It was these quiet moments that he lived for, after the snarky remarks, heated touches and whispered nothings. When the body glow receded and they simply had each other. The outside world didn't exist. There was naught but him and Katsuki, the only beings in existence. Izuku has his laid upon the blonde's chest, simply enjoying the sound and feel of his heartbeat against his cheek. He hums in satisfaction at the confirmation that they're here, that they have each other, despite it all.
The blonde looks at him with uncharacteristically soft eyes.
"What are you thinking about, Deku?" He asks in a soft voice, barely whispered into the quiet of the early morning. Izuku sighs as he feels the rumble of his baritone voice in his bones. He threads his fingers through rough hands, much like his own, and looks up to the sharp featured face he knows oh so well but sees so tragically little of.
"Just this..." Izuku says, lifting their threaded hands for emphasis.
"Us." He says again looking into the bright burning embers he feels like could burn up his very being if he looks too long.
He'll gladly burn.
He hates that they're relegated to secret rendezvous, only capable of showing his love in the quiet hours, when no prying eyes can look upon their forbidden coupling.
Katsuki feels his own heart fall. It killed him to that they couldn't live free in the sunlight.
For a day when they can join their clans, and none would be able to stop them. The day when they can end the battles, the wars, the suffering.
Izuku feels his heartbreak like he does every time they meet, and he witnesses the sun breakup the inky horizon of the night.
Both of them reluctantly untangle their limbs and help each other redress. Izuku can tell that Katsuki is just as heartbroken as he is at their impending separation.
When his love is distracted mourning the sun's arrival, he runs up and kisses his check.
"When the moon flees her sister's company, you'll find me here again." Izuku says, setting the plans for their next clandestine meeting.
"Until then, Deku." The blonde says, returning the kiss before parting.
That kept them going. That one day they could be together, live together, share their lives unafraid.
Ship: BKDK, Rating: Teen, Tags: AU, Hybrids, Minor Character Death, Happy Ending
Izuku’s body froze on the spot when he saw him—the same fox from that fateful night so many months ago.
His heart pounded in his chest fearfully as they stared at each other from across the valley; the fox stood at the treeline, and Izuku knew he should have stayed in the forest. There he was less vulnerable, less open to attack. But the sun had been high in the sky after an absence of what felt like many, many moons, and he longed for the heat and the light that was in abundance out in the open valley.
He had spent so many nights in his sad, empty burrow that he had come to crave warmth from whatever avenue he could derive it from. He longed dearly for the comfort his now long gone siblings and mother once provided. He could recall them easily, all huddled together in their burrow. He desperately missed the smell of them, the love and companionship that they had provided.
They were all gone now, lost the very night he had last seen the same garnet eyes he was now staring into. The fox kept his eyes on him—he made no effort to hide his presence from Izuku, to try and sneak up on him, chase him down, feast upon him. The last time their eyes had met the fox had done the opposite, clearly taught well by his mother how to hunt. He remembered the very same fear ripping through his body, his feet carrying him through the sodden, muddy earth. He recalled how he prayed with each stride for his feet to carry him to safety, away from the gnashing teeth of the fox. When he had finally lost him and escaped, he waited a while longer before making his way back home, as to not lead a scent trail and endanger his family—but his efforts had been all for naught anyway.
The very same relentless and sudden rain that had impeded his escape from the fox had caused the river to flood, taking away everything from him. Ever since that night, life had been so empty and meaningless. Even though it felt like the world had ended, he kept waking up, he kept on living no matter how much he wished he had just let that stupid fox eat him that night. He had been so lonely ever since, and despite the flourish of the woods and fields that once brought him such wonder, he always found his thoughts making their way back to that dark stormy night.
Izuku looked to the fox across from him in the valley again. He didn't run. He stood and stared back at the fox at the edge of the trees and waited, and waited... and nothing.
Time kept passing, yet all the fox did was stare back at him. He looked out past the tall grass and wildflowers between them, simply staring at the poor rabbit. The fox’s blond hair swayed with the breeze. The grass and trees seemed to sway with it, the sound of rustling leaves surging out to his sensitive ears all while his heartbeat met a staccato beat.
They stayed that way for several moments more, the cry of a cicada finally breaking the fox’s dark gaze as it moved swiftly towards the sound. He swished his tail a couple of times before walking off into the depths of the forest. Izuku watched him with bated breath until the fox finally left his sight.
The fox had stuck around, Izuku came to find out. The rabbit could smell him all over his territory. It put him on edge. Even though he had resolved to let the fox claim him in that field, it still bothered him. Why was the fox making himself so obvious when he had so expertly hidden his presence the first time around? It was like he was leaving out warning signs for any other predator in the area while also making his presence so glaringly obvious to the young rabbit. It was merely impossible to not have the fox on his mind.
After the last encounter in the field, he began to aggressively scent Izuku’s entire territory. The scenting soon led to the fox remaining constantly close by, which unnerved the rabbit greatly.
The fox stayed out of Izuku’s sight at first, lingering off in the distance, doing nothing to mask his scent nor hide his tread through the underbrush. He lingered at the edge of Izuku’s vision. He was like a shadow, making himself known but not speaking nor entering Izuku’s field of vision. His presence had become so normal that sometimes Izuku didn’t pay that much attention to him; he had long given up on the fox trying to eat him again.
It started to feel nice after a while, the presence of the fox. It felt like someone out there was still looking out for him and despite the fox never talking to him, he still felt at least a little less lonely. He had become so accustomed to the fox’s not quite there presence that it felt weirder to be away from the fox than not.
Eventually, even his unseen presence started to be seen, slowly but surely making his way further and further into Izuku’s field of vision. The first time he’d been close enough to talk to Izuku, he had just stared at him the whole while—just like the fox had done when they had met again in the field. That had seemed like forever ago now to him.
After several moments of staring at each other, the fox snarled out “What?!”
And it was so absurd to him that Izuku laughed and laughed—until he realized that this was the first time he’d heard another voice in such a long time, and suddenly, Izuku’s high-pitched giggles turned into short-breathed cries. His breath stuttered as he struggled to take in air, tears leaking uncontrollably from his eyes. The fox just looked on in confusion as the rabbit seemed to break down in front of him, collapsing on the earth as he wailed.
“What the fuck?” the fox said under his breath, clearly unaware of how to approach the situation in front of him.
He slowly made his way over to the small, pathetic rabbit that had caved in on himself and sniffed at him audibly, trying to scent the source of the small creature’s distress. The fox quietly watched Izuku for a moment more, wailing on the forest floor like some sort of lunatic, with his ears pointed back and reluctant concern etched out onto his features.
“You dying or something?” the fox asked him gruffly and Izuku soon found himself laughing through his tears again as he tried to regain his breath.
It took him several minutes of high-pitched noises and strained breathing before he was finally able to calm himself down enough to ask the fox the question that had been bothering him since he had met him again.
