Chapter Text
“Roses.”
“Roses? Why?”
“I don’t know. They’re just so… fragrant. And they’re pretty, yet prickly.”
“Like you, then.”
“You sayin’ I’m fragrant, Shitty Hair?”
“No, just that you’re pretty.”
—-
Kirishima woke up, his eyes settling on the opened homework he had in front of him. He had fallen asleep while studying, again.
It was already late. The sun had set a long time ago by the looks of it. It was quiet too. No wonder he had fallen asleep here in this silence.
Kirishima was in the library of UA. It was an additional wing that was constructed not that long ago. It was more like a separate building, because it didn’t connect to the main building at all, and had an entrance of its own. But because of the lack of property to build on, it was built next to the main building as an additional wing.
Now though, Kirishima was alone in the library. For what he knew at least. No one usually stayed this long to study there, except for Kirishima himself.
Kirishima raised his head and massaged his temples. He hated taking naps, they always gave him a headache and muscle pain. He sighed and looked at the clock on the wall above all the bookshelves, realizing how late it actually was.
He tried to get back to his homework, but the numbers from his math homework were starting to blend in together right before his eyes, making it quite hard to count anything or solve any equations. That may have also been a factor on why he fell asleep in the first place.
“Kirishima?”
Kirishima turned away from his homework to see one of his favorite teachers standing in the doorway of the room he was studying in. “Hi Cementoss.”
Cementoss had become Kirishima’s favorite teacher in his second year. Aizawa was close to being number one in his books, being his homeroom teacher making him climb up the ranks. Cementoss, however, had helped Kirishima the most in more mundane things, while Aizawa helped him more in hero-related things. At the time, heart-to-heart talk was more important to him.
“It’s time to close the library,” Cementoss informed, showing Kirishima the pair of keys he was holding. Cementoss was the teacher of modern literature, so closing the library kinda ended up being his job.
“Of course, sorry for staying so late again,” Kirishima apologized and stood up, messily throwing his homework sheets into his denim bag.
“Don’t worry about it, kid, here.”
Kirishima was fast enough to catch the keys that flew right at him. Cementoss sometimes let Kirishima stay longer, if he promised to make sure the doors were actually locked after he left. Some of the teachers lived inside the main UA building, but having an entrance of its own, it had to be locked separately.
Cementoss sighed and leaned against the doorframe and fixed Kirishima with a worried look. “You study too much nowadays, do you get any rest?”
Kirishima nodded, pushing the keys into the front pocket of his hoodie. “It’s my last year in this school, I have to pass math class.” Kirishima was in his fourth year of high school. Usually hero school only lasted for three years, but some higher ups had decided that an extra year was a good idea for hero students. Some had complained, but the majority deemed it appropriate for obvious reasons.
“You sure that’s the only reason?”
Kirishima sat back down and looked at his shoes, not wanting to have this discussion again. “The school nurse gave me melatonin pills, I get enough sleep with those.”
Cementoss hummed. “If you want to talk about it, you know you can talk to me. I don’t want you to isolate yourself ag-”
“I know sir, thanks, but I’m fine, really.”
Kirishima could tell that Cementoss wasn’t buying it, but he honestly didn’t want to talk about it.
It had been almost three years since the death of his best friend, and he didn’t want to burden anyone with his feelings about it. He had already talked about it with Recovery Girl, and even if he hadn’t talked much with his other friends about it, he deemed that it was enough.
Cementoss sighed and stood straight. “Okay, lock up after yourself. I’ll see you tomorrow in class.”
He was gone before Kirishima could say anything more, not that he had much to say anyway.
Kirishima’s posture slumped as he buried his face back into his homework. He had to finish at least some of it before tomorrow. It was Thursday right now, so after tomorrow he would have the whole weekend to himself. He was probably going to study then too, but at least he was going to convince himself that it was a short vacation.
He had heard Kaminari talking about the majority of their class going to Yaoyorozu’s place to study on Friday, but like always, Kirishima wouldn’t join them.
When Kirishima was in his first year, he had studied with Katsuki. Then came the end of their first year. A few days before their summer vacation, Katsuki died. No.
Katsuki was murdered.
At first the school and Katsuki’s parents thought Katsuki had taken an extempore trip to his grandparents, because he hadn’t shown up to class. But after his grandparents were called, it was apparent that no one knew where he actually was.
Katsuki was found later that night from his own dorm room.
That was roughly three years ago.
Kirishima hadn’t forgiven himself. He wouldn’t forgive himself.
Kirishima had been the last to see him. They had been studying in a local café the evening before the day he was murdered, and the evening had stretched longer than they had planned. When they had left, Kirishima had told Katsuki that he would visit the 24/7 store quickly, and that Katsuki should just head on to the dorms already.
