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Memento mori

Summary:

“You died,” says Kirishima, as amazed as the other. “You died and now you are alive.”
“I did what?” Izuku looks between them as if waiting for one of them to drop the act and tell him it was a joke. He didn’t die. He didn’t. He’s here and alive and breathing. Maybe his heart just stopped for a second but that must be it, right?
“Don’t say it like it would be ok for your heart to stop, even for a second!” Katsuki yells, interrupting the string of his mumbled thoughts.
Kirishima would really congratulate him on his ability to understand and get a coherent sentence out of Midoriya’s ramblings, but right now he’s more worried about Deku’s resurrection.

Notes:

This totally didn’t go as I thought it would.
Like, not at all.

You wanna read a really good Ajin!Au (where Ajin!Izuku is actually important for the plot and not just a plot device to have Bakugou realize he’s an idiot?) with angst and exceptionally written character (full of gore and unhealthy relationship) that will totally capture you?
Try Ramabear’s ‘standing in the awe of death’ series -> https://archiveofourown.org/works/8110444/chapters/18588106

This is just some self-indulgent Ajin!AU because I need Bakugou to suffer a lot.

 

Written for the COW-T #10 - week 6, mission 5
Prompt: memento mori

Work Text:

A bubble of laughs bursts in his chest and Katsuki lets it go. 

He laughs and laughs and laughs until he can’t breathe anymore and his chest hurts and his throat burns and tears wells in his eyes again. 

Kirishima would like to ask him if he’s fine, but no, of course, he’s not fine. Actually, Kirishima himself feels like throwing up. 

Midoriya Izuku lays dead on the street, impaled on a girder that’s obliterating his stomach, with third degrees burnt on half his body and half his face taken away by debris. 

They hadn’t expected the palace to collapse on him. 

They had found him still alive under all the wreckage, exhaling rapid and ragged breaths, and Bakugou had held his hand, whispered in his ear hugging his body, silent tears running down his cheek as Midoriya died and became a lump in his arms.

“You had to die, Deku. Of course,” Katsuki chokes on his words, pain and anger twisting his features, as he clutches his corpse. 

And maybe he’s not taking in enough air because his vision is getting dizzy and he sees black dots dancing in front of him. 

“Bakugou, I think you should take a step back.” 

There’s a hint of fear in Kirishima’s voice, but Bakugou sure as hell isn’t leaving Deku now. 

“Bakugou…” 

Kirishima’s hands grip the collar of his costume, pulling him up, and Katsuki tries to resist, but the hero pries him away and no… 

Black dust is spiraling around Izuku’s body, like a swarm of dark bees, buzzing with a dreading noise. 

“What -?”

“Deku!” Katsuki is too shocked to move. 

Black particles surround him and twirl around his body and damn, is he gonna be denied even the solace of a funeral? 

It takes a minute - but what does it matter? They don’t know what is happening, so it feels like an hour - then the dust dissipates and scatters, leaving behind a thinning black line. 

There are just a few particles, thick as flies, floating over Izuku’s head when he opens his eyes. 

“What happened?” He asks and his face is perfectly normal, no burnings on his body, his hands no longer scarred and his abdomen intact, the girdle laying cut in half on the floor. 

Katsuki opens his mouth, again and again, trying to find a suitable reply, but the truth his he doesn’t have one. 

“You died,” says Kirishima, as amazed as the other. “You died and now you are alive.” 

“I did what?” Izuku looks between them as if waiting for one of them to drop the act and tell him it was a joke. He didn’t die. He didn’t. He’s here and alive and breathing. Maybe his heart just stopped for a second but that must be it, right?

“Don’t say it like it would be ok for your heart to stop, even for a second!” Katsuki yells, interrupting the string of his mumbled thoughts. 

Kirishima would really congratulate him on his ability to understand and get a coherent sentence out of Midoriya’s ramblings, but right now he’s more worried about Deku’s resurrection. 

“And your heart didn’t just stop! Your body was a fucking mess!” 