“Not unless you finish what you started the first time I met you,” Izuku giggled and wiped his tears away with the back of his hand. “Why haven’t you, by the way?” he continued.
He looked up at the fox and held his hand out for the fox to grab, which the fox quirked an eyebrow up at for a moment before he shook his head and took his hand, helping him up off of the floor.
“Haven’t what?” the fox asked, his voice gruff and low.
Izuku didn’t know how the blond managed to convey anger through every syllable he uttered, but it was a trait that Izuku found himself already becoming unreasonably fond of.
“Killed me, eaten me, like you tried to do the night of the storm,” Izuku said.
The rabbit brushed the dirt off of himself before holding his gaze upon deep garnet eyes. The fox seemed startled at the line of questioning for a moment before he returned the rabbit’s gaze, seemingly contemplating his answer before he exhaled deeply and looked off into the forest.
“I don’t know,” the fox said after thinking for several moments, and Izuku had the sense that he hadn’t been truthful.
“Well let me know when you change your mind on that one,” Izuku said sarcastically. When the fox sneered at him the rabbit chuckled in response. He had owed the fox at least some kind of sass on account of the attempted murder.
The fox pinched his eyebrows and shook his head at Izuku. Izuku had presumed he was beginning to regret not having actually eaten him all those nights ago.
After the last encounter, Izuku found he couldn’t leave his burrow without running into the fox. He no longer stayed at the edge of his vision, silently watching. As soon as either spotted the other, the fox would stalk right up to him and quip criticism and sass at him throughout his day. Each time the fox, whom Izuku had learnt was named Katsuki (and whom he had begun to jokingly refer to as Kacchan on the account of his cuddly personality), criticized him, Izuku would mumble a joke about wanting the fox to just eat him already or some other such thing. It would always result in the fox snarling some lecture at him, and Izuku always found himself giggling at Katsuki’s grumbling.
It felt warm, whenever Katsuki had fussed over him.
“You’re gonna break your neck, climbing up there like that Deku!”
“Gods, you suck at hiding your scent. What if another predator comes and I’m not around, huh?”
“Did you skip a meal again? How have you survived this long on your own?”
“Wait for me before leaving my territory! I don’t care that the blueberries are sweeter there!”
Katsuki had become such a constant in his life, always appearing to be so concerned for his well-being. He was there, from when Izuku awoke in the morning until he returned to his burrow in the evening. He had long since given up on the notion of the fox trying to eat him; despite his harsh words and occasional swats at him, Katsuki nagged and lectured him far too much to see the rabbit as anything less than a companion. Izuku had hoped at the most the fox had come to see him as a friend. Izuku had come to think of him as such, though he’d be hesitant to claim such a thing aloud, scared of how the fox would react.
Still, when he left his burrow every morning, the first thing he found himself doing was searching the horizon for blond tufted hair and red, piercing eyes. If Izuku’s eyes would fail to reveal the fox’s presence he would find himself closing his eyes, tilting his head back and scenting the air in one deep pull. He could always catch the faint, aged sweet and musky scent of the fox everywhere around his borrow, but ultimately he would never fail to catch a fresher scent off deeper in the forest. Kacchan was never too far.
He’d walk up to meet the fox with a smile and a greeting on his lips, eager to hear the low growl of “whatever,” or some other such nonchalant response. Despite his abrasiveness, the fox would never be too far from his side, accompanying the rabbit while he foraged and went to explore out a little farther past his territory, eager to explore the forest a bit more now that he had the protection of the fox with him.
He found himself beckoning the tow coloured fox forward one sunny fall day. The sun had been high in the sky and he had felt like lounging under the sun, so he found a nice spot out in a field a little outside his usual stomping grounds. He sighed loudly as he stretched out dramatically, flopping to the ground and startling the fox in the process of his typical lapinian display of comfort. He laid comfortably amongst the grass and wildflowers surrounding him, and soaked up one of the last sunny days before fall was fully upon them.
He lay there for quite a while, occasionally peeking out of the corner of his eye to look at the fox, who had been seemingly standing guard, his tawny hair swaying in time with the grass and trees as the wind blew. Izuku turned his attention from Kacchan and looked over to the side. The rabbit saw some scarlet catchfly flowers next to him. His ears twisted towards them as he concentrated. He looked at them for several moments, the deep red colour of them reminding him of his companion’s eyes and the long straight, pointed petals reminding him of his unruly, spikey hair.
Izuku giggled at the comparison, sat up and smirking to himself. The rabbit's antics caused the fox to look over towards him and raise an eyebrow. He shook his head and looked back out towards the horizon. Kacchan muttered what Izuku thought sounded like “creepy weirdo,” under his breath.
Izuku looked back to the flowers that reminded him so much of the predator that stood across from him—bold, explosive and just as beautiful. Izuku grabbed them and began to weave them together, twisting them into a flower crown. He hummed as he worked, picking more flowers as he needed to and skillfully weaved.
It was nostalgic for him, something he used to do with his mother and the rest of his siblings. He looked over to the fox as he worked and smiled. He never thought he would be able to make one for someone else ever again.
He looked it over when he was finished and smiled. He was proud of himself when he looked it over, sure that the weaving would withstand a little tussle if it came to that.
“Hey, come here!” Izuku called out to the fox, whose ears twitched slightly before looking over towards him.
“What?” he questioned, looking over towards Izuku.
“Just come here, I made you something.”
The fox sighed and slowly made his way over. He sat next to the rabbit and stared at him.
“Well, what is it?” he asked.
“Here!” Izuku said and placed the crown of red flowers on the fox’s head and smiled at him.
Kacchan looked surprised for a moment before he blushed and reached up to touch the circlet of flowers Izuku had placed upon his head.
“It’s adorable, they really suit you!” Izuku gushed, he then reached over to tuck a stray hair misplaced by the crown. He tucked the tuft under the crown, tidying his appearance.
“Who the fuck you calling cute?” The fox grumbled, though his face was nearly as red as the flowers that sat atop his head.
Izuku giggled at the sight of it.
“Why you, silly! You think I call you Kacchan for nothing? It’s because you’re so cute,” Izuku laughed, pleased with his teasing of the blonde before he reached over and tapped him on the nose.
“Shaddup!” Katsuki shouted.
He rubbed at his nose and grabbed the crown from his head and firmly placed it upon Izuku’s.
“I think red’s more your colour anyway,” he said. He then grabbed Izuku’s chin and tilted his gaze up to meet his own.
There was a smirk on his face and his eyes were slanted into a sneer. It was heated and teasing. Izuku couldn’t think of anything to say in return, his face and ears simply heated up in response.
He imagined he resembled a tomato.
Katsuki started cackling at Izuku’s extreme reaction and patted him on the shoulder. He got up off the ground where he was seated next to Izuku and offered his hand to help the rabbit up, and Izuku grabbed it graciously, letting himself get pulled up by the fox.
The fox smiled devilishly at him. He then turned to look out towards the horizon, silent for a moment.
