelch and slop of Izuku’s greedy ass stretching and sucking in at his fingers sounded in the air.

Ears echoing with the blood of his own heartbeat, Izuku cried into Katsuki’s open, waiting mouth, gagging in shock as Katsuki shoved his tongue in and down to the back of his mouth, thoroughly fucking him through at each end. Izuku felt himself flood over Katsuki’s glove, the hot, honeyed gush leaking down his legs and behind his knees, down to trickle at his ankles when Katsuki added the second finger, the stretch so much, too much, perfect. He was trembling, quivering with the vicious thrusts up toward his prostate, the raspy fingertips of the glove doing something inside of him like a match to the coarse side of the matchbox.

“Up,” Katsuki commanded, and oh fuck, Izuku had never obeyed so quickly. Outright jumped up and expected Katsuki to catch him, which he did, hands and arms bracing Izuku’s thighs apart, planting him against the door, holding Izuku up with an ease that barely bulged Katsuki’s muscles.

There was a moment, right then, a moment where Izuku was reaching between them with his teeth sunk into his bottom lip, gripping Katsuki’s hefty cock to align it properly, when Izuku looked up and saw something he’d recognized only once before.

Yesterday, when Katsuki had protected him with his body, had looked into his eyes and said, Run.

Maybe Katsuki was just as terrified of losing Izuku, but in an altogether different way. Regardless, the end game was the same, and the realization left Izuku reeling as he resolutely wiggled his hips down on the wide crown of Katsuki’s cock and stuffed himself full.

“I’m not—” Izuku yelped, dragged out into a moan as Katsuki firmly thrust inside with the look of a desperate madman on his face. “I’m never leaving,” Izuku managed, breathless with the sweet and juicy bond that swelled and burst between them like overripe peaches spilling around clenched fist. “Never. Kacchan.”

The look of heart-wrenching relief was split-second before Katsuki buried his face into the crook of Izuku’s neck, groaning and rubbing his mouth and nose and cheek against the glaze of pheromones at Izuku’s gland. Then he split Izuku down on his cock. A short, startled scream cut from Izuku as he clung to Katsuki’s shoulders, nails digging into the beefy muscle and bone of his back, scrambling to hold on as Katsuki railed into him hard, grunting like an animal with each upward thrust.

The sound of their mating was maddening, the wet of Izuku’s needy hole, the staccato cry punched from Izuku’s lungs with every snap of Katsuki’s hips, the guttural throat sound his Alpha made to inch him close toward completion. The pace was frantic, riding higher and more frenetic, the door thundering on its hinges, Izuku butted Katsuki’s head with the side of his own to nuzzle and get at that snarling mouth, to lick at his lips in lieu of a kiss, everything clumsy and quick and culminating to a sharp, fiery peak.

“Knot me,” Izuku breathed into Katsuki’s mouth, and no sooner had he said it was Katsuki flattening him against the door, Izuku’s knees hooked over Katsuki’s arms and spread wide, too wide, the stretch between his thighs and around his clenching hole a sensory overload.

Their foreheads shoved together like a headbutt or a clashing of horns, hard and digging into each other, both Alpha and Omega growling in harmonic tandem as the knot inflated and pressed Izuku further and further apart, painful and the greatest pleasure all in one, the pressure driving Izuku to squirm until Katsuki crushed him further against the door, entirely immobile as his Alpha knot filled and spilled inside in great, molten spurts.

Izuku’s release came on like unconsciousness, sudden and violent and screaming, then black.

When he came to, his Alpha was clutched around him like a second skin, coaxing and kissing and humming at the underside of Izuku’s jaw, licking at a throat sting that must have been a bite Izuku hadn’t been conscious of during the knot. Izuku’s entire body pulsed in time with his blood beat, veins singing with the mating, endorphins drugging and leaving him dreamy and liquid as Katsuki held him against the uncomfortably rusty door, big hands and long arms around his body, keeping him close.

Izuku must have made a noise of consciousness because Katsuki was making that curious little question sound at the back of his throat that Izuku was now sure his Alpha didn’t realize he made, or else he’d be terribly embarrassed by the hesitancy of the noise. The thought made Izuku smile, loose and lazy as he turned his face into Katsuki’s neck and nuzzled.

Katsuki continued to snuffle at him, into his hair and at his ear, butting at Izuku’s cheek with his nose in the strange, cuddly way he had about him during a knot. It was cute. Izuku could never say so out loud unless he wanted to lose a limb in the process.

They didn’t speak for the full ten minutes or so until the knot deflated, simply basking in their low summer glow bond and the lapping waves of contentment. When Katsuki finally allowed Izuku to his wobbly feet, it was with a hiss and a whine from either or both of them at the separation, and Izuku could only continue to lean limply against the door as Katsuki righted Izuku’s underwear and shorts back up, buttoned all nice and neat. The messed shirt was a loss and Katsuki took it off, wiped down Izuku’s damp legs and his own uniform, and then threw it into the alley, returning to ride scarred palms along Izuku’s goosebumpy stomach and sides.

“H-hey,” Izuku managed, giggling against the light, loving touch, grinning up at Katsuki’s dark, worshipful gaze. “Stop! Stop that. What am I going to do now?”

“Shoulda thought of that before you pulled me into a damn alley to fuck you oblivion,” Katsuki said, taking Izuku by the wrist and raising his arm to scent him with his own gland, right up to concentrate on the crusted scab of a bite.

“Sorry,” Izuku said, not sorry at all. “You’re at work at everything. Are you going to get in trouble?”

“That seems to be my new thing,” Katsuki murmured, mouth against the thin skin at Izuku’s inner wrist. His blood red gaze flickered to Izuku’s wide one, lingering meaningfully in the eye contact just to show how much he didn’t care about that area of his reputation anymore.

“Regardless,” Izuku said breathlessly, the heat of the look leaving him flushed and flooded with a blush. “I need to be more careful. For your sake and for mine. Your job and our privacy. I really am sorry about that, at least. But I’d wanted to come and tell you I was sorry for acting like an asshole.”

Katsuki’s smile was all familiar feral teeth and cocky confidence as he leaned in, dropping an elbow beside Izuku’s ear so he could overpower the space and lean in.

“Y’know, I hate it when you say sorry, but I love it when you apologize.”

Izuku imitated offended shock, but ended up smiling anyway as he lightly punched his Alpha in the iron-tough gut.

“Shut up or I’ll take it back.”

“Nah.” Katsuki kept on grinning in that infuriating, self-important way of his that Izuku had grown to love. “Say it again. I’m an asshole, Mr Zero! I’m so awful and mean to you and you’re so wonderful!”

“Mr Zero,” Izuku said as primly as he could when he was smiling like a loon. “Go buy me a fucking shirt already.”

Katsuki smiled back, similarly insane and still so intense with his mask firmly in place, red eyes surrounded in shadow.

“Stay,” he said.

“Nowhere I’d rather be,” Izuku said, meaning it in every way he could mean it. Katsuki must have caught it, because he aimed a lingering look Izuku’s way before disappearing from the alley and away.

As Izuku was waiting, his phone chimed. Hitoshi’s text simply said:

<<< REALLY? Right in front of his agency opening?

>>> Ha ha. It was an accident.

<<< Liar. There are photos. You two looked two seconds from ripping off each other’s clothes in the middle of the street. Have I taught you nothing of discretion?

>>> It really was an accident!

<<< OK.

>>> Don’t take that tone with me. What are they saying?

<<< BKG’s PR team does good work. Ever since they spun you two as some kind of True Mates Prince and The Pauper Star-crossed Love Story, people eat up your PDA. If there isn’t fanfic already, there will be soon.

>>> Well then I can only guess that you’re texting me to get the gossip to share with the rest of the packs. No luck.

<<< Come on! One detail! What will our friends think of us if I can’t come out with one clever comment?

>>> . . .well, he’s out buying me a new shirt.

<<< WHERE EVEN ARE YOU?

“Oiy.”

Izuku looked up and caught the shirt, frowning down at it as he spread it open. He shot a glare up at his grinning Alpha.

“Really?” Izuku said dryly, pulling on the black tee sporting the Ground Zero orange X. “I’m already a walking billboard for you as it is.”

“Little extra won’t hurt you then,” Katsuki said, admiring Izuku with an approving nod. “Don’t jizz on that one. I’d like it to last.”

“You’re impossible.”

“I’m incredible and you’re welcome.”

Izuku laughed into their kiss, one hand careful not to disrupt Katsuki’s mask as he gripped at his hair.

“Well,” Izuku murmured against Katsuki’s lips, “now that you stink appropriately of me, I suppose I better send you back to your grand opening and whatever.”

“Come to mine tonight,” Katsuki said, mouth brushing across Izuku’s cheek, hot breath huffing through his nose.

“Sure,” Izuku replied, then jumped a little with surprise as his phone sounded again. He laughed, ducking his head when Katsuki growled into his hair while Izuku searched his phone from his pocket. “Sorry, Hitoshi was just—oh.”

“Oh?” Katsuki pulled back, frowning down at Izuku’s screen. “Bad oh or good oh?”

“It’s just—” Izuku stared balefully up at Katsuki and gulped. “Our mothers want to see us.”

“Oh,” Katsuki said. “Shit.”

Notes:

Thank you so much for your kindness and support. It's constantly overwhelming in the best way and your comments & enthusiasm really have been keeping me going these days. It's been a rough month and I am thankful for the community of you readers, more than I can say.

I am big time looking forward to these final chapters and I hope you are too. I want to leave you with wonderful feelings, positive thoughts, and maybe some insights on a thing or two. I know writing this opened up many parts of me that have been patiently waiting for the right time & medium to do so.

Chapter 45

Summary:

Everything in this moment felt eternal, felt like doors opening to another door and another, the architecture of their lives outstretching into forever.

Notes:

Songs For This Chapter:
R U 4 Me? - Middle Kids | Spotify | YouTube
Daydream - Milk & Bone| Spotify | YouTube
Imagine - Ben Platt | Spotify | YouTube

This chapter is oh so fluffy. Forgive me.

“Well don’t you two look guilty,” Katsuki’s mom said as she opened the door to the pair of them. She grinned, wide and toothy and murderous. “As you should be. You boys have been busy.”

Katsuki snorted and shoved past her without an official greeting.

“Oh, shove it up your—”

“H-hi, Mrs Bakugou,” Izuku said, frozen in the doorway looking unbearably cute and approachable in his khaki shorts and plaid button up. The short sleeves on the were rolled up a couple times to hug his biceps and that was just the edge of sexy to keep Katsuki distracted. “It’s wonderful to meet you again.”

“Oh, don’t get so formal with me, honey,” Mom said as she yanked him in for a bear hug, her Alpha nature scenting him with a cheek to his hair, the same way she’d do to Katsuki if he let her. “We’re family now, aren’t we?”

“Uh.” Izuku went red and still in Mom’s arms, entirely looking the part of tiny prey.

“Oh, Izuku, you’re here!” Auntie Inko’s voice sounded down the hall of the house, echoing against high fashion sculptures and black and white photography on clean walls. Then she appeared around the corner, the picture of short, soft Omega motherhood in a cozy cardigan and modest skirt and slippers. Her look of muddled worry was the same as her son’s. “I’m so sorry, I was helping Masaru clean up a spill in the kitchen. Hold on, let me look at you, let me look at you!”

“Mom,” Izuku had time to say before his cheeks were squished between two hands, their identical snub noses nearly touching as Auntie hemmed and hawed her inspection.

“Oh my, my, how handsome! My boy did turn out handsome didn’t he, Mitsuki? I always thought of him as my cute little bug but every time I get to see you it’s like you’ve matured more than I could imagine of you.”

Izuku, an almost twenty-six year old fucking adult, seemed to wince a smile, but remained in place, placated his mother’s hold.

“Thanks, Mom. It’s good to see you too.”

“Oh, but you do worry me, baby!” Auntie said, sighing as she dropped her hands and frowned up at him with eyes full of emotion. Katsuki wanted to yank Izuku in and keep him, take him away from everyone’s gaze but his own. “What were you thinking, jumping on that car, saving those people? You could have hurt yourself or worse.”

Izuku flicked the quickest look to Katsuki, brief and plaintive and back to his mother. But Katsuki caught the expression and the thin, tightening strings between their bond.

“So could they,” Izuku said softly, his smile gentle.

“Yes, well, we both know you’re no Hero,” Auntie said with a huff, suddenly pulling Izuku in for a tight, unrelenting hug as she murmured, “ and that’s what their job is for. Never you. I couldn’t dare lose you, could I?”

“I-I—” Izuku hugged her back, then twisted himself from her plump arms, his cheeks bright but his eyes dark and averted, meek, and not like Katsuki’s Izuku at all. “I think anyone would have done what I did.”

“But you’re not like everyone, are you?” Auntie said with the same warmth, her fingers circling Izuku’s thick, bony wrist. “Take care of yourself, baby.”

Katsuki wanted to scream, throw his mate over his shoulder, and stalk away with him never to return. Instead he shouldered against Izuku and knocked loose the protective bubble Auntie seemed to have cast around the two of them so quickly.

“Oiy, Auntie, how’re you? Food smells good. I’m sure my mom didn’t have anything to do with it.”

“Oh, Katsuki!” Auntie fluttered her hands, instantly charmed, all heart eyes as Mom shoved in with a snarl.

“Shut your mouth or I’ll shut it for you, kid. Who raised you up into the best? Me. You should be thankful.”

Katsuki laughed and threw an arm over Izuku’s stiff shoulders.

“I’m thankful that dad made sure we didn’t collectively burn the house down and starve on any given day. How’s that sound?” While Mom fumed, Katsuki dipped a thumb beneath the back of Izuku’s shirt and skimmed his soft skin, his palm turning Izuku away from his own tutting mother. “Slippers are over there for ya, shortstack.”

They were amiably chatting and meandering into the heart of the living room when Dad’s mellow, seamless Beta scent entered the space before him. He popped in, all smiles and the same old polo shirt and jeans he wore on any given day.

“Hey buddy, you made it!” Dad pulled him into a hug, shorter than Katsuki with less build than him, but still strong and solid and exactly always his dad. “ You’re lookin’ good. Oh, and Midoriya! It’s been so long I’d never recognize you unless someone told me!”

Izuku eked out a smile and Katsuki refrained from elbowing him in the gut with a jibe at his nerves. It was alright in other situations but Izuku had been a mess for days coming up on this lunch, their bond like a precariously thin sheet of glass prepared to shatter.

“Really?” Izuku said, a little breathless, his hands firmly in his pockets. “I-I think I look the same. It’s great to meet you again.”

“No way!” Masaru slapped Izuku on the back, all buddy-buddy like in a way that make Katsuki’s eyes roll out of his head and into the atmosphere. “You grew up so cool. I can’t say I ever saw this coming, but Katsuki was so despondent when you moved, I guess it all makes sense now. Some things are just meant to be, you know? I’m so happy Katsuki found someone like you.”

“Holy fuck,” Katsuki wheezed, making a beeline for the bathroom. “I’ll back back, gotta puke.”

Unfortunately for him, the bathroom was directly opposite the kitchen and his heightened hearing could catch every damn word.

“Someone like me. . .” Izuku murmured.

“Someone healthy for him,” Dad said, and Katsuki sighed and thudded his head against the bathroom door, eyes closed, listening quietly where no one could watch or judge. “He hardly ever comes around, but I follow my boy in the news. And you. You’re good people and you’ve made him better. Thank you for that.”

“There’s nothing you need to thank me for.”

“I doubt that. It’s just, you know, old dad and mom can only do so much, especially for someone as. . .determined as Katsuki.”

Izuku snorted a short laugh, obviously more at ease when talking shit about his mate. Katsuki grinned to himself.

“He certainly is that.”

“And yet—” Dad paused, hesitant and careful as ever. Between him and Izuku, it was amazing they could hold a decent conversation. “Forgive me, but you two are mated, right? I-I mean I know it, I can smell it, I just—it seems so impossible. For him. For Katsuki to do. That sounds awful, I know—”

“No no,” Izuku said with a quiver of laughter in his voice, “I get it. He’s—he’s a lot. But he’s also learned a lot. He’s fast like that. And I think. . .I think he’s realized that it’s okay to change for a person, if it’s for the best for themselves too. I learned that from him at the same time. I think I had to accept it even more than him. That it’s safe, with the right person, to let them change you in a healthy way. I think we’re equally thankful for each other these days.”

Katsuki’s ears burned and he groaned, his guts squirming with the love and the words and all of it being too much but exactly what he needed. He turned and leaned against the door, arms folded with a huff as he listened to his father huff a laugh of wonder.

“Gosh. You’re exactly what he has needed all this time.”

“It’s the same for me. I promise. The work he’s put in isn’t something anyone should have to ask of him. Heck, I warned him off of me so many times, but he was so sure—he was sure enough for the both of us for a long time. And now I’m finally there with him.”

“KATSUKI!” Mom hollered throughout the big, echoing house. “HELP YOUR MOTHER WITH THE FUCKING TABLE, YOU LAZY SON OF MINE.”

“I’M TAKING A SHIT,” Katsuki screamed from behind the door.

“Well,” Dad said from the kitchen, through their voices neared as they seemed to enter the corridor, “it sounds like those two are at it again. Let’s go save the day, shall we, Midoriya?’

“Oh, uh, um—please, uh, call me Izuku?”

“Then—then can call me Dad! Or-or Masaru, if you’re more comfortable with that, or, um—”

“O-oh! That’s—oh, no, th-that’s fine. Dad. . .Dad.”

“Alright,” Katuski said, bursting into the corridor and glad to interrupt the weird, moon-eyed look the two of them were giving each other in the hall. “Can we eat already? Ain’t that what we’re here for?”

“Ew, did you even wash your hands?” Izuku asked, wrinkling his nose.

“Y-you!” Katsuki sputtered, and by the cheeky smile from Izuku, he realized he’d been caught spying all along. Damn bond. “You little fucker, get over here—”

“NO FIGHTING IN THE HOUSE OR SO HELP ME, I’LL JOIN,” Mom bellowed from the dining room.

“Well,” Dad said with a smile, utterly unaffected and cheerful as anything. “Let’s eat!”

 

 

“So,” Mom said in the way that would forever make Katsuki’s blood run cold, “you read books all day.”

“Mom,” Katsuki snapped, low and menacing.

But Izuku only breathed a soft, slightly anxious laugh and paused to drink from his glass of wine.

“On a slow day, maybe,” he said, shrugging. “But since I’m the only full-time employee and the shop is basically my first born child, I spend a lot of my time keeping it clean and detailed and orderly. And, as one of the last small independent bookshops in the city that remains in good business, I take that as a challenge to keep a wide selection of books, both the modern, popular titles and lesser known works.”

As Izuku fell into the cadence of his own rambles, his shoulders relaxed and his pensive smiles came easier, his hands beginning to move as he spoke.

“On Mondays and Wednesday I hold children’s story time. It’s as much for the kids as for the stay-at-home moms, to give them somewhere to go and socialize together. I also have regular customers who order in for manga and magazine releases. I have the monthly window displays to place and design, and the morning rush from being near the train and—” Izuku went red and Katsuki wanted to touch him in a way that wasn’t so obvious, that wouldn’t attract so much attention or teasing. He wanted Izuku for himself, always, every day. “Sorry. I just, I get—I get a little carried away about it.”

“Why sorry?” Mom said, matter of fact, her gaze honed in on Izuku’s weakness like a wolf. “It’s good to be passionate about something. Gives fire to the blood. Never apologize about what you love.”

“O-oh.” Izuku’s exhaled in a rush and their congested bond began to clear and air out. He smiled, open and handsome and himself. “Thanks, thank you. I just. It’s a really fun place to work. It’s not all quiet, not all the time. And I’m in charge of who I hire, so I’m around the people I love all the time.”

“Who works for you?” Dad asked.

“Oh, well, heh.” Izuku met Katsuki’s gaze, who only rolled his eyes because Izuku was on his own with this one. “This one guy, he’s kind of like, sort of like my brother, I guess? And—”

“Oh, Izuku, don’t tell me you’re talking about that Chisaki Kai,” Auntie Inko cut in with words dripping in worry and disdain. “He’s a frightening man! Why, every time I Google him—”

“Then maybe don’t Google him” Izuku started behind a toothy smile that was much more Katsuki’s Izuku than the meek one his mother seemed to mainly bring out.

“Every time I Google him he’s being accused of some kind of nefarious crimes or for boycotting good, decent Hero agencies or, or —”

“He’s got fire in the blood,” Katsuki said, keeping his eyes to the plate as he resolutely spooned  his curry. “Ain’t nothin’ to get worried about, Auntie. He loves this kid like a son.”

Izuku made a sound of annoyance.

“Brother—”

“That’s not what he said.”

“Kai is —”

“What?” Mom said, looking genuinely off guard for once. “You’re friends with this Chisaki guy too? You?”

“Like hell I am,” Katsuki snapped a little too defensively. “But he's around a lot and he ain’t caused me much trouble that I couldn’t handle. And anyway, him watching the store is the only way I can get this workaholic idiot to go on a damn date with me.”

“You’re mated and still just dating?” Mom asked, scoffing a laugh as she exchange a looking with a shocked Auntie Inko. “I knew you were slow, kid, but not this bad. Izuku, how are you managing him? Why haven’t you two moved in together? You’re mates, aren't you? You’re True Mates, aren’t you? Everything I know I gotta hear from gossip rags, so I don’t know how legitimate my information is in the first place. No thanks to this shitty son of mine.”

Katsuki was actually going to roll his eyes out of the universe and discover new life. He kept his ridiculous mother plenty updated and not through the fucking tabloids. She knew just how to wind him up.

“The less you know the better, you nosy old hag! I ain’t even gotta tell you where we move at this rate. You’ll show up uninvited every other day or learn to pick locks.”

“Don’t kid yourself,” Mom drawled with a toothy sneer. “You’re not that interesting. I have a life outside of you, y’know. But your mother should know where you live, for fuck’s sake!”

Izuku’s hand rested warmly atop Katsuki’s beneath the table, their bond soothing and, if Katsuki wasn’t mistaken, more than a little pleased to see Katsuki harassed.

“Once we figure that out, I promise you’ll be invited to the housewarming.”

“And that kid?” Mom said, obviously on a roll now with interrogation mode. Thank fuck she never chose to join the authorities of any kind. “The Omega Killer kid you saved. What about him? Katsuki says you’re keepin’ him.”

“Keep—I, no!” Izuku’s flailing hand nicked the spoon in his curry and nearly sent it flying, but he caught it and fumbled it back to his plate as he spoke. “No, I mean, no, not—not legally. With his parents gone, he’s under the legal care of his aunt, but I’m funding his school and board here in the city so he can properly socialize and spread his wings into, I don’t know, hopefully a better life.”

“We’re keepin’ him,” Katsuki said pointedly.

“He’ll be living with us when he’s not at school,” Izuku quickly corrected, as if he was too scared to just claim ownership of the kid he’d laid down his life for and vice versa.

“Kouta will be eighteen in less than three years, anyway,” Katsuki said with a shrug. “What’s he gonna do, head back home every time school is on break? S’easier for him to stay with us.”

“That’s why it’s taking so long to find a place. I want something Kouta will be comfortable in too.”

“Is that why it’s taking so long?” Katsuki asked, sliding a grumpy looking Izuku’s way. “I thought it was because you been stickin’ your nose up at rich people houses.”

“You know that’s not—I mean, well.” Izuku smiled at the rest of the table as if in apology. Seeing him interact with people that weren’t his pack and friend group was hitting home just how decisive and confident and happy Izuku was when he didn’t feel like he had to apologize for his life decisions. “I just want something that feels like a home. I know that’s hard to do in the city sometimes, but I don’t want to live in a high tower.”

Not anymore. Not in his heart or in life.

“Well,” Mom said, seemingly mollified as her smile softened. “You’ll have to bring him over for dinner too one day.”

Katsuki snorted.

“Like hell.”

“Katsuki!” Izuku shot him a look, then a gentler one to his parents. He was good with parents once he pulled the stick out of his ass, Katsuki would give him that. “Of course we will. I’m sure he’d be happy to meet you.”

“Happy to terrorize you, more like,” Katsuki muttered, pushing his food around the plate. Kouta was a spitfire. Somewhere on the spectrum between Katsuki and Izuku in terms of smarts and sass.

“He only terrorizes you because you do it to him,” Izuku said, smiling plainly now.

“He’s a mean little smart-ass!”

“So are you.”

“So are you.”

“Am not.”

“Are too, dammit!”

“Okay,” Masaru said with an easy laugh. “Now I’m really seeing it. You two, I mean.”

“You’ve hardly changed at all,” Auntie Inko said warmly. And for once, to Katsuki anyway, she seemed to look at her son with complete acceptance.

 

 

“Your ma’s pretty weird with you,” Katsuki said as they stood shoulder to shoulder at the sink. He washed, Izuku dried. The lowering sun glared through the west-facing window, cutting tangerine across Izuku’s downturned face. Izuku pouted in thought as he gently toweled a bowl.

“Weird?”

“She’s all creepily protective, like you can’t do shit for yourself,” Katsuki mumbled, not wanting prying ears to listen in, although maybe that would be okay too, “but when you do stand up for yourself and act big, she don’t like that either. Pisses me off. You ain’t weak. At all.”

Izuku hummed without giving any agreement, which pissed Katsuki off, but he was growing to learn that Izuku and his mom did not have what Katsuki had with his own. They didn’t push at each other or jibe. They didn’t dare each other to be better or slam the other when they didn’t amount to what they could be.

The Midoriyas had an overwhelming way of loving each other. Like aggressively bubble-wrapping the person you cared about in so many protective layers until you couldn’t see who they were anymore. At least, from Auntie Inko’s end. Izuku seemed resigned to this weird, slow death that Katsuki had no life experience with.

“I used to be,” Izuku said simply.

“So? People change.”

“She’s just protective of me.” Izuku gently placed a bowl on the dried stack and took the next from Katsuki. Their hands brushed and their bond fluttered. “Because of my. . . condition.”

“Oh, come on,” Katsuki said, too loud probably, and he didn’t fucking care. “You’re not diseased, for fuck’s sake. You don’t have leprosy.”

“Leprosy is actually extremely curable,” Izuku said cheerfully, giving him a winning smile that was obviously meant to distract. Katsuki wasn’t stupid. “Thanks to modern medicine—”

“Shut up,” Katsuki said, biting back his own amusement. “All I’m sayin’ is she shouldn’t talk to you like your twelve. I don’t like it.”

Izuku set aside the bowl and paused with a sigh, bunching the towel between his fingers as he spoke.

“I’m not thrilled with it, either, but I keep my distance. Being around her too much isn’t healthy for me and it took a long time to realize that I was doing myself a disservice by sticking around and causing us both stress. We’re a better relationship when we’re apart, I think. We love each other better when we’re not affecting each other day to day.”

Katsuki frowned at his arms buried in bubbles. Him and his mom weren’t all that great at being around each other a lot, either. Never had been.

“I hear that. Not the same but, y’know, same. I guess.”

“Right,” Izuku said, nodding absently. His profile did things to Katsuki’s stomach. The strength in his jaw, the long curve of his dark lashes. When Izuku looked up with Katsuki with a smile, it startled him out of the reverie. “You know, I used to think you were an insensitive asshole.”

Katsuki scoffed and shouldered at his mate.

“Like I care.”

Izuku laughed and shouldered him back, harder.

“Now I just think you’re an asshole.”

“Oiy.” Katsuki reached out with a soapy hand and gripped Izuku’s chin in a slippery hold, both of them grinning in each other’s faces like idiots. “Who’s an asshole? You love me. Everybody loves me.”

“Everybody?” Izuku said, turning toward him and leaning fully into his grip, shards of electric sun haloing around him. “Me most, I think.”

“You think?” Katsuki breathed a laugh as closed in. “Fuck. Commit already.”

“Alright alright,” Izuku said, the dimple in his right cheek out in full dizzying force, “ yes. The very most.”

Katsuki smiled in return, squeezing Izuku’s cheeks between his fingers and squarely kissing Izuku’s silly smooshy fish mouth.

“Damn right.”

 

 

“Don’t push me, woman,” Katsuki snapped, tripping forward at his mother’s insistent shoves while Izuku followed with a boyish giggle. “Did you finally dig my grave, is that it? Did you go the full six feet down, because—”

Katsuki stepped into the back garden and saw the green nylon tent first. Twilight stained the sky in a watercolor blush of pink into gold, settling into the soothing deep blue of night. And, settled beside their very old, established sakura tree in delicate bloom, was the tent, the door unzipped in welcome.

“What?” Katsuki frowned, looking to his mom on one side, then to Auntie Inko on the other. Izuku was already rolling off his socks and padding into the grass, body language cautious and curious, like a skittish deer. “What is this? Why?”

“You don’t remember?” Mom asked, grinning like a goddamn know-it-all as he cocked her head to him. “Didn’t I let you have the photo?”

Recognition suffused through him like a warm, soft wash, like that first relieving sink into a full bath. The photo of he and Izuku in the children’s tent of the same color, passed out and sleeping together, a secret moment in time of two souls who had already unintentionally imprinted upon each other for life. Katsuki didn’t hold the memory itself in his heart, but the photo was one he kept stuck to his fridge all the same.

Wonder must have crossed Katsuki’s face, because his mother smiled a little wider, a little softer.

“See,” she said, elbowing his ribs, “I’m not a total witch.”

“No,” Katsuki murmured, distant to even his own ears as he stepped into the grass, his socks immediately soaking through with the cool, damp evening dew. Sakura blossoms fluttered over the tent like pastel confectioners confetti, sweet sugar petals crowning Izuku’s curls as he’d dropped to his knees before the tent to peek inside. “Hey.”

Izuku looked over his shoulder, already beaming, his cheeks rosy and his eyes greener than the grass.

“Kacchan, did you see! It’s like the pictures, look!”

“Get your ass in there and I will,” Katsuki said warmly, unable to do anything but smile back in the wake of Izuku’s joy.

Past the tentative smiles and cautious decisions, then past the caustic hurt and whip quick intelligence, then further past the deep, lifelong aches and bruises, was the Midoriya Izuku that Katsuki loved the very most. The excitable one, the childishly exuberant and hopeful one, the one who smiled with his whole face without the worry that someone would come and slap it off.

Katsuki was seeing more and more of that man nowadays, but if he could just be with that forever and a day, it would be enough.

Was forever too much to ask? Katsuki had never been a man to respect limits.

“Look, look!” Izuku fumbled into the tent, crawling over piles of blankets and pillows, all of them mismatched ones that Katsuki recognized as cushions, blankets, and pillows from around his own house. But Izuku was gesturing toward the very same spherical, rotating night light that shone stars across every wall of the tent.

The sun hadn’t yet fully set, so their glimmer was faint, but once night settled, they would fill the tent with the comforting night sky of their childhood.

“Isn’t it wonderful?” Izuku asked, breathless and glowing, sitting amid the luxurious, helter skelter nest, looking so young, smelling like morning dew and blossoms and beginnings.

“Yeah,” Katsuki croaked, adjusting his bulkier body in the tent, imitating Izuku’s crisscrossed legs, their knees touching. “Who knew the old bat had it in her?”

“I don’t know,” Izuku said, smiling one of those secret Omega smiles that knew more than he ever could. “I think you two have a lot in common.”

“You’re insulting me?” Katsuki replied, grinning like an idiot. “In my own home? You got some balls, shortstack.”

“Oh hush,” Izuku said, and now neither of them could seem to stop smiling and subtle stars swirled above their heads and across their cheeks. “Both of you just prefer to show your love through doing rather than saying.”

“And you wanna talk about every damn thing once you get going.”

