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Mar 6, 2022

An Archive of Our Own, a project of the Organization for Transformative Works

Chapter 1 Here

for @izuochaweek

Chapter 2 Prompts: Bruises/Heart Chapter 2 Title: ad infinitum. (to infinity) Chapter 2 Summary: Some wounds are tended, but others run too deep.

Izuku does not want to wake up. He feels warm and cared for, the way he used to feel when his mother kept him home from school with a cold. He would lie on his bed or the couch and Inko would sit beside him, sometimes with his head in her lap, and she would run her fingers through his unruly hair while she watched television, checking on him at every commercial break—“Do you need anything?” “Are you comfortable?” “Do you want more juice?”

No one likes being sick, obviously, but there were moments on those days when he didn’t think it was so bad.

He feels that same way now, like someone is taking care of him. It’s a strange and foreign sensation, one he’s almost forgotten. But like riding a bike, he falls into it easily, lets it soothe him as his breath deepens, safe and content. He turns onto his side, buries his face into something warm and soft; nuzzles against it.

He never wants to wake up.

But the sound does it, finally; snaps him out of whatever half-dream state he’s been lingering in.

As he’s nuzzling against his warm, soft pillow, arms tightening around it in a relieved, exhausted hug, he hears something.

The sound isn’t loud, exactly, but it’s high-pitched, startled sounding, and Izuku blinks his eyes a few times until he’s staring at his pillow, noticing the strange bright blue color that still reminds him of high school, of practicing Black Whip and Float in the gymnasium with Tokoyami and Sero and Mina and…

“Good morning, sleepyhead.”

Izuku turns his face slowly, sure this is still a dream.

But then he’s looking into wide, brown eyes that make him think of melted milk chocolate—warm and sweet, something he could never get enough of.

“O-Ochaco,” he says, smiling sleepily. He wouldn’t normally use her first name, but this is a dream, and so it doesn’t matter—he can call her whatever he likes, tell her all his darkest secrets, and when he wakes up it will have no impact on her or anyone else. “It’s so nice to see you.”

He squeezes her tightly again, letting his fingers rub over the small of her back where his hands still rest, palms spread wide to touch as much of her as possible. His eyes are almost closed again when he notices the deep blush painted over her cheeks., the way she bites her lower lip and smiles at him. It’s then that the rest of her slowly comes into focus.

Her hair is longer, braided back away from her face and long enough for a little tail to peek out from behind her ear. She also has a scar he doesn’t remember, a short little slice under her left eye she must have received in the months since he last saw her on television. He reaches up and traces one of his crooked fingers over the mark.

“What happened?”

“Don’t you remember, Izuku?” she asks, brows drawing together. “It’s from Toga. You were there.”

That is when his mind starts to truly awaken. Because his Ochaco would never call him by his first name, not even in a dream. And his Ochaco does not have a scar from Toga on her face—she has a scar from Toga on her shoulder. He remembers the sound of the blade slicing through Uravity’s uniform, trying to pierce beneath the skin to find Ochaco’s lungs or heart.

He remembers the panic he felt when it happened, sharp and ferocious, like someone had reached into his chest to squeeze his heart.

Izuku sits up almost too quickly, and he lifts a hand to his head to steady himself, to stop the world from spinning. His whole body feels like a bruise and he imagines his skin a mottled purple, physical proof of his last battle, of how badly he’d lost it.

“What are you talking about?”

When he looks at her this time, the warmth of Ochaco’s eyes has dulled a little, like melted chocolate left to cool and skin over, and he is overwhelmed by the distinct feeling that he has somehow let her down.

“Oh,” she says, “You aren’t my Izuku after all, are you?”

He can feel the flush, the way the blood vessels beneath his skin bloom across every inch of him—her Izuku.

Ochaco Uraraka’s Izuku.

He sputters, tongue tripping over his teeth as he tries to articulate his next question. Because he has never told anyone how much he wishes he could belong to her—how desperately he sometimes wonders what life would be like if he did. If she was his and he was hers.

But now, he is sitting up, finally taking everything in, and Ochaco is sitting on the floor of what looks like a basement, with too-long hair and a scar under her eye, wearing her U.A. P.E. uniform and calling him Izuku and—

The world doesn’t spin this time, but that doesn’t make him feel any steadier as he clambers to his feet, eyes desperately searching for a receptacle and failing to locate one as he leans against the nearest wall and retches violently, slicking the concrete with bile. Some of it spatters onto his shoes, his pants, and he grimaces.

Wait? Why is he wearing pants? He was in his uniform the last he remembers—shooting across the sky dazed and lost amongst the dimly flickering stars in Deku’s Hero suit.