“You should get home, it’ll be dark soon,” he said finally.
Izuku blushed, then nodded silently and started the trek back to his burrow, with the fox following behind him.
It wasn’t until later in the evening when the sun was low in the sky and Katsuki was about to say his farewells for the night that Izuku was struck by a feeling. When he realized it, something in him broke a little.
He didn’t want the fox to leave, even for just the evening.
“Wait!” Izuku shouted before he could think, running up to the fox and grabbing his wrist to stop him from making the trek back to his own burrow for the evening. The blond stopped and turned back to look at the rabbit; he remained quiet and waited for Izuku to continue.
“Umm,” Izuku uttered.
He released the fox’s wrist and began to rub his hands together in embarrassment.
“The nights are getting colder and since you always come back first thing in the mornings anyway…” The rabbit trailed off and pointedly looked everywhere else except for the fox before him.
He began to mumble unintelligibly and Katsuki cut him off.
“Spit it out, dork,” the blond said curtly.
“Stay with me?” Izuku shouted out in embarrassment.
His eyes were scrunched closed and his shoulders were hunched up. His heart was running away in his chest and he felt like it would burst out of his ribcage and fall down at Katsuki’s feet.
“Why?” Izuku heard the fox ask. His voice was the softest it had ever been.
The rabbit opened his eyes in shock at the tenderness in the blonde’s voice and when he looked at him he felt his chest hurt for another reason.
The fox’s eyes were downcast and set away from Izuku; his posture was smaller than the usual proud way he carried himself and Izuku could not figure out what it meant.
“Kacchan?” Izuku asked.
The fox sighed and looked up at him before he continued.
“I’m still a predator, you know,” Katsuki hissed, and Izuku was still for a moment.
Izuku knew all this, knew he must be crazy to yearn for the presence of a creature that tried to kill him when they had first met. He could remember how terrified he was that night, just barely escaping with his life. He also remembered the horrible sorrow he was faced with when he finally made his way back home. Remembered the unbearable loneliness he felt for nearly a year.
Izuku found he didn’t care about any of the risks. He had been resigned to die by the fox’s hand when they had met again in the field anyway. Izuku had only felt alive again when Kacchan had started lingering around every tree and bush.
Izuku slowly reached forward and grabbed the fox’s hand and held it in his own. He looked up to the fox’s eyes and held his gaze there before speaking again, rubbing his thumb across the back of Katsuki’s hand as he did so.
“I know but…” He stalled for a moment, gathering the courage to say what he wanted to say next.
“It’s lonely when you’re not here,” Izuku confessed, tears gathered at the corners of his wide eyes and threatening to fall down his freckled cheeks.
“Deku,” Katsuki said, his tone hoarse.
Izuku yelped when the fox pulled him forward into his body, a hand tilting his head up—and then suddenly lips were on his own. It was warm, soft, and sweet, and Izuku felt like thousands of butterflies were beating their wings against his ribcage. He returned it, deepening the kiss when rough fingers threaded their way through his messy curls and nudged against the flower crown he had forgotten was still sat upon his head.
He was lightheaded and struggling to breathe when they parted. Katsuki’s fingers lingered on his freckled cheek, lovingly stroking the skin there before he lowered his forehead against Izuku’s and closed his eyes.
“Me too,” he said. He took a breath and continued. “That night, when I tried to… The flooding…” he trailed off and Izuku immediately understood.
He wasn’t the only one to lose everything that night.
“And then, I saw you again in that field and you looked as miserable as I felt and I just knew… You didn’t even try to run away and you just looked at me with those wide eyes, you were scared but still resolved and I couldn’t… I’d never seen anything like it. I just found myself needing to be around you and you never ran, you always knew I was close by and it just seemed like you were waiting… I don’t know the exact moment when I started to need you but…”
He took his time with the words, and Izuku thought it was the most he’d ever heard the fox speak at once. As he listened, he slowly brought his hand up to grasp the hand that was caressing his cheek and intertwined the fox’s fingers with his own.
Katsuki lifted his forehead from Izuku’s and opened his eyes. Izuku held Katsuki’s gaze again before he repeated the question he had asked before.
“Stay with me,” Izuku says, more sure than he had been of anything before in his life.
Izuku doesn't know where he is or how long he's been here. He simply awoke one day, in the structure he calls "the house." He has no memory of who he was before or how he got here. He came to be here with no knowledge about who or what he was, except that his name is Izuku and that he is looking for something.
It takes him several weeks before he belatedly realizes something is wrong, walking through the ever winding hallways and staircases of the house. He's never tired, he never feels thirsty or hungry. The only thing he feels is a desperate longing. The ache nestles into his chest next to his heart, day after day. Sometimes he can recall a hint of exactly what it is he's looking for, garnet eyes, a blinding cocky smile. Even so, eventually the feelings and images drift away like mist on the sea.
Day after day he walks the drifting breathing walls the nonsensical useless flying staircases, deceiving dead ends, floors that flip into ceilings, walls that become floors. Day after day, he is forced to walk through the maze with nothing but the house itself for company.
He sings to it sometimes as he walks the ever-changing cage of a maze that the house has become, its sky never ending staircases, buttresses and pillars. When he does, he can feel the house rumble is satisfaction, a pleasant earthquake of pleasure shakes its halls every time he does. He swears he can hear a quiet, blinding hum of satisfaction from the house, as if it's singing along with him. Sometimes he feels an odd sense of fog in his head when he finishes. How did he know a song he's never heard?
He doesn't know how long he's been in the house, traversing its fluttering halls, trying to regain a freedom he can't even remember. Missing a snarky face he's seen before. When he's had enough of his aimless, longing existence, he ambles over to one of the house's many impossibly high ledges. He's never seen the end to the house. He looks into the abyss with tearful eyes and feels the air against his toes as he keeps his heels balanced on the edge.
The house is angry with him, he can hear its low, faint, eerie hum of a growl. Angry with him for what he is about to try. Izuku spreads his arms wide to feel a breeze through his hair and skin, he takes one deep breath and allows himself to fall.
He feels like he is falling forever. There is no end to the punched up feeling in the pit of his stomach.
The rustling of his hair is violent as he falls through the never ending ledges of the house. It truly has no end, and he is constantly falling down, down, down.
The house won't let him go.
Eventually the house takes pity on him, and he feels gravity shift and the wind is less violent through his hair soon he has slowed enough to a float and his tears start to fall down to his feet as opposed to the gnarled rotting architecture that is the sky of the house. He openly sobs and curses the house and screams his frustrations.
"WHY!" the green haired man fruitlessly screams out to the house's walls. His voice cracking and distraught. It echoes throughout the halls, and he is forced to listen to his own despair. His own voice mocking him.