“Yes,” Izuku replied unapologetically. Katsuki had always appreciated this about him. Right from the start and up to now. For better or worse, Izuku would make himself known on no uncertain terms, and the longer they knew each other, the more confident he grew with that. Katsuki wouldn’t change it for the world.

Katsuki opened his mouth to speak, but hesitated. Watched the way the wind from the open panel door ruffled at his hair, dislodging sakura that fluttered to the blanketed floor. Looked to where Izuku had taken one of Katsuki’s hands to brush his fingertips against Katsuki’s own calloused ones, as if Izuku were feeling the outlines of him. Noticed that Izuku’s nails had grown out clean and strong and healthy, no longer bitten and bloody stubs of anxiety. Met Izuku’s eyes and catalogued the way the green sunk into that deep lake teal as the sun continued to drop and blanket in blue shadow.

Would forever and a day ever be enough?

“Kacchan?” Izuku said quietly, ducking his head with a questioning smile.

A sudden urgency gripped Katsuki by the heart, yanking him forward as he took Izuku’s hands in his own and shakily exhaled.

“Izuku, would you—”

“Oiy,” Mom dropped to a crouch in front of the tent opening and Katsuki actually fucking startled with a short scream of shock, clutching at his chest like a wilting goddamn flower.

“Holy fuck, Mom, what the fuck!” Katsuki cut an unamused look to his mate, who has promptly toppled into the pillows in full belly laughs at his reaction. “You shut up too! Fuck. Both of you were born to age me. What the hell d’you want?”

“We brought food!” Auntie Inko said, peeking into the tent with a bright smile and offering out a tall stack of bento boxes neatly tied in a pink silk scarf. Katsuki gave it a quick, suspicious stare, but took it with a nod and subdued thanks. “We both thought how lovely it would be for you two to camp out for the night like a little vacation. Neither of you ever rest, so why not make a date night of it?”

Izuku sat up then and propped his chin upon Katsuki’s shoulder, their cheeks brushing.

“Mama,” Izuku said with humor in his voice. “You know I can’t have a baby right? If you two are looking for a grandchild, we have a toddler-sized cat and a very angry teenager on offer. That’s the entire package.”

“Oh, don’t be silly!” Auntie Inko said, blushing to the ears in the same way as Izuku. “We never see you two, me especially, and we simply wanted you to have some time to be together and for us to enjoy your company in the process. We won’t butt into your evening, promise!”

“Until you come inside to use the bathroom,” Mom said. “Then it’s a free for all if I get either of you in my clutches.”

“I’d rather shit in a bush,” Katsuki deadpanned.

“Kacchan!”

“Well then,” Auntie Inko said, glossing over them entirely. “We’ll leave you to it.”

“Kinda feels full circle, doesn’t it,” Izuku murmured after their mothers had left and zipped the door behind them. He flopped back into the pillows with a sigh, staring at the floating stars in a canopy above their heads. “I wish I could remember more from then.”

“S’not a big deal,” Katsuki said, even though he agreed with the sentiment. “Now is a thousand times better anyway. I’m rich and famous and you’re, y’know, mates with someone rich and famous.”

Katsuki was already grinning, knowing the pillow to his face was coming before it impacted. He let Izuku get the first hit in. He dodged the second and tackled his protesting, giggling mate into the nest, hands roaming and skimming beneath Izuku’s t-shirt, palming the length of a thick, fuzzy thigh to sneak up the hem of his shorts.

Izuku gasped and arched away with a strangled laugh, his smile bright and cheeks pink.

“No—tickles!”

“Good,” Katsuki said with relish, digging his fingers in for a more aggressive tickle and laughing when Izuku screamed and flailed.

They forgot about the food so lovingly prepared by their parents. Izuku squirmed and writhed from Katsuki’s unrelenting tickle onslaught, and soon they were rolling in the small confines of the tent, the reflective stars slowly spinning around their heads and warmly across Izuku’s cheeks.

The air smelled fragrant with evening, a deep, cool grass scent that clung to their skin. Izuku squeezed his monster thighs around Katsuki’s weight, shaking with laughter as he ineffectually tried to throw him aside with legs alone, happy tears clinging to his lashes as Katsuki hollered with Alpha victory and pinned his Omega’s wrists above his head.

“It’s not fair!” Izuku cried, playfully attempting to wiggle his body out from underneath Katsuki’s. Even with the soothing blue night dipping and pooling around their tight, his face seemed aglow to Katsuki; kindled with life and golden-light stars. “You Alphas just push your weight around like always.”

“I’m not any other Alpha,” Katsuki rasped, his voice hoarse for some reason as he snuffled into the crook of Izuku’s neck and inhaled the sweet morning mist and dew scent of his eternal summer mate. How had he lived a lifetime without this cooling, calming fragrance? How had he slept soundly at night without knowledge of this sturdy, livewire weight under or around him? “And you’re no one’s Omega.”

“Not even yours?” Izuku asked with mischief clear on his face.

That was a dangerous question. Luckily, Katsuki had never been afraid of much of anything, except maybe losing this. Now, there was no question.

“I meant,” Katsuki said, pressing his lips to Izuku’s ear and relishing the delicious shiver beneath him, “that you’re not like anyone’s idea of an Omega. Even my idea of an Omega. But yeah, you’re mine. How many times I gotta say it? I been sayin’ it since we met.”

“It was—” Izuku hummed, his wrists twisting in Katsuki’s loosening hold. “It was less than appropriate at the time. Jerk.”

“I just know what I know and I knew what I knew.”

“Cocky,” Izuku breathed out, turning his cheek so he could idly mouth and kiss at Katsuki’s parted lips.

“Confident,” Katsuki replied, dipping the tip of his tongue past Izuku’s soft lips, tasting his sweet water scent there as he lowered his weight more comfortably atop his mate’s.

“Brutish,” Izuku mumbled, bringing his arms loosely around Katsuki’s shoulders upon their release. He licked into Katsuki’s mouth without rush or seemingly any intent, just kissing to kiss, and while Katsuki would never have imagined himself the type, he found himself dizzy and falling into it.

“Powerful,” Katsuki murmured against Izuku’s lips as he palmed one hand down Izuku’s side to sneak beneath the leg of his shorts and knead at the muscle and fat of his thigh in earnest interest.

“Know-it-all.” Izuku gasped on the last word, swallowing it up as Katsuki’s fingers skimmed the warm, secret inner crease of his thigh. The shorts were too taut, though, and Katsuki growled as his hand was thwarted, bringing a frustrated laugh-moan from Izuku’s mouth to Katsuki’s.

“Genius,” Katsuki said, biting back a laugh as their bond trembled bright with giggles and playful pleasure. He leaned his weight to the side of Izuku a little, slotting a thigh between Izuku’s spread ones and skimming his same busy hand up Izuku’s belly, over the soft fuzz of his hard, chiseled stomach, and further up his shirt to rest over his quick rabbit heart.

Innocent starlight projected across the tent walls, now soaked a dark, deep green with the outside nightfall. Like a carousel, they idly danced over Izuku’s face, dipping in the dimple of his cheek and sparking light in his eyes. Everything in this moment felt eternal, felt like doors opening to another door and another, the architecture of their lives outstretching into forever.

“Hey,” Katsuki said, his voice hoarse.

“Hey back,” Izuku replied, smiling and sleepy and soft, surrounded in his nest of pillows and stars and spring nights.

“Marry me,” Katsuki whispered.

Izuku blinked, the shock spiking through their bond before he beamed, all brightly jeweled gold crowning their gilded connection.

“Are you asking?”

Katsuki grinned and leaned in further, his hand still firmly set beneath Izuku’s shirt, atop his heart.

“No.”

“Ah,” Izuku said softly, smiling as he hooked an arm around Katsuki’s neck and pulled him to touch foreheads. “That’s my Alpha.”

Notes:

Edit 19 July ‘21: No, this hasn’t been abandoned and this is not the end, my lovey concerned readers and friends. I just need a break for mental health reasons. I’ll be back to my regular monthly schedule shortly 💛💛💛

Chapter 46

Notes:

I am back! I've written 275,000 words to this story and I still don't know how to express what it does for my heart and soul that so many of you enjoy this piece. That some of you might have empathized with parts, healed from some, learned from others. Hell, maybe this isn't your bag at all most of the time but you're enjoying the story in some other way. I can't express my thanks. For your comments, your support. I say it every chapter, but as there has been a big gap between this chapter and the last due to some severe personal issues revolving around my managed PTSD & depression. . .just know that I see your comments and I treasure them. I wake up to them and I go to sleep to them and I hold them close to my heart. Thank you for reading. Here's to half a million Hits.

Songs For This Chapter:
Left After - BROODS | Spotify | YouTube
STUD - Troye Sivan | Spotify | YouTube
COMING HOME - Honne | Spotify | YouTube

“If you think,” Izuku slurred, leaning against Hitoshi for balance as he waved half a can of beer in the general direction of Katsuki and his lounging pack, “for one second—”

He paused and narrowed his eyes at a snickering Denki, then back to his grinning mate.

“That I was tempted, I assure you that I was not.”

“Yeah, okay,” Katsuki mocked with the demeanor of a fifteen year old hooligan. “Sounds like a lie, but you keep tellin’ yourself that, shortstack.”

“I punched you in the face!” Izuku hollered from across the low table, sweeping his arm as he did and nearly missing the clutter of bottleneck beers and half-empty cans that littered the space. “Asshole!”

“Didn’t say you don’t got a backwards-ass way of showin’ you’re into someone,” Katsuki replied, entirely unruffled and totally fucking delighted, much to Izuku’s dismay.

“You’re impossible,” Izuku grumbled as he promptly stood and swayed, hands on his hips as he lorded over his Alpha. “I don’t know why I bother.”

“That’s the best attitude to take with him, really,” Hitoshi said, all smiles and relaxation.

“You’re right.” Izuku pointed at him like it was an accusation. Hitoshi raised an eyebrow.

“I’m always right.”

“Well.” Izuku sniffed derisively and eyed Katsuki, who continued to grin like an absolute ingrate. “I’m going to get more beer.”

“You do that, freckles,” Katsuki said, his voice all gravel with a slightly drunken drawl. It shouldn’t have been attractive. Izuku was being indignant here,

The conversation began anew, a great uproar of overlapping music and voices as Izuku picked past a full floor and set of couches packed with Kirishima and Mina, Hitoshi and Todoroki, Denki and Jirou and Sero. This would be the last get-together they’d be having at Katsuki’s apartment before they moved out and onto greener pastures.

Izuku was practically vibrating out of his skin for the move. Everyone had insisted they not use a moving company, but that their big band of Heroes do the work. Even Chisaki would be coming—no doubt to loudly delegate the work rather than do any.

“I don’t know what I was expecting,” Izuku mumbled as he entered the kitchen to the sight of Chisaki sat on the counter, knees spread to fit Inasa’s hulking body as they shoved tongues down each other’s throats, “but it wasn’t this. Not this. Nice, though.”

Nothing could have shocked Izuku’s numbed reaction time more than the low thunder of a growl rumbling from Inasa’s giant barrel chest as he broke the kiss only to wrap his arms clear around Chisaki’s head and shoulders, effectively shielding him from Izuku’s view.

“Fuck off with that,” Chisaki’s muffed voice came from the inner sanctum of the Alpha’s embrace. “I said fuck off!”

A pristine white sneaker kicked and stomped at Inasa’s thigh as a struggle ensued, which ended in Inasa whimpering pathetically as Chisaki stuck one leg out, foot against Inasa’s stomach to keep him at bay as the Beta fixed his frazzled hair and shot a gold glare Izuku’s way.

“Sorry,” Chisaki said. “Alpha’s are fucking idiots.”

“And yet,” Izuku gestured vaguely at himself and then Chisaki.

“Shut up,” Chisaki snapped.

Izuku raised both hands and promptly turned to evacuate the kitchen. The beer was not worth it. He’d have a lifetime to jab at Chisaki over this. The last time Izuku had ever seen him in a relationship was, well, Hitoshi, and that was a mess Izuku never hoped to see repeated again.

There was something kind of nice about not knowing what was going on in Chisaki’s daily life except in freeze frames like these. It meant they were living individual lives instead of out of each other’s pockets. It meant that Chisaki was accepting more into his world, just as Izuku had been.

With a goofy, lopsided smile on his face and no beer to offer, Izuku walked back to the living room and lofted over the couch to sit in a free space beside Jirou. Katsuki glanced over, nostrils flaring in the way Izuku had begun to notice they always did when he was around, then scooted over to lean his back against the couch, his shoulder a small point of contact to Izuku’s knee.

Their bond was wobbly and unsteady with the alcohol between them, like ripples spreading out from water, but still warm and bubbly and something Izuku was still growing used to. Izuku had been receiving mail to the Parchment’s address from scientists worldwide, looking for confirmation of their True Mate bond. Demanding proof, requesting rests, offering exorbitant amounts of money to study their connection.

Izuku hadn’t given it much thought. While it was something utterly transcendent every single day, it was also theirs. Neither of them had lived a fairy tale and just because they were together didn’t mean that the world would suddenly get easier--but they had this. They had this happy ending and maybe Izuku didn’t want the entire world to know how it worked.

“What was the last time we were all together?” Mina asked. “All of us like this, I mean.”

“Funeral,” Todoroki said.

“Gala,” Hitoshi said pointedly, giving Todoroki a look.

“Never,” Katsuki said. “Not all of us. Chisaki and Izuku and that. Hell, the fuckin’ golden retriever too, most of the time.”

“Hey,” Denki said, smiling. “Remember when you and Inasa and Todoroki failed your hero license exam and we all passed. That was hilarious.”

“SHUT THE FUCK UP, DO YOU WANNA DIE, HAH—”

“Wait.” Izuku sputtered a laugh. “You—you failed your hero—”

“The preliminary! It was the fucking preliminary license!” Katsuki screeched, his voice boyishly cracking in the way it always did when someone had struck a chord. “And if it weren’t for all those fucking wastes of space—”

“Are you talking about the innocent bystanders you were meant to treat with the basic rules of empathy and decency,” Sero said flatly, earning a snort and an elbow to the side from Mina.

“Fuck off,” Katsuki snapped, leaning forward to swipe his warm beer from the table. Izuku had already been put under strict instruction not to let Katsuki drink more than three. After that, it was mayhem. “What do you even do with your life these days? Decorate kids' parties with your little streamers? Tape shut packing boxes for Amazon?”

“Excellent deflection,” Hitoshi said with a smirk. “Really, you’re outdoing yourself tonight, Explodey Boy.”

“Shut up!” Katsuki hollered.

“Shut up!” Hitoshi mimicked Katsuki's exact voice. Izuku had never heard him do it before and the affectation gave him the absolute creeps.

“Guess what!” Izuku chimed in, not wanting those two to escalate into more of Hitoshi’s eerie mimicry which would leave Izuku with confused dreams for life.

Katsuki whipped his head around, red eyes wide, looking boyish despite the harsh, masculine lines of his face. The drink definitely had his guard down more than usual. It was cute.

“Wait,” Katsuki said, gesturing between them with the beer. “Are we now?”

“Are you what now?” Mina asked from her spot on Kirishima's lap, her head leaned back against his hefty shoulder. Those unnerving, overwhelmingly black eyes fixed on Izuku, the gold in them still so intimidating to Izuku after months of knowing her. “What are we guessing? Are we playing a drinking game? Izuku, why didn’t you bring back more beer?”

“We brought the beer!” Inasa boomed as he appeared with two cases in each hand and a smile like a TV show host. Chisaki slunk in tow, his black mask firmly covering half his face, ungloved hands shoved in his pockets as he kept close to Inasa’s heels. “Fear not, my friends!”

“You’re just in time for a game!” Denki exclaimed, popping up to stand and take one of the cases of beer. “We’re guessing something.”

“I’m very bad at guessing games,” Inasa said.

“I’m worse,” Todoroki added soberly.

“This is why you have me,” Hitoshi said, aiming a theatrically flirtatious smile at his mate, batting eyelashes and all. Chisaki made an unpleasant, vaguely inhuman noise at the show.

“There’s no guessing game, you stupid shits,” Katsuki muttered, taking Izuku’s hand and promptly dragging him back to the floor, one heavy arm draping over Izuku’s shoulders to keep him close. “We’re getting married.”

The jostling and laughter jolted to a halt.

Izuku’s face went up in flame as he felt himself instinctively curl closer against the furnace heat of his fiance. He glanced to Katsuki’s sharp, serious profile then dared a look at his friends. His pack. Their pack. Joined together, because of the two of them. A fate Izuku could have never imagined.

“EHHH?” Denki was the first to react, baffled and grinning in turn as he looked between the two of them. “No you’re not. No way. You’re not.”

“You’re not actually, though,” Mina said, smiling wide as if they’d just told the biggest joke. “Come on.”

“Wh—” Izuku sat up straight now, pouting because he couldn’t help it and the alcohol wouldn’t let him control his face properly. “Wait, what, why! What do you mean, we’re not. We are! We’re going to get married! He’s my mate!”

“You’ve got to be fucking kidding me,” Chisaki muttered, as he swiped a can of beer from Inasa’s hand, wiped the mouth with a gloved thumb and drank.

“Guys,” Jirou said as Izuku felt Katsuki’s ire bubble and rise between them, just as he began to sit up straighter, his shoulders stiffer. “I think they’re serious. You’re serious, right?”

“Of course we’re fuckin’ serious!” Katsuki screeched, kicking out with a leg and jamming his heel into Kirishima’s thigh to interrupt his burst of laughter. “The fuck’re you all laughing about? I’m serious—this is serious!”

“You guys are married!” Izuku pointed out, waving his hands in Kirishima and Mina’s general direction. He didn’t understand why everyone was laughing.

“We’re saps,” Mina said with a smile. “Shameless ones. Sorry, I’m sorry, I can totally see you’re both serious about this. But you both realize that neither of you seem like the marrying type right?"

“That literally makes no fucking sense, horns for brains,” Katsuki snapped. “We’re fucking mated. What more is there?”

“You two do realize,” Hitoshi said slowly, his grin wide and feline, “that you’re both going to be, I don’t know, publicly demonstrative? Give vows in front of people? Be emotionally available in front of a crowd?”

“I’m emotionally available,” Izuku mumbled, slumping sideways to rest his head on Katsuki’s shoulder as he suspiciously eyed his so-called friend. “I don’t mind.”

“Tell your anxiety when you have to speak in front of a giant wedding party, darling,” Hitoshi said, smiling wider.

“Shut up,” Izuku said, frowning deeper. “You didn't get married, so you can’t talk.”

“We didn't get married because both of us would rather have food poisoning for a week then have an event centered directly around us,” Hitoshi replied and Todoroki nodded sagely and repeated, “Food poisoning.”

“I don’t give a shit about what I say in front of who,” Katsuki butted in, throwing an arm over Izuku’s shoulder and yanking him in close. “He’s gonna be mine in every way I can pull it off.”

“Stop that,” Izuku said weakly, entirely on principle, because in reality hearing that at this point in their relationship made his knees turn to warm pudding.

“So,” Sero said carefully,  watching them closely. “You two are getting married. You know that’s really not necessary, right? Marriage is getting phased out so often these days. It was only designed for the old days when Alphas and Omegas were forcefully married into families before they were bonded or compatible.”

“This,” Chisaki said crisply, despite the alcoholic flush creeping over the edge of his mask as his sharp amber gaze flicked between Izuku and Katsuki, “is going to be a media frenzy. No matter how private you try and make this, Japan—if not much of the Eastern world—is going to go ballistic. Mating is one thing. You two took that and ran with it before anyone could convince you otherwise—”

“Kai,” Izuku snapped, not wanting to go down that route now that it had seemingly been cleared between them.

“—but a wedding is money, time, and in the case of Boom Boom Boy over here—”

“I’m gonna snap your neck in your sleep one day.”

“In my sleep? Coward. Anyway, there’s nothing worse than a wedding. Except for a Hero’s wedding. And I think it’s fairly clear that no one in this room expected either of you to go for the pomp and circumstance of one.”

“Get married if you want,” Todoroki said, his tone even keel and his gaze calm. “Whatever you two want to do is your choice. I think we’re just surprised because it’s you two and you’re both disasters.”

“Todoroki!” Izuku cried, shot in the chest by the finality of his judgement. “Disasters? How could you—”

“I mean,” Sero said, “he’s not wrong.”

“Oiy!” Katsuki hollered, rising to clumsily stand. He was normally so poised, but with the beer in him and his low tolerance for it, he had to use Izuku’s shoulder to anchor himself and push off to stand.

“That’s not right,” Hitoshi drawled, eyeing Katsuki from head to toe as the Alpha lumber to his feet with a huff of fury. “Excessively unfortunate, maybe.”

“OIY! Katsuki shouted, towering over the pack, his teeth bared as he gestured wildly at them all. “Shut the fuck up you goddamn ingrates! When did we ask for your opinion, hah? Who the fuck do you think I am, HAH? I’m Bakugou fuckin’ Katsuki, I’m the goddamn Alpha Prime, I am the Ground Zero of this city, and if I want to throw a fucking three day party with my entire life savings and air it on every channel in the country and let the world know that I finally finally caught this unbearable, stubborn little shitbag, then I damn—well—WILL.”

The pack went silent, mixed looks of horror, confusion, and amusement painting the picture of them.

“So,” Denki said. “Are those gonna be your vows orrr—”

“I’LL FUCKING SKIN YOU AND TURN YOU INTO A RUG, YOU SHITHEAD!”

A minor brawl began, but Izuku sat still at stone, his skin humming with the sharp rake of possessive violence Katsuki’s speech raised in him. Like hot welts, they both burned and enticed and begged for more. Izuku swallowed hard and stared at the flexing muscle in Katsuki’s big, beefy back and shoulders as he pounced Denki to the floor and play-fought with him.

Yours, Izuku thought with such sudden vehemence that it quite literally took his breath away. I’m yours. Show them all.

Katsuki turned so abruptly that Izuku gasped. No one seemed to notice because Denki was busy scrambling away and consequently knocking over three beers across the hardwood. Multiple pack members jumped to attention, laughing and berating him in turn as they rushed for towels.

“What?” Katsuki said.

“What?” Izuku squeaked.

“Did you just say—”

“Come here.” Izuku took Katsuki by the hand and stood, tugging sharply until Katsuki blinked slow and got with the program, quickly getting to his feet and following.

“Where—”

Izuku sharply shushed him, rushing from the room and practically throwing Katsuki into the bathroom and locking the door behind. He was buzzing between the ears and pulsing between his thighs, the long-ignored Omega inside whimpering and wandering in anxious, needy circles.

Maybe Izuku even whimpered aloud.

“Come here.” Izuku dragged Katsuki in by the collar, his lips feeling hot and loose and full with arousal and alcohol. Katsuki went cross-eyed for looking too close at him and it would have been cute and unexpected if Izuku wasn’t bust smashing his forehead against Katsuki’s, their mouths brushing as he quickly whispered, “Talk to me like you were in there.”

“Wh—hah?” Katsuki swallowed hard, the sound of his throat clicking in the quiet bathroom. Izuku had him pulled in like a dog on a leash, their faces mashed together and Izuku huffed a laugh and licked the corner of Katsuki’s mouth, the line of his jaw, then nipped his ear, reveling in the gasp and shudder in reply. “Izu—”

“Talk to me,” Izuku murmured, his mouth to Katsuki’s burning ear. With their height differences, they couldn’t press up close to each other like this. Katsuki could only bow his head to Izuku and that was something Izuku would like to come back to one day. But for now— “Talk to me like you own me, Alpha.”

Izuku could feel the moment his Alpha’s body stilled. Could sense the black rise of something dark and sticky and liquid between their bond. Danger, a survival scream in Izuku’s skull sounded. Alpha!

And, overwhelmingly over it all, was the sound of his heart saying:

Yes! Alpha!

“‘Zuku. . .”

The depth of Katsuki’s voice jolted Izuku’s already racing heart as he dropped his hold on Katsuki’s shirt and took a step in retreat, his back bumping against the sink. Katsuki unfurled to his full height in seeming slow motion, like he was coming into his body, slipping in the muscle and bone of the big bad Alpha suit.

When their eyes met, it was almost like the first time. That spark, that almost painful rasp of flint to stone, flame and earth fighting for the spark, bringing on the impending forest fire.

The both of them had been burning for some time now and Izuku didn’t see an end to it. He wasn’t complaining.

“Like I own you?” Katsuki said, and god, oh god, his voice was dark. The arousal rippled through Izuku like black water, hiding all manner of hungry monsters beneath the depths. And when Katsuki reached out and cupped Izuku’s cheek in his hot palm, Izuku quivered right down to his thighs like a creature in heat.

Katsuki’s nostrils flared and those teeth bared themselves, sharp Alpha canines bright in the blaring bathroom lighting as he smiled and cocked his head.

“You’ve been mine since the first time we said goodbye. And hello again. You’re the only one who didn’t realize it.”

“Kacchan,” Izuku whispered, at a loss. So full, primed to burst by the desire that pressed against the seams of his decency. He was already dripping, hot and squirming between the thighs. “Please. Take me.”

“I don’t need to take anything,” Katsuki murmured, rough and raspy in the throat as he stepped into Izuku’s space and finally, finally placed hands on him. Palmed at Izuku’s shoulders, down the goosebumps along his arms, framed and gripped Izuku’s hips, much too far away from the thick bulge growing in Izuku’s jeans. Softly, Katsuki said, “You’ll give it to me, because it’s all mine anyway.”

Izuku dropped to his Alpha’s feet before he’d fully registered the hand nestled in his curls. His knees ached beautifully with the sudden impact, a delicious spark riding up his thighs and curling around his cock. Izuku looked up, eyes wide, lips parted to speak, but Katsuki’s unforgiving grip was already on his jaw, a calloused thumb dragging across Izuku’s lower lip to open up. Katsuki’s mouth stretched in that snarky half-grin, the point of one canine just peeking out, his eyes coal hot and bright red, the overhead lighting shining behind his hair like an unholy crown.

“First,” Katsuki began as he tested the edge of Izuku’s bottom teeth with his thumb, putting on pressure until Izuku’s mouth was wide and ready for him, “I’m gonna feed you my cock nice and slow. And you're gonna take it, because that’s what you’re here for. For my cock. Got it?”

When Izuku only blinked up at him, brains hazy and balls tightening up against his body, Katsuki gave his jaw a little shake in the taut hold he had on it.

“Oiy,” Katsuki snapped. “Nod for me, freckles. You’re gonna take my cok like my good Omega. Yes?”

Izuku nodded rapidly, groaning and shifting on his knees, trying to squeeze his thighs together as he felt the leaking begin. He closed his mouth around Katsuki’s thumb and sucked, watching Katsuki’s pale lashes flutter and his pulse quicken at the beating spot of tawny skin beneath his jaw.

“That’s what I thought,” Katsuki rasped, a decibel lower again, dropping down into Alpha tones, dangerous and meant for only Omega ears. “No, keep that pretty mouth nice a wide for me. It’s about time I reminded you who belongs to who.”

Izuku couldn’t help his reaction. He moaned, mouth wide, tongue out and flat in wait as Katsuki worked at the zip of his jeans and released the hardening length of his cock.

The weight of his Alpha’s long, fat erection slapping down on Izuku’s tongue once, twice, three times, and again drowned out any remaining thought process. There was only Alpha and his cock, Alpha and his desire, and what his Alpha desired was a show of true Omegan submission.

Feeling his face burn with pure, simple want, Izuku gazed fiercely up into his Alpha’s eyes and stretched his mouth around that powerful cock.

Even without scent or taste, the salt and tang and musk of Katsuki was familiar at the back of Izuku’s throat, making him salivate and drool over that dick as he began took no time to tease, only eased his lips further down, then back, then down further and back.

The bond between them incinerated, a red hot iron threatening to press into flesh, a desire so severe that Izuku had been battling it since he met this man. Katsuki hissed, his grip on Izuku’s jaw sliding around to grip the tangle of curls. The short, quick yank bolt hard through Izuku’s frame, dominant and demanding Izuku tilt his head back for a deeper entry of Katsuki’s big dick. Izuku choked on it once before sloppily swallowing, but there pheromones he couldn’t smell in the air must have been affecting him anyway, because his body felt obedient and slow, his throat gone lax as a few tears streaked down his burning cheeks.

“Look at you.” The solid intensity to Katsuki’s voice slugged Izuku in the gut like a sucker punch. Through the tears and the wet suction of Katsuki fucking into his mouth in a slow rhym, Izuku met that glinting garnet gaze and felt the desire between them rampage and ravage between them. Through the bond, Katsuki’s pleasure was Izuku’s and vice versa, an expanding blackhole devouring the scents of each other, the salt taste, and the slick of Izuku’s pulsing asshole, the searing snap to the air.

“Look at you,” Katsuki said again, and it was almost with wonder that he watched Izuku’s mouth stretch and lips swell as he sucked him off faster, messier, hungry for the leaking slit that salted his tongue. “My Omega. Perfect amount. Gorgeous. I’ll fucking kill a man who touches you. I already want to kill them. If you hadn’t stopped me on the street, I’d have ripped that fucker’s throat out with my teeth and used his blood to paint my fucking walls. Mine. You’re mine and I’d kill anyone.”

Izuku doesn’t recognize the sound of his own voice, the muffled choke of shock and the moan muffled by cock. Of course Katsuki’s said things similar here and there, but never so violently, with such assurance, such promise to tear the world in two to make a home for them. Izuku can only utter a guttural groan of agreement around Katsuki’s quickening thrusts and leans in, hands gripping the unrelenting muscle of Katsuki’s thighs for stability.

“D’you understand,” Katsuki asks, the weight in his tone like a fist around Izuku’s aching, desperate dick. Izuku tries to vigorously nod while his jaw aches and the drool trails down his chin, unabated as he buries his nose in the pale, prickly curls of Katsuki’s groin and uselessly inhales. “Do you understand now? What I’d do for you? What I haven’t been able to deny you since I met you?”

“Fuck,” Izuku curses, popping off that heavy Alpha cock to pant hard and lean back against his heels, the small of his back and knees smarting from his place on the floor. They look at each other, chests heaving, cheeks pink.

I don’t deserve it, is what Izuku wanted to say. I’m not worth so much, he wanted to scream. The small, pathetic pieces of him scattered from the whole of him by too many blows from too many men he has loved. Those are the pieces that want to retaliate, to rip open his wrists and show this singular, incredible man that he’s simple flesh and blood and a lifetime of failures.

It takes everything not to say it. It takes his fledgling self respect, still not exercised enough, still so easy to outrun if his doubts allow it--it’s his adolescent self-respect that keeps him from saying a damn word.

Katsuki must sense the struggle in their bond because his stare goes sharp and narrow, flaying Izuku open with terrifying ease. He held out a hand, looking entirely confident and without artifice while still clothed with his full, high erection out.

Izuku didn’t think twice. He took the offered palm and stood on unsteady legs. It wasn’t until Katsuki had spun him and pressed Izuku’s hands carefully to the large mirror over the sink that the realization settles.

“I’m gonna fuck you,” Katsuki said as he draped his hard, fit body over Izuku’s and brushed his lips to Izuku’s cheek. He didn’t look away from the mirror. Didn’t breath their eye contact, Izuku’s wide and shocked, Katsuki’s expectant and assured. “And you’re gonna watch just how you look when I claim you. Omega.”

“Oh.” A thick, syrupy wave washed over Izuku, humid and hot in his lungs, leaking down his legs as he scrabbled fingertips and nails across the counter with nothing to hold onto. He settled for sweaty palms flat on the marble, fingers flexing as he gaped blankly at his flushed reflection, absently licking his chapped, swollen lips as Katsuki took down his sweats over his ass and lets them puddle to the floor. “Oh god, I don’t—I don’t know if I can—”

“I didn’t ask,” Katsuki said, clipped and authoritative, his head bowed in the reflection, big hands busy sliding a hand up the small of Izuku’s back and pressing, urging Izuku lower and his ass higher. “Stay.”

