Heartbeat - Boku No Hero Academia Fanfiction

Awake

The first thing that reached Midoriya as his consciousness began to return was a steady beeping that was all too familiar to him by now. A heart monitor. So this was a hospital. Was the monitor his? Probably. He struggled to remember. He had been with his friends, trying to find a villain... the last thing he remembered was being unable to breathe, his friends' worried voices, and then the pain in his heart as it stopped- 

Midoriya's eyes flew open with a gasp as he brought his hand up to his chest, pressing it against his heart. He was breathing hard, but he could breathe. His heart was clearly beating... what had happened? He could feel the oxygen mask that was strapped to his face. His arm had an IV dripping an unknown liquid into his veins. He had sensors on some of his fingers too. His chest hurt with an ache that was sometimes accompanied with a sharper pain. 

He slowly struggled to try to sit up, but stopped suddenly at what he saw. In the darkened room, there was a silhouette of a person slumped in a chair, leaning on his bed, asleep. He watched for a moment as his eyes adjusted to the room around him and he realized he knew him. Even in the dark, he had no doubt who it was. 

"Kacchan?" Midoriya's voice was broken with disuse and muffled by the mask on his face, but the boy beside him still snapped awake, jolting to sit upright. 

"Deku" he whispered, seeming almost in disbelief. There was a long moment where green eyes met wide red ones, before Bakugou jumped to his feet and took a few steps toward the door. Behind him he heard a sharp gasp of pain as the bed shifted with the sound of Midoriya trying to sit up and he froze. 

"I hate you." He muttered, still turned away from Midoriya on his way to the door, though he made no more move to go to it. 

"I know." The words felt like a punch to Bakugou. The way they were whispered with such a quiet resigned tone. Bakugou hadn't meant to say it, and he certainly didn't mean it. Could Midoriya really believe Bakugou hated him? His tone sounded like he did. And if he thought Bakugou hated him, that was Bakugou's fault. 

Bakugou felt tears gather in his eyes again. He turned to face Midoriya, who was looking down at his hands that were folded on his lap, trying to hide the sadness in his eyes. The sheet had fallen off his chest revealing the bandages. Bakugou forced himself to tear his gaze from the bandages as he looked into Midoriya's eyes. 

"I hate that you have a quirk that hurts you. I hate that you're so fucking reckless, or selfless, or whatever that you have no sense of self preservation. I hate that I tried to push you away and you didn't leave even when I hurt you. For years! And you never left to protect yourself, you never fought back, you never seemed to hate me!" Midoriya opened his mouth to say something, but Bakugou cut him off, taking a deep breath and continuing. 

"I hate that you always talked about catching up to me when I have so much farther to go to reach you. I hate that you want to be a hero because it means you'll get hurt and I hate that I won't be able to protect you. I hate that you died today! You DIED. IN MY ARMS!" Bakugou's voice is rising but he doesn't care. Even as Midoriya's eyes widened, he continued. 

"I HATE that I had to try for SO long to keep you alive, that I had to breathe for you for so many minutes, I had to force your heart to beat, and at the end of it all, you weren't waking up, your heart wasn't beating, you weren't breathing! I hate that your ribs are broken and it's my fault! I fucking hurt you again! I hate that it was Kaminari who actually zapped you back to life, but I can't hate him because if he hadn't, you-" Bakugou broke off to take a shuddering breath and swipe at the tears that were now falling down his cheeks. He couldn't meet Midoriya's eyes anymore, but he knew that he was listening in shock.