The house flutters in response, it feels his pain but has no answer for him. It never has answers for him. He wails and falls to his knees as he crumples into himself, a despondent heap of flesh and bone that will never feel the heat of another. Ears that will never hear the voice of another, eyes that will see naught but rotting stone and crumbling concrete, no matter how they long for ruby orbs. How his hands long to feel calloused sweet smelling skin. It's all for naught. He aches, he longs, but he will never be satiated.
The house's halls will always deny him. It covets him, keeps him trapped inside its cold and drab, rotting halls. It needs Izuku, it desires him. If Izuku leaves, who will traverse its creations? Crumbling wood and splitting concrete. It's always been Izuku and the house.
He didn't need anyone else. All he needed was the house. They are warden and prisoner, and all they need is each other. They are eternal together. The house has never ending space and Izuku has never ending time. A special hell for each other. He is doomed to walk these halls.
Naught but an unsuccessful hum of comfort from the house and his unending and desperate longing for a man he's never known. Step after step Izuku goes down, down, down...........
Katsuki counts his steps as they echo against the cobblestone that paves the way to a familiar destination. He takes this trek every evening, to the centuries-old cathedral in the millennia-old city. It’s become something of a ritual now, the only ritual left that he’s kept in his entire existence—the length of eternity.
Katsuki waves his hand over the entrance of the cathedral and he hears the click of the doors unlocking for him, and him alone. The doors creak loudly as they allow entry to him. Despite his banishment from heaven, he was still a child of God, and no house of his Father’s would deny entry to him. The locks on the doors click behind him as he enters the cathedral and his steps echo out across the wide space and high ceilings. He makes the familiar path toward the back of the cathedral where a great gold-encrusted glass encasement sits covered in every gem imaginable. Katsuki walks up to the glass and places his hand on it. His ever-harsh features soften as a smile takes over his face.
“Hello, Deku,” he says to the emerald-covered bones trapped within.
Katsuki looks at war-torn fields scanning for his charge. There is gore and stench as far as the eye can see and he sighs in disgust. Of course, now would be the time his father would choose a prophet. He hated coming down to the mortal plane. How his father loved man so much despite their endless sin and depravity, he had no idea. And yet, it was not for him to understand his father but to enact his will. Katsuki was an excellent angel and an obedient son, despite his constant bickering.
He senses the soul his father aims to lay claim to and flies over to him. The man lies face down in a puddle of blood, whether it’s his own or others from the battle, Katsuki has no idea. Katsuki lands and walks over to the man, grumbling about the detritus he walks through as he kneels next to his mark. Katsuki flips the man over and he feels his heart stop for a moment. Katsuki doesn’t understand the buzzing feeling that starts in his gut and works its way up to his chest, but what he does know, is that this man is unlike any other he had ever witnessed. His hair is deep and lush like the forests surrounding the fields upon which he stands. His face is round and freckled, almost borderline cherubic. His body is strong, tanned and scarred; the man had not lived an easy life. Most of all though, is the quality of the man’s soul he can feel where he touches him.
He heals the man as much as he can manage before lifting him up and asking where his home is. The man visualizes it in his mind, too far gone to speak. Katsuki takes them there.
_________
Katsuki was charged with simply delivering his father's commands and returning. The prophet—Deku, as Katsuki has taken to calling him—is something the angel has become fond of. He cannot describe it but it pains him to be away. He initially dropped the man off at his home, declared his actions a miracle and intervention from God and delivered upon the prophet his first charge—to protect the faithful. He immediately returned to his father, but a dread, unlike anything he had experienced wormed its way into his soul. When he came to deliver his next charge, as soon as he laid eyes on the mortal, his chest eased. It took a few instances like this before the angel decided that he will simply stay at the human's side.
The angel discovered loneliness.
_________
“What’s God like, Kacchan?” the man asks one day as they sit around a fire and Deku eats his dinner.
Katsuki looks up towards the heavens. He chucks a rock as he thinks of a way to describe his father. The stars twinkle and the heavens weave their way between them, proof enough for any mortal that God watches over them. He himself had never met him, only the highest chorus of angels had that privilege.
Eventually, Katsuki settles on the truth. Blunt honesty always seemed to suit him.
“I don’t know,” he sighs as he looks back from the heavens down to wide emerald eyes, a much more pleasant sight.
“What do you mean you don’t know?”
“Never met him.”
“Huh,” Deku says as he wipes his hands of his meal and looks up to the night sky like Katsuki had been not a moment before.
The angel keeps his eyes on the mortal as he gazes upon the heavens.
“Then how do you know he’s real?” Deku asks. Katsuki knows the man is devout and is just curious about it and not actually questioning his father's existence.
Katsuki is silent for a moment before responding.
“I feel him.” He says resolutely. His father is in the air, light and water, in the soil and in the very flames before him.
Izuku looks down from the heavens and down to Katsuki’s eyes. They hold each other for a moment, and the mortal's face flushes as he smiles.
“Me too,” he says.
And Katsuki feels that funny feeling in his chest—
—and realizes that he will fall in more ways than one.
_________
It’s in the quiet moments he comes to know what home is. Heaven never holds a warmth like this, even as he treads through the snow of Deku’s land. He tends to the few animals the man kept and pats the heads of Deku’s dogs as they happily follow him through his routine. It was like time passed slowly here and he wishes it wouldn’t pass at all. He wished that he could stay in this moment of peace forever and that the troubles on the horizon would not come to pass. He knew the future would soon not be kind to Deku. The incoming army of pagans that Deku had been selected to defend God’s children from would not be an easy enemy to defeat.
When he had told Izuku that he was chosen, that he would lead an army of faithful and sacrifice everything, he knew for them he simply looked up at Katsuki and smiled as he spoke softly.
“It would be my honour.”
It struck Katsuki; most would scream and cry at a fate so horrible given to them—by the father of all no less. He defied all of Katsuki’s expectations of man. He possessed a graciousness he had never known, a dedication he had not realized possible, and a gentleness that quietly betrayed love for all, despite origin or creed. He had stared at the angel a moment, got up from the bed Katsuki had placed him in to recover, and asked if he drank tea. Simply content to lay down the rest of his life to his father, more concerned about being a good host for the creature in his home than his own fate.
“That’ll keep us through the winter, I think,” Izuku says, breaking Katsuki out of his reminiscing.
He looks down at the wood he has chopped. A couple of the dogs had been dragging it back to the house with him. Maybe he went a little overboard.
“It sure is handy having you around Kacchan,” the man says as he goes to relieve the dogs of their harnesses.
“I’ll help you stack them against the house,” Izuku looks back at Katsuki and smiles. “I don’t know how I’m going to cope when you’re back to wherever it is you came from.” He sighs and begins to stack the firewood as he said he would.
“Me either…” Katsuki says forlornly as he picks up some wood.