“Kacchan,” Izuku  breathed, hushed and heady with the way Katsuki arranged his hips, then palmed down his ass cheeks. He gasped when Katsuki spread him open, thumbing at Izuku’s hot, slick hole, dipping the tip of both thumbs in to test the stretch of him. The inspection shocked through Izuku’s blood, fissures wrecking havoc through his thighs, his cock heavy and hanging between his legs and dripping to the tile. “Kacchan, what’re you—”

“Look at how you stretch for me, how you take me. Never knew it would be like this. I don’t think it can be like this for anyone else—with anyone else. You ever think how this sweet little body was made for mine? Over and over through time?”

“Please,” Izuku whined, his knuckles whitening on his counter grip. “Please just—”

“Just fucking mount me!” Izuku burst out, shocked with his own mouth even now. Katsuki grinned at Izuku in the mirror, as Izuku’s panicked gaze flicked from those fire eyes to his own flared up face. “M-mount me and mate me and—”

The depth and ferocity of Katsuki’s snarl struck Izuku’s instincts still, frozen him in place just in time to feel Katsuki stretch him open with that big, hot cock and fill him through in one long, swift thrust. Their twin, throaty moans echoed as Katsuki seated himself deep and paused, hands kneading the flesh of Izuku’s hips, up to hold onto his sturdy waist and hold him in place.

“God,” Izuku wheezed, already actually fucking shaking, shivering from being filled and nothing more. His sweaty palms fought to stay atop the counter.

“Me,” Katsuki snapped as he slid out slow and back in quick, his balls smacking the back of Izuku’s ass.

As Katsuki fucked into him with a teeth-baring fury, bruises embedded into Izuku’s bones and their purpling, swollen bond, Izuku didn’t look away. The shame couldn’t breathe beneath the weight of his Alpha's weight slamming over him, into him. Katsuki looked at him like he ever did when they fucked, like he wanted to rip past Izuku’s ribs and eat his heart, like he wanted them to be one. But this time Izuku could see himself too, see his debauched expression, the way his lips parted to reveal his wet tongue with each rabid pant, the way his mouth swelled up and his pupils flooded to dark pools.

This is me with my mate, Izuku thought, both numb and over-sensitized by the site and the knowledge. This is who I am with him.

“Yeah,” Katsuki grunted, shoving in particularly harsh and holding the spot that has Izuku wailing on his cock, thighs shaking and threatening collapse. “Mine.”

Then Katsuki took Izuku’s jaw and turned his face aside, big weight blanketing Izuku entirely as he shoved his tongue in Izuku’s mouth and kissed him soundly. He fucked Izuku right through the orgasm without stopping, unwavering in his rhythm and tongue-fucking into Izuku’s slack-jawed moans until his own release whited-out their bond like staring into golden hour light.

Izuku’s legs gave out but Katsuki all but laid on top of him, using his frame to keep them both up and against the sink. Feeling more liquid than human, Izuku made a single spent sound as Katsuki already shifted into nuzzling the back of his neck, nosing at his mate mark, snuffling and at his ear and hairline.

“S-stop,” Izuku managed around a weak laugh. “Tickles.”

Katsuki huffed through his nose like a dog and continued to inhale deep, face pressed into Izuku’s hair.

“Let me die in peace,” Izuku slurred, wincing as he shifted and Katsuki’s dick slipped from his ass and the backs of his thighs absolutely flooded. “Ugh. Okay, now I can die.”

“Shut up,” Katsuki murmured, sounding as loving as anyone else’s confession.

Eventually, though, Katsuki did part from him and let Izuku sit down on the toilet. Izuku gave him a withering look and Katsuki only grinned and held out a hand towel he’d soaked in the sink.

“You can go now,” Izuku said, trying to keep up his indignance like before, but failing when the humor and the love shimmered beneath their bond. “You did your damage so let me clean myself in peace.”

“I’ll clean you,” Katsuki said, sounding entirely reasonable about this.

Izuku, exhausted and a little tipsy both from the booze and the bout of frantic sex in the bathroom, only sighed and held the towel back out to his Alpha. And, to Izuku’s shock, Katsuki actually seemed pleased with the duty.

Alphas.

They didn’t speak of what happened or why. They were past the point of needing to. Izuku’s need had been clear and Katsuki would always step up to the plate if it came to making the world know who Izuku belonged to—including reminding Izuku.

Neither of them even attempted to look sheepish as they eventually returned to the party.

“Hi,” Hitoshi said blandly. “Yes, we still exist on the same plane of existence as you. In the same apartment, even. Within hearing distance, in fact. I’ll be sure to tell my therapist all about this.”

“Sorry,” Izuku said, grinning at Katsuki’s totally unfazed expression. “Um—”

“Don’t be sorry to this creep,” Katsuki said, eyeing Hitoshi critically. “How many times did I have to listen to you with Denki—”

“Hey,” Denki said, “We were like fifteen and that was for like two weeks!”

“Two loud fuckin’ weeks. Literally. And then Ojiro—”

“He was very shy. There’s no way we were that loud—”

“He’s right,” Todoroki said darkly, his eyes narrowed almost suspiciously on Hitoshi. “You were loud. I contemplated murder.”

“We weren’t even together!” Hitoshi shot back, looking baffled. “Not for lack of trying on my part, mind you.”

“See,” Katsuki said smugly. “Murder.”

“Why does everything have to go back to murder,” Sero muttered.

“Instinct,” Mina said. “And idiocy. We have simple brains, you know. They’re just built that way.”

“Actually,” Izuku chimed in, “that’s true. Not necessarily the simplicity, but the capacity for complex brain functions has been proved higher in the majority of Omega brains. While it’s been shown that logical problem solving, puzzles, and mazes are easier for Alphas to manage, the capacity for knowledge and the ability to focus, concentrate, and absorb subjects is higher in Omegas. Alpha brains are constantly being pumped with high octane hormones and it leads to more quickly distracted minds.”

After everyone stared at him, Katsuki looked up from his phone.

“He talks a lot after sex.”

“EUGH,” was the consensus.

“You know a lot about Omegas,” Kirishima pointed at. When Izuku only gave him a curious look, Kirishima shrugged and smile. “I mean, we know ourselves but you know a lot more. You’re real smart—”

“I’ve been saying that forever,” Katsuki interrupted sourly.

“Maybe you should write a book or something,” Kirishima continued, blissfully unphased by his best friend. “I don’t know. But, like, your story is amazing and manly and inspiring. And so are the stories of lots of male Omegas in the world. And you know books. Maybe you could write one about them. About us. I don’t know. People might listen to you because of who you are.”

Because of who he was. No one had ever listened to Izuku in his life, precisely because of who he was. He was the ultimate minority, sitting in a room with two more of his kind who had experienced their own struggles and strife in the name of succeeding despite, or because of, their gender.

But he wasn’t famous. He wasn’t important. Who would listen to him?

Chisaki must have read his expression because he sighed dramatically and gestured vaguely with a delicate hand.

“You are famous now,” he drawled. “For better or worse. There’s been a growing shift in the country toward Omegas—even more so since The Omega Killer and your achievements, both alone and beside this cinderbrain. This guy isn’t wrong—there are people who will listen to you. Who will want to listen.”

“I—” Izuku sputtered a laugh. “You guys are crazy. Thanks, though. I’ll keep reading books instead.”

“Speaking of,” Chisaki said. “Eri wants more hours at the shop after school. Don’t give them to her. She has to start thinking about university.”

“She’s barely fifteen,” Izuku said flatly. “Let her live, Dad.”

“She just wants to get paid to hang out with your brat,” Chisaki replied, making direct eye contact with the startled expression of Katsuki.

“What?” Katsuki snarled. “Why’re you lookin’ at me? I had nothin’ to do with his shitty attitude. You know he’s all Izuku.”

“Be that as it may,” Chisaki began calmly.

“Hey!” Izuku hollered.

“You don’t help,” Chisaki said.

“He doesn’t even live with us!” Katsuki cried, sounding genuinely offended by the idea that he was responsible for Kouta’s attitude, which Izuku knew was arguably the sass and independence of Izuku and the mouth of Katsuki. “He stays over on weekends, for fuck’s sake. And not even every week. If your kid’s got puppy dog eyes for mine, that’s only because mine is worth it.”

Mine is worth it.

Mine.

Izuku barely heard Chisaki and Katsuki’s bickering over how to raise two teens, one late to present gender, the other much too conscious of his own. He couldn’t help his smile or the way his heart lit up a new, unexamined place at the words of ownership Katsuki had put on Kouta.

Kouta knew about the engagement. He’d been the first person they’d told. The only person they’d told until their friends. They both agreed that their parents could be told way later so they wouldn’t butt into the plans or force them to invite relatives they hated.

And Kouta had only looked between them and said, “Well, obviously. You two are saps. I’m not surprised. Congrats.”

Of course, Kouta wasn’t their kid. Kouta didn’t particularly act like it and Izuku put in great efforts not to let his paternal instincts overwhelm and frighten the skittish, callous male Omega in ways that might make him withdraw or run. Kouta wasn’t their kid.

But god did Izuku realize over the weeks of living with him, clothing him, feeding him, and seeing him off to a good—god, did Izuku wish Kouta was. The fact that Katsuki let it slip that he might just feel similarly was a high Izuku had never experienced. There was humoring Izuku by letting Kouta live with them in their future home, and there was this.

This. Them. A family even more than they were a pack.

“You’re happy,” Chisaki said softly, sitting down beside Izuku on the couch, their bodies close and warm.

Izuku blinked from his reverie and realized the surrounding conversation had shifted. Katsuki was arguing about protein powders with Kirishima in a discussion Izuku was probably more qualified to comment on than either of them. He quickly looked to Chisaki, flashing a shy smile as he nodded.

“Yes. So are you.”

Izuku didn’t miss the way Chisaki’s gold gaze flickered to Inasa like a flame, lingering warmly as Inasa intervened into the argument and threatened to bench press anyone in the room. Chisaki’s lips may have curved from behind the black mask as his attention returned to Izuku.

“In a capacity, yes.”

That was as good as Izuku would get.

“And I’m happy you’re happy,” Izuku said, smiling wide at the narrow look of indignation he received in return.

“You’re mocking me?” Chisaki said darkly.

“Never.” Izuku grinned. “Or, well, not right now anyway. Look, I know we haven’t talked a lot recently and we’re like ships passing in the night at the shop, but—”

“Leave it,” Chisaki said, not unkind but not gentle either. “Just because I’m with him doesn’t mean I’m suddenly foaming at the mouth for a heart to heart.”

“With him, huh?” Izuku said lowly, trying to keep out of earshot from the great battle of the meatheads before him. “What exactly does that mean for you—”

“It means he’s been shadowing me since we met and I guess I’m finally used to it,” Chisaki snapped, clearly not wanting to go further than that.

Izuku couldn’t wipe the smile off his face.

“Uh huh. Okay. Well, I really am happy for you and your Alpha. Maybe they’re not so bad, huh?”

“Let’s not get fucking extravagant here,” Chisaki muttered, promptly crossing his legs in the opposite direction of Izuku and pointedly angling away to watch the show before them.

Izuku only continued to smile at the back of Chisaki’s head and revel in the warm summer aura of a new pack united.

“It’s good,” Chisaki mumbled, still faced away. He’d propped his elbow upon his knee, his sharp chin in the cup of his palm, attention fixed on their men. “All of this.”

Izuku laid a brief hand on Chisaki’s shoulder and used it for leverage to stand. That was all the two of them had ever needed.

“Shut the fuck up,” Katsuki seemed to say to no one in particular as Kirishima seemed to get into push-up position for also no apparent reason. “We been doin’ this since we were in UA.”

“I have no idea what I managed to miss in such a short time,” Izuku said, but he was already getting the gist and as the Ground Zero promptly sat on the Red Riot’s back and smacked him upside the head.

“Don’t you dare lose!” Katsuki snarled as Kirishima breathed out and adjusted his hands at shoulder width.

“Shouldn’t I be on his back?” Mina asked, standing up and giving them a berth as Inasa also took a push-up stance.

“I weigh a hundred pounds more than you,” Katsuki snapped. “What’s impressive about you?”

“Why are we friends again?” Mina muttered, but she only smiled and looked to Izuku with a wink.

“Darling!” Inasa boomed, so large and long across the floor that Sero and Denki set to dragging the couch back until the space could accommodate him. Chisaki hissed and jumped off the sofa as Inasa beamed at him from his prepared position, “Come, sit on my back!”

“Oh fuck no,” Chisaki said, flattening the nonexistent creases from his shirt.

“That’s not fair!” Mina hollered. “He weighs even less than me and you’re two times bigger than Eiji!”

“I’ll join,” Izuku chimed in, taking Chisaki by the wrist and dragging him.

“Traitor, what the fuck!” Katsuki screeched from his seat atop Kirishima’s back. He pointed an incredulous finger at Izuku’s unapologetic smile. “Don’t you dare! You should be on my back!”

“That doesn’t even make sense!” Izuku shouted back, laughing around the words as he promptly sat on Inasa’s back. It was like a rock plateau, insane. “

“I’m not taking part in this dick-measuring contest,” Chisaki bit off, hands on his hips as he loomed over the mayhem.

“I’m pretty sure Inasa would win that too,” Hitoshi said.

“True,” Todoroki said soberly. “I’ve seen every dick in this room and his is like an arm.”

“How ever do you manage, Kai?” Hitoshi asked with a feline smirk, eyes hooded as he leaned further into his mate.

“The same way I managed you, I’d think,” Chisaki snapped.

Todoroki’s growl, so rare that at first Izuku didn’t recognize to whom it belonged, built with slow, rising intensity, ominously deep and dark.

And then Izuku’s ground shifted and he toppled off the mountainous shoulders beneath him as Inasa rose up with a quickfire, bellowing snarl.

“Hey!” Chisaki yelled, lighting fast as he reached out and gripped the back of Inasa’s belt with both hands and tugged with his full, measly weight. “Stop that!”

“You stop!” Todoroki fired back, on his feet now with a surprised Hitoshi stumbling to stand and follow as Todoroki made for Chisaki.”That was years ago. I don’t appreciate the comments or insinuations, now, then, or ever.”

“Oh?” Chisaki was already sneering on automatic, utterly fearless in the face of any and all Alphas, especially the Alpha of their own pack. Chisaki had always been not only unaffected by the hormones and warning smells Izuku was sure punctured the room, but actively venomous toward anyone who dared go toe to toe with him. Izuku had met Chisaki well after he’d developed this disposition and Chisaki had never let on how he’d come to be the way he was. Izuku was sure he’d never know. “Are you so insecure that you think I’ll snatch him back?”

“What?” Todoroki looked genuinely confused, enough so that he stopped, shoulders sagging and arms hanging at his sides as he eyed the Beta. “No. I just think you’re rude.”

“The fuck?” Chisaki said, as if he’d never heard it in his life when he likely heard it several times a week. “Fine, whatever. Inasa, let’s buy more beer. This was meant to be a celebration right? Of the idiot kings.”

Fine, whatever was as close to an admission of wrongdoing as they were going to get, and Todoroki had been around long enough to know it. He only nodded and let Hitoshi throw an arm around his shoulder and jostle him playfully, pulling him out of any residual Alpha fury.

Izuku shared a brief chiding look with Chisaki.

“Yes,” Izuku said, nodding. “More drink!”

“And snacks!” Kirishima chimed in, hopping to his feet. “I’ll come with, I wanna pick!”

“Outstanding, friend!” Inasa boomed, rolling with the punches as if his rare Alpha outburst hadn’t happened. “Let’s go!”

“I’m not a dog-sitter,” Chisaki muttered without much heat as he allowed himself to be bustled toward the door by two exuberant hulks. “Don’t you two come with leashes?”

“What, for real?” Kirishima asked as they wandered to the door. “Because I could hook you up.”

“I hate this for me,” Chisaki said as they left the apartment.

“So,” Mina said as she popped up from the floor and pulled from beside the television an oversized karaoke machine she’d brought with her. “You and that anti-Hero guy, huh?”

“Literally high school,” Hitoshi replied blandly, but Izuku could see the pale flint glint in his eyes. “Shut your giant gossiping mouth, darling.”

Mina cackled.

“I didn’t realize you recognized him,” Izuku said, moving to collect empty beer cans for recycling.

“Well I wasn’t going to say it in front of him,” Mina said, which was remarkably well thought out for her, in Izuku’s opinion. “Not in a room full of Heroes. And he’s obviously your best friend—”

“I’m his best friend,” Hitoshi and Katsuki said in tandem, both visibly startling and exchanging death glares.

“So what could I say anyway?” Mina said with a laugh.

“He’s on the radar, you know,” Sero said as he and Jirou shifted the low lying table out of the room’s center.

“Radar?” Izuku frowned and accepted Denki’s grabby hands to take the cans off him, off like a flash toward the kitchen and humming a tune.

“Of notable citizens to keep an eye on, basically,” Sero said. “I mean, I won’t lie, I’m pretty sure he’s killed some dudes.”

“I. . .” Izuku flicked a look to Katsuki, who had lounged back on his couch and seemed to be lording over the room with his knees spread like a King Alpha of old times. Jackass. “Couldn’t say.”

“Mean Green over here’s got secrets,” Mina said with a lascivious air of someone thirsty and not for water. “Look at you. I mean, I got the idea, but it’s wild to think of Mr Goody Two Shoes over here so into you. Or it makes total sense. You’re his walk on the wild side.”

“I’m not challenge to be achieved,” Izuku fired back. He knew by now through dealing with Katsuki that most Alphas had the inherent drive to conquer and claim, and that Izuku’s gender and general personality seemed to alert that nature in the Alphas around him, but he was still his own entity, his own person, bonded or not. Engaged or not.

The scene in the bathroom was only one part of Izuku—his own instincts, long cocooned and tucked away, now unfurling bright and bold in both Omega and Alpha inclinations. What excited Izuku the Omega to hear in the bathroom was still the same Izuku the Alpha who refused to relent his life to the predatory nature of another Alpha.

“Alright,” Mina agreed easily,  holding up acid pink hands in a show of peace. “I’m sorry if that came out offensive. I’m used to Kirishima and you two are entirely different breeds. I think what I really meant is that you and Bakugou really compliment each other. I was doubtful for a long time but he’s genuinely a better person with you. More bearable too.”

“Oiy!” Katsuki looked up from his phone, still splayed out and lazy on the couch. Izuku could feel the deep blue drag of their bond, Katsuki’s exhaustion settling in with the late hour, a man who preferred a bedtime early enough to rival a grandpa. “Everyone loves me.”

“You’re annoying,” Todoroki said easily, busy peeling the label off his sweating beer.

“You’re annoying,” Katsuki shot back.

“Oh my god,” Sero muttered. “Can we all just agree that no one in this room has the ideal personality for presidency?”

“That’s not exactly the best bar,” Hitoshi said.

“Midoriya could be president,” Jirou said.

“There’s never been an Omega president.” Izuku smiled warmly at Jirou. “But thank you.”

“I’d be a good president,” Sero said.”

Katsuki snorted, still scrolling his phone with heavy eyelids.

“You’ve got a smile that terrifies children and look like a scarecrow brought to life. Dream on.”

“Oh,” Sero shot back, mouth curved in genuine amusement. “And the people of Japan would vote for a walking grenade with anger management problems? You’re already a PR nightmare.”

“WHO’S GOT ANGER MANAGEMENT PROBLEMS?” Katsuki leapt from the couch and hurled himself at a cackling Sero.

War was waged from that point on. Jirou and Denki worked to pull Katsuki off of Sero, which led to Jirou rolling Katsuki into a headlock while Hitoshi mildly pulled out his phone and filmed the entire thing. Mina howled with laughter and Todoroki looked sleepy and unbothered by the entire show.

When Chisaki walked into the foyer of the apartment with Inasa and Kirishima in tow, the scene had escalated. Sero’s tape hung from the ceiling and furniture, the kitchen table cracked down the middle, Katsuki’s hand print burnt black around the corner of a wall. The couch had been knocked back with Izuku, Todoroki, and Jirou ducked behind it like the trenches.

Mina, meanwhile, had happily cranked up the karaoke machine and had begun to sing Eye of the Tiger with Denki as backup.

“Aw man,” Kirishima said with a pout. Katsuki and Sero were nowhere to be seen, but  a crash and scream sounded in the guest bedroom. “I always miss the fun. I wanna play!”

“I love this song!” Inasa announced.

“I wish I still did drugs,” Chisaki muttered as he made a beeline for the kitchen.

“THE BOOZE HAS ARRIVED!” Mina yelled too loudly into the microphone and everyone with enhanced hearing whined and covered their ears. “Here’s to Bakugou Katsuki and Midoriya Izuku, showing up the entire world!”

Izuku felt his face burn and couldn’t help the tentative smile that ached his cheeks. Sero came dashed from the bedroom with Katsuki in tow, and like a magnet, he changed course and made for Izuku. Strong arms cinched around Izuku’s waist and lifted him with a surprise spin.

“Hear that?” Katsuki murmured as he finally stopped their dizzying spin. He was breathing hard and smiling wide, big and childish, rare and entirely himself as their noses bumped. “We’re the best thing that ever happened to this world.”

All around them people talked and bickered, shared jokes and barbs, picked up the couch and picked a new song, poured drinks and passed around snacks. Their world was a wild one and half a year ago it would have left Izuku frozen in horror, terrified of what and who could hurt them.

Now, this was home.

“Oh yeah.” Hitoshi’s voice perked Izuku’s ears. “Izuku’s a great singer. Remember our New Year’s party at the karaoke?”

“Barely,” Todoroki said as Mina said, “Not even a little.”

“I’m not singing!” Izuku said, laughing as Katsuki refused to let him go but instead chose to nuzzle his face into Izuku’s neck and inhale deeply. Exasperated and amused, Izuku placed a hand on Katsuki’s face, covering his nose with a palm as he half-turned in Katsuki’s hold and grinned at Hitoshi and the crew. “I’m not singing!”

Izuku managed to hold out a good hour and several more drinks before he morphed into the idiot Katsuki had long ago seen standing on a table, belting out a song. The damage had already been done and Izuku found himself lying across Hitoshi and Todoroki’s laps, emphatically singing up at them through the giggles.

He felt young. He felt stupid. He felt like nothing was wrong with him, and even if there was, everyone here embraced him regardless.

Celebration poured like champagne noe, congratulations and exclamations like golden fizz and heady bubbles as the party stretched deep into the night. Even Chisaki slipped his mask around his wrist in the final hours nearing sunrise, his smile sharp and quick and rare when Hitoshi threw a crippling remark his way.

Inasa and Kirishima proved to be horrific dancers, the bulk of their muscle getting in the way and no sense of rhythm to speak of, but they danced all the same and  Denki absolutely filmed it all. Jirou pulled out an acoustic from the guitar case she’d arrived with and Sero snuck in a jibe about every person who could play the guitar inevitably brought theirs to the party. He got a foot in the face for it and in the end, toward the dizzying wind-down, their mellowed conversation melted into the soft pick and strum of Jirou’s warm, idle tunes.

To absolutely no one’s surprise, Katsuki fell asleep first, splayed out on one couch like a train wreck, his hair in a wild fray, his cheeks bright with drink. Mina didn’t sleep so much as pass out on the floor, her head on Kirishima’s big thigh, where he sat and softly petted her curls.

Todoroki had at some point got up and simply left the room for the guest bed, never to return. When Izuku popped into the kitchen with some dishes and returned from the washing, he found Sero and Denki dog-piled into the bed with Todoroki too, all asleep in their clothes, long limbs flailed across each other.

Izuku watched them solemnly for a moment. They’d grown up together, side by side, and Izuku on the periphery of their lives without even really realizing it. Befriending Hitoshi had never actually felt like being friends with a Hero. They’d been kids. But these people had shaped Hitoshi, who had then shaped Izuku, and by some degree of separation, the mingled pack passing out in this apartment had always been meant for him.

Sleepy and content in his stable soul in a way he’d never begun to experience until recently, Izuku padded back to the living room where murmured conversation kept up. Inasa was asleep on the other couch, head tipped against the back of the couch, mouth partially opened as he softly snored. Chisaki kept close to his side, one leg slung over Inasa’s giant one.

“Just us night owls, huh?” Izuku half-whispered as he approached, nodding with amusement at Kirishima slumped to the floor with someone’s hoodie for a cushion. Mina had at some point shifted to use his butt as  her own pillow.

“Insomnia crew for life,” Jirou said, fingering a familiar melancholy tune on her guitar.

“It’s the mental illness that keeps us going,” Hitoshi said with mock-sobriety, his mouth curling as he tapped the side of his skull with a finger.

Izuku barked a laugh despite himself and eased onto the far end of the couch where Katsuki’s feet didn’t reach. In sleep, their bond was like still, clear water, pure and untouched.

For a moment, a pre-dawn hush fell across the group, intimate and at ease. Then:

“So.” Hitoshi seemed to subtly scoot closer to Chisaki as two pairs of eyes, cut-glass gold and unflinching pale purple, closed in on Izuku in terrifying solidarity. “Did you choose your best man?”

“And on that note,” Izuku said, standing right back up and aiming his most merciless smile at his best friends, “I think I’ll try to sleep.”

“I told you it was too soon,” Chisaki whispered harshly as Izuku made a beeline for the bedroom and held back laughter. “Are you an interrogator? What the fuck is your malfunction?”

“Wanna see the list I keep for my therapist?” Hitoshi said, his voice muffling behind the door Izuku closed behind him. “It’s on my phone.”

“I do,” Jirou chimed in.

“Prepare to be astounded,” Hitoshi said.

Izuku rolled himself up in Katsuki’s blankets and smiled himself to sleep.

 

Notes:

Four chapters left!!! We've got some good shit coming before I close this off. Thank you for sticking through, lovelies! I wish your heart and mind all the calm in the world.

Chapter 47

Summary:

“Isn’t this what we’ve always been about,” Katsuki snapped. “You and me without the rest? You’ve harped on for as long as I’ve known you that your biology doesn’t define you, define us. But now when it’s time to prove it, you’re gonna chicken out—on us?” 

Notes:

HELLO! I am indeed alive and kicking and still writing QR (how could I EVER stop, especially when I'm so close)!

Thank you, from the bottom of my heart, from the tips of my toes to the top of my head, for your comments, your feedback, your kindness, your empathy. I am so blessed to have found such an inspiring, beautiful group of readers in you all and I don't take you for granted, not for one second.

I hope you enjoy this chapter. A BIG one is coming as soon as I possibly can get it out.

Songs For This Chapter:
Hello My Old Heart - The Oh Hellos | Spotify | YouTube
Show Me Love - Tove Styrke | Spotify | YouTube
Lover - Taylor Swift | Spotify | YouTube

“How the hell were you planning on fitting that through?” Izuku asked, standing on the sidewalk in the bright summer sun, his ratty tee sticking to his back with sweat, his damp hair pushed back with a thin headband. 

“That’s what he said,” Denki said as he passed by and into the house with a stack of cardboard boxes in his arms.

“Shut up,” Izuku mumbled absently, in tandem with Katsuki. The Omega was busy eyeing the huge leg-weight set that sat on the front walk up the gutted apartment building that was now their home. He looked at the slim doorway, then back to Katsuki and his crew. 

“Did you not all graduate at the top of your class?” Izuku asked, scrunching his face up against the sun as he eyed them with a distinct lack of enthusiasm. 

Katsuki held back the urge to kick at some stones on the curb like his own mother was judging him. There really was something about an Omega who wielded an Alpha’s stare that seemed to make people want to heel for Izuku, whether he realized it or not. Especially since the weeks and months of him stepping into his confidence.

“I sure didn’t,” Kirishima said cheerfully. 

“The how wasn’t taken into consideration,” Katsuki said, hands on his hips as the reality of his situation began to set in. Him and Kirishima had carried the hulking, unwieldy thing to the doorway and, after some admirable attempts at Tetris, thudded it back to the cracked pavement and were left puzzled, sweaty, and annoyed. 

How the actual fuck were they meant to get a gym’s worth of weight sets to the top floor? Dismantle them all? Katsuki and the boys had just hauled everything from one apartment to the next and Katsuki sure as hell wasn't patient enough to take it all apart and figure out how to put it all back together upstairs. 

“Well.” Izuku dropped his hands in a white flag gesture. “I give up. Doesn’t someone here have a Quirk that could help with this?”

“You guys look like idiots,” Kouta said, shoving between Katsuki and Kirishima with a box for his bedroom, when he could have easily scooted around. He’d ditched his hat in this heat and had recently chopped and shaved the lot of his hair off into a short, spiky mohawk down the middle. “Can’t Eri’s dad just transform the thing into something more manageable?”

With that, he was in the building and dashing up the steps. His and every bedroom was on the second floor, but his was the only one Izuku was giving up full control of in favor of letting Kouta decorate and plan the space himself. 

Izuku frowned at the metal monstrosity, then up to Katsuki. 

“He’s going to be smarter than you one day,” Izuku said plainly. 

“And you!” Katsuki snapped, rubbing his sweaty brow with the back of his hand.

“Let’s not get ahead of ourselves,” Izuku teased, his eyes gone bright, glass bottle green in the sun’s direct light. “Now, where’s—”

“Ohhh no.” Katsuki jabbed a finger in the direction of Izuku’s reacting pout. “He is not helping. You already saw him. He’s got a fuckin’ clipboard of—of directions! Orders! I don’t take orders from—”

“Well, it wouldn’t be an order from him would it? It would be a request from us. And I’m sure Chisaki would be happy to help.”

Katsuki aimed a narrow look at Izuku’s stupidly reasonable demeanor.

“Who brain damaged you in life?” Katsuki whispered.

Izuku stared at him, hands on his hips.

“I’m sure it was all the drugs,” Izuku said flatly, though humor shone bright in his gaze. “Now come on, let’s find him.”

Of course they found Chisaki at the center of the moving mayhem, looking unflappably stylish and without a single bead of sweat on his goddamn brow. The guy’s black slacks were pressed without a wrinkle from the wet heat, but it did look like he’d stripped down to a plain white undershirt where he’d first arrived in some obnoxiously crisp shirt. Katsuki didn’t know what the asshole was made of, but through Chisaki alone, Katsuki was beginning to think that Betas were secretly made of some kind of strong shit. 

Or Chisaki Kai was a freak. More than likely, considering his relationship with Izuku. 

“The furniture placement is all off,” Chisaki said immediately as they entered, scowling as he made a great, flamboyant sweeping gesture along the vast living room. Either Chisaki was becoming more relaxed with present company to go full-on queen, or Inasa was encouraging the Extra in him—neither option with which Katsuki was necessarily thrilled. “Between the two of them they still have the interior decorating skills of a frat boy.”

“Bitch,” Katsuki said as he stomped over, “my apartment was cool as fuck.”

“Your apartment was decorated by me,” Mina said as she passed the doorway and loped up the stairs with a laugh. 

“Really?” Izuku asked with a considering frown at Katsuki. “It was very subdued. For her, I mean.”

“As if I let her have free reign,” Katsuki said with a derisive sniff. “Her and Kirishima did it.”

“While that’s so adorable I could just die,” Chisaki cut in, dry as dust, “you’re both dealing with huge rooms, not enough furniture, and even less rugs.”

“Rugs?” Katsuki and Izuku said at the same time, mirroring shared expressions of confusion. 