That’s what he had done, and after getting back, Kirishima didn’t want to bother Katsuki anymore by knocking on his door. It was already very late and Katsuki probably had fallen asleep immediately after getting to his room.
If only Kirishima would have been a good enough friend, he would have checked on Katsuki. If Kirishima had gone with Katsuki, there was a good chance that Katsuki would still be here, or at least the one that was murdered would have been Kirishima himself. Anything would have been better than this.
Kirishima was doing anything he could to distract himself from thinking at all the ways Katsuki could have been murdered, or even worse; tortured. The nightmares about Katsuki’s mangled corpse were not as common anymore, luckily.
The first year after Katsuki’s death held the title of the worst year of Kirishima’s life. He had hardly slept because of the nightmares. His grades had suffered, his mental health had suffered, his friendships had suffered. He still made sure that his physical health didn’t waver, or else his dreams of becoming a pro-hero would’ve crashed and burned, but it was very hard to maintain even that.
Kirishima is doing better now. After his moms convinced him to go to therapy, he got his life back together enough that he managed to go to school and spend time with his friends.
He still hated talking about it, and made it very clear to anyone who brought Katsuki up in conversations. He studied most of his time now anyway, leaving very little time for friends or unwelcomed thoughts. He was a little afraid that his friendships would start suffering again because he was studying so much, but he tried to keep some conversations up with the friends closest to him. Even if they were mostly via text.
He wasn’t attending Yaoyorozu’s study sessions for a lot of reasons. One of the main reasons being Midoriya.
Everyone was affected by the incident, but everyone knew that Midoriya and Kirishima took it the hardest among their class. Kirishima knew what Midoriya must have felt like, but he didn’t want to talk to the guy about it. Midoriya always attended the study sessions, and known as a blabbermouth, he would say something to Kirishima or ask about stuff, he was sure. Kirishima didn’t want that.
Kirishima hadn’t talked to Midoriya in three years, not really. They had spoken only when it was necessary, in group projects and in missions, but Kirishima had mostly ignored Midoriya outside of those the whole time. If Midoriya wanted to talk to someone, he would turn to his own posse or a therapist. Midoriya seems fine enough nowadays anyway.
Kirishima really didn’t want to talk about it anymore. It had been three years, he should be over it already and not whine like a little bitch. Katsuki would think lowly of him if he knew how long Kirishima had been mourning him.
Kirishima caught himself just in time before his head slumped enough to hit the table once again. He shook his head to keep himself awake. He glanced at the clock and winced when he saw that it had been an hour since Cementoss had left.
An hour and he had hardly done any work. It was pathetic, really, but he decided that he was too tired to make anything coherent at this hour. Maybe he should just stop for the day.
Just as he was shoving his work into his bag, the light above his head turned off. He looked around himself, and realized that every light in the room had turned off.
Kirishima reached for his phone and turned the flashlight on. He took his bag and went to the door, trying the light switch next to it.
Just like he had thought, a power outage.
Not his problem, Kirishima decided and walked out of the room into the hallway that led to the elevator and the staircase. He was on the third floor of the library, so he headed for the stairs. Elevators wouldn’t work during a power outage, right?
Before he got to the stairs however, he heard shuffling coming from the lounge area that was the first room on this floor.
Must’ve been a student that didn’t know the library was technically closed already, Kirishima thought. He walked to the door and scanned the room with his flashlight, finding a person that was crouching on the furthest corner of the room.
“Hey, this library’s actually -” Kirishima said, but before he had finished the sentence, the person turned around. “- already closed…”
Kirishima took a step back and hardened his skin. The person was wearing a black mask over their mouth, a black masquerade mask over their eyes, and a tight looking beanie that covered their hair, if they even had any. They also wore all black clothes, looking like a very stereotypical thief from old video games.
“You’re not supposed to be here,” the thief said, very clearly changing their voice as they spoke.
Kirishima was about to say something else to that, but then he noticed the thing the person had been working on. He couldn’t really tell the shape of it, because the light he was holding was still quite far away, but the glowing red numbers that counted down gave away the seriousness of the situation.
A bomb.
And the countdown was already at 37. 36, 35, 34…
The thief apparently noticed it too, mumbled something and got up. Kirishima didn’t have time to react as the stranger ran to him and grabbed his hardened wrist, pulling Kirishima with them to the stairs.
They’re never going to make it in time.
Luckily, the thief seemed to realize this as well, and pulled Kirishima to the second floor. They went to the first window they could see, and took something from their pocket. Kirishima can’t really see what that something is, but it’s enough to break the window apparently.