___________
Katsuki lays next to Izuku on his small hay mattress. Moonlight is pouring in through the window and illuminating his dark, full lashes. His view of the man beside him is obscured by his messy hair and Katsuki reaches over tenderly to push it to the side, rubbing the strands with his fingertips as he does so. He releases his hair after a few moments of observing the man in the moonlight. His freckles spread across his bronze skin, numerous and intricate in their patterning. He envied the sun that had kissed the skin as he wished to and left its mark, without retribution or damnation. He’s never known a feeling like this, of yearning, obsession, how the mere thought of this mortal’s existence brought him higher than any of his kind had ever been, and yet the mere thought of losing him brought him deeper than any layer of hell that ever existed.
And losing him was a very real possibility, saints and prophets weren’t known for their long, peaceful lives after all.
The pain in his chest rose to the surface as he watched the man’s peaceful slumber. He knows he’d prepared Izuku for the coming war, and in turn, Izuku had consulted any lords that would hear him and prepared the faithful as much as he could. But still, the outlook was bleak.
Katsuki wanted to have something to hold, a piece of Izuku to remember at the end of all this. When the moment is over and he’s left to face eternity bereft of the thing that finally gave him purpose as opposed to duty.
The thought has the angel’s breath catching and he shocks when he feels wetness caress the plane of his cheek. He lifts his hand up in shock and sweeps his fingertips across his cheeks, when he pulls away the tips of them glisten in the moonlight—proof of the moisture that had collected. His breath catches in his confusion and he feels Deku stir from his slumber at the sound.
“Kacchan?” he asks groggily as the fog of sleep leaves his eyes.
He startles when he notices the angel's condition and concern sweeps over his features.
“What’s wrong?” he asks, his rough, scarred hand grasping his cheek in concern.
“I don’t know… what is this?” Katsuki asks.
Deku goes silent for a moment, contemplative, before speaking once more.
“You’ve never cried before?”
Katsuki blinks more of the curious wetness from his eyes and shakes his head.
“What’s happening?” Katsuki repeats and Deku snuggles up closer to him. The man tilts his head up towards him and wipes a tear off of his cheek before tucking a stray tuft of hair behind his ear.
“Us mere mortals do it when we’re in pain. I guess angels aren’t as acquainted with that feeling,” Izuku states as he wraps an arm around Katsuki.
The action brings warmth up to his chest and somehow he finds himself ‘crying’ harder.
“Shh, shh…” Izuku coos as he holds the angel in his arms.
“So what brings you such anguish, oh mighty creature?” Deku asks, his manner of speech teasing in an attempt to lift the angel’s spirits.
Katsuki stops for a moment. He can’t explain… how can he? He doesn’t have the words—the vocabulary. How to explain the pain in his chest when the sunlight bounces off of his eyes, when he laughs as clear and as pleasant as the ring of a windchime, the look on his face when he gazes upon the stars, the thick timber of his voice when he contemplates the meaning of it all, late in the dead of night. Katsuki cannot fathom it at all, how any creature such as he had been born of a mortal mother, raised among mortal men, and still came to be the most precious of all of his father’s creations.
He doesn’t have the words but…
Katsuki lifts his hand up and cradles Deku’s cheek. The angel closes his eyes and lets the mortal feel what he does not possess the means to say. All of it, the need, the worry, the loneliness, and the ultimate soul-consuming warmth of it all.
He hears the man gasp aloud as Katsuki slowly retreats his hand back from his cheek.
Deku’s eyes are wide. They start to shine with the moisture the angel has recently become acquainted with himself and he reaches over to grab the angel's hand and intertwine it with his own.
“But… you’re an angel,” Deku says, his voice quiet and reverent.
Katsuki, again, can’t think of anything to say, so he simply rubs Deku’s hand back and forth with his thumb.
“You’re an angel and you love me…” Izuku says, dumbfounded, his eyes wide and glistening where they stare into Katsuki’s own.
“Oh…” Katsuki says. It’s a soft little exhalation that leaves his lips, a puff of air between them, where they lay nearly intertwined under the wool and fur bedding.
“I love you?” Katsuki confirms, a little dumbfounded.
There it was.
The vocabulary.
Deku giggles as he nods, the gentle and cheerful sound bringing warmth to his chest.
“Yes!” he confirms as he leans forward to press his lips against Katsuki’s. He revels in the feel of them, plush yet chapped, from the dry winter air. His own lips tingle where Deku’s are pressed against him. An odd, curious sensation but so, so lovely.
“Deku—mmf,” Katsuki gasps out, in an attempt to ask what this wonderful action was called but he is cut off when Deku presses his tongue into his parted lips.
It’s warm and hot and slick and it causes a heat he’s never felt to spark at the core of him. He opens his mouth wider and little sounds fall out of him, sighs, whimpers, and groans. Odd, weird little noises, he would think to be embarrassed by them if it weren’t for the same sounds leaking out of Deku. Along with a chorus sung sweeter than any angel had before.
“Kacchan, Kacchan, Kacchan…” The green-haired mortal sighs over and over. If Katsuki never hears any other sound again he will be satisfied.
“Deku…” he gasps out in return. He can’t think of anything else in this moment.
All that matters is Deku. The heat of his skin, his wirey strength where he holds the angel against him, the copper of his skin in contrast to his own, the herbal, musky scent of him, the soft feel of his curls where his hand is tangled within them. He could drown deeper in the sensations and feelings of the most precious creature in all of creation, all that mattered anymore. Katsuki was a heathen and he knew it, now, knew his transgressions and spat in the face of them. Not even the warmth of his father could compare to the heat threatening to burn him to ash. Nothing could compare to the prophet, to this moment, to the time they had spent together.
He feels a hand against the core of him and he audibly moans, his flesh desperate and heated.
“What?” He asks, breaking his mouth away from Deku’s, breathless and gasping. He groans again when the man repeats the motion, more sure and targeted, and he shivers at the feeling.
“Oh, can I show you Kacchan?” Deku gasps out between them, his breath desperate and shattered. Katsuki can’t help but stare at the pink shine of his kiss-slicked lips.
“Show me?” Katsuki repeats dumbly, lost in the revelation of the night, the exploration into new territory.
Deku sighs again as he grasps the angel's cheek and tilts his gaze up forcing him to meet his own. His eyes are lidded as he looks into them. His thumb rubs against his cheekbone before he speaks again.
“Show you how mortals love,” he whispers and brings his thumb down to rub against his bottom lip.
Katsuki nods frantically and thick calloused fingers move to thread into his hair as his mouth is claimed once more.
The heat is back, the sweet sensations clouding his mind until the pressure is back against the core of him. He moans out at the foreign pleasure and Deku groans in response, taking control and deepening the kiss even further. The pressure continues against him until he gasps out, "Please."
He sounds absolutely wrecked and before he can even think to feel embarrassed, thick calloused fingers are frantically tugging apart the laces of his trousers. Then, Deku is dragging the garment down his legs. Katsuki gasps as he feels the cool night air against his heated flesh. His face feels just as heated as the rest of him when Deku parts to stare at his newly exposed groin.
Katsuki recognizes hunger in his eyes when the human stares for a few moments more before leaning into the shell of the angel's ear and whispering, "Your cock's just as pretty as you are, Kacchan."