“This is worse than I thought,” Chisaki muttered. “It doesn’t matter that you gutted the building and took down the walls, built some shelving, blah blah blah. This place is going to look and feel like an echoing warehouse until you get more shit to put in it.”

“But I hate shopping,” Izuku wailed, his posture going slack in a fine imitation of Kouta. 

“And we already have furniture,” Katsuki pointed out. It was mainly his own from the apartment, paired with Izuku’s books, knick knacks, and other well loved items. Izuku surrounded himself with memories and keepsakes and Katsuki found himself warmed with the idea of having them around his house—their house. 

Chisaki drilled Katsuki with an unflinching, brittle amber stare. Apparently it was at least too hot to wear the mask, which was more unnerving than Katsuki liked to admit, because Chisaki’s sharp and, yes, pretty features so easily screamed disapproval and judgment, and that demeanor at times reminded Katsuki of his mother. 

“You’re both fucking unbearable,” Chisaki said between neat, perfect teeth. “If I—”

“Can you help me with something, Kai?” Izuku interrupted and Katsuki nearly swooned in Pavlovian reaction to the boyish, beaming smile Izuku aimed at his friend. Even knowing Izuku was putting it on didn’t hinder its effects and Katsuki mutely swallowed, refused to inhale his mate’s scent, and marched away under the assumption that Izuku would take care of the damn weight set on the street. 

“This is an awful lot of books,” Inasa said as he nearly thudded into Katsuki in the hall. Inasa carried boxes upon boxes of the damned things, so stacked that he couldn’t see in front of his damn face. “While I have never had the pleasure of visiting Izuku’s home due to the ban on Alphas—”

Katsuki made a face that absolutely was not guilt and put a hand on Inasa’s bulging arm, guiding him past the old apartment stairs and around the back of them to a gutted apartment that was now dedicated entirely to what was basically an entire fucking library.

If anyone had told him a year ago that he’d be mated, nearly married, mooning over a smart-mouthed, sassy Omega and building him a goddamn library, Katsuki would have laughed them all the way to the grave. 

“—where has he been hiding these?” Inasa finished, with Katsuki only catching the tail end of it. 

“Apparently the nerd couldn’t bear to spend All Mi—the old owner’s money he inherited on much of anything except for a storage facility where he hoarded books like the dragon. Figures.”

“That does sound very like him,” Inasa said, his voice swelling with a disgusting amount of love as he gently placed the boxes in the center of the room. 

Looking around, Katsuki had to admit that the place needed furniture. Here, for sure. He could see this being a haven for Izuku when the world got too hard. Rich, warm colors to match deep wood shelving they’d installed, floor to ceiling on two of the main walls. Cushioned seats, a desk. 

Katsuki could see himself coming home from a long day and approaching the desk where Izuku worked, no doubt on some great book that he hadn’t yet realized he was absolutely going to write one day. And just dropping to his knees to rest his head on Izuku’s lap, let those knobbly, scarred fingers rake and run through Katsuki’s hair as he let the day’s stress be petted away. 

“Bakugou,” Inasa asked, frowning as he leaned in to shove his face in Katsuki’s blank one.

“Get outta my face, meathead,” Katsuki mumbled without much heat. He placed a palm on the center of Inasa’s face and pushed him away, using Inasa’s boisterous, carrying laughter as an opening to escape. 

“Pull yourself together,” Katsuki said to himself, dragging a hand down the burning back of his neck and coming away slick with sweat. Sometimes it felt like the longer he was with Izuku, the more he realized that being Alpha wasn’t just breathing fire and exacting domination, but embracing subservience to his Omega as a part of a true mated pair. 

Or maybe this was just Izuku and his extremely special body. Maybe it was just them. Katsuki had no way of knowing and he didn’t want input from side characters. 

Katsuki stopped dead in the hall, frozen in shock with what stood in the center. 

“What the actual fuck is that,” Katsuki wheezed.

“It’s your weight set,” Shinsou said, appearing out of absolutely nowhere like the motherfucking creeper he was. The corridor was crowded, both Shinsou and Todoroki having apparently just arrived, arms labored with plastic bags of food. Denki had out his phone to snap a photo of Kirishima draping his arm over the shoulder a full blown Quirk-crafted statue of Chisaki fucking Kai, smirking and lording over everyone in the room. 

The creator himself stood in the archway to the living area, arms folded, looking excessively pleased—while Izuku, the goddamn traitor, hunched, red-faced, shoulders shaking, facing the wall like he knew Katsuki would lose his shit if he saw Izuku laughing at thing like this. 

“I—” Katsuki didn’t even know where to start with this. He fumed, running a hand over his face as he tightly muttered, “Get that monstrosity upstairs and pray that it’s changed back before I next see it or there will be so much fucking hell to pay.”

“As if you need to pump anymore iron, Alpha,” Chisaki said, pulling up beside him with arms folded across his chest, chin titled to appreciate his likeness. “All that testosterone fucks with your thought processes. Your brain is probably half eroded from hormones by now. Actually, that would make a lot of sense.”

“How the fuck you manage to talk out your ass with your lips movin’ so well?” Katsuki asked. He winced with a hiss as Kirishima and Inasa took statue Chisaki by the base and shoulders, turned him, and knocked his head on the stairs banister. 

“Watch my face!” Chisaki snapped, as if the statue was going to remain as such. 

Meanwhile, Izuku seemed to have reached his limit because he sobbed a loud laugh and pressed his face into the wall, increasing in hysterics. 

“I hate this for me,” Katsuki said, and followed Kirishima and Inasa up the steps. “Oiy, pretty boy—follow!”

“Me?” said Chisaki, Shinsou, and Todoroki in tandem. 

Katsuki looked on in mounting horror. 

“What the fuck is wrong with all of you? But I meant the damn artist over here. Come up and fix this. Now.”

Chisaki blinked with a look of complete disinterest. 

“Yeah, I don’t think so,” he drawled. “These two just brought food. I’ll do it after I eat.”

Katsuki was about to commit a murder. 

“Errr.” Izuku wrapped his arms around Katsuki’s middle, gave him a quick squeeze and released. “Why don’t you go upstairs and check on Kouta and Eri? They might need help with the room.”

“Anything to be rid of these assholes,” Katsuki managed between clenched teeth. His patience was a muscle growing more than his arms these days. Without addressing Izuku’s little Omega noise of distress at the danger rumbling in Katsuki’s voice, he took the stairs two at a time, following the sound of teenage bickering.

“You’re too short for this,” Eri said. 

“You’re too short for this!” Kouta snapped, making a choked sound of struggle.

Eri laughed and there was a shuffle, like one pushing at the other. 

“Just stand on the bed maybe? I’ll balance you while you stick the hooks.”

Katsuki leaned in the entrance, arms folded, temple pressed to the doorway, observing. 

Kouta stood on his new bed, a queen size, because Izuku insisted they had enough room and Kouta would be an adult before they knew it and Izuku wanted him to have a safe, grown space for himself. 

Eri stood behind him, her long silvery hair in space buns adorned with butterfly clips, her hands pressed to Kouta’s back to keep him balanced as he went to his toes and stuck sticky wall hooks along the edge of the ceiling. On the floor looked like miles of unraveled fairy lights. 

Omega things, Izuku had told him when Katsuki’s initial reaction was to make a face at their very presence. What fifteen year-old boy wanted shit like that in their room?

Omega things, Izuku had said, smacking the back of Katsuki’s head in the process. Cozy things, comfort things, warm and glowy and soft things. 

“You’re not like that,” Katsuki had said. 

“Of course I’m like that.” Izuku had replied wearily. He still didn’t seem to much appreciate his Omega nature even if Katsuki basked in it. His scent, his soft cheeks, his sensitivity. “My shop is warm and quiet and safe. My clothes are comfortable. I like my blankets. I like you . I’m pretty sure liking you is my biggest Omegan flaw.”

Katsuki had taken offense to that one and they’d ended up fucking on the bare wood floor of their new, empty home, Katsuki’s knees bruising with the force of it. 

So here was Eri, unpresented, helping Kouta put up his comfort lights. Katsuki imagined them now, softly aglow in the room painted so deep sea blue, and realized that it would actually all come together rather well. There was a reason that the Alphas of history rarely emerged as famous creatives or artists. 

“You need a hand?” Katsuki asked. 

Kouta threw an impertinent glare over his scrawny shoulder.

“I can do this,” he said, even as he wavered back against Eri’s hands, keeping him steady on his toes, his arms barely reaching. While he was built like a classic male Omega, slender and short, his attitude was all Izuku. And yeah, maybe some Katsuki. Maybe. 

“Then I’ll take this wall,” Katsuki said as he entered the room and took a second string of lights from their tangle on the door. “There’s nothing to stand on over here.” 

“I can do it myself, y’know,” Kouta muttered, but the sound of his struggle didn't help his case any. 

“Obviously you can,” Katsuki said, keeping his back to them as he easily reached the ceiling and hooked the lights up. The apartment was not big, two apartments per floor, three floors, and all of them with low ceilings. At Katsuki’s height, he barely had to go to his toes for this. “But I’ll do this side anyway. Faster with more people.”

For a while they were silent, working. Eventually, Kouta mumbled from across the room. 

“Thanks or whatever.”

Katsuki kept his grin to the wall.

Okay, maybe he was a little more Katsuki than Izuku sometimes. 

They finished quickly, and Katsuki cajoled them downstairs to grab some of the food brought over before giant Heroes with vast appetites swallowed it all whole. He watched Kouta and Eri race each other down the stairs, Eri taking no prisoners as she edged in on Kouta, shoving him against the wall lightly so she could claim the last-second win. 

Katsuki raised his eyebrows and briefly wondered if Eri would be Alpha or Beta. Despite Izuku changing his mind on some aspects of secondary genders, Eri didn’t exactly scream future Omega to him. 

Despite the living area and open-plan kitchen sporting nearly no furniture, with Katsuki and Izuku’s packs mingling together, food spread out on the floor as they all sat around it and took their fill—

Well. Something in Katsuki’s chest shifted. Like his ribs were broadening to create more space for whatever filled it at the sight. 

“He’s it and that’s it,” Mina said with knowing eyes as she approached him in the kitchen area and offered a plate. 

Katsuki accepted the food with a frown.

“Hah?”

Mina shrugged and leaned against the counter beside him, their shoulders brushing as they faced the clamoring room. 

“That’s what you said to me. After the New Year’s party, I think. Around then. You told me, all angry and pissed off about it, he’s it and that’s it.”

Katsuki barely remembered the period after the kiss. He’d been confused and distraught, unfamiliar with his body’s reactions, unfamiliar with his heart. But if Mina said he said it, then he probably did. 

“Well,” Katsuki said, watching as Izuku’s plate had the least food, as he smiled and shook his head at the offer of something more, “he is.”

“You’ve always been so sure of yourself.” Mina paused, as if wrestling with something. She didn’t often struggle with expressing herself. “It was weird to see you sure about that, though. Him. All of this.”

Katsuki tore his attention from his mate to settle it on Mina.

“Doesn’t feel weird to me. Not anymore. Haven’t all you nosy assholes tried to pair me off our entire lives?”

“Yeah, well. This is all awfully domestic for you, blondie.”

“Fuck off,” Katsuki said, just on principle. “As if you’re not gonna have twelve babies with Kirishima one day.”

Mina snorted an ugly laugh.

“Not that many. You won't have any, though.”

“With Kirishima? Hell no.”

Mina made a sound of strangled amusement and elbowed Katsuki’s ribs. 

“You know what I mean. Midoriya can’t—”

“I know that,” Katsuki interrupted, frowning deeply now as his gaze settled anew on Izuku. Despite this being his house, he kept on the edge of the circle of friends, his lips faintly curved as he clearly enjoyed his off-center spot. “Of course I know that.”

Mina sighed and bumped at Katsuki’s shoulder again.

“We are Alpha , Bakugou. It’s our drive to have children, to sow.”

Bakugou didn’t want to know about Mina’s child-bearing drive. He barely knew how that shit worked. Female Alphas were almost as rare as male Omegas. They could not impregnate, and it was difficult for them to actually get pregnant with all the testosterone and Alpha hormones flowing through their veins. But their drive to bear large packs and provide for them remained strong. 

“This coming from the one who’ll have to bear those twelve kids you’re talking about,” Katsuki muttered, unsure what to say. He’d never been particularly conscious of any drive to fuck a baby into Izuku, aside from his rut, when his brain was spectacularly misfiring. 

And he had Kouta. He had Izuku. He had his friends. He had the entire city. His pack spanned a country. 

“I know,” Mina said with a wince. “I’m not looking forward to inflating like a giant useless balloon, but it’ll be worth it. It’s what I want, one day.”

Katsuki shoved bread into his mouth, chewed and spoke at the same time.

“Your brats will be obnoxious as hell.”

Mina barked a laugh and punched his arm, didn’t even retaliate. 

Katsuki was prepared to ramp up his insults until he saw Izuku pull his phone from his back pocket and frown down at the caller. Without looking at anyone in the room, he quickly excused himself and headed for the hall. 

Without a second thought for his conversation with Mina, Katsuki followed. When he didn’t find Izuku in the corridor, his ears pricked up to the sound of Izuku in the library. 

“Are you sure about that?” Izuku was saying as Katsuki walked through the open door. He’d turned away to face a solid wall of boxes. “I’m not particularly interes—no, I know. Yes, that’s me. Yes, that’s him.”

Katsuki approached slowly, careful to make enough noise to alert Izuku to his presence.

“Well, if you’re sure that’s something anybody would be interested in,” Izuku said, doubt lacing his taut voice. He was picking at his bottom lip with thumb and forefinger, nail grazing the chapped skin as he listened and nodded to no one who could see. “I—okay? My work email is—”

Katsuki waited until Izuku said his goodbyes before clearing his throat. He made no attempt to hide his grin when Izuku jolted in the air with a shocked yelp and turned, clutching at his chest. 

“Still got it,” Katsuki drawled as he approached.

“What, being a creep?” Izuku shot back, grinning and pocketing his phone in those distractingly revealing work-out shorts. “Yeah, I can’t imagine you’ll ever entirely rid yourself of that quality.”

“Ha-ha,” Katsuki intoned, flicking Izuku’s chest just for the sake of bullying him. And also because Izuku looked wound tight and he wanted to distract him. “Who was that, anyway? Your other boyfriend?”

“Other boyfriend implies I have an original boyfriend,” Izuku said, flicking Katsuki back, but harder on the ear, smiling with glee when Katsuki yelped. “And since you are my fiance, the implication doesn’t work. I mean. . .unless I have a fiance and two boyfriends.”

Katsuki made a show of grabbing Izuku around the waist from behind and growling into his hair, but Izuku’s easier, looser laughter had him relieved to see the anxiety gone from his frame. 

“Alright,” Katsuki said, squeezing him a little too hard, until Izuku made a show of theatrically wheezing for air. “So what about the call, if not one of your two boyfriends?”

“It was ChrOmosome Magazine, if you can believe that,” Izuku said, sounding as perplexed as Katsuki was. Izuku turned in his arms and sheepishly smile, glancing off to the side. “They—they want to feature me in a future publication. Like, the main feature. On my life, my struggles, my successes—and about you, probably. But mainly my place in society as Omega who has, I don’t know, been through so much shit? I’m not sure what their angle is frankly, but ChrOmosome is the nation’s number one Omega-centric magazine, so I can’t imagine they’re out to, I don’t know, paint me in a bad light.”

“No one would paint you in a bad light unless they wanted to mysteriously disappear from the face of the earth,” Katsuki said, entirely fucking serious. 

Izuku looked like he knew it because he blushed and slapped Katsuki on the arm.

“Stop that,” he said lightly, but his fragrance was light and dizzy, pleased. He pulled out of Katsuki’s embrace, but didn’t go far, his hands flitting to open one box and another to look in at his long-stored away book collection. “I told them we’d talk about it. I’m not going into something like that blind. But they said I’m—well, they said I could be a, a role model to the new generation.”

Izuku looked up, his smile crooked, his eyes a little wet. His voice was hesitant and hopeful in one.

“Wouldn’t that be something? Me, of all people. A role model to anybody.”

“I think,” Katsuki said slowly, taking Izuku into his arms once more and squeezing him tight, “that finally the world has got some sense knocked in their heads. Only took your stubborn ass to show them all.”

Izuku inhaled Katsuki’s chest once, a damp snuffle, but when he pulled back his eyes were clear and his smile bracing and bright. 

“Maybe. Let’s get back to the pack. I’m scared of what they’ll do to the place if we’re not there to monitor.”

“No more statues of your fucking friends in our goddamn house,” Katsuki groused as he followed. 

Izuku laughed but made no promises. 

Hours of moving and unpacking passed before they herded everyone out of their new home. Even Kouta had to get back to the school dorms for Monday classes. Izuku and Katsuki split up, taking on projects around the place, the radio echoing into other rooms from its spot in the still-barren kitchen.

By the time Katsuki finished flattening cardboard boxes and stacking them in the entrance hall, he realized he hadn’t heard from Izuku in a while. He moved slowly through the building, absently trailing his hand along the brand new white paint of the hallway, the new shiny wood railing leading upstairs, eyeing the new lighting above his head. 

This place didn’t yet feel like home, but Izuku had told him that it would in time. Katsuki didn’t know how that worked, not really. He’d never felt attached to any one place, minus maybe Parchment. His apartment had been a place to rest his head. The house he grew up in had been vast and cavernous, full of art deco and sharp edges that hadn’t agreed with some deep part of him. 

Izuku’s apartment had been nice. Warm, soft—Omega things, Katsuki thought dryly. 

But now Izuku brought himself to this place, and Katsuki had too, so this was maybe a place he could feel a sense of ownership over. A sense of a pack. The rooms didn’t smell entirely like them yet, but it would come. 

Katsuki stood in the doorway to their bedroom and watched Izuku dress their giant bed in fresh sheets. This was one thing they’d agreed on—the vast bed fit for five people, fit for a heat nest, fit for a lifetime together. 

Izuku was struggling to lift one corner of the hefty mattress and hook the warm, cream fitted sheet around the end. Katsuki grinned and looked on because it was never not fun to watch his stubborn Omega grapple with tasks as he began to bare his teeth in annoyance. 

Eventually he finished that final corner and got to draping the bed in a few layers of sheets, but no blanket. It was too fucking hot and Katsuki ran like a furnace enough for the both of them. 

Katsuki looked on, enjoying Izuku’s quick, economical movements, all buzzing bee energy as ever as he finished piling on the pillows. Izuku heaved a happy sigh and placed hands on his hips, surveying his work with a smile. Then, slowly, the smile dropping, mouth gone pensive, expressive eyes fogging over as he seemed to stare at the bed without really seeing it. 

“Don’t think too hard,” Katsuki said as he broke Izuku’s bubble and stepped into the room. “Might hurt yourself.”

“Hilarious,” Izuku said dryly, but his lips had already curved in reply to Katsuki’s presence. He gave the bed one lingering look that Katsuki couldn’t discern and wandered over, stepping into Katsuki’s already spreading arms. Izuku sighed, a happy thing, nudging his cheek between Katsuki’s pectorals. He didn’t hug Katsuki back, just stood there and seemed to bask in the attention—which, this in itself was miles from the man Katsuki had met more than half a year ago. 

“What’s up,” Katsuki murmured into Izuku’s curls. He smelled like clean sweat and summer sun, the efforts of the day overpowering his fresh grass and rain scent. 

“Just.” Izuku inhaled, the bond between them wobbling like a slow, uneasy tightrope walk. “All of this. Big. Scary.”

Katsuki snorted.

“Now you’re getting cold feet?”

“No,” Izuku quickly replied, wrapping his arms around Katsuki’s waist now, their hips pressed flush as Izuku leaned back just enough to meet Katsuki’s amused expression. “Just. It’s like that climb up the roller-coaster before the drop, right? You know it’s going to be amazing and exhilarating and a little heart in your throat terrifying, but worth it. All of it, worth it.”

Katsuki met Izuku’s anxious gaze. 

“And?”

“And I never thought I’d be here,” Izuku said quietly, earnest in everything he said as ever. “At the top before the drop. Looking out over all of it with the knowledge of how I climbed to get here. I never thought I’d get here.”

Katsuki laughed and ruffled Izuku’s hair, stepped out of their embrace to attend to a few empty boxes waiting to be flattened. 

“You’re tellin’ me. I wasn’t interested in mating either, y’know. Wasn’t even interested in anyone, in any way, ‘til you.”

The bond warmed, sunset soft, beginning to ease between them. Izuku sat on the end of the bed and was too short for his bare feet to touch the floor. He lightly kicked his legs, likely without realizing or he wouldn’t have done it, and considered Katsuki with a delighted smile. 

“I still can’t believe that. No one in all the people you’ve known in your life?”

Katsuki aimed a look at Izuku and flattened a box with too much force. 

“I was bonded to you before memory, dumbass. How could there have been anyone?”

“And I to you.” Izuku pouted in thought. “But I had people. I had. . .love. In a way.”

Katsuki wouldn’t allow himself to rise to the jealousy, not right now, not on this day. 

“You and I are built different,” he said with a shrug, moving onto another box. “Born different, lived different. And everybody loves me. You’d always wanted just one. Person to love you, I mean.”

“Gee, thanks,” Izuku replied with a sour face. 

“Tell me it’s not true,” Katsuki said, stepping on his new pile of flat boxes, smashing them down in a stack. “Shitty or not, the reality is that you’ve been looking for that one person your whole life. You just didn’t know it was me. When I smelled you, I realized it wasn’t that I’d never been interested in looking, it was that I’d already found you.”

Katsuki recognized the rising scent of Izuku’s lust, hot and sticky, tropical, hothouse thick, but didn’t understand the purpose of it even as his lips parted to taste that heavenly slick scent across his tongue and turned a narrow look to his mate. 

Izuku sat on the bed, fists in the pristine sheets. He licked his bottom lip, pink tongue, pretty flushed cheeks and sun-dark freckles, eyes bright and hungry.

“You’ve always said you don’t have a way with words and then you come out with stuff like this,” he rasped. 

Of course. Of course Izuku would get horny off a simple throw away set of words. Ridiculous.

Katsuki rolled his eyes and walked over, unable to keep the cocky swagger from his hips as he slowly approached and fitted himself between Izuku’s wide, welcoming thighs. Izuku yelped a laugh as Katsuki gripped behind Izuku’s knees and hauled him half-off the bed, sending Izuku flopping onto his back. 

“Yeah, well,” Katsuki murmured as he leaned in, looming over Izuku to nuzzle at his neck, “don’t tell no one or you’ll regret it.”

“Kacchan.” Izuku giggled and turned his head toward Katsuki’s cheek to keep him from tickling at Izuku’s throat. His lips pressed warmly to Katsuki’s ear, his voice all honey and light despite the syrupy thick scent radiating from him, those stocky legs wrapping around Katsuki’s waist to bring him in close. “I hate to break it to you, but the entire country knows you’re a feral romantic at this point. The world’s perception of you is changing the longer you’re with me.”

Katsuki hummed his assent, distracted with the way Izuku’s powerful little body fit so neatly against his own, his hands traveling down Izuku’s sides to sneak beneath that thin slip of a shirt, fingertips finding the familiar dips between his Omega’s delicate ribs. 

“I was born to change the world,” Katsuki managed to say as Izuku rolled his hips against the swelling weight in Katsuki’s shorts. “So were you.”

Izuku’s laugh was throaty, distracted as he snuck his hands between the heat of their bodies to expertly undo Katsuki’s button and fly.

“Not me,” Izuku murmured, palm into Katsuki’s underwear, cupping Katsuki’s cock and pressing hard, no slow build, only possessive desire in his hold. 

“You’ve already done it,” Katsuki whispered, shaky, rutting into Izuku’s loose fist. Exhaled sharply onto Izuku’s lips, talked through Izuku licking at his mouth with a needy animal noise. “You’re doing it. You think I’d bond to just anybody?”

Another laugh, husky and distracting as Izuku released Katsuki, only to look down between them as he wiggled out of his own shorts. Katsuki’s face was busy burying into Izuku’s shoulder, mouthing at the mating mark as Izuku breathlessly mumbled. 

“You bonded with your next-door neighbor in a fit of childhood anxiety and loneliness, so yes.”

Katsuki snarled at the delusional assessment and lifted from Izuku with a glare. 

“Oh, shut the fuck up will you and put that smartass mouth to good use.”

Izuku laid there with a lazy grin, his shirt shucked up beneath his armpits and chin, exposed nipples flushed dark, the subtle musculature of his stomach shifting with each breath. His arms draped over his head, fingers lightly flexing with some absent need to touch. His thick, pretty cock laid across his belly, thighs spread, the greenhouse slick of him flooding Katsuki like a tropical storm, sopping wet. 

“You love my smartass mouth,” Izuku said, smiling. 

“Not always,” Katsuki croaked, already squeezing the supple muscle and fat of Izuku’s thigh in one hand, coaxing his legs further apart. He took his cock in hand and watched, rapt, as the big, red head of his dick spread Izuku impossibly wide, splitting that greedy hole open until it was Izuku’s hungry body sucking him in, muscles flexing and encouraging him forward.

“Fair enough,” Izuku wheezed as Katsuki bedded in deep, pausing to rock there. His brow already glistened with sweat as he moaned loud and low, unabashed, and shifted his hips for an easier angle, eyes slowly blinking up at the ceiling, pupils pooled big and black. “Fuck.”

“Yeah,” Katsuki breathed out, hands inexplicably shaking as he cupped the back of Izuku’s knees and spread them wide, lost to the vision of his cock disappearing again and again inside the tight, succulent clench of Izuku’s body. It should get easier, he vaguely thought as Izuku gripped the sheets and met his eyes, unyielding and fierce, hips rolling and rising to meet Katsuki, refusing to be passive as ever. 

It should get easier to look at this man and not be so ravenously attracted, so gut-punch in love. It should get old. 

It never got old. 

MINE, the Alpha inside him snarled as Katsuki fucked into him faster, unable to take it slow, unable to say no to Izuku’s gasping, goading smile and the way he bit down on his bottom lip when he noticed Katsuki falling apart. MATE IS MINE. 

“Yours,” Izuku gritted out between clenched teeth, the whole of his body ramping up the sheets as Katsuki stuffed him full, hard. 

Izuku was so fucking wet that just pulling out of him soaked the sheets between his legs, an overwhelming, dizzying gush of greenhouse scent and animal desire, thick down Katsuki’s throat with every ragged breath. He chased Izuku onto the mattress, lifted him by the hips, and drilled down into him with brutal, ramping intensity. Each gutted sound Izuku made, each gasp and cry and the salt-scent of tears prickling at Izuku’s eyes set Katsuki’s teeth on edge, bared and aching to bite. 

For lack of anything better, Katsuki hefted Izuku’s legs higher, turned, and sunk his teeth into the meat of Izuku’s muscular calf. Izuku’s shocked punch of breath followed a quick, harsh shudder and clench around Katsuki’s cock that nearly had him coming on the spot. Their eyes locked and Katsuki released, having drawn no blood and still ravenous for the taste of his mate. 

And then Izuku reached between them as they fucked, a bright hot blush rushing from chest to throat to cheeks as he rubbed at his stretched, swollen hole, his fingers slicking up glossy and glazed. He brought his hand up, mouthed the word, open, and Katsuki obeyed. Opened his mouth and sucked on Izuku’s fingers with a gravelly groan, eyes slipping closed as he felt his knot inflate.

It felt like whiting out, like the rush of a white-capped wave over his head, or being buried beneath a snowfall, a muffled roaring in his ears followed by a cotton ball brain that couldn’t fathom much but cloak of his Omega’s scent, the deep-cave quiet that coddled him, all pleasure-scent and strong arms encircling. 

“Are you alive,” Izuku said, his sing-song voice filtering through the white, sunshine through the clouds. 

Katsuki grunted, snuffled at Izuku’s throat, lapping lazily at the hormone swell that still seeped through the skin. 

Izuku trembled beneath him, hands gripping at Katsuki’s shoulders, hips shifting to alleviate the pressure of the knot to no avail. The movement rocketed a gasp from Katsuki’s guts, his entire body seizing up tight as he came a second time, the force of his cock and cum against Izuku’s prostate sending Izuku clenching and coming in turn, a weak, heavenly gasp in Katsuki’s ear. 

Some time had to have passed before Izuku finally groaned and slapped Katsuki on the back as if saying, good game buddy, and forced them to roll on their sides together. 

Katsuki wasn’t exactly pleased to move from his place, crushing Izuku’s soft, sweet body into the sheets, but he growled and allowed it anyway.

Still knotted together, Katsuki wedged his leg between Izuku’s, who slung his heavy thigh over Katsuki’s hip and used Katsuki’s arm as a pillow. Looking a million miles more bright-eyed and bushy-tailed than Katsuki felt, Izuku smiled, the dimple in his cheek begging for a bite that Katsuki was too weak to deliver. 

“So, you really knew it was me the moment you scented me?” Izuku said, pulling Katsuki back into their previous conversation. How Izuku always came out of sex even more revved up than he began continued to perplex him. 

“Obviously,” Katsuki croaked, his voice still weak and his lips loose with orgasm. “I made a complete fucking idiot of myself. I was out of my mind with you. Didn’t even realize the shit I’d said ‘til hours later when the worst of your scent had faded from my clothes.”

“You really were an entitled jackass,” Izuku said with relish, beaming. 

Katsuki didn’t have the energy to rise to a well-known fact. 

“And you were mine,” he said.

Izuku’s smile tapered off, but the warmth in his expression remained. He’d once looked at Katsuki with anger. With fear, curiosity, trepidation. Hurt. Anxious, tentative affection. Hope. 

Now, he just looked pleased, the bond between them a swaddled, fresh sheets from the drier comfort. 

“‘Zuku,” Katsuki murmured, meeting Izuku’s curious look. “Lemme fix your nose already.”

Izuku blinked, eyes wide. 

“I—“

“Please,” Katsuki said, low, stern.

Izuku chewed at his swollen bottom lip for a brief moment, looking away but not shifting from their intimate position. The knot had sapped away and Izuku could move, but he remained. 

“I was afraid before,” Izuku murmured, lashes lowered, looking down at nothing. “Of that.”

“I remember,” Katsuki said, keeping his voice low, as if not to startle a skittish animal. “You told me on Valentine's Day before it all went to shit. So I let it go. You were scared you wouldn’t be as into me as I was with you once you could smell me.”

Izuku winced.

“Yeah. I’ve—I’ve been afraid of so much in my life. But none of them so terrifying as finding out I’m not compatible with you.”

“Then you’re more an idiot than I thought,” Katsuki muttered. 

Izuku started to sit up, cross. 

“Hold on—“

Katsuki rolled them, a hand on Izuku’s shoulder to shove him back into the sheets. He loomed over Izuku’s pinched features, dragging his palm from Izuku’s shoulder to cup his clenched jaw. 

“Isn’t this what we’ve always been about,” Katsuki snapped. “You and me without the rest? You’ve harped on for as long as I’ve known you that your biology doesn’t define you, define us. But now when it’s time to prove it, you’re gonna chicken out—on us?” 

Izuku’s jaw worked, chewing on something Katsuki knew he’d spit out because Izuku couldn’t bear not to speak his mind. 

“Yes,” he bit off.

Katsuki threw himself off Izuku with a snarl, rolling and sitting up on the bed, ready to storm out and cool himself down. 

“Fuck—“

“Yes, we can get my nose fixed,” Izuku said quietly from the place Katsuki had left behind.

Katsuki whirled, the clamor of his pulse in his ears as he gaped at Izuku sitting quietly on the bed, considering Katsuki with a small, gentle curve of lips. 

“Seriously?” Katsuki rasped.