“What am I… wearing?” he finally asks, stepping away from the puddle of vomit and swiping his mouth with the back of one hand.

Ochaco is standing when he turns to look at her and he’s struck by how beautiful she looks, even in the awful fluorescent lighting. It’s then he notices her jumpsuit is a little too small, a little short at the ankles and wrists, too tight around her thighs and her shoulders.

“Sorry,” she says, “I guess I probably shouldn’t have done that, since you aren’t who I thought you were.”

Who did she think he was?

He hates to admit it, but he’s waiting for Danger Sense to flare, for this to be some horrible illusion—the result of a perception-altering Quirk gone wrong. Is he still with Katsuki? Are they still fighting?

Did Nitro win?

The thought sits like charcoal in his throat—rough and chalky, staining his insides black.

But even as Ochaco steps toward him, even as she reaches out one pale hand to brush his hair away from his sweat-dampened brow, all he feels is safe.

“Your uniform was covered in… blood, mostly, and it was pretty damaged, so I changed you out of it.” It does not escape Izuku’s notice that Ochaco doesn’t blush when she says this, though he imagines he's as red as the old shoes he used to wear at U.A., the bright red ones he finally gave up when he realized such cheerful colors made him too easy to target as he moved. “I’m sorry, I didn’t mean to make you uncomfortable.”

Ochaco has never made him uncomfortable. Not even when the first met and sometimes she would stand too close and he could smell her shampoo. Even then, even when he was embarrassed and a little flustered by her proximity, Ochaco has only ever prompted one feeling in Izuku and that is one of belonging and acceptance.

“Where are we?” he asks, running his tongue around his mouth. It feels fuzzy and dry and acidic and his eyes dart around the room in search of a water bottle, but he doesn’t find one.

Ochaco smiles, using her hands to gesture down her body. “Welcome back, Deku-kun!” she says. Even though she’s smiling, it’s a pantomime.

He can tell because the warmth doesn’t reach her eyes. Izuku is also a little disappointed to hear her use that name again, loathe as he is to admit it.

It’s then he realizes they are in one of the underground shelters built into U.A. during the battle with the Paranormal Liberation Front. It looks like it’s mostly used for storage, now, though, filled with boxes and broken desks and mop buckets with damaged wheels.

He mutters, mumbles, trying to discern his trajectory if he really did land at Heights Alliance. The thought had been a fluke, a distant, nostalgic hope conjured by his damaged brain. Not all that unsurprising, if he’s honest. Even Izuku has noticed the intrusive way his mind has started fantasizing about that time in his life—that first semester at U.A. when everything still felt right and possible and like it was finally falling into place.

Before his secret was revealed to the world on live television.

Before Katsuki Bakugou abandoned his path; disappeared for three years only to reemerge a Villain.

“What did you just say?”

It always surprises him when someone can understand his muttering. It feels like he’s naked, almost—exposed and vulnerable.

It occurs to him that he should probably not use this analogy now, knowing Ochaco is the one who dressed him in the strange clothes he’s wearing. He shifts, trying to discern of the underwear he has on are his own, of she’d swapped them out as well.

He can’t tell and he doesn’t know whether he’s relieved or not.

“Which part?”

“About Kacchan.”

Kacchan.

Izuku’s blood turns glacial. Kacchan. Why would she call him that? No one ever calls Katsuki that except him, and even Izuku doesn’t really use that nickname anymore except sometimes when the sadness of losing Katsuki to Nitro overwhelms him, when he is alone in his apartment and he weeps for the boy he used to know.

He can’t help it; his eyes narrow and his fists tighten at his sides.

Ochaco notices, eyes darting to his hands. He can see the way her body tenses, just slightly, defensive and on edge.

“What’s wrong?” she asks.

He doesn’t have time to answer, though, because suddenly there’s the sound of metal scraping over concrete, and the hairs on Izuku’s neck stand to attention as he turns.

It takes only half a heartbeat for Katsuki to close the door and survey the room. Then, the corner of his mouth quirks up in a cocky smirk and he says, “About fuckin’ time you showed up.”

Izuku doesn’t think, he only moves, One for All bursting to life, racing across his skin and brightening his eyes as he flies toward his opponent.

Katsuki’s gaze widens, but only for a second, before they narrow into crimson slits again and his smirk turns into a feral, lopsided grin.

“You wanna brawl!?” he shouts, running across the oversized room, ignoring the chairs and desks and boxes of paper towels he demolishes as he does so, “Then let’s fuckin’ go you shitty nerd!”

Black Whip extends out, each static-drenched tendril desperate to make contact with its target. Katsuki is too fast, though, and he dodges, rolling on his broad shoulders out of the way and ducking behind an old bank of lockers someone was too lazy to dispose of properly.