The slow timber of his voice, the feel of his breath against his sensitive ear, and the lewd statement all feel like a punch to the gut.
"You're going to kill me," Katsuki wheezes out when he feels a rough calloused hand firmly grasp him and tug.
"Only a little," The human replies chuckling before wrapping his plush lips and hot mouth around his cock.
Katsuki loudly groans his hand shooting to green locks and grasping them between his fingers. Deku hums happily as he takes him deeper, his mouth hot and slick. It's like nothing he ever would have thought of before. Humans have found many a purpose for their mouths than just eating and Katsuki, between his broken moans as Deku takes him apart, can't help but wonder what other human ingenuity lies in store for him.
“Ah, Deku, hnngg…” Katsuki groans out, as the prophet laves against him, his tongue working in tandem as he bobs his head up and down.
He moans and groans as Deku works him relentlessly. It feels so good in a way he never could have comprehended before. He tries his best not to pull the green locks of hair trapped in between his fingers, he can’t bear to even think of hurting Deku. Katsuki lets go of the hair and thrusts his hands into the bedding to stop himself from pulling, but Deku makes a noise of dissent, grabs Katuki’s wrist, and places his hand in his hair again.
Katsuki tentatively gives Izuku’s hair a tug and he groans out lasciviously in turn. Katsuki lets out a moan of his own, keeps a tight hand on Deku’s hair while he watches rapturously as the prophet’s plush, slick lips take him deeper and deeper into his mouth. Despite the quiet of the night, there’s so much noise. The wet slurping noise of Deku taking him in as deep as he can, the little mewls that erupt from his throat, muffled by Katsuki’s cock, and Katsuki’s own whimpers falling unbidden from his lips.
Katsuki grasps harshly at green locks when Deku takes him deeper.
“Deku, aah—” He groans out. “Something’s…something’s happening.”
Katsuki continues when a tight pressure in his abdomen coils tighter and tighter. His hips thrust up as he speaks and Deku firmly grasps his hips, pinning them down to the bed as he continues fucking his throat on Katsuki’s cock.
The coil snaps and Katsuki cries out as the feeling overtakes him. He rides the high, completely oblivious of the world for a couple of moments as Deku works him through it until he whines when he starts to feel oversensitive. Deku slides Katsuki’s dick out of his mouth with an obscene slurping noise and smiles proudly up at the angel as he licks his lips.
Katsuki is panting, a puddle of raw nerves underneath the prophet, unable to string along any thought other than holy shit.
“You were so good, Kacchan. So polite,” he says with a smirk on his face as he leans up to press his lips against Katsuki’s. He opens his mouth needily and bitterness sweeps across his tongue as Deku’s tongue teases against his. Katsuki gasps around the taste and hears a slight chuckle from the human pressed against him.
Izuku breaks the kiss and breathily speaks against him. "You want to keep going, angel?" Izuku asks and Katsuki dumbly nods his head, words still evading him.
The prophet leans over their pallet bed to the wooden nightstand beside it and fumbles a moment before coming back with a vial of green-coloured liquid.
"Traded for this last time we were in town," Deku says as he grabs hold of Katsuki’s wrist and turns his palm upward. The blonde angel watches with rapt attention as the thick, slick liquid pours into his palm and pools in the center as he quickly cups it.
"Hold still," Deku commands, pulling his shift up and off his torso.
The angel gasps when the prophet's golden, freckled skin is laid bare before him. Deku's white scars stand in contrast with the tan of his skin and Katsuki's ruby eyes burn as they take in built muscle. He smells like the forest after rain, and deep green hair makes its way down his abdomen to his full and leaking cock.
Katsuki reaches his un-oiled hand forward and caresses his hip bone in awe at the unbelievably mortal beauty before him. Deku shivers at the touch and straddles Katsuki’s waist as he leans forward and nuzzles into Katsuki’s chest. Katsuki watches with rapt attention as Deku grabs his wrist again and leads it down to his ass where he’s lifted it up in the air.
The prophet brings their hands forward to press at the seam of him. Deku’s thick, calloused fingers pressing against the back of his hand and pushing the oiled pads of his fingertips against the ring of muscle. Deku moans and Katsuki imitates the movements the man shows him, rubbing against him. The weight of him atop his chest makes something within him rise again, the whiny, breathy moans that ghost along his heated skin. Katsuki gasps when Deku presses Katsuki’s middle and ring fingers into him. The little gasps and moans continue as the mortal guides him. Katsuki thrusts them in and out like he’s been shown until he feels something within him towards his abdomen that has the man atop him groaning loudly.
“There!” Deku yells out, high and whiny.
Something in Katsuki roars up at the sound; he needs more, he wants.
He presses at the spot and Deku presses his ass against his hand as he cries out again, as if Katsuki’s hand has more to give him. Katsuki questions the thought for a moment until he feels two of Deku’s fingers snake in beside his and press incessantly on that little spot within him. He thrusts their fingers again and again as Deku’s cries grow louder and louder with each passing moment.
“Kacchan please, please,” he gasps out against him as his eyes meet his own.
“Anything, anything I have is yours to take,” Katsuki groans out brokenly.
Deku removes his fingers from his ass and grabs Katsuki’s wrist again so he does the same. The smaller man moans at the emptiness and Katsuki’s ears burn at the lewd slurping noise as they exit. Deku shakes against him for a moment before taking a deep breath and pushing himself up to pin Katsuki’s arms against the pallet bed beneath him.
“I’ll teach you, Kacchan, it’ll be so good. We’ll be so good.”
He squeezes his hands and Kacchan groans at the pressure against his wrists. Izuku releases them. Katsuki keeps them there like he was told as Deku leans back and grabs him with his slicked hand, pouring more of the oil on him. Deku thoroughly spreads it on him before positioning his ass atop his swollen, aching cock.
“Kacchan, look at me,” the green-haired man says. Katsuki tears his gaze away from Deku’s hands and looks towards his wide, emerald eyes. “Don’t look away,” he commands as he slowly lowers himself unto Katsuki’s cock.
“Ohh—” Katsuki grunts out brokenly as he struggles to keep his eyes open. It’s slick and tight and hot. It’s everything he didn’t know he could want and nothing he ever expected to.
He can’t stop his hand from lifting up from the mattress to grab at Deku’s forearms where he has them braced against him.
“Deku!” He cries out when Deku lifts up and grinds his hips back down against him.
Deku grabs his hands and intertwines their fingers, holding them, before pressing back down against the mattress.
Katsuki holds Deku’s gaze as he continues to grind against him. The movement of his hips is slow and he grinds against him when his ass meets his hips. Katsuki feels that moisture on his cheeks again and that now familiar coil tightening at the core of him yet again.