Izuku’s cheeks burned bright as he nodded quickly, eyes downcast as he scoot across the bed and sat behind Katsuki. His legs bracketed Katsuki’s, his chest to Katsuki’s back, arms wrapping around his waist, cheek between Katsuki’s shoulder blades. 

“Seriously,” Izuku barely said, barely on a breath. Then, “You’re right. You’re right. It doesn’t matter. Not in any way that counts. Not really. It’s always been us. Hasn’t it?”

Katsuki took one of Izuku’s hands, laced their fingers together, and stared at the room that was theirs. The home that was theirs. 

“Damn right. Now come here and kiss me, you stubborn bastard.”

Izuku really shouldn’t have bothered making the bed.

Notes:

I'll give you one guess as to why the next chapter is going to be an absolute monster <_<

Chapter 48

Summary:

“I don’t want presents,” Izuku managed to say with some level of self-assurance as he dragged his attention back up to Katsuki’s face. “Um. So. No presents, okay? It’s mortifying.”

“Your ability to sabotage anything good for yourself is mortifying,” Katsuki said, all blase in the way that had Izuku worried that he and Hitoshi had been hanging out too much lately. 

Notes:

As always and forever, your comments, input, fanart, kindness, and encouragement have made this entire fic possible. I'm so blessed to have had the opportunity to share it with you. I treasure the stories you've shard with me because of this fic and I hold dear the insights you've had into yourselves from time to time in reading this too. I feel like I've gotten to connect with hundreds, thousands of you over the course of years and I could never once take that for granted.

That being said, grab yourself a bottle of water and HYDRATE because this is over 13,000 words of primarily porn.

Songs For This Chapter:
Everlasting Light - The Black Keys | Spotify | YouTube
I'll Never Let You Go - ur pretty | Spotify | YouTube
Fangs - Night Riots | Spotify | YouTube
As You Are - khxlil, Marco Richie | Spotify | Soundcloud

“How you feel?” Katsuki asked as Izuku blearily watched Mr Bakugou drive them back to the house. From his angle in the backseat, Izuku could appreciate the familiar cut of Mr Bakugou’s stubbled jaw, the curve of his ear that was all so very Kacchan. 

“Your dad’s hot,” Izuku slurred. He chuckled, low and congested and loopy from the piece of work strapped to his swollen nose and pulsing face. 

Katsuki made a noise like a gut punch but Izuku was kind of busy giving Mr Bakugou a little extra appraisal to care. 

“See, son?” Mr Bakugou said cheerfully as he navigated traffic like a madman. He swerved between lanes like a racer and it was bringing Izuku a great amount of joy. “Your old man’s still got it.” 

“That’s fuckin’ sick, dude,” Katsuki said, his proprietary grip on Izuku’s knee tightening. “That’s cradle-robbing.” 

“I’m almost twenty-six!” Izuku screamed, louder than he’d anticipated. Self-control was not a factor right now; not after the pill his swanky plastic surgeon had let him have before he left. “Your dad could date me any day!” 

“No one is dating you, ever!” Katsuki screamed back, unnecessarily hysterical if Izuku had anything to say about it, his face all red and his voice all dad-sounding. 

“Heh,” Izuku said, leaning his skull against the headrest and eyeing the faintly fuzzy ceiling of Mr Bakugou’s car. “What’m’I, your baby?” 

Katsuki bit off a tsk between his teeth and stared out the window, the back of his blonde head now even more similar to his father’s from his angle. 

“Yeah, and what of it?” Katsuki muttered to the passing city. 

“Your Dad already told me to call him Daddy,” Izuku slurred with a slow, wide grin.

“I didn’t!” Mr Bakugou immediately squawked as Katsuki let out a roar of fury and lunged forward. “I didn’t say Daddy—” Mr Bakugou hollered while Katsuki slapped at the back of his head as they sped down the road. “I said Dad, call me Dad! Holy fuck, Katsuki, you’re going to get us killed!” 

“NOT IF I KILL EVERYONE IN THIS CAR BEFORE WE CRASH!” Katsuki screamed, and Izuku laughed and laughed all the way home until his face hurt good and proper. 

After that, the whole healing thing was boring and Izuku hated it more than most things. He’d never been good at sitting still on a good day, but being laid up and dizzy and achy in the beginning was a waking nightmare. 

Katsuki had gone full Alpha on him. Keeping him fed, regulating his over the counter pain medication schedule, making sure Izuku didn’t try his hand at anything strenuous like heavy lifting or working out or fucking breathing and living his damn life. 

Okay. Izuku may have been getting more than a little antsy. He was probably as unbearable to Katsuki in that first week as he Katsuki was to him with his—his babying. 

“I’m not a baby,” Izuku stressed as he buttoned up a thin, lightweight plaid shirt in cheerful yellow and white. His bruised, mutinous expression in the mirror did not match his outfit. 

“Oh my fucking god,” Katsuki said, because that was his current go-to reply against Izuku’s endless bitching instead of rising to any kind of argument. Katsuki wouldn’t even argue with him right now. Izuku was quickly losing his mind. 

Readying himself for a fight regardless, Izuku meticulously rolled up the short sleeves of his shirt while he kept an eye on Katsuki in the mirror. His Alpha was throwing his weight around the room in a silent stampede of preparation for shift. He often wore his slummy, crummiest clothes to work since he would be gearing up in uniform anyway, and less people minded him when he dressed like shit. 

It had taken some time for Izuku to realize that Katsuki cared about his looks way more than he let on. His Alpha had always been cocky beyond limit and held himself with a confidence that was born into his very bones, but Izuku had slowly come to realize that Katsuki’s closet was jam-packed with high-end athleisure wear that Katsuki painstakingly picked to keep him both casual and cool at all times. 

For this reason, Izuku supposed he enjoyed the way Katsuki dropped his vanity every morning and night on his way to and from work, keeping a low profile for the sake of efficiency when Izuku knew for a fact that Katsuki basked in attention. 

Meanwhile, Izuku had long ago lost his predilection for style. He’d kind of mirrored Dabi’s edgy fashion sense when he was with him, then went more studious when in university with Jin, and during the years of his single life, had finally fallen into the comfortable lull of his leftover clothes from past eras of his life and the new, cozy clothes of his present. 

“And don’t call me a million times to check in on me,” Izuku said, turning away from the mirror to watch Katsuki yank on a black shirt with the sleeves artfully torn off and frayed. Katsuki turned on him like a wolf catching prey scent. Swallowing hard, Izuku scrunched his face in his best imitation of threat. “I’m fine to go back to work. Kai and Kouta can’t do everything for me forever—” 

“They can, actually,” Katsuki snapped. “It’s literally what you pay them to do.” 

“I don’t actually pay Kai—” 

“You’ve been healin’ for ten damn days, shithead,” Katsuki said as he sat down with a great level of drama. He put on his black socks with an equal caliber of theatrics. He was really worked up over Izuku returning to work and Izuku would laugh and feel touched about it if he wasn’t twenty-four hours away from peeling out of his skin like some cosmic horror and setting loose into the city. “Everyone’s more than happy to carry the weight for you. That’s both literal and figurative, by the way, Mr University.” 

“My nose is broken, not my hands!” Izuku mimed choking Katsuki’s neck with said hands, just to prove a point. Katsuki only stared dispassionately at Izuku’s flailing and then met his eyes, unflinching. Frustration built up and Izuku yelled, “I’m not useless,” before storming out of the room and down the stairs.

Downstairs, Izuku slammed around the kitchen a little and drank his stupid protein shake while glaring out the back window. Their little gutted apartment building had no backyard, but the sun streamed in and it was something. 

Izuku binned the empty bottle and stared down into the garbage for a moment, scowling. He still couldn’t smell; could barely taste but a memory of flavor. The doctor had found plenty of cartilage shards up in Izuku’s nasal passage and the surgery had been detailed. It would be three to six weeks before he could properly smell or enjoy food. 

The waiting was making Izuku lose his mind. Patience had never been his strong suit. 

“Freckles?” Katsuki said from the entrance. 

Izuku looked up with a frown, his hands placed on his hips as he eyed Katsuki distrustfully, waiting for a blow up. 

Katsuki was leaned up in the entryway, looking the picture of masculinity with his narrow hips and long legs, his mountainous shoulders and tanned arms bulging against his chest as he kept them casually folded across his body. He wasn’t smiling but he didn’t look angry and Izuku realized his own body went lax with a relief he hadn’t expected. 

“Call me,” Katsuki said. “Whenever. You choose. Just call.” 

A compromise, Izuku realized. A release of control from Katsuki’s end. The way Katsuki leaned into the learning curve of their relationship put Izuku to shame, in Izuku’s own opinion. Humbled him too. 

Izuku realized that the front door was already opening by the time he’d collected his wits. He dashed out of the kitchen and living room. 

“Wait!” He squealed to a halt in the corridor, his bare feet sticking to the cool floorboards as he stopped short of Katsuki turning around with a frown. “I—” 

“Watch yourself,” Katsuki said, catching Izuku by the upper arms and keeping him at a safe distance. “Don’t hit your damn face, pretty boy.”

Izuku couldn’t roll his eyes hard enough into the stratosphere. Pretty boy. Not with two black eyes and a bandaged nose. 

“I’ll call you, okay?” Izuku said quietly, slightly bowing his head to his Alpha. The action must have spoken more than his words because Katsuki inhaled sharply, his grip flexing on Izuku’s arms with untold restrained strength. 

“Right,” Katsuki croaked. “Okay.” 

He leaned in with the obvious intent to kiss Izuku, but when Izuku lifted his face to Katsuki with lips softly parted, Katsuki retreated and pressed his mouth to Izuku’s curls instead. He inhaled once, deeply, and Izuku quietly sulked over the lack of action he’d been getting these past days due to his Alpha’s stupid babying. 

“Not a baby,” Izuku muttered, and felt Katsuki smile into his hair. 

“My baby,” Katsuki murmured with humor clear in the rough dark of his voice. He kissed Izuku’s head one more time and ruffled Izuku’s hair, shoving him off and away into the house with a blinding, boyish grin and a wave. “Seeya, shortstack.” 

“Oh, fuck off already,” Izuku said on a laugh and shut the door in his mate’s stupid, smug face. 

Two weeks in and Chisaki was still yanking deliveries out of Izuku’s arms and storming off to drop them in the office. 

“You don’t have to do that anymore!” Izuku called after him with a sour face. “Arguably, I am stronger than you anyway!” 

“Arguably, you are more of an idiot than any of us when it comes to taking care of yourself, so shut up and let me help.” Chisaki said as he returned to the register looking crisp and unruffled as ever. His mask was white and his tan was a deep contrast for someone nearly white in the winter. His amber eyes were sharp and glacial as ever as they cut Izuku from sneakers to curls in one dismissive assessment. “You should be thankful I take time away from my day to do this anyway.” 

Chisaki Kai, who was richer than any man had a right to be, rarely had shit to do in daylight hours, and they both knew this. Chisaki was strictly a man who did business when the sun went down and so Izuku only rolled his eyes and smiled.

“Thank you so much for your help,” Izuku said in his most polite voice. 

“That’s what I thought,” Chisaki replied with humor in his voice. He settled onto the stool behind the counter and checked his nails. “How’s the pain anyway? Smell anything yet?” 

“Pain’s barely there,” Izuku said with a shrug. He knew he still looked rough, his under eye bruising sapped to mottled green and yellow. “My nose is itchy all the time but that’s a healing thing I guess. Can’t smell. I’m all stuffy, like a cold or whatever.” 

“You’ll get there,” Chisaki said, flicking through a magazine. “What about your interview with ChrOmosome?” 

“That’s—” Izuku tripped up; felt himself flush hot all over. He didn’t know why he got embarrassed any time his friends brought it up. Everyone was obviously proud of him. But it didn’t particularly feel deserved, while at the same time Izuku knew somebody had to speak up for men like him. He just couldn’t wrap his mind around that somebody being him. “It’s—we moved the interview for August, so I can be entirely healed up for, for photos and stuff.” 

“Have you been sent an outline of possible interview questions?” Chisaki asked, looking up from the magazine. Izuku knew that Chisaki had his own ulterior motives for his interest in Izuku’s interview; not merely pride for his friend. Anywhere that he might be able to get in a word against the Alpha population as a whole was an open opportunity. 

“Yeah, some.” Izuku said quietly, then flashed an annoyed look to his friend. “And no, you can’t see them. I’m not having you influence me. I’m too easy.” 

Chisaki’s smile was evident even through the mask. In the way his feline eyes squinted and the mask shifted. 

“You, easy? Who told you that.” 

“I listen to you way too easily, asshole.” 

“I don’t see why anyone would complain about that.”

Izuku coughed a laugh and stole Chisaki’s magazine on principle. It was all fashion stuff and not for the first time did Izuku wonder if Chisaki and Katsuki realized they had several things in common. 

“I’m not Inasa.” 

“Now he listens to me way too easily,” Chisaki said in that lazy, satisfied way he’d definitely picked up from Hitoshi somewhere along the line. 

“Going that well for you, huh?” Izuku said, snatching the magazine out of reach as Chisaki reached to rip it back. “Come on, give me any details! It’s been months.” 

“No,” Chisaki said, standing and seizing the magazine before Izuku could blink. He was way too fast for anyone’s good. 

“Aw, come on,” Izuku whined like the little brother he basically was to Chisaki. “I tell you everything about me.” 

“Not these days,” Chisaki said delicately as he settled back to his stool, his eyes lowered so the comment would cut less, Izuku thought. This was still somewhat of a sensitive subject between them both. 

“So it’s your turn, then,” Izuku goaded him. “You can’t hold me off forever, Kai. You—you—are dating one of the most honorable, good Alphas I’ve ever known. Certainly the best one you’ve ever known. That has to be—different. Or challenging. I don’t even know. Are you even serious about him or is this some kind of, of experiment?” 

“As if I’d waste my free time experimenting,” Chisaki snapped, his eyes catching the light, fired up and vivid. “He’s not a plaything, Izuku, he’s a man.” 

“Your man?” Izuku asked, undeterred and smiling. 

Chisaki looked to open his mouth from behind the mask, then snapped it shut. His gaze cut off to the side, looking at something Izuku couldn’t see. 

“He—he’s so fucking uncompromisingly cheerful.” 

Izuku’s eyebrows shot to his hairline, his nose aching slightly with the breadth of his smile.

“Yeah, and?” 

“And he forgives me even when I’ve never apologized to him and don’t plan to,” Chisaki muttered, still staring off. His forefinger was worrying the corner of the magazine, flicking just the corner back and forth, folding and unfolding. 

“Uh huh,” Izuku said, smiling still. 

“And he makes me want to be—” Chisaki didn’t move but for his eyes. His attention flicked to Izuku and caught. “Better. I suppose. Not that the urge has ever particularly gripped me.” 

Izuku’s chest softened and warmed. He knew the feeling well. 

“Yeah. Can be tough when you’re with someone so good it intimidates you into working on yourself.” 

Chisaki scoffed and waved him off, seemingly dismissing the conversation altogether. 

“What would you know? That dog of yours has the temperament of Cerberus.” 

Izuku laughed and laughed again until he was still laughing about it at home. Katsuki wasn’t entirely pleased with him, growling and grumping and slamming doors, and that only made Izuku love his big bad hellhound all the more. 

Three weeks in, Izuku suffered through a dinner with both sets of parents and Kouta to boot. 

Izuku had never been one to complain, but he’d had a long, unexpectedly busy day at work without anyone to cover his lunch and he mostly wanted to spend his Friday night snuggled on the couch with Natsume and Katsuki while he listened to his mate argue with Kouta over what to watch. The two of them often brought it to a wrestling match on the floor and Izuku was glad that Kouta lived at the school dorms most of the week. They were in a constant battle of one-upmanship. 

Conversation was loud and laborious, a battle of Mrs Bakugou’s opinions versus Katsuki’s, paired with Mr Bakugou’s quelling comments and Izuku's own mom’s antiquated input on how the upcoming wedding should go, all topped off with Kouta’s constant snark. Izuku had used up his powers of socialization for the day already and exhaustion weighed heavy on his slow tongue and dragging thoughts. 

He chewed blandly on his salad and hated it. The salad, specifically. Without flavor, a salad basically equated to chewing grass. But his manners always won and so he continued his best imitation of a cow. 

A spark of something bright and floral, sweet and tangy burst on Izuku’s tongue and he stopped mid-chew, blankly staring across the table. The brief flare of flavor burnt out just as quickly and mellowed, leaving Izuku startled still, marveling. Wondering. In awe. 

“You good?” Katsuki said, low at Izuku’s ear, leaning into him as their mothers discussed floral design choices for a wedding that Izuku wasn’t actually going to let them have a say in. 

“I’m—yup.” Izuku didn’t know why he didn’t say anything about it. Didn’t know why he didn’t whoop for joy. 

He wasn’t used to good things happening to him. They kept happening to him, but somehow each new one never felt like they quite belonged to him. To speak of it this soon would probably ruin it all. 

“I’m good,” Izuku said, returning to his drab salad. 

“Oiy, are you two gettin’ hitched or are we?” Katsuki snapped at their mothers, already moving on. Izuku allowed himself a small, private smile and kept his knee pressed to Katsuki’s beneath the table. 

Two days before the party was due and the sweltering July heat seeped into every crack of their poorly air-conditioned building, Izuku sat on the clammy bathroom counter and held out a towel as Katsuki abandoned the shower. 

“We really don’t have to do a big thing,” Izuku mumbled, already distracted by the frustrating level of gorgeousness that was a wet, dripping Ground Zero buck naked in his bathroom. 

“We don’t gotta do jack shit,” Katsuki said as he accepted the towel and used it to scrub at his face and hair. “Doin’ it ‘cause we all wanna.” 

Instead of answering, Izuku took the moment to outright appreciate his fiance’s impressive assets. Would this ever get old—the wanting? Maybe for Katsuki, who could have anyone on this planet if he merely nodded at them. But not for Izuku; he’d been a ride-or-die to his detriment for years, heavy on the die. 

He was better about that now, okay. 

“I don’t want presents,” Izuku managed to say with some level of self-assurance as he dragged his attention back up to Katsuki’s face. Which, well, didn’t last long as Katsuki began to dry himself off and Izuku’s attention followed the path of the towel. “Um. So. No presents, okay? It’s mortifying.” 

“Your ability to sabotage anything good for yourself is mortifying,” Katsuki said, all blase in the way that had Izuku worried that he and Hitoshi had been hanging out too much lately. 

“I’m just saying—” 

“C’mere,” Katsuki murmured, his voice all hot coal and his hands just as scalding as he approached and grabbed at Izuku’s hips, dragging him easily to the counter’s edge. Izuku gasped, his legs automatically parting to invite his Alpha snug between them, naked heat to clothed. Katsuki’s smile was slow and unbearably smug. Sexy. He nuzzled at Izuku’s throat, pressing wet, lazy open mouth kisses down and over Izuku’s scarred mate mark. 

“Fuck,” Izuku breathed out, already shaking as Katsuki licked the rough flat of his tongue across the gland once, twice, again until the steady pulse of lust swelled and pumped through Izuku’s frame. “Wh—why’re you—” 

“‘S funny to watch your stubborn ass try to argue with me while you smell like you wanna roll over ‘n take it instead.” 

Izuku opened his mouth in rebuke and instead released a full blown moan as Katsuki bit down on the mark to still him. A clever hand crept up Izuku’s boxers to nudge a thumb low and back, just behind his balls, pressing, circling, searching. Izuku’s skull thunked against the mirrored wall behind him, his sudden staccato breaths punctuating the otherwise echoing silence. 

“Spread,” Katsuki said, gravel rough. “Lemme see how wet you are for me already.”

Izuku stopped leaning back against the counter with both sweaty hands keeping him up. Eyes wide and sightless toward the ceiling, he circled his arms around Katsuki’s neck, letting him take Izuku’s weight. Izuku sighed and spread. 

“There you are, baby,” Katsuki murmured at Izuku’s burning ear, and oh shit, oh fuck, no one had ever called Izuku anything remotely like that before. He’d have probably punched them. But right now, with Katsuki’s two fingers sneaking between Izuku’s shivering thighs, the tips just dipping into the slick, searing clench of him, Izuku could let baby slide. “Look at how you open for my cock so quick. I ain’t even gotta do shit, do I? You’re just ready to take it whether your runnin’ your mouth off t’me or not.” 

“You’re insufferable,” Izuku gasped out as he shifted his hips, spreading his thighs further to allow those two long, calloused fingers to nudge past the first tight ring of muscle and slide home, sucked in by Izuku’s body, pulsing and welcome. Izuku gritted his teeth and knocked his head back against the glass again, a high keen cracking in his chest as Katsuki only laughed, husky and self-important, before he eased into a slow, torturous thrust. 

“You love it,” Katsuki said with a smile in his deep voice. His fingers already sounded sloppy as Izuku’s hole wept slick with each slowfuck of Katsuki’s hand. Izuku whined and a rumble of laughter threatened Katsuki’s throat as he crowded Izuku against the counter, the mirror a cold shock against Izuku’s back. “Say you love it,” Katsuki said, his lips smearing against Izuku’s. 

“I love it,” Izuku slurred, far past inhibition. “I love it, I love it, take my fucking clothes off already.” 

Katsuki’s low victory laugh was practically demonic and Izuku shouldn’t have found it as attractive as he always did. But those fingers did slip from him and the boxers were dragged from Izuku’s legs in quick, desperate movements. 

When Izuku reached out to Katsuki with open arms, Katsuki only grinned and took him by one wrist, yanking him off the counter. Izuku yelped and yelped again when Katsuki spun him and, with both hands covering Izuku’s, placed them flat on the counter.

They both faced the mirror now and Izuku quickly looked away from his own reflection. Red colored his face from ears to cheeks to lips to throat to chest. His eyes were eclipsed, and his cock was so hard that it lightly bobbed against the edge of the counter. Behind him Katsuki loomed, all swaths of golden tan and molten gaze meeting Izuku’s in the mirror. 

Katsuki liked it in front of the mirror. Izuku had learned this since they began living together and Katsuki had more time to, frankly, pounce him. Katsuki was vain and Izuku couldn’t care less if it meant watching himself get fucked into another plain of existence. 

And Katsuki did fuck him. Didn’t prep him past those first two fingers because Izuku never needed it, was already dripping when Katsuki slapped his thighs open and used his feet to kick out Izuku’s ankles to spread his stance. Katsuki lined up and shoved in, sure and steady, big Alpha cock stretching Izuku so suddenly that he felt the best kind of tears sting at his eyes. 

Katsuki fucked him with his chin hooked over Izuku’s shoulder, cheek to cheek, his strong hands atop Izuku’s upon the counter, their fingers laced and sweaty. His thrusts were short and brutal, unforgiving, refusing to give Izuku space to move or shove back. Izuku didn’t dare close his eyes like this no matter how good it felt. The intensity in Katsuki’s gaze as they fixed eyes on each other in the mirror demanded full devotion. 

After so long fighting against it, Izuku could finally give him that now. 

With brutal slaps of skin scattering Izuku’s pulse, he inhaled deep, desperate for a breath as Katsuki smiled at him in the mirror, his lips and teeth parted in a deliriously devilish expression as he panted and fucked Izuku open right down the center. Izuku inhaled sharply a second time and— 

The solid punch of sticky, visceral, humid forest fire plunged down his throat and burned his lungs like the first searing drag on a cigarette. 

Izuku choked once, eyes wide, and the orgasm ripped through him like a sonic wave, wracking his body to the bone, surging white through his blood. Katsuki swore in shock and came in turn, his knot locking them together in a blinding burst, a brand of their bodies cauterized in place. 

About a year later, when Izuku regained control of his consciousness and body, Katsuki urged them both back into the shower and pressed Izuku into the tiles, shoulders to toes. 

“What the fuck was that,” Katsuki asked, still a little breathless despite his inhuman fitness level. 

“Dunno,” Izuku murmured, dazed, and let Katsuki wash his hair for him. 

But he knew. He just didn’t know what to do with it yet. The moment was gone, anyway; a burning star already flickered out as quickly as it had come. 

Izuku couldn’t jinx this. He wanted good things in this life. He wouldn’t say it aloud. Not yet. 

“You look less bad now,” Todoroki said at Izuku’s party two days later. He was on his fifth drink to everyone’s third but Izuku couldn’t blame him because Todoroki seemed to live in the limbo of his father’s extreme attempts to earn his son’s love, paired with his life as one of the greatest Heroes in the city. 

Let him have his mild alcoholism. 

“Thanks,” Izuku said. If Todoroki said it was true, then it actually was. 

Nearly a month in and the facial bruising was nearly a memory. Izuku’s summer tan had come through, punctuated by a thousand freckles, and it masked a lot of the yellowed fade beneath Izuku’s eye sockets and around his nose. He’d cut his hair for the party and even though Katsuki bitched and moaned over the change, Izuku appreciated his shaved back and sides in this damp heat. 

“Less bad?” Mina asked, sneaking into the conversation. She threw an arm over Izuku’s shoulders and Izuku still had to refrain from flinching away from the overt Alpha attention. He supposed they were all amalgamating into one massive pack and an Alpha subtly spreading their scent through the group was natural, but Mina had always been a little suspicious of Izuku from the start and Izuku wasn’t sure what she thought of him so many months later. “He looks cute as hell!”

Izuku wrinkled his nose. He didn’t want to be cute. 

“Paws off,” grumbled a familiar voice. From behind, Katsuki nudged Mina aside in order to wrap his arms loosely around Izuku’s and dropped his chin atop Izuku’s head. Izuku’s entire frame instinctively sagged back into him as Katsuki spoke. “Who’s cute? This the most handsome motherfucker in the room.” 

Izuku felt his face burn and said nothing. 

“Your level of adoration would be cringe if it wasn’t you,” Mina said, smiling without a hint of malice, from what Izuku could see. She swirled her mysterious pink drink in it’s clear plastic cup and gestured to the two of them with it. “Better strap in for the ride, cutie,” Mina said to Izuku specifically. “This one is truly a dog with a bone when he’d got his jaw locked on what he wants.” 

“Am I a bone in this idiom?” Izuku asked, grinning despite himself. His hand found Katsuki’s wrist from where his fingers were linked at Izuku’s belly; he squeezed the sturdy bone there and felt Katsuki’s steady pulse. 

“There’s a boner joke somewhere in there,” Katsuki said, because apparently he was giddy and all of twelve years old tonight. 

“I crossed the room for this?” Chisaki said as he approached their conversation with a scowl. “You’re all adults. You know this, right?” 

“Blah blah blah, go home already if you’re tired of us,” Katsuki drawled, seemingly unaffected. That was a good step for them. 

“I just got here and there’s alcohol ,” Chisaki said, like Katsuki was the idiot here. 

A flash flickered in Izuku’s periphery. He glanced over and spotted Denki with his phone out, snapping photos of them as usual. 

“If I find that in a gossip column,” Katsuki said with sharp teeth in his voice, “Several news outlets will find in their inboxes that video of Sero teabagging your face in your sleep.” 

Denki gawked. 

“You wouldn’t do that to Sero!”

“My face,” Sero said out of nowhere, “ is not actually in the video. Just your face and my balls.” 

“Why were you videoing Sero’s balls in the first place,” Izuku asked as he tilted his head back to grimace at Katsuki. 

Katsuki gave him a look like he was stupid. 

“It wasn’t about Sero’s balls. It was about Denki’s face.” 

“Can any of you have a conversation about things unrelated to dick and balls?” Chisaki snapped and sullenly sipped his drink. 

“Have you met them?” Mina said. “Probably not.” 

“You’re the worst for it!” Katsuki accused. 

“I’m much more clever about it than you boys,” Mina said. For some reason, she winked at Izuku. Who even winked? Who winked and made it look good? Ashido Mina, apparently. “So is Izuku.” 

Oh. Well, that was nice of her. 

“‘Zuku can talk circles round you dumb fucks,” Katsuki said, still protectively at Izuku’s back, his hands now braced on Izuku’s hips. 

“Uh.” Izuku wasn’t sure what was going on. Katsuki didn’t particularly lavish Izuku with compliments, but he wasn’t stingy either. He did, however, talk himself up a shit ton. Was Izuku now automatically part of his self-confidence by proxy? It would be cute if it wasn’t drawing an embarrassing amount of attention Izuku’s way. “That’s—no one here is a, a dumb fuck. Let’s, yeah, let’s not do that.” 

“Have you seen his library?” Katsuki said. 

“Everyone has seen the damn library,” Chisaki snapped, obviously annoyed but not enough to walk away. Across the room, Inasa bust out laughing loud enough to practically shake the windows and Chisaki abruptly looked at him. Hitoshi was gesturing wildly, his usually tame expression gone elastic with storytelling. “Fuck,” Chisaki said, already leaving. “He better not be lying about me again.” 

“Whatever he’s saying,” Izuku said, grinning at Chisaki’s stiff, retreating back, “it’s probably not a lie.”

“They’re so fuckin’ weird,” Katsuki murmured. 

“Who, Inasa and Kai?” Izuku asked. 

“Nah. Him ‘n Shinsou. Still can’t get my mind ‘round it.” 

“Be quiet,” Todoroki said, short and to the point. He wasn’t making any particular kind of face, but Izuku recognized the tightening of his jaw as the same in Dabi’s when he was working his mouth around something that pissed him off. 

“This whole pack is so fucked up,” Katsuki said, sounding really happy about it or something. 

Afternoon wore on into evening and Izuku spent his time mingling. To his surprise, the event itself wasn’t exhausting to him, emotionally or mentally like the dinner with their families had been. Had someone told him six months ago that he’d be celebrating his next birthday with a mixed pack of ten, including him, with the majority of them some of the best Heroes on the planet, all celebrating him, Izuku would have laughed himself off the edge of the world and into space. 

Now, looking out at the lot of them all laughing and arguing and rubbing shoulders, sharing scents, it felt. . .maybe not yet entirely familiar, but it felt comfortable. Natural. Like Izuku had been waiting for this family. 

And then the fire started. 

Izuku was in the kitchen, binning some plates and pulling cold beer from the fridge to place on the island counter when the assault on his senses came on like a force of nature, like the moment your ears pop and clear from high altitude. 

Izuku was pretty sure it was fire; a scent that was burned into the primal brains of humans and animals, once smelled and never forgotten. The musky smoke, the radiating warmth, the crack and pop of cedar and spicy sandalwood. The most comforting fire, like a winter hearth or a haven in the deep, dark woods. 

Frowning, Izuku followed it. Barely realized he’d walked away from the party, nose raised to catch the trail. If there was a fire in the house or something was burning, Izuku needed to find it and fix it anyway.

Izuku found himself in the library first and paused, placing a hand to one of the two highback, cushy chairs in deep, lush leather that they’d just brought in to complete the space. The built in bookshelves were filled, orderly as a true library, and Izuku’s ornate, carved desk sat before the window, his laptop closed on top and the surface already littered with the knick-knacks of his life. 

He and Katsuki had spent hours in here the day before, finishing the unpacking now that the furniture and faded antique rug were placed in the room. Then, Izuku had sat Katsuki down in one of the chairs and rode his cock to completion as a nice, thorough thank you for his beautiful library. 

The fire smelled strongly here, but more. Izuku cocked his head, stepping further into the heart of it, taking a slow turn, inhaling deep and slow. Licking flame and spicy sandalwood, crushed leather and dark molasses musk. 

Izuku shuddered out a breath without realizing he’d been holding it in, savoring that scent in his mouth and rolling it around his tongue like candy. 

But other than that, there was nothing here of note. 

Chewing on his lower lip, his knees feeling oddly weak—he really hadn’t been eating much these past few days, something odd in the twist and turn of his stomach recently—Izuku ventured back into the corridor and toward the clutter of conversation overlapping in the living room. 