Katsuki points at the thorn clothe of his costume, blood soaking the burnt rims, and at the intact skin underneath. 

“I - I don’t know what happened.” 

 

* * * 

 

The drive home is silent.
Izuku doesn’t know why Katsuki is here with him, why he insisted to stay in the first place, why he went in with him to talk to the doctors, why he pressed to bring him home afterward. 

Kirishima was worried as well, but he could send him away with the promise to keep him posted. 

Kacchan, on the other hand, wouldn’t leave his side. 

The doctors didn’t  know anything - they went as far as to try telling them they don’t believe them and Katsuki went really close to hurt them too because he was there, he held Deku’s body in his arm and he was dead, he was, for fuck’s sake. 

In the end they settled for the existence of a regeneration quirk. They said maybe, maybe, Bakugou thought him dead, but actually the quirk was already working. 

If they had other theories - such as ‘maybe Ground Zero has his morning coffee flavored with some sort of liquor’ - they kept them for themselves. 

Kacchan follows him in the lift and waits for him to open the door of his flat. 

“May I offer you a cup of tea?” Izuku asks because it’s only polite, after what Kacchan did for him today. 

Katsuki nods and has a seat at the small table of his kitchen. 

“I want to sleep here tonight.” 

It’s weird and awkward how he lays there his request. Not asking - Kacchan never would - but not imposing either, more a ’this is what I want, take it in consideration’. 

Once  he would have just stated ‘I’ll sleep here tonight, make room, you idiot’, but to be honest, once he wouldn’t have wanted to spend the night at all, death experience or not. 

Izuku places the steamy mug in front of him. “Kacchan, it’s not necessary. I don’t need -”
“I need it. Please. I’ll take the couch.” 

Izuku’s brain halts and stops, and maybe he really died and ended up in a parallel universe because this is not Kacchan. 

“I - I  can’t leave you the couch!” he says instead. 

“You just died, I take the couch.” 

“The doctors said I wasn’t…” 

“Screw the doctors!” Katsuki cuts him off. “I was there, they weren’t. You stopped breathing, your heart didn’t beat. You were dead. Not ‘near-death’, not ‘almost dead’. Completely dead. I saw it, Kirishima saw it. You - you just  came back.” 

Izuku knows this was a long day, “That’s not possible, Kacchan.” 

Bakugou scoffs, the sound hard and bitter. “Even having six quirks is not possible and here you are.  Your whole carrier is impossible, quirkless Deku, number 3 hero of Japan,” he rubs his closed eyes with a hand, trying to ward off some tiredness. “I’ve realized with you the word ‘impossible’ doesn’t exist.” 

“Kacchan…” It’s a leap of faith, one that Izuku would have never expected from him, and he’s flattered, yes, but maybe Kacchan should just see a doctor too because this whole situation looks a lot like PTSD to him.

“Shut up, nerd” Katsuki interrupts his mumbling. “You were dead,” His mouth twists, his lower lips slightly trembles, almost as if his muscles were contracting on their own, “you were dead and I couldn’t save you.” 

“You weren’t supposed to.” 

“Yes, I was!” 

Katsuki hides his eyes behind his hand and Izuku’s heart loses a beat. 

“Kacchan, I’m here, now.” Izuku tentatively puts a hand on his shoulder, expecting Katsuki to swat it away, angrily. 

Instead, Katsuki grips it, pulling him down, and Izuku stumbles and falls and finds himself straddled on his laps. 

Kacchan is hugging him, and surely now he can believe he’s dead and went to Heaven because he’s so near to hyperventilate… he should probably calm himself, it’s just a hug, nothing more. Just a hug, doesn’t mean anything, right? 

“Deku…?”

“Y - yes?” 

“Think quietly.” 

“Oh. Of course, Kacchan.” 

 

* * * 

 

Afterward, Katsuki brings him to bed. “I’ve been so close to losing you,” he says as he kisses him and Izuku melts in his arms. 