This was something his father would punish him for—will punish him for. No doubt, Katsuki is damned. And yet, he can’t bring himself to care. Thoughts of never knowing the prophet, never loving him and being loved in return, and shown it, in the mortal way as Deku stated, eat at him. Being ignorant of something like this is hell, worse than any punishment his father could levy against him. His still heart has finally started to beat to a rhythm he was unable to hear until red eyes came upon green. Until that moment he’d been ignorant of the symphonies and the beauty of the melody surrounding his father’s children. If all humans even held a portion of the beauty and brilliance of the prophet’s, he had been a fool.
No, falling was worth knowing the beauty of the man whose gaze held his own. An eternity of damnation was worth knowing the mortal Izuku Midoriya, was worth loving him.
“Don’t go anywhere,” Deku whispers, leaning his forehead against his as he bears down on him again. “Stay here with me.”
“I’m here,” Katsuki tilts his lips up and kisses him, “I’m right here.”
“Ahh!” Izuku cries out as Katsuki thrusts up to meet him as he grinds down.
Katsuki continues thrusting up, chasing the pressure at the core of him, the cries falling from Deku’s lips, the tears threatening to fall from the corners of his own eyes.
The pressure rises and rises. He thrusts faster, chasing that now familiar cliff’s edge. He’ll gladly fall.
And fall.
And fall.
Deku’s hands squeeze tight against his as he moans loudly and throws his head back.
“Kacchan!” He cries out as his release covers his stomach.
Katsuki wraps his arms around him and pulls him back down to his chest and chases his own climax with wanton abandon, Deku crying out in his ear, still sensitive from his own.
Katsuki gasps when his orgasm finally finds him, he struggles to find his breath as his cock pumps spurt after spurt of his release into the prophet. He throws his own head back and tries to come back down as his hands wander. Over thick muscle and scarred skin, seeking, needing, feeling. He’s real, this small mortal, seemingly inconsequential and yet demonstrably important. His hands eventually thread through green, curly strands and he plays with them as he returns to himself. Moment by moment.
Deku is laid against his chest as they slowly come back to themselves. His chest heaves, breath by breath, and Deku rises and falls with it. He wishes he could stay like this forever, with the prophet safe against him like this, ear against his heart. Whole and present and ignorant of the fate to befall him.
Katsuki plays with evergreen strands of hair and tries not to weep.
________________
Katsuki waits for the other shoe to drop. But it’s nothing sudden, nothing so simple as that. No dire and prompt invasion; it’s a slow and torturous progression. It’s hours of convincing local leaders, nobles, and kings. It’s months of proving to the faithful the prophets link to divinity, of being chosen. It’s slow, oh so slow, and then, there’s an army at the gates and Katsuki can do nothing but watch as Izuku leads the faithful into war.
Then it’s fast, Katsuki can do nothing but hold on to the man for whom he’s fallen. He can love him with all he’s capable of, everything he never knew he had within him. He can do all of this… but he cannot save this man.
He can only enact his father’s will.
For once in the length of eternity, he envies the humans their freedom.
__________________
It’s another hush evening in the camp and his heated skin is soothed by the cool night air. It’s a nice sensation, the chill of the night and the all-consuming heat wrapped around his back. The smell of him soothes him after the body bliss of their coupling, all strength and musk and heat beside him. He’s alive and breathing despite another precarious battle.
Katsuki closes his eyes and listens to the camp. To the men tending their wounds, the many and numerous prayers to his father, to Deku himself. He tries to focus on the prophet’s breath ghosting against the nape of his neck, on the arm slung across his waist. Alive, so very alive.
Katsuki.
Suddenly, the bustling encampment is so very silent, as the call of the higher choir reaches him.
__________________
When the prophet wakes in the early morning, all that greets him is loose feathers against his pillow.
___________________
He breaks free of his chains and escapes down to the mortal realm. He was at risk of falling, locked up and replaced for his own good. The prophet was to be betrayed and martyred. inspiration for an eternity for the faithful.
He’ll burn for all time if he has to.
He must make it in time.
He falls to the earth, his pure white feathers burning off as he plummets, replaced one by one by dark inky down. It hurts, it hurts like nothing he’s experienced before burning him inside and out but, still, it is a small burden in the face of what is to come.
Katsuki grits his teeth and gains control of his newfound wings and soars to where he can feel the prophet. The chill of the wind where it chafes against his skin serves as nothing but a reminder to be swift. The newfound pain will not deter him.
He has to be there.
____________________
He can see the smoke in the distance and he knows, he just knows. He lands amongst the humans, believer and not, watching on as the pyre the prophet is tied to begins to burn. All eyes are locked on his bruised and dirty face, his emerald eyes focused on the flames making their way up to his feet. His eyes look up again to scan amongst the crowd of people, his followers openly weeping and the pagan army sneering at his imminent suffering. Their eyes catch each other and hold, tears gather at the corners and spill down his cheeks. He smiles. Deku stares at him and smiles, simply happy to see him at the end.
A sob works its way up his throat that only he and the prophet can hear. He can’t let him suffer like this. He feels the blade in his hand before he can even finish the thought as he makes one step and then another toward the pyre. He knows the consequences, knows he will burn like Izuku is now…
Katsuki ignores the burn of the flames against his feet as he steps up unto the pyre. Deku’s still smiling and staring as Katsuki cradles his face with his left hand and swiftly works his blade into his chest with his right. He feels all the breath leave Izuku in a pained wheeze.
“Thank you.”
It’s barely a whisper that leaves the prophet’s chapped lips. Katsuki holds him and watches the light fade from his eyes. He stays with him until the very last second. He tries to fight the scream that wants to tear out of his chest but still, it leaks out of him as he lets go of the prophet to step back from the pyre and watch the thing he loved most in all of existence burn.
He wishes he could burn too, in that very moment, right that second, go as swiftly as his sun had.
And he does, he screams the moment it happens, his father’s favour leaving him. He can no longer enter heaven. He watches as the fire blazes up into the night sky. He watches as it builds higher and higher. He watches it burn all the green in the world. He sits and watches as all faithful and nonbeliever alike leave and the night turns to morning and all that is left in the field is the shell of Katsuki and a pile of ash.
He can no longer go home.
_________________________
Katsuki’s feet echo off of the cobblestone every night. He lives through wars, first fought with sword and then eventually, slowly, with bullets and then humans become able to summon hellfire itself and wipe nations out of existence. Word is sent by pony, then spoken through the wire, and finally through the air itself. The country he is in, the language, and the people, all have changed over time, and still Katsuki comes to the cathedral. He and the emerald bones are the only things that have remained the same over the millennia.
Katsuki comes every evening, bereft of his brothers, bereft of his father and bereft of his love. He has lived alone through the centuries. The occasional coming and going of mortal acquaintances and friends have briefly kept him company throughout the years, but at the end of it all he is alone.
Technology has risen and fallen, and eventually, the people do too. Katsuki hangs around the old dilapidated church, the prophet's bones miraculously untouched. Deku retained his father’s favour even after Katsuki had defied him. He sits alone, next to the jewel-encrusted corpse and speaks to them all the while. Even as Katsuki waits for the sun itself to go out, growing hotter and hotter each day. Eventually, it’s so bright he cannot see.