“Ugh.” Izuku paused at the stairs, hand gripping the rail as he balked at the wide-open entryway toward the main party. 

Food. 

So much. Too much. Holy shit. 

He could smell the sticky rice, the raw fish, the hot tang of ginger, the pungent bite of wasabi. Sticky-sweet sauces glazed over savory, greasy meats, the overpowering waft of alcohol and sickly liquor dripping over the lot of it. 

Izuku groaned, face hot with nausea. He dropped to a squat, one hand gripping the rungs of the railing for balance and pressed his brow to his outstretched arm, trying to breathe through his mouth. He wanted to smash his nose into his flesh, smell himself and nothing else, something that might be familiar and not sickening, overwhelming, layered in flavors that threatened vomit at the back of his tongue. 

But his nose was in a delicate place and he couldn’t bear to touch or hurt it by accident, even if the back of his anxiety brain fretted how his sinuses would handle it if he puked. 

In an attempt to work through it, Izuku inhaled slowly through his nose, eyes closed, intent on weeding through the scents and wading his way out. 

A second wave of nausea slopped around his churning stomach, and this time it was too much. 

Perfumed night flowers and lemongrass, frigid wind and biting winter, chafing spice and rock candy, vanilla and rose gardens and sweat and salt and happiness and annoyance and lust and— 

Friends. He was scenting his friends, the entire pack of them, all at once, for the first time ever, and Izuku was going to be sick. 

Panting, Izuku thrust to his feet, grabbed the railing like a lifeline and took the steps slowly toward the second floor. The food and friend stink seemed to lessen the further he ventured upstairs and into the hall, and Izuku whimpered with relief as he paused to lean his brow against the doorframe to his bedroom. 

Here, he inhaled and smelled that same safe haven, hot hearth and sandalwood scent, all framed in old, familiar leather and dark, subdued brown sugar. Comfort, the scent told him. Home. 

Izuku turned the knob and fell through the doorway with a sigh, inhaling deep, the shuddering out a breath and inhaling again through his nose as he stumbled forward and face down on the bed. He grunted once, his nose vaguely smarting at the impact, and turned to his cheek, eyes blissfully shut as the deep, warm, coddling scent blanketed his body, safe in the bed. 

Abruptly, a thick, golden liquid feel rolled through Izuku’s body in a slow, syrupy wave as he moaned into the pillows, his hips edging short aborted thrusts against the pristine sheets. Izuku felt like he was filling up, swelling at the seams with sinuous heat, his fingers and toes and lips and hole threatening to spill over and flood, soaking him through and through. 

Izuku had been gripped by the shuddering, hunted throes of heat before. Unmated and matchless, he’d been a fire raging out of control, burning from the inside out. 

But the fire he smelled now was different from the one that mercilessly ate at him. This one licked at his senses with a promise of warmth, the mouthwatering bite of spice, the luscious undercurrent of dark caramel. 

“Kacchan,” Izuku murmured, unbidden, automatic, the knowledge sinking into his bones. 

Izuku tingled. That was new. He sighed happily, drifting upon the bed as the firecracker fizzle and pop all sparked up his legs and between his thighs; sparkled and sizzled in his stomach and climbed his ribs to nestle and glow in his heart. Izuku rolled in the blankets, grabbing onto them, yanking them from their neatly tucked edges and cocooning himself as he chirped pleasure at the back of his throat and shoved his face into Katsuki’s pillow to inhale. 

A fresh current of something zinged through him, electricity, a hot charge like touching a livewire and Izuku gasped and rubbed his thighs together where the taut energy collected and swelled. The build up quickly grew to a throb, though, a wet pulse starting from the center of him and soaking outward. 

Izuku whimpered, the first sharp edge of distress cutting through the building pleasure. He both knew this feeling and didn’t. No heat had ever come on with such a rush, a stampede of senses, his heart racing, his head weighed down with the sandalwood and spice and sugar, a molten, melting drug flooding through his limbs. 

And then it was too much. Izuku whined high at the back of his throat and kept his face plunged into Kacchan’s pillow, inhaling deep and breathing out through his mouth, dampening the cloth as he tucked his knees beneath his body and lifted his ass to the air. He struggled with his shorts, his hands heavy and clumsy as he shoved them down his thighs, his feverish skin screaming for the cool slap of air conditioning.

Izuku reached behind himself, two fingers slopping in deep and easy, the clench of his body instantly quivering around the invasion, sucking at his fingers, inviting him in. His long, low moan pressed at the seams of his vague frame of a nest, the sheets rucked up around him despite not remembering doing it. 

Faintly, his ears pricked to the sound of a crash. Yelling. Izuku whined again and hooked his fingers in his hole, pulling a little, spreading himself, the rim of his ass flexing against the stretch. A fresh flare of throbbing emptiness cramped at Izuku’s guts and the slick dripped, warm and pungently tropical as it dribbled down his thighs. 

Fuck, he needed something in him. Someone. Kacchan. Alpha, mate. Big, vicious cock. 

Izuku inhaled deep again and nearly cried for the wealth of warm hearth scent that washed over him, through him, lit his veins and curled in his empty belly. He didn’t understand the sounds scraping from his throat; something foreign and needy as his ass swayed helplessly in the air, his fingers buried to the hilt and pumping in a clumsy, uneven rhythm. 

“Kacchan,” Izuku whispered into the pillow again, his voice thick and wet. 

The bedroom door slammed open like this was a fucking raid. The knob struck back against the wall with a definitive crack. Izuku shot up in bed in a blind daze, shorts around his thighs, blankets askew, eyes wide and breath coming hard as he gaped at Katsuki coming at him with a look of frantic concern. 

“Kat—” 

“How the hell did this hap—” 

Izuku launched forward. Constrained by his pants around his thighs, all Izuku could do was scramble over and get up on his knees, arms caging around Katsuki’s waist before he buried his face in Katsuki’s shirt. 

The first inhale of his mate’s t-shirt was better than any drug he’d ever taken. Izuku moaned as their mated pheromones flooded through him, unable to brace against the onslaught but instead letting it taken him down hard. No hallucinogenic or weed had him reeling like this, buried in the barrage of their bond gone haywire, Izuku’s body slicking down his legs like a broken dam, and the scent of home hearth heart haven heaven. 

“‘Zuku—” 

Izuku whined, his shaking hands rucking up Katsuki’s shirt to shove his head right under the material. Distantly he felt Katsuki’s sharp intake of breath, the way his stomach jerked, and it didn’t matter. Not when there was all this taut, tan skin to lav his tongue over, and oh god, oh fuck, Katsuki tasted like salt and sin, the heady musk of his growing arousal rising up from his belt with a mouthwatering secret, sultry spice. 

Izuku needed Katsuki’s cock in his mouth like yesterday. 

“Wait,” Katsuki choked out, his voice muffled by the tight stretch of his shirt over Izuku’s head as Izuku hummed and sucked a bruise into Katsuki’s hip and worked at the belt buckle. “Are you really—is everything—” 

Izuku unearthed from Katsuki’s shirt and pulled his Alpha’s cock out in record time, sucking down the thickening head with a sloppy slurp and a muffled moan. Oh hell, he tasted like, like power, virility, like he could and would fuck Izuku into a cum-induced coma. 

Something of Izuku’s thoughts must have rocketed through their bond because suddenly Katsuki was groaning long and broken, cracked and rough like he couldn’t decide between pain or pleasure. Two big, hot hands gripped in Izuku’s hair as Katsuki hunched forward, looming around and over him, his Alpha scent flaring out like a bomb. 

“Holy—” Katsuki bit off, his voice dropped low, wracking a harder shiver through Izuku’s trembling frame. “You’re—fuck. Is this—” 

Izuku popped off his Alpha’s throbbing, lengthening cock with some sound of regret, but it was worth it to clumsily sit back on his bare ass and palms so he could assess his mate. Licking his lips, Izuku raked his gaze over Katsuki’s reddened face down to his equally blood flushed dick, jutting out from his pants all lurid and dripping with spit. 

Again Izuku inhaled, slow and with purpose. Made a show of it for his mate. Let his eyes fall closed as he arched his spine and eased his head back to expose the length of his throat. And, with even greater purpose, Izuku worked up a weak, warbling Omega whine of invitation, a full submission for which he’d never thought possible. 

A brief pulse of silence swelled up between them, the space filled with the welling, wet scent of Izuku’s throbbing, aching hole, all lush rain pounding into dirt, earthen and green. Izuku opened his heavy eyes, his skull swimming and dreamy, drugged out of his mind and soaking through the sheets beneath him. 

A thunderous, rising growl rolled through the room like nothing Izuku had ever heard, loud and bass-heavy. Before him, Katsuki bared his teeth, white and perfectly sharp, his canines impossibly longer than Izuku remembered them. Katsuki’s face was transformed, a terrific violence in his harsh features, those fire eyes somehow unholy alight as he slowly rolled his shirt off and away, his gaze fixed on Izuku. 

The growl only grew louder, a vibration humming through Izuku’s bones as he squeaked out a small noise of shock, his entire body gone still as a piece of prey. 

He wasn’t scared, though. Izuku wasn’t scared. 

He was fucking exhilarated. 

Izuku was being stalked, he realized as he scooted up the bed, his sweaty hands clenching in the sheets as Katsuki slid his shorts away and took a knee to the mattress. His Alpha’s nostrils flared wide, inhaling long and deep, and in turn Izuku watched the garnet spark of Katsuki’s eyes eclipse black. 

“K-Kacchan,” Izuku whispered, his voice dry and hoarse. He didn’t know what else he wanted to say but he hoped his face said enough. 

Katsuki seemed to already know, his head cocked just off-center, his eyes trained on Izuku’s expressions rather than where his hands clenched at Izuku’s boxers and shorts and dragged them away. Izuku licked his lips, his heart kicking up in a new rhythm, something hunted and frantic in contrast to the lazy, big golden cat way Katsuki crawled up the bed on hands and knees, his muscles flexing beneath bronze skin. 

Izuku’s back hit the headboard, a soft eke of surprise from his parted lips as he found himself pinned by nothing but his Alpha’s predatory aura. Izuku’s legs spread automatically to accommodate his mate’s lithe, crawling approach, and while Katsuki inhaled sharply, a wash of red flushed across his cheeks, that black, unblinking gaze didn’t leave Izuku’s face. 

“Kat—” Izuku began, his breath hitching and catching in his lungs as calloused fingertips grazed the ridges of Izuku’s ribs. Electric. The simple touch was silver through him, sharp and lit up and almost too much, like his skin was raw and tender already from all the scent and sensation rubbing up against it. 

Katsuki didn’t make a sound, the growl having tapered off to the sound of their breathing—Katsuki’s almost calm for how deep and subtle he inhaled in opposition to Izuku’s panting. Katsuki’s hands barely brushed Izuku’s skin as he shucked off Izuku’s shirt, but again, every skim of skin on skin was a dream. Everything felt soft and hazy around the edges, like Izuku was fizzling away into the atmosphere, all electric currents and the bone deep buzz of standing beneath humming power lines. 

And then Katsuki’s face was so close to Izuku’s that their noses brushed. Izuku startled, his fists clenching in the pillows on which he sat, his quivering knees spread and his Alpha sitting right between them, watchful and dangerous and smelling of him, them, a forest fire and a hard, deep fuck. Izuku shook, his eyes wide open and fixed on Katsuki’s, nearly cross-eyed. 

Izuku didn’t know how long they sat there, staring at each other. Katsuki’s eyes, blacked-out suns, scanned Izuku from head to toe, his gaze lingering on Izuku’s painfully hard cock until he grew wet from the attention, dribbling down the raw, untouched length. Izuku whimpered and whined, his lungs heaving now, worked up without a single reason to be other than his Alpha smelled like a fucking king, like his master, like he was indescribably pleased as Izuku squirmed and soaked the pillows and sheets through like never before. 

Something about the inspection left Izuku speechless. Like he couldn’t make the first move, like the Omega in him was so goddamn belly-up for this Alpha that he simply could not move but for spreading himself in wider, wetter welcome. 

When Katsuki finally placed a hand on Izuku’s knee and leaned in further to slide the flat of his tongue along Izuku’s pulsing gland, a new bloom of summer storm and sweet grass scent flourished between them, flooring every last functioning brain cell.

Izuku’s mouth gaped, his head thumping back hard against the headboard, eyes on the ceiling as Katsuki snuffled and grunted at Izuku’s throat, all animal. The hand not squeezing at Izuku’s knee dropped between Izuku’s thighs, one calloused thumb smearing the crown of Izuku’s cock, smoothing down a rigid, pulsing vein to drift and press over his wide, aching hole, seemingly testing just how wet and gaping he already was. 

Izuku’s body jolted and clenched around nothing, a gut-wrenching clamp in the core of him writhing for his Alpha. 

“Kacchan!” Izuku burst out, shocking himself with how near-tears he sounded. Those eyes snapped back up to him, black and hungry. “Kacchan, touch me already. I’m—I’m so—please.” 

“When I touch you,” Katsuki said, and holy hell, he sounded dark and deep and further gone than Izuku imagined, “I won’t be able to stop. Not when you’re like this for me. Not when you’re finally—when finally—” 

“Please,” Izuku begged, strained, his bottom lip sore from chewing at it, his eyes damp as he frantically whispered to his mate. He leaned in quickly, catching a short, desperate kiss from Katsuki’s firm lips. “I’m already yours. All of me. Take me. Take me.” 

Lightning fast and just as sharp, Katsuki pinned Izuku to the headboard with a savage snarl to Izuku’s neck. Izuku barely had a second to gasp before one hand shackled his wrists above his head in a sweaty, iron hold. And then oh oh oh, Katsuki was steadying his big, fat cock and working it into Izuku’s ass without pause, fitting in slick and tight, a lurid, sloppy stretch as he fucked in to the flush fit of his hips pressed firmly against Izuku’s ass. 

Izuku wailed, unabashed and unable to hold back a single desperate sound when Katsuki had him by the wrists, the hulking size of his Alpha so defined like this, looming over Izuku, holding him still, his free hand shoving Izuku’s knee wide aside, pressing it in place to the sheets as he looked down at the stretch of Izuku’s slick, creamy hole around Katsuki’s cock. The intrusion was a miracle, a harsh, frenzied mating that lit up every inch of Izuku from the wet Omega guts of him to the ravenous Alpha teeth of him. 

Katsuki fucked into him steady, his lips pulled back to reveal dangerous teeth, the heavy drag of his dick a maddening weight inside of Izuku's quaking little body. The scent between them was dark and dank, lush and lewd, musk and slick and cum, a mess Izuku could smell now. Could sink into, get lost in, dream of. 

“Ohfuck,” Izuku ran his mouth, drunk on long, thick Alpha dick and the forest fire scent of their fuck. “Oh my g—yes, yeah, yeah—fuck, I smell so good on your cock, don’t I, Alpha. Like yours, yours—ah!” Izuku yelped as Katsuki snarled, loud and savage in Izuku’s face, his expression colored red with lust before he released Izuku’s wrists and dragged him down the bed in by the hips. 

Now he had a hold on Izuku. 

Eyes huge, Izuku grappled at the sheets, a scream clutching silent in his throat as Katsuki lifted his hips like they weighed nothing and shoved him right onto Katsuki’s cock like a fucktoy. Stuffed him full, the squelch and suck of their mating loud in a room where Izuku struggled to breathe and Katsuki grunted and huffed with each thrust. Izuku couldn’t even fuck back onto him; Katsuki had his lower half entirely lifted off the bed, bodily splitting the whole of Izuku onto the huge pulsing length of his cock. 

Between them, the bond went haywire like Izuku hadn’t known was possible. Like a symphony of riotous, quivering strings. Like seeing sound, like tasting and smelling color. No longer the black and blue sea of sensation between them but also the pink and violet sky of summer sunrise, the red root of veins connecting and entwining them at every place flesh touched flesh. 

Briefly, Izuku considered he really was hallucinating, but then Katsuki folded Izuku’s knees over Katsuki’s shoulders, walled him in with big, bulging arms on either side of Izuku’s head, and fucked the thought right out of him. Izuku dug nails into Katsuki’s iron biceps and held on, his voice carrying high and sharp as Katsuki stuffed him faster, fuller, the girth of him thickening in a way that promised Izuku a knot, a release, a reprieve from this heaven and hell of encompassing heat. 

And Katsuki’s scent was shifting, riling up spicier, thicker, smoke and leather burning along Izuku’s tongue, filling him, driving him crazier as Katsuki rode him higher. He was so out of his mind on the stretch of his hole around Katsuki’s growing knot that by the time his instinct recognized the specific smell, Katsuki was sinking his teeth anew into Izuku’s mate mark and detonating inside of him, the sharp inflate of his knot and the shots of hot release filling Izuku up sending him into a vibrant, sizzling short circuit. 

Izuku came to, whimpering and sore, the heat in him barely doused and simmering beneath the surface of his skin like a threat. A reminder that this was new; not like heats alone and unsated, nor like the couple heats spent with Katsuki, thoroughly fucked and the fires banked surprisingly quick. 

No, Izuku dimly realized as it dawned on him that Katsuki had arms wrapped around Izuku like a ragdoll and was slowly, slowly fucking his knot up into Izuku like he’d never stopped at all when Izuku had gone down. Arms limp above his head, one heavy leg hiked over Katsuki’s sweaty hip, Izuku licked his lips and gasped with each subtle thrust, felt the slick and cum overflow and seep hot between his asscheeks. Staring at the ceiling as color reflected red hot and syrup slow through their bond, Izuku thought again: 

This was the new Them. Or, the original Them. Didn’t matter. Izuku was whole. Maybe for the first time in his life. A whole, solid piece to a puzzle. 

“Wow,” Izuku said, his breath hitching as the fizzle and pop sparkled up his spine anew and Katsuki’s knot deflated enough to allow a real thick, aching, sloppy fuck between their barely moving bodies. “I love you so much. What the fuck.” 

A gust of hot breath rushed against Izuku’s throat, because of course Katsuki was nuzzling his throat, practically lived there. Izuku understood why now. 

“Don’t sound so fucking surprised,” Katsuki said. The first thing he’d said in forever. The black velvet of his voice was wrecked. He nosed at the side of Izuku’s face, then licked his cheek, an old fashioned, out of date marking. “You smell different.” 

“You smell different,” Izuku shot back, unthinking. He was dizzy again, the air saturated with them, the walls practically dripping with it as Izuku hiked up both legs, ankles hooking at the small of Katsuki’s back to encourage the slow, deep fuck eased by slick and Katsuki’s emptied knot. 

Izuku’s thighs were already shaking, a fizzle and pop sparking up his spine. He rolled his hips once, lithe and sensual, taking Katsuki deepmthen pulling all the way out before fucking himself down onto that hefty girth all over again. 

“The fuck’s your point of reference?” Katsuki choked out, his arms tightening around Izuku, his mouth damp at Izuku’s ear. 

Izuku hummed, too soft around the edges and hard between their slippery bodies to bring it to words. He turned his head and found himself faced with Katsuki’s own mating mark. A silvery scar more ragged than Izuku’s own, as if Katsuki just had to do everything better than him. Izuku’s bite had been savage, desperate, the long-suppressed Alpha in him finally freed, embraced, accepted. 

The scarred gland scented strongly of Katsuki; a fragrance already embedded into Izuku’s genetic make up, a part of who he was now. Spiced sandalwood and warm leather, fireside warmth and brown, toasty sugar. 

Together, they smelled like a forest fire. Wasn’t that something. 

Experimentally, Izuku licked at the glistening hormones that seeped from the gland. The slam of sensation was like taking a hit off something strong, shooting through him like an arrow to the heart and a roaring life between his legs. Izuku moaned and clamped his mouth over it, sucking hard, and oh yeah, the dreamy wash of color and scent and sound wracked through him anew. 

“Rut,” Katsuki rasped, a bright sound scratching at the back of his throat as his entire body jolted around Izuku, an electric chord struck between them both. “S’ rut you’re smellin’. Dammit, shit, fuck, stop, I can’t—” 

Izuku shifted his mouth and bit up Katsuki’s throat, high where anyone would be able to see it. Sucked at a bruise until he could feel Katsuki’s cock begin to inflate all over again— 

He hefted his weight hard, vaulting Katsuki’s moment of weakness and flipping their positions with a great sigh of pleasure. Yeah, he couldn’t take this on his back forever. Not when he’d gotten his second wind and the heat was winding vicious and hungry through his body, begging for a cock that would accept the ferocity with which Izuku wanted, needed.

“You’re with me?” Izuku asked, breathless, hoarse as he pressed palms to Katsuki’s heaving chest and eased down on an ultra thick cock that should already be inside him, spearing him and stretching him out. The punch of Katsuki’s dick went straight to Izuku’s stomach, the drive for deeper and more something only his Alpha could give. 

“With?” Katsuki gaped up at him, the red that had returned in his eyes already receding, swallowed up to black as the rut swarmed his senses. “That—you—” 

Izuku hummed, letting his eyes fall closed as he gasped, licked and bit down on his bottom lip as he rocked into the increasing stretch. Inhaled deep and waded through the musk and sweat and salty cum scents that dripped and mixed with their succulent, spicy heat-rut fragrance. Shuddered out an unsteady breath as he lifted his hips away from a that slowly swelling knot, then working and wiggling his hips down to take it in again. 

“‘Zuku,” Katsuki whispered, hoarse and a little shaky as his hands kneaded up Izuku’s thighs, dug into Izuku’s damp hips, bruising, holding tighter as Izuku just shifted his his ass and chased the bright spark pop that burst from his prostate straight to his cock every time he dropped down just right. “‘Zuku, you gotta—you gotta move.” 

Heat was descending like a storm cloud in high summer, thick and choking, a velvet thunder roar rolling through Izuku’s body, humidity rising, a wet gush sopping Katsuki’s cock anew and easing the slide of his half-knot stretching Izuku too much, too good, just right. Izuku barely registered Katsuki’s words as his own hand went to his leaking cock, his head thrown back, his free hand still splayed on Katsuki’s heaving chest for balance as he rode his Alpha slow and with a singular mind to please only himself. 

Katsuki may have cursed but it may have been a sharp sob, followed by a big, hot hands squeezing at his waist, clenching hard in warning, and then Katsuki was holding him down with a snarl, an iron force as Izuku’s eyes flew open with a panicked cry. The knot popped, inflated fat, too filling, too much, no no no! 

Izuku didn’t know if he was crying out loud but he knew his face was wet as he mindlessly writhed and came, spending across Katsuki’s chest in thick ropes.

When Katsuki came in him, brutally milked by Izuku’s shivering, twitching body, a second orgasm overlapped the last and Izuku cried in earnest, sobbing as the relief washed through his limbs, tingled his fingers and toes, sized his body as he filled up hot and full, a properly fucked and mated Omega. 

Izuku crumpled atop his Alpha, shuddering and unable to stop, overwhelmed by their fucked-out scents and the bond which burst like a smashed peach in a fist, all dripping sticky and sloppy-sweet, delicate pink. 

The black thunder roll of Katsuki’s deep Alpha growl was the only warning between one breath and the next before he was sitting up sharp and quick, iron arms clamped around Izuku’s boneless, fucked-out body— 

And then Izuku was sitting on Katsuki’s lap, sitting on his knot as a second load flooded into him, swelling him at the seams, the overflow of cum seeping out around the knot regardless of how plugged up he was as he sobbing into Katsuki’s neck, both arms thrown over Katsuki’s bulging, muscular shoulders, nails sinking trenches into perfect golden skin. 

Red edged Izuku’s vision even with his eyes clamped tight and all he could do was hold on tight as Katsuki rut up into him, his emptying knot sucking and slurping out of his abused hole in the most obscene symphony of their mating. Dizzy and gasping against Katsuki’s skin for a single solid breath, Izuku’s body and mind spun, soaked in the heavy leather spice of his Alpha, his skin so sensitized he fancied he felt the air shift and rub across his flesh, the hairs on his arms and legs standing on end as Katsuki fucked him open again, spilling thick seed and slick between their thighs and soaking the sheets. 

Izuku wasn’t sure how long Katsuki fucked him. He was almost certain he lost consciousness at some point, or at least faded into a place where he floated on their bond, cherry bright and bursting, a glistening ripple that flowed between them, red red red. His own orgasm was wrung out of him, juice brutally squeezed from the fruit, and just as wet and succulent on his tongue as he wept into Katsuki’s throat and shuddered, shook, shattered apart on top of Katsuki’s deep, bulging knot.

Katsuki uttered the cracked, broken groan of a dead man and slumped forward instead of back, both his and Izuku’s arms around each other like a deathmatch ending in mutual demise. His sweaty cheek mashed on Izuku’s shoulder and vice versa, the both of them hunched and folded toward each other, a mass where neither of them were separate entities but one singular hot mess entangled on the bed. 

The heat subsided enough for a shallow sleep, filled with forest fire dreams, hot lightning sizzling electric in the charged air, and a sunset dripping over the trees to douse the flames. Izuku grunted and whined at some point, separated from his mate and spilling across the sticky sheets, but then cool water touched his lips and he sat up on one elbow enough to drink, enough to wonder at how sweet and clear and bright plain old water tasted, before his head hit the pillow and he surrendered to surreal dreams once more. 

Izuku woke up whimpering, his hips flexing against the mattress, his face buried in a sandalwood and molasses pillow. A big, hot body weighed him down, all sharp angles and thick muscle rolling, a knee wedging Izuku's thighs open, a slick mouth suckling at his gland, a honey gold drip soaking through their bond. 

“There you go, baby,” crooned a dark, soothing night voice as long, calloused fingers slicked down between his asscheeks and slipped right into him, a creamy suction sound all sticky in the air. “So ready for me,” Katsuki slurred against Izuku’s humming skin. He fucked Izuku slow and thorough and deep, just two fingers, not nearly enough even when they curled and touched on the spot that sent Izuku sparking and hips snapping against the sheets. “Opened up for my cock like you were made for me, hah? Listen to you, beautiful, so perfect for me.” 

“Kacchan,” Izuku gasped, blind and struggling to breath into the pillow, his hands gripping and slipping on the mattress. “Kacchan, I—need you, need you, please—” 

“What d’you need, hmmm?” Kacchan’s entire body was sweating on top of him, slippery as he rut the fat brand of his cock against the back of Izuku’s thigh. “Say it, say it now—” 

“Fuck me, Alpha,” Izuku breathed out, his breath hiccuping as he turned his face from the pillow and sucked in a desperate lungful of dank, thick sex air. “Fuck me, fuck me full, need you—”

Katsuki’s long, unhinged moan cut through Izuku’s begging, Katsuki’s face buried against the back of Izuku’s skull, inhaling his frizzy curls as he used both hands to shift and hold Izuku’s hips. Fingers dug into the fat of Izuku’s ass and spread him open, cleared the way for the big, blunt head of Katsuki’s cock to dip into the flooding slick of Izuku’s hole, the ridge of his crown just popping in and filling him so much, right away. 

When Katsuki’s teeth sunk into the back of Izuku’s neck in a heeling, stunning bite, his cock sinking balls-deep in one long, solid thrust, Izuku came on that dick so hard, so fast, it robbed him of breath, of sense, only pleasure and shock railing through him as he clenched around his Alpha’s cock and wailed. Katsuki fucked him through it, his teeth a solid burn at Izuku’s nape, his quivering Omega body utterly still and unable to struggle against the particular pressure while Katsuki crushed him into the bed and had his frantic, fevered way with him. 

Izuku was so sore, and it wasn’t enough. Every thrust ravaged through him, burning and bursting, red spark, red dynamite, red flame, and it wasn’t enough. He knew he was shaking, new he was weeping anew, knew his cock was only half-hard despite the way he clenched around Katsuki’s dick, desperate for more even when his gut was already pregnant with his Alpha's virile load. 

“Kacchan, please!” Izuku begged, unsure what he needed more than what he was getting. He’d never felt so insatiable, never been so needy, so hot, so desperate to be filled and kept. 

Then Katsuki was groaning and rising up and releasing Izuku's neck. Izuku opened his mouth to complain, but Katsuki’s hand was there, fingers shoving into Izuku's mouth, two of them edging along Izuku's teeth then pressing down on his tongue, shoving back until Izuku choked and moaned and got the message. He sucked eagerly, eyes rolling back into his skull as a third finger stretched past his lips, spit dripping down Izuku's chin as he lapped and sucked and loved on Katsuki’s fingers. 

Katsuki fucked him like that, one palm on Izuku's hip to angle them, testing each thrust until every slap of skin on skin arrowed Katsuki’s cock against the spot that had Izuku losing sight, breath, sense. Katsuki was unrelenting, breathing hard, panting like a dog, sweat from his face and body dripping onto Izuku's back as he was filled and fucked from both ends. Izuku cried out each and every time, choking on Katsuki’s fingers if he took them too far, too enthusiastic, too mindless, a slave to sensation, to Alpha cock and the scent and sound of them. 

This orgasm came on different, like a tsunami, a distant, ominous rise that Izuku felt coming in the way his entire body tensed and stilled, followed by a crash so loud that Izuku lost all sense of his surroundings. He went under with a violence that shook him to the bone, his fists knotting in the sheets until his joints ached, and when Katsuki took a chunk of Izuku's shoulder in his teeth, roaring behind the force of the bite and inflating inside Izuku's ripe, soaking center, Izuku drowned entirely. 

But the power of Izuku’s release wouldn’t let him go, wouldn’t let him collapse as his own body wrung him dry, his ass clutching greedy around Katsuki’s cock, craving every thick spurt that mated him down deep. Katsuki may have said Izuku’s name or a prayer or both were the same, but Izuku was too high, too faded around the edges as everything in his body released at once, sated and soaring. 

This time around Izuku slept without dreams. Probably because he was more unconscious than asleep, but either way his body rested, recuperated. 

Izuku woke to midday light burning against the closed curtains and Katsuki spooning him, dick already heavy and hot in Izuku’s ass with the faintest flex and thrust of hips against him. The red hot burn of spicy rut in Katsuki’s scent was milder, an ember glow against dark, luscious leather and Izuku breathed it in, sighed and wiggled his hips back, parting his thighs to throw one leg back over Katsuki’s hips to open himself for an easier, smoother fuck. He tilted his chin and reached up and back, hands bunching in Katsuki’s hair, holding on as they moved in time. 

Vaguely, Izuku recognized his scent gentling as Katsuki murmured praise in his ear, less choking jungle green and more damp earth and summer rain on grass. He smelled. . .nice. Nothing to write home about; didn’t understand what the big fucking deal was that Alphas tripped and slobbered at their feet for him, but over the years he’d come to assume he somehow smelled. . .wrong. 

Mating with Katsuki, Izuku thought he smelled exactly as he should. And wasn’t that just something.

Katsuki sighed at Izuku’s ear, a gentle breath so at odds with the day and night before. Those lovely, hard palms skimmed came around him and painted down Izuku’s torso, leaving warmth in their wake that all fizzed and coiled at Izuku’s hard, dripping cock. 

Izuku hummed and arched beneath the touch, his body aglow and at peace, his own hand guiding Katsuki’s to rest low at his belly where the soft bulge signaled just how satisfied his body was with how well his Alpha had filled and kept him full. Katsuki crooned his pleasure and nuzzled at Izuku’s throat, then slowly eased onto his back, taking Izuku with him. 

But Izuku didn’t want to lay prone, belly up as Katsuki fucked into him. A spark of heat still sizzled beneath his skin, little jumpy nerves skipping sparks through his blood as he sat up. Facing away like this, straddling Katsuki’s lap, his Alpha’s cock clutched inside him satisfyingly deep. With one hand on either of Katsuki’s thighs for balance, Izuku cast a heavy-lidded look over his shoulder and met Katsuki’s eyes. 

