Burnt Out {A Hero!AU Sheith Fanfiction}

Morphine And Stuffed Lions

Standing outside of the hospital door, Keith was so tense he could barely raise his hand to knock on Shiro's door. He didn't know what to do, half of his brain wanting him to turn and leave and tell Shiro that something cropped up but the other part of his mind wanting him to go in and to help. Part of him even wanted to just stand here and let everything pass him by until he didn't need to leave.

He knew what had happened. He knew that Shiro had been admitted in the early hours of the morning yesterday and Matt had refused to let Keith come until around six in the evening over a day later because he hadn't wanted Keith fucking up the healing process or encouraging Shiro to do anything stupid. He knew that he'd given Shiro a fair majority of those wounds. He knew that there would be one thing predominantly on Shiro's mind until he got an answer to his question.

'Why had Red saved him?'

And he knew that he'd only saved Shiro because it really hit him in that moment how important to him Shiro was. He only realised then how much his gut twisted when Shiro was in pain, writhing, coughing up his own blood and a matter of seconds away from dying. It had only truly occured to him what he'd done when Sendak was already dying that agonising death. When the flames were eating away at him and there was no way to undo it.

He still had the look of pure fear on Shiro's face ingrained into his mind. How was he supposed to respond to seeing something like that? Shiro, who he had been in love with for an indeterminable amount of time. Shiro, who had looked at him with pure fear in his eyes in the moment that Keith had turned to face him. Shiro, had looked him in the eyes and dared Keith to finish him off, just to kill him. Shiro, who was going to work incessantly to find out who he was because he thought that Red might tell Zarkon that Shiro is the Black Paladin.

But, after a few moments of this painful hesitation, he raised his hand and knocked on the door, awaiting Matt's appearance and that grimace that was always on his lips when Keith was present.

The door opened after a few moments and, like Keith had assumed, Matt's tired features went a little bitter at the sight of Keith. He looked Keith up and down, frowning, his dark eyes narrowed a bit before he offered a long, impatient sigh. Matt stepped aside, holding the door open.

"I still don't think you should be here," Matt mumbled, flicking his eyes off to the side. "But Shiro insisted. Fair warning -- he's pretty spaced right now. Higher than a kite on all the fuckin' pain meds he's on." He lifted his hand, and pointed a thumb towards the hospital bed behind him where Shiro was.

He looked drowsy -- completely out of it, nestled underneath hospital sheets and blankets, connected to IV drips and heart monitors. Shiro's head had been turned towards the window, as if he hadn't noticed Matt even get up and let Keith in, but the patched up damage was still rather apparent. The right side of his face had been taped up in all the places his shattered mask had sliced him. White medical bandages could be seen wrapped around his neck from behind the collar of the hospital shirt they made him wear, and they traveled all the way down his torso, wrapped tightly around his broken ribs. Shiro's foot was propped up on a pillow at the end of the bed. It hadn't been properly casted yet, just wrapped up -- the ugly purple-green bruise could be seen crawling past the tight bandages and up the side of his leg, disappearing beneath the hem of the blanket.

It wasn't until Matt closed the door behind Keith that he noticed the change in the room. Shiro turned his head around, and his hazy eyes instantly brightened.

"Keith!" he chirped, offering a crooked smile. His voice was slurred, drawn out and groggy, even with his newfound excitement. "You came! That's great... really... I missed you so much."

Matt gave a long sigh, stepping past Keith and towards the chair dragged over to the side of the bed. By the amount of coffee cups and the look of his tired eyes, it was obvious he had been sitting at Shiro's side ever since he was admitted there. "He won't stop talking about you," he grumbled, rolling his eyes. "To be fair he won't stop talking about his cats either."