It’s so bright.
He cannot see.
He cannot feel.
_____________________
Katsuki blinks and he’s come to realize he’s reached the end of everything.
He hoped, at least, he’d finally be able to rest. That his father could muster up some mercy for him and lead him to oblivion.
Katsuki opens his eyes and knows, deep down, to the very depths of his core, that he is in the in-between. The ocean between heaven and hell, where the forgotten souls are left to rot. He feels tears well up in his eyes. Was his crime so great that he could not even feel the flames of hell? He was forced to endure eternity alone, always alone. He had suffered hadn’t he, did he not survive his punishment? His father had all of creation’s forgiveness for his mortal children, did he not have any for him?
He feels despair overtake him, its black pestilent waters rising up and up and up, like the ocean of the in-between, rising up to drown him. And Katsuki lets them; he’s so, so tired. He floats like that, in the darkness, for what feels like an eternity more when his half-lidded eyes, bleary through the sea, spot a speck of light. It’s faint at first but persistent, it grows and grows. Eventually, all the dark is gone and Katsuki basks in the warmth, a warmth he hasn’t known in so, so long.
Rough, calloused hands encircle his wrists and pull him from the void. Katsuki chokes on it, he coughs out all the despair, he coughs and coughs as a warm hand slowly caresses his back. Eventually, when all of it’s free of him and he feels the hand on him, he understands.
He turns in shock and looks at the soul next to him, and he sees eyes he thought he would never see again. His eyes filled with tears just like his own and a sad smile overcoming the face he’s yearned an eternity to see again.
The blonde human won’t stop staring at him. The man feels familiar, but he just can’t put his finger on it. The human’s ruby eyes find his verdant ones from across the hall constantly. He thinks the human doesn’t know that due to the size of his irises (and the size of his eyes themselves) he has near 360-degree vision. His green, glowing eyes tend to unsettle most humans—as large and wide as they were. Most humans attempt to avert their gaze from his eyes, but somehow they seem to attract this particular human instead. He consistently holds his gaze, and when that isn’t possible, he continues to stare at him.
Maybe he knows me? the alien thinks to himself.
His childhood is a complete blank; he can’t remember before the age of fifteen. He had awoken on a federation ship, afflicted with a nasty head wound and no prior recollection of his life beforehand. The captain of the ship, commander Yagi Toshinori, had taken him in as his own and gave him the name “Midori”—he assumes due to the colour of his hair and eyes.
Maybe that is the reason that the human will not stop staring at him? This evening’s soiree is to celebrate his adoptive father’s retirement, and given that he was a war hero it was quite the event among federation members. Many humans took issue with their most well-known warrior taking in an alien—perhaps the blonde was one of them? The human was around his age; maybe he was xenophobic and mad that the humans’ precious “All Might” had not taken in a human child.
He contemplates it the entire evening up until the band starts to play after the dinner and humans start to pair off one by one and make their way to the dance floor. Midori gets up from his seat next to his father and is about to excuse himself home—he’s never asked to dance—when the blonde man comes out behind him and says, “Hey, Deku!”
Midori turns around instantly at the call from the blonde. He looks puzzled at the blonde for a moment. Maybe he had him confused with another sarisian?
“My name is Midori…” he says, sounding unsure of himself.
“No, you definitely look like a Deku,” he says, the softest grin the alien had ever seen on a human overtaking his features.
The human holds his hand out for Midori to take and asks, “Dance with me?”
Midori feels his hearts lurch in his chest in tandem. He frantically nods and takes the human’s hand and lets himself be led to the dancefloor.
The blonde intertwines his hand with Midori’s and places his other hand on around his waist and pulls him close. He starts to lead the alien into a slow dance as the live band plays a love song. Midori can feel heat in his cheeks and guesses that they’re an embarrassing shade of blue at the moment. He’s never had this sort of attention from anyone before, let alone a human this attractive.
He feels like he’s about to burst into flames when the man unlinks their hands and brings his up to thumb at the bioluminescent markings on his cheeks—the glowy equivalent of human freckles.
“They still look like stars…” he says, rubbing them with his thumb a moment more before closing his eyes and leaning his forehead against Midori’s. “Never thought I’d see ‘em again.”
“Still?” Midori questions. His hearts’ attempt to leap out of his throat is only tampered by his curiosity regarding how the human knows him.
The human leans back and frowns at him, leading the dance all the while.
“You don’t remember, do you?”
Midori shakes his head and lifts his fringe up from his forehead to reveal a gnarled scar running across it.
“I don’t think I ever will.” he says.
The blonde maintains his somber look and moves his hand up from his cheek to trace the scar with his index finger.
“I’m sorry,” he says.
“Why are you sorry?” Midori asks him.
“This injury is my fault.”
Midori tilts his head in question, waiting for the human to continue his explanation.
“We grew up together, a little colony on the outskirts of the galaxy. Slavers perfectly timed an attack when the fleet would be thin in the area. I grew up training how to fight, figured I could fight ‘em off on my own. I pushed you into an escape pod—you hit your head.” He says, his eyes trained on the scar above his eye.
“Oh,” Midori says, trying his best to remember—but is not surprised when nothing comes to the surface. He does jolt, though, when he remembers what the blonde had called him earlier.
“Wait, so is my name really Deku?” he cries, a little distraught.
The blonde laughs in response, a grin splitting his features and the column of his neck exposed when he throws his head back.
Midori’s face heats in embarrassment, was he being made fun of?
When the human calms himself enough to speak again he shakes his head and clears a tear from his eye with the back of his hand.
“No, no, that was my nickname for you, I was a little shit back then.” He grins again and it feels so nostalgic. “Your name is actually Izuku Midoriya.”
“Izuku Midoriya.” Midori repeats tasting his real name on his tongue for the first time, “Takes some getting used to…”
“Nah,” the blonde smiles, “I’ll still call you Deku.”
Midori jolts again when he remembers he’s forgotten to ask something important.
“Oh my goodness, I’m so impolite! I never asked for your name.”
“Terrible host really, isn’t this your father’s party.”
Midori groans and nods his head. The blonde chuckles and Midori nearly shouts when he’s suddenly dipped low by the human and he stares deeply into his eyes.
“It’s Katsuki, Bakugo Katsuki.”
“So you’re Kacchan then,” Midori blurts out before he can think, and is about to frantically apologise—when he spots tears suddenly fall from Katsuki’s eyes as he smiles.
“Yeah, sounds about right,” the human says, swinging him back up from the dip before leaning down and pressing his lips against his.
Midori opens his eyes wide in shock before leaning into the human and closing his eyes. The kiss is sweet and it’s chaste and it feels like every love song you ever played on repeat in middle school. He feels a little lonely when it ends but he smiles wide when he opens his eyes and looks back at the blonde.