Katsuki groaned, barely able to hold his gaze, and quickly it dropped, black pupils eclipsing the fire of his eyes as he watched his cock stretch and spread Izuku’s ass open. Izuku laughed breathlessly and began to move, putting on a show, buzzing down to the bones with a solid, soul-bonded sense of completion as he drove his Alpha to distraction. 

Freedom. Izuku inhaled, savored the burn of their forest fire scent, and thought: 

This is what freedom feels like. 

They came in tandem with Katsuki’s knot keeping Izuku locked to him, binding them, the connection between them humming a newer, sweeter frequency. Katsuki laid them out on their sides, easing a sensitive, shivering Izuku down into their nest and wrapping arms and legs around him until they slept again. 

“Holy shit,” was the first thing Izuku said when he finally, finally woke up and came to his entire damn senses. 

Katsuki was sitting up in bed beside him, back against the headboard, and going through his phone. He glanced up and quickly gave Izuku a once over, scanning and cataloging whatever it was he was looking for. Then he met Izuku’s eyes and grinned, sharp and wide, wolfish and boyish all in one, and Izuku’s entire heart fell again. 

“Holy shit?” Katsuki asked, setting his phone aside. He opened his arms and Izuku crawled into them, groaning as he rested his cheek on that broad, firm chest. Katsuki smelled amazing; unshowered and arguably nasty, but perfect—Izuku’s, his. 

“I hurt everywhere,” Izuku said, wincing as he shifted his aching hips. He was actually kind of terrified to go to the bathroom for the first time in like, a whole day. His belly felt full and every shift of his thighs together released a new gush of cum between them. 

Katsuki chirped a rare happy noise and Izuku refrained from squishing one of Japan’s top Heroes and kissing his face all over. 

“Don’t give me too much pity,” Izuku mumbled. “Jeez.” 

He knew Katsuki could hear his smile regardless. Just as he could hear Katsuki’s. 

“Yeah, I’m absolutely full of pity for the guy who got fucked within an inch of his life by yours truly.” 

Izuku slapped a hand to Katsuki’s bare stomach, not lightly, and enjoyed Katsuki’s grunt of surprise and vague pain. 

“Jerk,” Izuku said warmly. “I need a bath. A long one.” 

Katsuki made an abrupt noise and the arm he had around Izuku’s shoulders abruptly tightened. When Izuku looked up, he startled to see Katsuki’s expression pinched and. . .shy? 

“Not yet,” Katsuki muttered, looking at Izuku’s face but not his eyes. “You’re—you smell like me.” 

Izuku’s smile was slow and wide with realization. He shifted up, ignoring the deep ache in his body so he could straddle just one of Katsuki’s thighs, his own thighs obviously thicker than his Alpha’s when they were side by side like this. Another warm gush of slick and cum spilled out as he spread his legs to accommodate Katsuki’s thigh, and Izuku caught the exact moment Katsuki realized what was coating his leg so quickly.

“You wanna keep me a mess, huh?” Izuku murmured, idly rutting down on Katsuki’s hairy thigh, just enjoying himself, relishing the way his still loose hole sparked and hummed hot and needy against Katsuki’s skin. 

Katsuki’s lips parted, his mouth flushing dark to match his cheeks, eyes blown dark as he nodded. 

“Yeah,” he breathed out, then inhaled, his nostrils flaring dramatically. “D’you—you smell it, right?” 

Katsuki had asked Izuku a remarkably similar question the very first time they met. 

This time Izuku whispered, yes, as he cupped Katsuki’s face in both hands and kissed him soft. 

“Yeah,” Izuku said against Katsuki’s parting lips. “I smell it, handsome.” 

Katsuki’s hands were gentle and encompassing on Izuku’s waist, just holding him in place as they exchanged lazy, messy kisses. Izuku couldn’t help but keep up the roll of his hips, relishing the mess between them, the evidence of their mating as felt himself grow wet all over again, dripping anew around all that hot cum matting in their thigh hair. 

God, Izuku felt disgusting in the best way ever. He groaned into their kiss, his hands itching to touch, suddenly frantic as they caressed Katsuki’s stubbled cheeks and stroked down his throat, over his shoulders, and roaming his chest to land on his hardening cock. Izuku sighed against Katsuki’s tongue, letting his Alpha lick up his sounds as he cupped a palm over the crown of Katsuki’s cock and used the leaking mess to massage and squeeze just the head. 

Katsuki uttered a pained sound and shuddered, one of his hands pressing to the small of Izuku’s back, urging him higher up his leg, almost humping his hip, while Katsuki’s free hand reached around and lower to gently test the tender skin of Izuku’s hole. A zing shot straight through him and Izuku moaned against Katsuki’s smiling mouth, started working the obscene length of his Alpha’s cock in long, frantic strokes as Izuku tipped his hips to invite those questioning fingers. 

Izuku got off like that, using Katsuki’s hip and thigh to rut his dick against. Katsuki kept slurping his fingers out of Izuku’s ass and shoving the leaking cum back in, using it as lube to fuck him harder, slicker, faster, and each time he overflowed, Katsuki would pause, collect the mess, then stuff and slide it back in. 

By the end of it, Izuku was wild for release, blindly humping the wet his cock left on Katsuki’s hip, his forehead pressed to Katsuki’s, their mouths smearing breath between them, his hand and wrist cramping up at Katsuki’s dick. And of course Katsuki held off to the end, finger-fucked Izuku into oblivion and swallowed Izuku’s plaintive noises as Izuku shot off between them, and then Katsuki followed with Izuku’s name on his lips. 

Limp and loose and spent, Izuku collapsed into him, vaguely glad for the headboard at Katsuki’s back which kept them from dissolving into the bed. The musky, masculine aroma of buttery worn leather and deep cabin warmth suffused through Izuku’s body and eased some of the pain in his bones, his Alpha’s calming scent coddling him through the final tremors as peace blanketed them both. 

“Yeah,” Izuku croaked. “Gonna need that bath now. And you’re not invited.” 

Katsuki made a flat, disapproving noise at the back of his throat but didn’t move. 

“Fuck you.” 

“Not for at least another twenty-four hours,” Izuku drawled, drunk on too many orgasms. He cracked an eye and realized the clock showed early evening time, the same time he’d gone into heat the night before. Where had the time gone? How? 

“I’ll sit on the floor while you bathe,” Katsuki said, forever surprising Izuku when he showed himself to be a gentleman. “Don’t want you fallin’ asleep or some shit and drowning yourself.” 

“As if I would.” 

“We both know you would.” 

Izuku sighed and didn’t argue the point. Katsuki’s hand found his hair and he turned his face to nuzzle at Izuku’s throat, a familiar comfort. Katsuki’s voice soothed through his skin and left it shimmery and overstimulated as he spoke.

“I’ll wash your back or whatever. And while we do that, I’ll order a shit ton of food. We got left overs from your party but you need like, home cooked good stuff.” 

“Shit!” Izuku jolted up, eyes wide on Katsuki’s narrowed expression. “My party! I forgot all about it! Oh my god, how could I even—” 

“As if anyone cares,” Katsuki said, reaching up to brush Izuku’s sweaty curls from his sticky brow. “We all kinda figured out what happened at once when Inasa started getting weirdly aggressive and showing off his teeth, yellin’ at Shinsou for talkin’ to Chisaki ‘n shit. Your heat riled him up real good, unmated Alpha he is and all.” 

“Oh nooo,” Izuku wailed as he shoved his face into Katsuki’s chest. “I feel awful. I bet he feels awful too. Inasa’s like the only Alpha who has never hit on me.” 

Katsuki sighed and stroked Izuku’s hair. 

“S’fine. He was fine. They brawled barely at all, okay?” 

“BRAWLED?” Izuku wailed, sitting up so suddenly that his head knocked on Katsuki’s chin. He was so distressed that he outright ignored Katsuki’s curse and glare. “Are they okay? Is the living room okay?” 

“Everything is okay, holy shit, freckles!” Katsuki held Izuku’s face in both hands, his thumbs soothing the apples of Izuku’s cheeks in long, even strokes as they made eye contact. “Like I said, I’m pretty sure everybody got the gist of what the hell was happening. There’s nothing to worry about. When you passed out and I went downstairs for water, everything was all cleaned up and crap. And you can bet your pretty ass it wasn’t me who done that.” 

The wind left Izuku’s sails as quickly as it had come and he sagged, nodding faintly as he wilted into Katsuki’s open arms, his head tucked beneath Katsuki’s chin once more. 

Quietly, and with more than a little awe, Izuku whispered: “I can smell you.” 

“Yeah,” Katsuki croaked, his voice oddly full, deep. 

“And I love you still,” Izuku murmured, shifting only to press a kiss to a collarbone. Katsuki shivered.

“Yeah,” he said. A pause, then, “More? Less?” 

Izuku snorted a laugh. 

“Eh. Middle-same.” 

Izuku was already laughing by the time Katsuki hollered and harrumphed with displeasure, rolling them back to the bed, and it was still some time after that before Izuku finally soaked down to the bone in a deep, bubbly bath. 

Katsuki sat on the floor, his back to the edge and kissed Izuku’s fingers where they rested on the lip of porcelain, and Izuku thought maybe he loved Bakugou Katsuki a little more than middle-same.

Notes:

IMPORTANT NOTE JAN 20 2023: I’m getting A LOT of comments about this being abandoned. It’s not abandoned. I’m suffering a spinal injury, which started up in late August. I got Covid in early September and as I am immunocompromised, I suffered greatly from this for a good month on top of the spinal injury. From September onward, I have been on constant strong painkillers, 24/7, live in unstoppable pain, have had epidural steroid shots, and am now awaiting spinal surgery. I have been out of my job since September, am a single mom who can’t walk or stand, and am struggling to get through each day. This is not abandoned. Please go easy on me.

 

If you enjoy the Quiet Rapture world, I HIGHLY recommend that you Subscribe to not only this fic, but the actual
Quiet Rapture Series. Once this fic ends, I'm going to be releasing one-shots that continue the story and you'll want to be notified for that!

In the same vein, do check out Kill The Lights, which is an AU of my own AU! The story of QR if BkDk had met as teenagers instead. Very disastrous and a total blast.

Sending all my love!

AND HAPPY BIRTHDAY DEKU! (Both in the fic and yesterday!)

Chapter 49

Summary:

“Life happens so fast,” Izuku found himself saying, quietly, like a secret. “Every moment is gone as quick as it happens and before you know it you’re standing somewhere you didn’t even see yourself arrive.”

Notes:

I know, it's been a while. For those who haven't kept up on my Lala Lore via social media or whatever, the short of it is:

1. Got Covid in my first week back, working at school, in August 2022. I have immune system issues due to my kidney transplant and it took me many weeks to recover.
2. After years of back pain, I stopped being able to walk in mid-September 2022. Beyond excruciating pain.
3. I spent Sept 2022-Feb 2023 drugged up to my eyes on more than one pain medicine, going to physical therapy, multiple tests, spinal shots, and then finally spinal surgery when they found out the lower part of my spine was shattered.
4. Surgery in Feb 2023, then recovery, then back to work in April 2023 while I continued to heal.

The single mom life while being physically bed-ridden, unable to walk to the bathroom, to care for myself or my child, while on heavy medications, all impaired my ability and confidence to write. I've been working up to writing this because I'm struggling with my confidence, my energy, and my life lately.

All that being said, thank you for your kindness. Your time and your generosity and your heartfelt feedback.

Comments are on. There is this chapter and one more left. I will reply to all comments (unless purposefully inflammatory). I hope you stick with me to the end of this story.

Songs For This Chapter:
abstract art - Wrabel | Spotify | YouTube
Heaven - Niall Horan | Spotify | YouTube
Young & In Love - morgxn | Spotify | YouTube

Izumi Kouta had never considered himself lucky.

Not blessed, not fortunate, not any other hashtag at the end of a self-important social media post. He hadn’t grown up in a household of clean, streamlined furniture or had a parent to coo and coddle him during sick nights or draw him a cool bath for his first heats. He’d grown up too angry and jagged around the edges to make any friends that stuck, and as he’d grown, the only people receptive to him were those interested in the perceived weakness between his legs.

The deep country had never been kind to Omegas, and certainly not the rarer males like him. And while his aunt had been kind, like a person is kind to a dog they adopt from a shelter, Kouta had grown to hate her as much as he hated anyone else.

It had never been fair to her, and Kouta had recognized that after all of it—after the running away and the hospital and the going home only to come back. He’d realized it wasn’t fair to her, either, that a four year-old boy had been thrust into her care when she too was another big damn Hero who wanted to save everyone but the people closest to them.

Kouta hadn’t hated her because of how she’d treated him. He’d hated her because, for the longest time, he could still remember what it had felt like to have parents who loved him, really fucking loved him, and now that it was gone, there was no one and nothing who could or would ever make him feel that kind of love.

Most of all, he hated his parents for taking that love away, because now he knew what it meant to lose that which was most intrinsic to living.

“I can’t fucking breathe in this thing,” Bakugou snapped in the face of an unruffled Sero, who continued to resolutely tie the loose, black and gray striped hakama pants of the groom. “How tight you gonna tie that, motherfucker. You want all the blood cut off from my dick to sabotage my wedding night, hah? I will hang you up by the balls in the shrine and make a wish on your corpse.”

“Jeez, dude,” Kirishima said with a strangled laugh from where he lounged in a velvet chaise, picking at a bowl of bright green grapes. His own kimono matched that of Bakugou’s pack, all of them having agreed on the drape of deep, earthly maroon and cream.

Kouta had never been to a wedding before—had never given it even the barest thought—so it was kind of cool to see the packs between Bakugou and Izuku differentiated by their own colors. One side of the wedding aisle and the other weren’t simply for blood family, but blood brothers and sisters.

“It’s not even tight,” Sero said, finishing up with a jovial pat on Bakugou’s shoulder and a mile-wide grin. “You’re just having a panic attack.”

“Like hell I am,” Bakugou snapped, his spicy scent going acrid and smoky in Kouta’s wrinkled nose. “I’m fine. You’re not fine. I’m fine.”

“Dumbass,” Mina said from her perch beside Kouta, placed much too close for a mated Alpha and an unmarked Omega ten years her junior to be sitting. Kouta felt all kinds of. . .something about that, but comfortable was not one of them. He wouldn’t say so, though. That wasn’t cool. “You’re already mated. What’re you nervous about? You think Izuku’s gonna realize he has way better prospects in Shindo Yo after all?”

“Do not say that fucking name in front of me,” Bakugou hollered, waving an arm to swipe off Sero, who approached with the black haori. “I will spill blood on my wedding day!”

“I mean,” Denki said from his spot at the table of champagne and glasses. “That would be very traditional. Like, strictly speaking or whatever. Didn’t the Alpha use to give their Omega a human sacrifice of a weaker Alpha as a gift? Like how my mom’s cat leaves dead animals on her pillow.”

“I’ll be bringing back that tradition in about two seconds if you don’t shut your trap.”

“But I’m not an Alpha!” Denki wailed, looking genuinely fearful as he skirted the table upon Bakugou’s half-threatening jolt in his general direction. “Kacchan, don’t bully me, I’m scared!”

“You’re all idiots,” Kouta muttered, slouching back into the couch, arms folded across his chest as he eyed the room of full-grown Heroes who bickered and joked more than the teenagers at his new school. “Show some decorum, for fuck’s sake. It’s a wedding.”

“Watch your mouth, shit snack,” Bakugou said mildly as he turned back to the mirror and actually allowed Sero to help him into the luxuriously draped haori fabric.

“Watch yours, cinder brains,” Kouta replied with even less heat, already bored with the exchange. Why wasn’t he allowed to drink? This sucked. “When do we get this show on the road? I’m bored. You’re all annoying. I bet Izuku’s room is having fun.”

“Shut up and sit down,” Bakugou said, even though Kouta was already sitting, which earned an eye roll and a glare between them. “You stay with me. You’re my—”

When Bakugou stopped and frowned, Kouta backed off too, narrowing his eyes at Bakugou’s sober profile.

“We should probably find our seats, though,” Mina said, heaving a great and obvious sigh of exaggerated exertion as she braced a pink hand on Kouta’s shoulder and pushed to her feet. She too wore the kimono of deep maroon as well, and in Kouta’s opinion it didn’t suit her at all, but she was the only one who wore black underclothes with it, and it made her look more striking, sharper than the rest. Aside from Bakugou, she was the only other Alpha in this pack, after all.

“Thank fuck,” Kouta said, also standing and pausing to brush the wrinkles from his own sedate black and grey kimono.

“Oh no,” Mina said quietly, leaning in with those big gold eyes and big lips and big boobs and holy hell, Kouta hated puberty more than he enjoyed anything about it. “Hasn’t blondie told you? The son of an Alpha stays on the Alpha’s side for the ceremony. More traditions, I’m afraid, though far less bloody and exciting.”

“The—” Kouta’s teeth cracked shut so quickly that his jaw ached, eyes wide as he cut a sharp look between Mina’s close face and where Bakugou was murmuring something to an eager, nodding Kirishima. “That’s not—I’m not—”

“Honey.” Mina’s voice was all warmth, all motherhood and soft embraces as she brought a palm to Kouta’s flushed cheek. “Aren’t you, though? Don’t hang onto that loneliness, kid. It’s more deadly than murder. You’d know.”

With that, she lightly ruffled his artfully spiked hair and winked before making her way from the room. She paused in the doorway to plant a smacking kiss on Bakugou’s cheek, ignoring his warning growl, and said,

“Don’t fuck it up today, buddy. Any of it. Save that for the rest of your lives together.”

“Gee,” Bakugou hissed, “aren’t you the paragon of moral fucking support.”

“You don’t need moral support, big guy. You need someone with a good leash to lead you in the right direction.” She grinned at Bakugou’s scowl and flounced away. “And you’re lucky as hell you found him!”

“Ridiculous,” Bakugou muttered to himself, crossing the dressing room to unscrew the cap of a water bottle and guzzle it all in one go.

Kouta just watched, his guts churning with Mina’s words, trying to make them sink or swim, trying to figure out which was worth it.

“So,” Bakugou said, outright startling Kouta from where he’d been chewing on a thumbnail.

Quickly, Kouta collected himself into a usual pointed glare. Much more his speed and not so. . .terrifying as being vulnerable to Mina’s influence.

“So, what?” Kouta said.

“Tsch.” Bakugou gritted his teeth, his hands moving to stuff into pockets, then growling when he found none, so he only turned and made for the small carry-on suitcase he’d brought. “You’re not gonna make this easy on me, are ya, kid.”

“As a general rule, yeah,” Kouta drawled, making a point to slouch into the couch with little care as his heart raced. When Bakugou turned with a small box in his hand and a look like sour milk, Kouta scoffed a laugh. “S’that? Your ring for Izuku? Don’t lose it, dumbass.”

“Dumbass,” Bakugou shot back, presenting the box to Kouta with cheeks rising in color. “It’s for you. Take it already before I change my mind.”

“Uh.” Kouta didn’t reach for the box and Bakugou didn’t open it. “No? What—hell no. That’s gay.”

“That doesn’t even make sense,” Bakugou shot back. “I’m gay and that doesn’t even make sense to me.”

“But why the hell are you giving me a ring? Is this normal?”

“Since when is anything normal anymore,” Bakugou snapped, but his face was slowly seeping red and his eyes had dropped to the box as he opened it and thrust it forward, bumping it into Kouta’s chest so that he was forced to catch the box or drop it. “If you must fucking know—”

“I really do—”

“It’s a promise,” Bakugou said flatly. He paused then, the gravity of his statement sinking into Kouta’s heart, filling in some of the old, worn out gaps. “From us. Me ‘n Izuku, to you. We know your parents are always gonna be your parents and we ain’t interested in covering up who you were and are. But we promise we’ll be here for the rest of who you become.”

Kouta stilled and stared at the open box in his palm. The ring was sturdy and black, some kind of material he couldn’t begin to recognize. Inlaid around the center was a streak of shimmering ocean blue, mottled sparks of turquoise and sea green flashing with a surprise of pinkish red in the depths. Wordlessly, Kouta removed the ring from the box and turned it in the light, watching the bright water inlay flicker and refract the light. He didn’t understand what he was looking at, but it was beautiful in ways things just weren’t in the real world.

“I didn’t pick it,” Bakugou said into the stretching silence. “I uh, I mean. I approved it, but Izuku’s always better with this kinda shit. The, uh, the center part going ‘round is an abalone shell. S’why it’s all rainbow shiny or whatever. Izuku thought it suited you. So. . .”

“This is still pretty gay,” Kouta deadpanned as he put the ring on his middle finger and held it out to wordlessly admire while Bakugou sputtered. “Thanks, though. It’s cool, I guess.”

“You guess,” Bakugou replied flatly, but when he rolled his eyes, the corner of his mouth tugged into a crooked grin. “Y’know, whenever my ma was pissed at me, she’d say she hoped I’d have a kid exactly like me as payback.”

“You can only dream.” Kouta tossed the ring box toward Bakugou and scoffed when it was effortlessly caught. “For now you’ll have to deal with one better than you.”

Bakugou’s bark of amusement surprised a short laugh out of Kouta in return. He immediately squealed, his newly-lower voice cracking as he protested the bulky arm hooking around his neck and dragging him into a rough side hug.

“Smartass,” Bakugou said with a warmth that Kouta didn’t know how to accept nor turn away. “Let’s get out there and get this over with.”

“So you are nervous.”

“I’m never nervous,” Bakugou said as he needlessly fucked around with his hair in the mirror.

“Yeah right. I was there when you tried to move that statue of Chisaki and his head bust through the wall and into the hall. Nearly shit your pants when Izuku started up the stairs.”

“The ceilings are low! I had no room to move him! Fucker keeps shifting my gym shit every time Izuku lets him into the damn house!”

“I thought he had a house key.”

Bakugou stilled.

“He does not.”

Kouta snorted at the dawning horror in Bakugou’s voice.

“Okay, but he does.”

“What do you know. Tell me!”

Laughing riotously, Kouta burst into the hall and slammed straight into a wall of mellow, cologne and subtle Beta scent. His grin dropped as he glared up on instinct, only to find himself looking into the face of a handsomely aged version of Bakugou Katsuki.

“‘Sup,” Kouta said flatly as he stepped back and promptly bumped into Bakugou.

“Dad,” Bakugou said, his heavy hand rising to rest on the back of Kouta’s neck, an instinctive familial scenting. Kouta wondered if Bakugou even realized how often he pulled people into his Alpha circle of protection, or if it was so a part of him that these touches went utterly unnoticed. Or maybe Kouta was special. That would be a weird fucking concept.

“You ready, son?” Masaru said, his smile kind and nothing like his kid’s feral, boyish demeanor. He was a real chill dude and Kouta kind of liked him from the few ‘family dinners’ he’d had to endure with the lot of them. Masaru and Izuku were safe, nonthreatening, warm.

“Hell yeah I am,” Bakugou replied, beginning to lead Kouta down the corridor by the scruff of his nape. Kouta ducked out of it and slapped his hand back to connect with Bakugou’s arm, but Bakugou must have been in a real banger of a mood because he didn’t even snap at him or start shit over it.

“Everyone’s seated,” Masaru began—

An abrupt, angry ringing railed through the muffled calm of the corridor and Bakugou’s easy demeanor dropped like a stone. Before Kouta could voice his concern, Bakugou had turned to rush back into the room.

“Work,” he called over his shoulder as he disappeared.

“What the fuck,” Kouta monotoned.

“At least he’s not bringing it with him to the alter,” Masaru said, unfazed as he ever seemed to be. “He has always been work first, life second.”

Kouta wanted to disagree. The image Masaru painted didn’t correctly overlap with the Bakugou Katsuki that he knew. Bakugou checked in with Izuku often, especially on his longer shifts. He answered his texts and assured Izuku he wasn’t injured when some kind of pain or horror carried through their bond, and he always left his shift on time to be home when he said he’d be. Bakugou was boringly devoted to living a balanced life.

After a short wait, Bakugou’s low voice too mumbled to understand from the hall, Bakugou reappeared with a sallow complexion and sweat dotting his brow. He strode up to them, expression stony as he handed the phone to Masaru.

“Hold onto that ‘til I get into a proper suit, old man. And don’t tell anyone you’ve got it on you. Meet me back here after the ceremony.”

Kouta frowned, his hackles high, a chill clinging to his arms and spine as he looked between Bakugou’s stoic visage and Masaru’s sober nod.

“What’s wrong?” Kouta asked as he quickly fell into step with the two much taller Bakugous. When no one answered, Kouta sped up and grabbed at Bakugou’s arm. “Hey, are you—”

“It’s just work.” Bakugou spared Kouta a glance as he increased speed. “Nothing for you to worry about.”

“But you’re worried.”

“It’s my job to worry, not you.”

“Oh, well, wow, thanks for the advice,” Kouta snarked as the sound of the hotel’s venue hall started to rise with proximity. “I’m fucking honored to absorb such wisdom.”

“Watch your fuckin’ mouth,” Bakugou shot back, but it was too careless to carry any heat. “Hey. Hey, stop.”

Kouta whipped around, his arms folded tightly across his chest as he glowered. Bakugou ran a hand down his face and when his big palm fell, he looked easier, his sharp features softer as he met Kouta’s eyes.

“Look, I’m over it now. Work is work. The city is the city. Someone else gets to take care of it tonight. And I’m gonna get married. Sound good to you, boss man?”

Kouta narrowed his gaze, searching for signs of subterfuge. Then he sighed, his shoulders dropping.

“Fine. Whatever. Go get married already.”

Bakugou grinned and reached out, squeezing the back of Kouta’s neck again.

“Nothin’ could stop me.”

And as Kouta came to sit in the front row and watch the fanfare play out with great, grand romanticism, it hit him right in the chest.

The thing about Bakugou and Izuku was that they were, like, seriously in love. True Mates in love, whatever that felt like. Dedicated to each other and shit.

Kouta remembered how his parents had looked at each other; how they had put the others’ needs above everyone and everything, but Kouta couldn’t romanticize their relationship enough to say it was like this for them.

There was just something about the way Bakugou and Izuku gravitated around each other. Looked to each other. Finished each other’s sentences when telling a story. Ordered the right food for each other. Mimicked each other’s hand movements when speaking.

Despite the vast spectrum of their differing personalities, there was almost an eerie twinness about them. A person would have to hang out with them for a while to catch on, but once Kouta had noticed, there was no ignoring it.

Was that love?

Kouta didn’t fucking know. He was the last person to be able to comment. But he thought maybe all of these things were the side effects of love.

The real love was the way they gave into each other when it wasn’t worth a fight, but stood their ground against each other when it mattered. How they worked as a team even when they disagreed. Stood up for each other. Told off each other. Reached out, held, kept, comforted.

Kouta had been so young when his parents had passed that he didn’t exactly have a direct line to understanding what a healthy relationship looked like anymore. But he liked to think he was getting a crash course in it now. Even watching his unofficial guardians fuck up with each other, bicker and nitpick, separate and return to apologize, was a learning experience in real time.

Now, watching them exchange rings, their hands linked, their eyes cast over each other like a true religion before they smiled into a sealing kiss, it really fucking hit him.

I’ve hated Heroes for as long as I can remember, but these two might be the best thing that ever happened to me.

And for the first time in my life, I feel like I got lucky.

 

 

“Baby,” Katsuki said the moment the dressing room door shut behind them. Izuku was already in his arms and pressed against the wall, Katsuki’s hand at his hip and the other smoothing right up the large sleeve of Izuku’s kimono, palming skin and desperate for more, immediately.

Izuku’s breathless laugh sent delighted, sparkling chills through their bond and down Katsuki’s body.

“Stop with the baby,” Izuku managed, humor quivering each word as they avidly untangled each other’s sashes and yanked open layers of ceremonial cloth.

Katsuki’s palms smacked against the wall at either side of Izuku’s head, caging him in as Katsuki leaned in with a sharp, predatory smile.

“My Omega. My Alpha. My mate. My husband. Fuckin’ mine. Now kiss me already.”

“So demanding,” Izuku rasped out, his eyes large and dilated, his forest floor scent soaking the room in dark humidity, clinging to the back of Katsuki’s panting mouth.

Heaven was the pliant give of Izuku’s body against his own, like sinking into the damp earth until the world became a muffled and muted surrounding. The wet velvet swipe of his tongue and the strong, hurried hands pulling at Katsuki’s clothes, guiding them toward the gilded chaise lounge.

Izuku splayed out against the cream and gold tapestry of the chaise, his forest curls stark and lush around his rosy face. Katsuki eased between his spread legs, swallowing hard against the whisper of heavy fabric brushing against folds and drapes of more fabric, Izuku’s skin all flushed at the sharp, stark vee of his neckline. Calling him, the full moon mark of Katsuki’s teeth calling him as he leaned in to lap at it in slow, purposeful licks. Izuku’s breath hitched and held as Katsuki’s nipped at the spot and moved to his ear, breathing in that come-hither scent radiating hot and wet from Izuku’s hairline.

Izuku keened, a high Omega call of submission, the sound echoing through the quiver of their bond. Katsuki rumbled low in Izuku’s ear, an instinctive response as his hand dragged down Izuku’s hip and fingered back the folds of ceremonial cloth to slip past Izuku’s waistband. Smooth, fevered skin greeted him and Izuku’s frame arched up like a plucked string, their bond bowing and glowing in turn.

“How wet’re you gonna be for me, Omega?” Katsuki whispered against Izuku’s temple as his hand and arm traveled lower, palming over Izuku’s softly furred leg, fingertips just skirting the taut band of his underwear.

“Kacchan,” Izuku gasped out, hips flexing forward.

A knock cracked through the tension and broke it in two. Katsuki pulled back sharply, his teeth bared on automatic.

“THE FUCK YOU WANT,” he bellowed. Izuku giggled below him, the saucy little fuck.

“You okay in there, bud?” said his dad through the door.

Katsuki actively felt his libido wilt. Ugh. Parents. Suddenly he was glad he had no sex drive to speak of during his teens.

“I repeat,” Katsuki hollered as he pulled back and began to adjust himself in his pants. “The fuck you want?”

“You asked me to come, remember?”

Cold realization cut through any remaining heat worked up in Katsuki’s body as he quickly made for the door. Through his bond, he felt Izuku’s instant curiosity pulling and plucking at the taut connection between them.

“Leave it,” Katsuki said low, not bothering to cast a look over his shoulder. They were so in tune, he knew Izuku would hear.

With a sigh, Katsuki cracked the door open just enough to shove his face through and glare.

“Bad timing,” he snapped.

Masaru gave him a placid look of a father who notoriously gave no fucks but kept the attitude neatly blanketed beneath his eternally amiable demeanor.

“Here,” he said, holding out the work phone.

Katsuki quickly snatched it up and shoved it in his pocket. He wanted to check for updates, for confirmation that an apprehension had been made, for anything, but with Izuku just feet away, he had no chance of doing it in a low profile way.

“No messages,” Masaru said, as if reading his mind. He made a show of glancing up over Katsuki’s head. “It was a lovely ceremony, son,” he called out to Izuku. “Just let me know if you boys need help tying the tie on those suits of yours!”

“Thanks!” Izuku sounded distant and muffled, like he was already changing clothes in the bathroom. Opportunity lost.

“I’m considering strangling you before I do,” Katsuki snapped as he stepped back from the wood and moved to pocket his phone. He growled at the reminded that he had no fucking pockets and promptly checked the notifications for himself and, disappointed, tossed the phone on lounge. He looked up and found his dad leaning in the doorway, looking on with a serene set to his curved mouth. “What,” Katsuki said tiredly. “ Thought you’d gone.”