It doesn’t matter, because Black Whip rips them out of the way and lets them crash carelessly into a wall.

Distantly, Izuku is aware of Ochaco shouting something, but he ignores her, too focused on his objective to bother deciphering the words.

His ears are ringing and Katsuki is launching himself at him in the wake of the lockers, palm outstretched. It collides with Izuku’s chest and he feels the fierce sting of Katsuki’s Quirk burning through the borrowed shirt.

For a moment, Izuku pauses because Nitro would never be so gentle. If he’d ever caught Izuku off-guard, dazed and injured and fucking confused like he has now, he would have blown a hole through Deku’s heart as big as Japan.

“Enough!”

Izuku feels the slap, though it barely registers as his mind races with thoughts of Kacchan and Katsuki and Nitro. The three versions of the man Izuku knows and knew all blur together and it makes him dizzy.

Ochaco must hit Katsuki, too, because soon they’re both being launched to the ceiling. Izuku hits his back hard enough to bruise his bruises, hard enough to knock the wind out of him, though at least he’s quick enough to get his hands around his head to protect it. His knuckles scrape against the spackled ceiling and he can feel the little cuts in the skin, blood seeping into the crevices like a sponge.

He’s breathing too heavy and when he looks at Katuski, the other man is only scowling, letting himself twirl aimlessly in the air after stopping himself with much more grace and accuracy than Izuku.

“You gonna release us or what?” Katsuki asks curtly.

“Only if you promise to behave,” Ochaco says. Then, she swings her eyes over to Izuku’s and his heart flutters. “Both of you.”

Izuku doesn’t know what’s going on. He feels like a rabbit trapped in a snare—heart beating too fast, thoughts racing. He wonders if he would chew off his own leg to escape. Wonders if Katsuki would let him.

What the fuck is going on?

It’s the last thought he has the luxury of before Ochaco releases her quirk and he’s falling too fast toward the floor, his feet kicking wildly behind him. It’s been so long since he’s felt her Quirk and suddenly he can’t remember the best way to counteract the sudden shift in gravity’s pull.

It’s Katsuki who catches him. He’s far nimbler than Izuku, and lands on his feet a few moments earlier, holding his arms out to arrest Izuku’s momentum before he collides with the concrete floor. He scoffs as he sets Izuku on unsteady feet.

“What the fuck’s wrong with you?” he asks, watching Izuku stumble a little, bring a hand back up to his head.

“He’s got a concussion, Kacchan, be nice.”

“I told you not to fucking call me that.”

Izuku is still dreaming, he realizes. Of course. All of this has been a dream.

Ochaco blushes. “Sorry. Force of habit.”

“Whatever.”

Her arms are strong when they wrap around his shoulders, guide him gently to the floor so he can sit.

“What a crazy dream,” he says, mouth still dry and fuzzy from his vomiting—vision swimming until he has four legs and three arms and there are two Ochacos in front of him, peering at his face with concern.

He smiles because likes that she’s concerned about him. It makes him feel important. He leans his head forward, rests it against her shoulder. It’s nice.

His eyelids feel heavy, leaden. He feels them slipping closed and it’s a relief.

“Hey, dumbass! You can’t sleep if you have a fuckin’ concussion.”

But Kacchan’s words feel soft and faraway, like Izuku is listening to him through water. Like that day they went to the beach when they were kids.

Izuku remembers the way the sand got into his mouth, grinding against his teeth when he chewed. But he couldn’t stop chewing, inexplicably drawn to the uncomfortable noise it made, the way it felt dangerous and a little painful.

His mother had worn a blue and white striped bathing suit and a matching sunhat while she sat on the sand. She never went in the water, but Izuku and his All Might-print swim trunks had hardly left it. His shoulders were sunburned and peeling by the time they got home, and he cried when he bathed the next day because they stung under the hot water.

Mitsuki had been there with her son, too, sitting next to Inko in a bright yellow bikini, brash and unashamed of her body in a way Izuku didn’t think his own mother had ever been, even back then.

He and Kacchan had played in the surf for hours, splashing one another (well, mostly Kacchan had splashed him, but Izuku didn’t mind) and wrestling in the waves.

Izuku liked to float on his back sometimes, just drift with the tide as he closed his eyes, listening to the way the water lapped against his ears.

And then Katsuki had yelled something. Izuku heard him, but the vowels were dulled by the water in his ears and he couldn’t understand the words. When he turned his head to look, Kacchan’s eyes were wide and imploring, his hand pointing up at the sky as he jumped excitedly.