“I thought I had time,” he says hiding his face in his collar, inhaling the warmth of his skin. “I thought I could make it up to you, for everything. I thought I shouldn’t push it. If I gave you your spaces… Fuck. And you died. And I -”

“It’s ok, Kacchan, it’s ok. I am here,” Izuku takes his face in his hands, and kisses him again. “I am here and I am not going anywhere.”  

Katsuki slides a hand under his t-shirt, that awful thing bought in the hospital shop to replace his thorn costume, and presses it to his chest, taking in his heartbeat, loud and steady. 

Izuku just takes the t-shirt off, throwing it on the floor, and Katsuki looks at him startled. 

“Make love to me,” he says, boldly, and trails a finger on the fabric of his tank top as if suggesting him to remove it, watching a whole set of emotions passing in Kacchan’s eyes - fear, excitement, anticipation, love. 

“Are you sure?” Kacchan asks, so quiet it’s almost a whisper. 

“I’m sure. I love you.” 

He sees it. The surprise, the bewilderment, as if he couldn’t really believe it. As if Izuku hasn’t been in love with him since forever. 

“You do?” 

“Yes. Don’t you?” 

“Yes. I love you too.” 

It’s sweet and tender and heartbreaking.
Izuku doesn’t remember his death, but Katsuki pours every piece of his soul in worshipping him,  as if he could vanish between his fingers as if he was living on borrowed time.

Katsuki licks and suck, leaving a trail of kisses down his chest, and unbuttons his jeans. 

Izuku looks at him and thinks he could die again, just for that image, the hunger in Kacchan’s eyes, his mouth hovering inches over his groin. 

Katsuki takes down his jeans, freeing his erection and Izuku shivers when he takes it in his hand, stroking him lightly. 

“Kacchan…” he moans when Katsuki licks him, tentatively, from the base to the tip. Then he’s slowly taking him in his mouth, inch after inch, sucking gently and rubbing his tongue against his shaft. Izuku squirms and closes his eyes, because if he keeps looking at Kacchan - Kacchan’s eyes fixed on him, dilated black pupils full of lust, Kacchan’s checks hollowing, Kacchan’s lips stretched around his cock - he might come even before this has started properly. 

“Kacchan…” Izuku shambles to open his drawer and rummages until he finds some lubricant. 

Katsuki sucks him deeper and takes the vial from his hand. 

The lubricant is cold against his skin, but Izuku doesn’t care because Kacchan is inside him and his finger is hitting right that spot that makes him weak in the knees. “Ah, Kacchan, more,” he pleads and Katsuki adds another finger, scissoring him and opening him up. 

Izuku thrust his hips against him, willing more, almost choking him and Katsuki makes it a challenge to take him deeper. 

“Ka - Kacchan! If you don’t stop, I’m - I’m gonna come like this,” he says, his voice trembling and faltering. “I want you inside me.”

Kacchan, still sucking, lips still tight against his cock, slides him out with a wet and indecent sound that makes him throb, pre-come dripping from his tip. 

“Are you sure?” 

“If you ask me again, I’m gonna say no.” 

“You wouldn’t dare,” Katsuki growls, smiling wickedly - as if Izuku’s stupid line had erased every doubt he had about Izuku’s willingness - then he props up. 

“Kacchan…” Izuku urges him and Katsuki looks at him, crimson eyes planted on his face as he slides inside him. 

Izuku feels the intensity of his gaze filling him along with his cock. 

It’s strange and serious, it tastes like commitment, like sealing an oath and tears gather in the corner of his eyes. 

Kacchan loves him. 

Kacchan loves him. 

It feels impossible, and yet here it is. Laid bare in front of him. 

Kacchan loves him. 

“Yes,” Katsuki whispers over his mouth. “Yes, I love you.” 

Izuku closes his legs around his waist and brings him closer. 

“I need you,” he whispers against his mouth. 

“I’m here,” Katsuki replies as he starts moving inside him. “I’m here and I’m not going anyway.”