“Whatever emergency is happening out there,” Masaru said quietly as Izuku rummaged around in the bathroom, “can be handled by people who were trained to handle it. You’re not the only competent Hero in this city, Katsuki.”

“I’m the best one though.”

Masaru smiled a little wider and inclined his chin.

“Maybe you are. But tonight is your night to live your life. So live it to the fullest.”

Katsuki felt his shoulders slump at the reassurance.

“I’m trying,” he admitted. He didn’t mean tonight, or what danger lurked around the corner, but his entire life. Embracing being more than a Hero, a star, the best of the best.

Embracing being, because living meant more than achieving.

“I know you are.” The hug shouldn’t have caught Katsuki by surprise, but it did. Katsuki melts into the firm, unyielding confidence of his father’s embrace; breathed in his subtle scent of childhood comfort, and released.

“KNOCK KNOCK,” hollered the most obnoxious intrusion known to man, only then followed by a jovial rap on the open door.

Katsuki jolted from his dad’s arms and glowered at a grinning Shinsou and mutely amused Todoroki.

“The fuck’re you—”

“Here to help you into your suits,” Shinsou said as he glided in with an air of importance. He flashed Masaru a slow smile and eyed him from top to bottom. “Hi, Daddy Bakugou.”

“CAN WE ALL PLEASE STOP WITH THE DADDY,” Katsuki screeched as he shoved his beaming father out the door.

“Who is we?” Todoroki chimed in. “Who is calling who Daddy?”

“Oh, hey!” Izuku entered the room, stripped down to sinfully cherry red underwear. Katsuki hate-loved him so much in this moment. “Who’s Daddy?”

Shinsou hugged Izuku and shot Katsuki a shit-eating grin over Izuku’s shoulder.

“That’s what we’d like to know.”

“I’d like to know if I’m going to survive this night with the way you idiots are carrying on,” Katsuki said, but they all carried on like school kids and took twice as long to get ready for the after party.

 

 

From the elevated length of the honored guest seating, Hitoshi relished not only his place as Best Man, but his view over the array of round tables extended across the hall, and all the drama that followed.

Izuku sat front and center beside Bakugou, totally lost in his husband and mate, while on Hitoshi’s other side, Chisaki Kai stewed in his secondary place as a groomsman. Talking Chisaki’s ear off was Inasa, who had never been to a wedding and acting absolutely darling about it. Bakugou had Kirishima, followed by a surly Shouto who kept flashing sulky eyes down the table at Hitoshi, with Mina leaning into him with active chatter. Each table was capped by Eri and Kouta, neither of which looked particularly thrilled to be the book ends to the mayhem.

Ignoring the warring scents of displeasure, adrenaline, and joy filling the hall, Hitoshi brought a champagne flute to his curved lips and leaned toward Chisaki, using the glass to subtly hide his mouth as he spoke.

“Aren’t you supposed to give a speech at some point?”

Neither of them needed to point out how Hitoshi’s own speech was a landslide hit. Laughs had echoed across the venue and everyone had smiled as he’d delivered a flawlessly fun and faithful narrative of their friendship from love at first punch to this very day. Even Kirishima’s bumbling, but enthusiastically heartfelt speech was met with excessive approval.

Chisaki didn’t stand a chance. More than half of the people here were Heroes, after all, and knew full well who he was and what he stood for. Barely mattered that he stank of Inasa these days—it would take more than that to warm this audience to an anti-Hero crime lord ever clever enough not to get officially caught.

From the ill pallor of Chisaki’s cheeks, Hitoshi had a feeling the reality of that was hitting harder than ever. He knew Chisaki well enough to recognize that this man didn’t give a shit about what these people thought about him—but how he reflected upon Midoriya Izuku, new Omega sweetheart of the general public, and adored by every single person in this room—

Well, there was work to be done.

“Aren’t you supposed to be paying attention to anyone else but me?” Chisaki snapped back as he meticulously flattened the napkin on his lap for the tenth time. “Let’s not forget the short leash your overbearing Alpha keeps you on.”

Oh, and no one managed to get Hitoshi going from zero to sixty like an asshole who fucked him through all of his high school love-interest lamentations. He knew way too much about Hitoshi’s yearning, broken, and mended heart than either of them ever let on.

Except tonight. Apparently stress really got Chisaki going.

“Oh please.” Hitoshi took the smallest sip of his champagne, just enough to cool himself from cutting too deep. He was older than that, and better than the man next to him. “You know I love a good leash.”

Chisaki flashed him the most unamused glare, hardened amber and a tautness about his starkly stunning features without the mask. Shinsou briefly remembered being stuck on that face for a good chunk of Third Year; if not the personality.

Chisaki had once casually offered to take out Todoroki if Hitoshi would only give the word. Shinsou sometimes had to remind himself of that when he and Chisaki butted heads too hard.

This was the kind of man who would do anything for a person in his care. Even when he and Hitoshi had only been an assured body to each other.

With some effort, Hitoshi sighed and set down his drink. Left his hand on the table and allowed his pinky to just brush Chisaki’s wrist. The kind of comfort for which a man like Chisaki Kai might break off a finger.

Instead, his gaze dropped to the tiny point of touch. He didn’t move away, nor did he speak. Hitoshi sighed, knowing that his ability as an Omega to comfort others didn’t work on a hard-headed Beta, but he’d do what he could.

“You know, whatever you say, Izuku is going to be thrilled that you said it. Because it’s you.”

“As if I need you to—”

“So don’t be such a coward and start acting like the Chisaki Kai everyone is so fucking scared of. You speak, they listen. How many protests have you spoken at? How many have you started yourself? Say something important or don’t waste your time, Kai. Come on, now. What are you so scared of?”

Their gazes met and held.

Perhaps they’d never be as close as they were during that scant but significant window of their lives so many years ago, but Hitoshi wasn’t one to forget that Chisaki was once someone to whom he could safely confide. Hitoshi would continue to be that for Chisaki, even if his services were never used.

“You talk so much shit,” Chisaki eventually replied, turning his attention away to the elegantly set table. He minutely adjusted a crystal flute of champagne just inches to the right, turning it slightly as it refracted the fairy lights’ glimmer.

“You love that about me.”

“When have I ever loved anything about you. Brat.”

Hitoshi had to laugh at that. A short sound of surprised delight at a nickname he’d heard more than once, so long ago. That was enough for him to know they still had a chance at being a pack in the long run.

“Who’s being a brat right now?” Hitoshi threw back, tossing a grin on for good measure. “You can’t even make a silly speech because you’re too busy sulking.”

“For the love of—” Chisaki abruptly stood, his champagne flute in hand, and began clanging his spoon against the edge with unrelenting vigor. “Excuse me. I said excuse me.”

Hitoshi honked a laugh despite himself and slouched into his seat, leaning back on two legs of the chair until he caught Izuku’s eye. Izuku sent wondrous eyes from Chisaki to Hitoshi, a smile breaking out as Hitoshi waggled his eyebrows in reply while the room swept into tense silence.

“One of the first things I ever taught Midoriya Izuku was that he didn’t need a Hero in his life.”

Not exactly the winning opening line Hitoshi had been hoping for, but he merely smirked and fixed his gaze up at Chisaki’s stoic expression.

“He was young and so much brighter than anyone in the room. Not simply in intellect, but integrity and drive. I immediately wanted to protect him in ways that I knew the outside world would not. In ways that we all understand the world to be callous and cruel and accustomed to chewing up and spitting out a heart like his.”

Chisaki shifted, his attention dropping to an already red-faced, wet-eyed Izuku.

“I suppose I wanted him to be his own hero before anyone else disappointed him. To believe in himself more than he believed in an ideal of a government-produced action figure brought to life.”

Chisaki paused, his voice quieting.

“And he is that,” he softly said. “He saved himself right from under my nose. I didn’t have to be an Alpha to smell his power. His self-actualization despite the duress of this small-minded world.”

With that, Chisaki glared out at the audience. His voice was clear, impactful, and full of care.

“The only reason I approve of this mating, this marriage, is because Izuku will always be his own savior before anyone else can claim to be. Bakugou Katsuki can spend the rest of his life catching up with him, and I think I’d enjoy watching him try. Thank you.” He glanced at the couple; Bakugou agape and Izuku, biting down on a laugh through the tears. “I wish you both the best of luck with each other. I anticipate you’ll need plenty.”

Hitoshi wasn’t sure who clapped first, but it was an enthusiastic race between Inasa, Izuku, and himself that lit the rest of the room up in applause. Confused conversation overlapped some murmurs of approval from the crowded tables before them, and Hitoshi imagined the great and terrible Chisaki Kai had just made his first real dent in a world that had previously shunned him.

“See.” Hitoshi put every drop of smug into his smirk as Chisaki neatly took his seat. “That wasn’t so hard, was it?”

“Don’t speak to me,” was Chisaki’s clipped reply as he allowed Inasa to scoot his chair unreasonably close beside him and place his giant paw over Chisaki’s delicate hand.

“No promises.” Hitoshi grinned. “I mean, we’re practically family now.”

With Chisaki suitably horrified for the remainder of dinner, Hitoshi continued to lord over the event, content in his place in this world and with these people.

 

 

Izuku had no qualms sneaking out halfway through dessert. The scents and sounds of that many people in one confined space, lubricated by an open bar, and surrounded by fit, famous Heroes in every direction was enough to send him into a tailspin of panic if he didn’t get five minutes to himself.

“This is my day,” Izuku reminded himself as he released a long breath into the sweet night air of the hotel courtyard. The stone paths weaved through neatly raked sand and small pebbles, casting waves across the soft ground, only punctuated by a few perfectly trimmed trees. “My day,” Izuku repeated as he flopped onto a bench and pulled at his tie. “I can do whatever I want.”

“Get lost?”

“Oh!” Izuku lightly clutched at his chest and exhaled with instant relief as a broad, dark figure strolled forward. “Mr Aizawa, hi, hello. It’s—no, not lost. Just, um, breathing.”

When Katsuki’s old teacher silently sat beside him and lit up a slim black cigarette with a long drag, Izuku worked his jaw, his tongue twisted in his mouth as he searched for something to say. He’d never met the man in earnest until now. Spying him from across the room at a cat cafe like half a year ago did not count.

Izuku opened his mouth to say something undoubtedly stupid and startled when Aizawa offered him the smoke. They exchanged a look, unreadable but still somehow comforting, and Izuku nodded a little before accepting. Aizawa lit up a second one, and for a time they simply blew smoke into the smoggy night sky.  He smelled like a worn leather jacket and tobacco wrapped in a winter hibernation kind of heat.

“It’s just overwhelming,” Izuku said as he neared the stub of the absolutely rank cigarette. He really needed to give up stress smoking, especially when it led to him accepting whatever in fresh hell this thing was.

“Marriage?” Aizawa huffs out smoke in what may have been a laugh. “I imagine so.”

“My life, I mean.”

Izuku shot an alarmed look at Aizawa’s placed countenance, instantly panicked by an admittance he hadn’t meant to make. He was meant to be fine now, wasn’t he? His life was going places. He was better. He was fixed.

“N-not that I’m not grateful for it! But it’s just—”

“You’re good,” Aizawa said. He had a simple way of speaking that left no room for argument, and Izuku found him clamping his mouth shut and blotting out the butt of his cigarette on the arm of the bench. “Just because other people say this is the happiest day of your life doesn’t mean it has to be, kid. Happy and sad aren’t opposites. They’re hand in hand, married in their own right.”

“I’m not sad,” Izuku said, jutting his chin forth, his jaw going hard against the very idea.

Aizawa shrugged and flicked his cigarette into the darkness, the cherry burn of it a brief glow among the neat waves of gray.

“Excitement confuses the brain sometimes,” Aizawa said, rather than arguing the point. “Happy versus sad, hating someone versus wanting to fuck them—”

Izuku huffed a laugh as he relaxed into the bench and tilted his head back to the sky. Aizawa’s deep, dark voice moved through him better than the nicotine.

“Life’s always going to be complicated like that. You either find peace with it or fight the whole way through. I’ve tried both and I recommend the former.”

Izuku felt his smile fade, but a sense of calm did sit within him more steady than it had when he’d faked a bathroom break and blindly ran down the corridor to escape everyone who was here for him.

“Life happens so fast,” Izuku found himself saying, quietly, like a secret. “Every moment is gone as quick as it happens and before you know it you’re standing somewhere you didn’t even see yourself arrive.”

“Wait ‘til you get older, kid.”

“I already feel old.”

“I get it. How’s that breathing going for you?”

Izuku paused and took stock. Inhaled and exhaled. Shifted to aim a smile at Aizawa’s dark, handsome face, all silent and expressionless, watchful.

“Better. It’s just—there’s a lot of people in there. And most of them aren’t mine.”

Aizawa’s face did something subtle, maybe a wince. He didn’t seem like the type who loved a crowd either.

“Much as it pains me to say it, you chose someone beloved by much of the world. S’how it’s gonna go. Forever, probably.”

“I know.” Izuku nodded to himself, gaze downcast. “I know. I did choose him. I wouldn’t take it back. It’s just a lot of eyes on me and I’ve spent a lot of my life hiding from that. From them. Judgment, I guess. I’ve been trying to keep my peace for a long time.”

“Well, it’s lucky you married a peacekeeper yourself, then.”

“Kacchan?” Izuku looked up, pouting in thought. “I guess so. I never thought of him that way.”

“It’s hard to remember beyond all the explosions.”

Izuku snorted a laugh and caught the brief curve of Aizawa’s stern mouth.

“It is. But he’s a good person. The best person for me.” Izuku hesitated, but felt no negativity emanating from this man. He was practically another father figure to Kacchan, for fuck’s sake. If Izuku couldn’t say it here, where could he? “But even after all this time, I still can’t fathom how I’m the best person for him.”

Aizawa merely grunted in reply, looking out over the moonlit zen garden.

“Only person who can convince you that you’re worth good things is yourself. Believe me.”

Izuku hummed his thoughtful assent. Couldn’t argue that. He only had himself to work on.

After allowing himself another centering breath, Izuku shifted on the bench to fully face Aizawa. He offered a soft, small smile and swore Aizawa mirrored it in his own minor way.

“Hey. Thanks for coming. And, uh, talking to me, I guess.”

“I just came out for a smoke. You happened to be here.”

It was such a Kacchan thing to say that Izuku chuckled and shook his head.

“Yeah, okay.”

Aizawa rocked away from the bench to stand, his movements lithe and taking up little space, like he was accustomed to keeping in the shadows. Vaguely, Izuku recalled how Aizawa had trained Shinsou for years, and a lot about both of their personalities suddenly made sense.

“But I’m glad it’s you. All Might’s kid.”

Izuku stood quickly, shock hurtling from his seat with too much fanfare.

“What? How did you—”

“He’d be the happiest man on earth today, if he could see his two boys together,” was all Aizawa said. He eyed Izuku from head to toe as if taking stock and approving. Izuku wanted to ask a dozen questions and a dozen more about the man who made this life possible, but he didn’t know where to start and wasn’t sure Aizawa was the kind of man who would offer more than he was willing to give.

“I—wow. I’m—thank you,” Izuku managed.

Aizawa nodded.

“Just saying it like it is.” He turned and headed for the set of glass doors from which Izuku had burst through a lifetime ago. Aizawa raised a hand without looking back. “See ya back in the action, kid. Go find your man and don’t let go.”

“I—” Izuku realized he was smiling. “I will.”

 

 

“I don’t think I’ll ever understand how we came to be here,” Inko said, holding back another sniffle.

Mitsuki’s coral lips faintly curved, her gaze lowered and intent as she efficiently repaired the damage done to Inko’s concealer and eye makeup. Her effort was deft with the skill of someone with more lifetime expertise than Inko ever had in such things.

“What, in the bathroom?”

“No.” Inko blotted at her nose and eked out a smile when Mitsuki batted it away and gently used her ring figure to pat down the fresh concealer. “Well, perhaps that too. This entire situation.”

“Situation?” Mitsuki frowned, her bright, sharp gaze darting between Inko’s eyes, inspecting her work. “You mean our boys.”

“Yes, the boys,” Inko whispered. It all still seemed too good to be true for her little boy. To end up with an Alpha so strong and noble and heroic. Her vulnerable little Omega, always in a scrape, always with his feelings hurt, always pushing for that which he could not have, had finally found someone to keep him safe. Inko couldn’t wrap her mind around their luck.

“They seem to do well for each other.” Mitsuki rummaged through her designer purse and emerged with mascara. “Are you really that worried about them? That kid of mine has and would protect yours with his life.”

“Oh, no!” Panic railed through Inko at the slightest implication that she was anything but ungrateful. Her small hands fluttered around as she scrambled for proper wording. “I—that’s not—not what I was thinking about. It’s just—don’t you find it utterly fantastical to think that our children would marry? I used to cheer for you from the bench at our volleyball games. You cheated off my history exams and I copied your math homework. Never would I have thought our lives would be so intertwined as they are now.”

Mitsuki considered her for a moment and shrugged a slim shoulder sheathed in a pearlescent silk blouse. Unscrewed the mascara wand and waved it at her with a smirk.

“I hadn’t really thought about it. It is nice, though. How life works out for us sometimes. Now look up and don’t move.”

Inko obeyed, silent, and imagined Mitsuki didn’t worry about much at all. She’d always sauntered through life with a confidence and magnetism Inko could only dream of and admire.

“We raised good boys, you know,” Mitsuki said, her voice low with focus as she worked. “Good for each other. It takes a special kind of person to embrace the kind of man my son can be.”

With that, Mitsuki pulled back and put away her beauty products while Inko glanced over her shoulder to the full wall of glitzy, well-lit mirrors. She no longer looked blotched or distressed, but even through the makeup, she could see the same old unsure Inko gazing out from green eyes.

“I don’t know how much of Izuku is because of me anymore,” she softly admitted to her disappointed reflection.

“I couldn’t say.” Mitsuki said, her candor as frank as ever as she leaned a place on the marble counter and leaned in to inspect herself and fluff her fine hair. “I was hardly there for it. But I know you love him and I know you fear for him. And I think it’s about time you admit that Midoriya Izuku is one of the strongest people we know and should be treating him accordingly.”

At Inko’s pointed silence of doubt, their eyes met in the mirror. Mitsuki’s spine straightened as she turned, hands on her slim waist.

“My son wouldn’t settle for less and I won’t take kindly to anyone thinking otherwise of my son-in-law. Understood?”

Inko slumped, gaze casting to the ground, then back up to Mitsuki’s searching expression.

“He’s just so small,” Inko said.

Mitsuki’s face twisted and she scoffed, lightly swatting at Inko’s shoulder.

“He’s not. You just need to expand your opinion of him to be able to encompass all he is. And he is. So much more than you or he can imagine for him. You’re both doing him a disservice by minimizing your expectations of his abilities. Got it?”

Inko couldn’t help but smile, her chest swelling with faith in the future.

“I’ll do my best.”

“I know you will. You always have.” Mitsuki threw an arm over Inko’s shoulders and led her toward the door. “Now let’s get you back on the dance floor. That nice, haggard Detective Tsukauchi was eyeing you up like a snack.”

A giggle burst out unbidden and Inko failed to clamp it down with her hand.

“Mitsuki, no!”

“Inko, yes!”

Giggling away like the school girls they once were, Inko let herself be led into the light of the possibility.

 

 

“Hello, darling,” Shinsou’s warm voice instantly smoothed through the taut, heavy static stand-still Todoroki’s body was caught in, sitting stiffly at a table on the edge of the dance floor. His Omega’s body draped over his back, long arms slinging over Todoroki’s shoulders to present a stocky, cut glass tumbler full of amber liquid and oversized ice. “I bring you respite.”

“You’re my respite,” Todoroki said, tilting his head back enough for his cheek to meet Shinsou’s. Inhaling deeply, Todoroki let his eyes fall shut as the aroma of night jasmine and lemongrass, sweet green tea and evening breezes pacified and pleased him to the bone.

“Uh huh,” was Shinsou’s disbelieving reply. Words had long stopped impressing Shinsou Hitoshi; not when he was the king of manipulating them. “Take your medicine anyway. We won’t stay until the end, I promise.”

“I want to stay,” Todoroki replied with a frown. He accepted the glass and gripped Shinsou’s wrist with his free hand, leading him around to sit in the chair opposite. Instead, Shinsou all but lounged atop Todoroki’s lap; seating himself sideways, one long leg crossed over the other, and one arm closely hooked around the nape of Todoroki’s neck.

Todoroki eased, his rigid frame sapping and leaning into Shinsou’s. They rarely exchanged this much touch in public and he was going to bask in it while he could. Shinsou preferred to keep their relationship to themselves; Todoroki always supposed that working in a world of undercover missions and espionage had led Shinsou to being more enigmatic about his life than he inherently was already. Todoroki didn’t care one way or the other. Wanted nothing more than Shinsou’s presence and the symbiotic ease between their soothing bond.

“Then we’ll stay as long as you’d like,” Shinsou said, his mouth pressed against Todoroki’s temple.

Shinsou shifted to look out at the dance floor and Todoroki’s attention followed his mate’s. Bakugou and Izuku stood in the center, pooled in light, smiling widely in each other’s faces. Bakugou looked his age in ways that Todoroki had never realized he’d been missing. His brother through bloodshed and a lifelong bond had long been wearing a hard, callous mask for the world. Seeing it slip off in the face of Midoriya Izuku was close to witnessing a miracle.

Izuku had somehow returned Bakugou’s youth to him—a chunk from nearly every Hero which was too soon torn out.

“Do you ever feel jealous,” Shinsou murmured, his gaze sulky as he watched their friends take slow, enraptured turns around the floor.

Shinsou often said things that made zero sense to Todoroki. He’d long stopped questioning from where such bizarre thought processes emerged and tended to just let Shinsou run with them until he grew exhausted with his own convoluted thought processes.

“I have no idea what you’re talking about,” Todoroki said, because he didn’t.

“Them,” Shinsou said, as if that explained anything at all.

“You want to marry me?” Todoroki asked, floundering to find the logical line of this conversation.

“Are you asking,” Shinsou replied flatly, casting his discerning, mercurial gaze over Todoroki’s face.

“I’m asking if I should be asking, I think.”

Shinsou’s hard look went soft, his wide mouth curving with familiar, welcoming warmth. Their both faintly pulsed, a steady, shared heartbeat between them.

“No, I’m not asking you to ask me to marry you.”

“Are you asking me to do anything specific at all right now?” Todoroki asked, parsing through the peculiarities of their conversation.

Shinsou’s thoughtful hum lightly shook with humor as he turned his gaze back to their friends.

“No. I’m just being ridiculous. Wondering if you wish you had a True Mate like that. Stronger bond, better match, all that.”

Todoroki had no idea what to do with that. This was almost as ludicrous as the time Shinsou asked if Todoroki would still love him if he were a worm.

“The concept has never occurred to me,” Todoroki said, studying Bakugou’s face and once more marveling at the breadth and devotion of his smile. “As someone who had planned never to mate or even date, I feel lucky every morning I wake up beside someone who fought to be with someone like me.”

Shinsou scoffed and turned on him. Carefully took the untouched tumbler in Todoroki’s hand and placed it on the table before taking Todoroki’s face in his hands. Todoroki obediently looked up at his Omega, beautiful and ethereal, stormy and unpredictable on any given day—and entirely belonging to him.

“Someone like you,” Shinsou murmured, drawing Todoroki closer, his voice deep and his mouth welcoming, “deserves the world.”

“In that case.” Todoroki tipped his face higher to press a gentle, lingering kiss to Shinsou’s lips. “I have it. The world.”

Shinsou reeled back with a laugh, nearly toppling off Todoroki’s lap if not for his fast reflexes, both arms wrapping around Shinsou’s waist.

“Who has been teaching you to talk like that,” Shinsou asked, incredulous but smiling all the same.

“You,” Todoroki replied. “Who else?”

“Okay, I deserved that.” Shinsou’s arms lounged around Todoroki’s neck, their scents playing together with proximity, dreamy jasmine and winter’s bite. “I might be a little drunk,” Shinsou mumbled into Todoroki’s shoulder.

“I figured,” Todoroki said. He didn’t say how he knew. Shinsou tended toward sulks and scowls and martyrdom when sloshed. It was kind of cute, as long as no one dared rile him up about it.

From between them, Shinsou ducked his head and unearthed his phone from a pocket. Todoroki bowed his head to glance down between their bodies. Shinsou’s work phone scrolled with updates.

“Any word?”

Todoroki had been keeping as alert as he could, but because Bakugou had pulled them aside to stress how important it was that everyone enjoy the day and act in no way suspect, he’d also been doing his best to do just that. Have fun, let the Heroes on duty do their jobs, heighten security outside the hotel, and in no way alert Izuku to what was going on.

“Negative,” Shinsou said, pocketing his phone with a scoff. “Every Hero worth a damn is here and we’ve got our backups running around the city in search of one person who—”

An upbeat song ramped up through the venue and cheers rose up.

Not wanting to dance but not wanting Shinsou stewing on the sidelines either, Todoroki stood and held out his hand with a smile.

“Dance with me?”

Shinsou gave his hand a suspicious look but took it.

“Only because you know I’m weak for Beyonce.”

 

 

Swiftly pocketing his phone upon the approach of his husband, Katsuki aimed a winning smile at Izuku and basked in the champagne glow lapping at the seal of their bond. He’d been learning more and more how to compartmentalize the worries of work in favor of quality time with his mate, and tonight more than ever deserved the entirety of his attention.

“Stop scowling at your phone and come dance with me,” Izuku said, not missing a beat as ever. He offered his ringed hand, glinting in fairy lights, and Katsuki wouldn’t have been able to turn him down in a million years.

Leisurely music dripped with love and longing, and Katsuki didn’t care enough to even voice a complaint on principle. Izuku’s fingers threaded easily with his own, their bond gilded and growing between them, a golden ring of feedback as they slowly circled the dance floor. Katsuki’s palm found the curve of Izuku’s lower back, a warm home in which to press his fingers and ease them closer.

“There’s still time for you to take my last name,” Katsuki murmured, his posture reverent in the way he curled his frame low to speak in Izuku’s ear. A laugh puffed warmly against Katsuki’s shoulder.

“Absolutely not,” Izuku said with a clear smile in his voice.

“Worth trying.”

“Why don’t you take mine instead,” Izuku asked as he pulled back, his deep lake eyes glinting with humor. Katsuki clucked his tongue and turned them with more confidence than he actually felt in slow-dancing.

“Mine carries more weight.”

Izuku’s brows jolted toward his hairline, his cheeks and mouth rosy as he grinned.

“I’ll carry your ass home where you can sleep on the couch.”

Katsuki hummed and leaned in, brushing his lips against Izuku’s forehead.

“Always loved your sweet talk.”

“Yeah, that’s definitely what had you falling for me,” Izuku replied dryly.

“It was. Part of it.”

Izuku huffed through his nose and pulled back enough to properly look at him as they idly wandered the dance floor in their handsy embrace.

“What, the way I hated you on sight?”

Katsuki matched Izuku’s smile.

“You didn’t hate me on sight.”

Izuku gaped, but was interrupted by his own baffled laughter.

“No, I promise I did.”

“Well, whatever.” Katsuki’s face pleasantly ached from his own smile as Izuku only heaved a theatrical sigh and rolled his eyes. “I mean, the way you stood up for yourself. Punched me in the fuckin’ face. Talked back. No one does that.”

Izuku’s eyebrows meaningfully rose.

“Maybe they should.”

“I think living with you is more than enough humbling per day.”

“At least you’re learning your limits.” Their dance eased to a halt as Izuku rose to his toes and placed a lingering kiss on Katsuki’s mouth. They lazily parted, a happy noise high at the back of Izuku’s throat before they both opened their eyes to gaze upon each other in the luxurious light. “My handsome husband,” Izuku whispered.

Katsuki smirked, cocky and sharp.

“Aren’t I?”

Izuku patted Katsuki’s cheek with a little too much force, the two of them grinning through it like idiots.

“How about you not talk, we enjoy this dance, and I get to look at your face without it making noise?”

“How about you kiss me again instead?”

“And you say I’m the smart one,” Izuku replied, his smiling mouth already rising to meet Katsuki’s own.

They barely got to touch lips before the song faded and overlapped into a boisterous, bass-heavy beat that had the entire crowd bounding from their tables and back to the dance floor with hoots and hollers of glee. Quickly they were surrounded and soaked in high energy, bright and bubbly scent, sound and touch as the sing-along and dance blew up the room.

Caught in the whirlwind of friendly hands feeling over his body, Katsuki lost his suit jacket and the top buttons of his shirt, sweat soaking the thin vee of white as he laughed like he couldn’t remember the first or last time. Izuku was never far, enveloped as he was by their packmates, spinning him into Katsuki’s arms and yanking him back out when they started to feel each other up. Every time their eyes met it was that spark and flame, flint to stone, heat and hunger, promising a life of this and more.

Katsuki couldn’t fucking wait.

Panting and grinning, Katsuki broke from the crowd and grabbed a bottle of champagne on his way out of the main venue. He needed to piss like a storm and even so he freely chugged from the bottle as he meandered unsteadily down the marble hall toward the restrooms.

Bleary and humming to himself, Katsuki vaguely remembered who he was aside from a blissfully happy husband and took out his phone to review any updates on the work he’d so expertly evacuated from his brain.

Frowning, he scrolled the frantic conversation between the agency’s skeleton crew on duty due to every big name Hero having attended this very function. Worry crept cold and heavy over the sparkle of his day.

“Kacchan!”

Katsuki abruptly looked up, his loose hand dropping his phone in surprise. Caught out, he licked his lips and squatted to collect his cell, hoping to recuperate enough to face Izuku as he approached. The women's restroom door swung closed behind him.

“Uh, what’s—”

“You looked so happy,” Izuku said.

Katsuki’s frown deepened as he stood.

Something was wrong. The freckle on Izuku’s eyelid was missing. His eyes were the wrong color green. And their bond wasn’t reacting to their proximity.

“Ha-happy?” Katsuki asked, scrambling to assess the situation through the champagne.

“So happy,” said a woman’s voice.

Izuku evaporated in a puff and the knife scythed and slicked through Katsuki’s guts before he could process the pain.

Camie, gaunt and grinning, hair lank and greasy around her face, stood in the wake of Izuku’s ghost.

“I would have made you happier, B,” Camie whispered, her smile lengthening and growing teeth as Katsuki dropped to his knees. In the distance, screams of horror on the dance floor. Scarlet blotting out their bond. Izuku. Izuku! “But since you all decided to fuck me over, you get what you give.”

Obscene, pulsing pain beat hot and dark around Katsuki’s consciousness and closed in, black, bleak.

“‘Zuku,” Katsuki eked out, clutching at the knife in his stomach, his arms shaking with the effort to yank it out. The blood spilled over his hands, but the cold was quicker than his blood was hot, and the shivering had already set in.

“Oh my fucking god.” Camie rolled her eyes from above, hands on the hips of her garish Tartarus uniform. “And to think I almost felt bad. You could at least say my name before you die.”

Katsuki’s head dropped, too weak to hold up, and in his hands pooled red, failing completely at keeping himself together. Before the nothing took him, the last thing he saw was his gold ring winking through the nightfall.

Notes:

For those repeatedly asking why I haven’t released the final chapter: my grandmother, who raised me as a mother alongside my own mother, who I lived with 26 years of my life, who I have in-home hospice care to in the final months of her life—died, a couple weeks after this chapter was posted. Even at the time of publishing this piece I was caring for her in the end of her life. Inspiration is very hard to find when you’re grieving the person who raised you as their child.

Series this work belongs to:

• Part 1 of "I Want That Quiet Rapture Again"