When Izuku looked up in the direction he was indicating, he saw it, and suddenly Kacchan’s words made sense, like a puzzle he’d found the last piece to.

“Look, Izuku, a Hero!”

He could see them, streaking across the sky in a swirl of grey clouds, on their way to stop some Villain or rescue a civilian or protect somebody important.

It wasn’t All Might, of course, but Izuku still felt the way his face split in a grin and his heart raced as he watched them disappear over the horizon.

It had been a nice day. They ate ice cream and built a terrible, lopsided sandcastle both their mothers had fawned over anyway, even as one of the turrets disintegrated, reclaimed by the tide as it came in.

When he went to bed that night, Izuku dreamt of shooting stars, but instead of meteors, each of them was a Hero streaking across the sky to save someone. He and Kacchan tilted their faces up and watched in delight.

“Look! Look! Another one!”

They didn’t make wishes, but it didn’t matter because it felt like they’d already been granted.

Katsuki’s Quirk had manifested soon after that trip to the beach. Sometimes, when Izuku thinks back, he realizes that day is the last time he can remember Katsuki calling him by his real name.

The last time he was my friend Izuku instead of worthless Deku.

It’s a bittersweet thing—like sand rolling over his tongue while he ate his ice cream. Gritty and rough, scraping his gums beneath the sugary good parts.

Izuku does not see the Vestiges often. So when he finds himself standing before them now, he is immediately on alert.

Because something must be wrong if they have summoned him to this sacred space within his subconscious mind.

Instantly, his eyes drift to the Vestige of Toshinori Yagi. All Might has never spoken to him in this space and Izuku has always thought his mentor’s silence was an indictment of his poorly chosen successor.

Proof that Izuku has failed as the new Symbol of Hope, the final wielder of One for All; that he has fallen woefully short of the expectations All Might had for him when he revealed his identity before his death. When the told the world Izuku Midoriya would be there to protect them from All for One and anyone else who threatened their lives and security.

Izuku waits for one of the other wielders to speak, to tell him why he is here. He expects Daigoro Banjo to shout about his inadequacies in his last battle, for Nana Shimura to offer subtle words of encouragement.

For Toshinori Yagi to shake his head in disappointment.

But no one says anything. The shadow of Izuku—the only way he can exist within this space—shuffles its feet. He feels like he’s been called to the front of the class, asked to give a presentation he didn’t know about; to provide a coherent defense for his existence when he has none.

When Yoichi Shigaraki stands, shuffling toward him slowly, Izuku stiffens.

Everything is silent—unnaturally so—and then Yochi is staring directly into Izuku’s eyes and the Ninth Wielder realizes how much taller he is now than when he was first summoned here.

Yochi reaches out, grasps Izuku firmly by the shoulders, and pushes.

Izuku wants to scream as he tumbles, but his mouth still doesn’t work right in this place and all that comes out is a muffled gasp. He doesn’t hit the floor as expected. Instead, Izuku tilts back and back and back, falling through the infinite space of nothingness that suddenly exists behind him.

Or maybe it isn’t nothing. Maybe it’s everything, infinitude—his subconscious or the universe or the veil of time itself, unending and unknowable. All Izuku knows is he is still falling long after he should have stopped.

If this were a dream, he should have woken up by now.

When his eyelids finally open, Izuku is staring at the shelter’s ceiling. He can see the spiderweb cracks in the concrete his body made when he collided with it.

He blinks and it is then he realizes there are tears streaming over his cheeks, silent and warm and collecting awkwardly on his neck, under the collar of his stolen shirt.

He thinks of the Vestiges—of the grim silence of them. It felt like judgment and Izuku weeps because he no longer understands what they want from him.

“Izuku,” he turns to find Ochaco looking at him with soft eyes. She reaches out and brushes her fingers over the back of his crooked hand, pinky deftly lifted. She threads her fingers between his and Izuku’s whole body feels warm, relaxed.

Like he is finally where he is supposed to be.

“I think we need to have a conversation,” Ochaco says, “All three of us.”

Izuku’s eyes swing to the left and there is Katsuki Bakugou, sitting with his back propped against the cinderblock wall, no murder or malice in his eyes. If anything, Katsuki looks extremely tired, like all he wants to do is sleep forever.

“Hope you’re ready, Deku. Because your headache’s about to get a whole lot worse.”

He isn’t sure that’s possible, honestly. But for all that Katsuki has often been an asshole, a bully, a Villain… one thing he’s never been is a liar.

It’s something Izuku wishes he could emulate better because he’s tired of never telling anyone the whole truth.

#izuocha week 2022 #izuocha week #bnha fanfiction #mha fanfiction #izuocha fanfiction #prompt week #f4nf4nwr1t3s

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