The thief didn’t have time to clear the hole in the window too much, so he grabbed Kirishima again, this time lifting him up completely. With his hardening on, Kirishima weighs infinitely more than usual, so whoever this thief was, had a lot of muscle. Not that he had time to actually think about that as he tried to knock down the pointy glass shards with his hardened foot the best he could in the little time he had. Not that it really mattered in the end.
Before Kirishima had time to react, the stranger pushed him out of the window.
It didn’t hurt, obviously, but hitting the ground still wasn’t exactly pleasant. The second floor is not that high anyway, but he doesn’t have time to think about that right now. Kirishima gathered himself up from the ground and let go of his hardening to flex his back properly.
Kirishima glanced up while stretching, and saw the thief just about to jump, but then the bomb goes off.
Kirishima managed to jump behind a convenient large tree to shield himself from the largest flying parts. He covered his ears and shut his eyes to avoid any internal damage.
He waited for a while, and once he was certain that there was no immediate danger anymore, he opened his eyes and looked around. There were burning wood panels and books everywhere, ash and cinder covering the usually green yard. Kirishima could still hear the building behind himself crumbling down.
Where are they?
Kirishima got up on shaky legs and decided to look for the thief.
It doesn’t take long for Kirishima to find them. They’re lying on the ground on their stomach. The back of their shirt is miraculously still intact, just like the beanie covering their head. Their clothes must be made out of some sort of fire resistant material, Kirishima thought.
Kirishima crouched down and grabbed their shoulder, turning them around. He was about to ask if they were okay, but he froze completely after the stranger was turned.
The mask over the stranger’s mouth was nowhere to be seen.
Kirishima’s words get stuck in his throat. He’s just seeing things, he’s sure, but this kind of looks like…
Kirishima yanks the beanie off, and a fluff of ash blond hair puffs to lay on the ash covered grass.
Katsuki.
He’s older but it’s unmistakable.
But why would he -
How’s he -
How did he -
But he’s -
An overwhelming amount of questions flooded Kirishima’s head. He fell to the ground, and without thinking about it, leaned down to remove the mask that’s still circling Katsuki’s eyes.
He doesn’t believe it.
This is a dream.
This is a dream.
He saw more than heard the sirens that appeared behind the corner of the crumbling building.
Time is weird. It’s slow, but so fast at the same time. It’s like the medics are running to them in slow motion, but they appear next to Kirishima before he can barely blink.
Someone hoisted Kirishima up and started to escort him away from Katsuki. Kirishima doesn’t resist.
He saw two medics rushing to Katsuki, carrying a stretcher. Why are they not running faster?
Once Kirishima’s sat in the back of an ambulance, the medic started to ask him some questions. He tried to answer, but he couldn't really hear what he was being asked, nor what he answered. He’s probably saying something right, because the medic is nodding her head and treating Kirishima based on his injuries, which were scarce.
Why’re the medics not bringing Katsuki out yet?
A police officer walks to Kirishima, but before the officer can ask anything, the walkie-talkie in his chest pocket goes off with the sound of loud static.
Kirishima listens closely, trying to concentrate to catch some useful info.
“Medics injured. The victim is nowhere to be seen. I need more officers to check the nearby area, he couldn’t have gotten far.”
The officer on his side is gone before more information is given. The medic on his side also got out of the ambulance, deeming Kirishima well enough to take care of himself for a while. There were no more medics on scene yet, and Kirishima didn’t see any pro-heroes either, so Kirishima understood that she had to go check on her colleagues.
Being alone though, apparently meant that the reporters that had already appeared to film the scene could invade Kirishima’s personal space and shove their cameras to his face.
Kirishima ignored their questions, because he really didn’t know the answers to most of them. Then he heard someone ask; “Who was the other victim? Were they a friend of yours?”
Kirishima leaned forward to grab the mic closest to him and looked straight into the camera that his eyes settled on first. “Katsuki Bakugou, he’s my best friend.”
He could tell some of the reporters recognized the name, which just resulted in more questions.
The air around him started feeling suffocating suddenly, he could hardly take in steady breaths. Everyone’s cramming him in.
His nostrils burn, must be because of the ash flying around.
Can the reporters just shut up, they’re so loud.
Is it getting cloudier?
Damn, the sirens are loud as hell, his head’s spinning.
Flashing lights from cameras and the sirens nearly blind him.
Why are the reporters here before any heroes?
His eyes burn.
The feeling in his limbs goes more numb every second he breathes.
Can everyone just shut up for two seconds!?
Shut up.
Shut up!
SHUT UP!
Kirishima lost consciousness.