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He had died.
A few months ago his heart exploded and he had died.
Sure he had come back to life thanks to Edgeshot and Beast Jeaninst but he had died. Pro heroes had died, civilians as well, and the villains too but, he wasn’t dead still, he had lived, and it messed with his mind.
It started a month ago. He had been feeling like something was wrong with his body but his constant visits to Recovery Girl led to nothing. He hated feeling like this, like he didn’t belong where his mind resided, like he was observing the world from the outside, like he wasn’t real. It happened in training, Kirishima’s quirk had activated as a reflex against Katsuki’s explosions except his arm slid across Katsuki’s right arm, the one Shigaraki had almost completely destroyed during the war, and it… lit something in him. He had left class with a bleeding arm and the pain was reeling in his head, for the first time in a while he finally felt like he belonged in his own body, like the pain had brought him back down to Earth.
At first Iida didn’t notice it. The two spent a lot of their time together, especially since the latter was so scared for Katsuki’s heart, forcing him to wear his heart monitor at all time. But as the weeks passed it was impossible to ignore it. Katsuki had grown sensitive and didn’t want to be touched, he was covered in scars, new scars. At this point in their relationship Tenya knew his body through and through and those scars were fresh. He had to know what was going on.
Everytime Katsuki found himself naked in front of him he had fresh scars. Not only that but in every field mission where a villain was involved, Katsuki would throw himself into the fight. Sometimes it seemed he wasn’t even trying to block some of the blows the villains delivered or, he let his body flung into walls without trying to soften his fall.
—
It was Sunday, most of the class went home on weekends and this Sunday was like every other. Only a few people were left and Iida and Katsuki were two of them.
When Iida first seeked Katsuki, the day was almost already over. Katsuki had stayed in his room all day and had only come out for snacks once or twice. They had an exam in the morning and he was probably preparing for it, which is why Tenya knocked softly on the door and, as usual, entered before receiving an answer. As he had hoped, today was the day he would find out about everything but, did he really want to know?
The scene he walked into had him hold back a scream. Katsuki was sitting in his underwear on the ground, in the middle of tissues covered in blood, his blood. He was sitting there, a blade in hand, carving into the meat of his thigh. He hadn’t even noticed Tenya who was standing there, tears swelling in his eyes, gripping his stomach.
He walked up to him slowly, his throat was closing up, making it harder to breathe, to express his concern or guilt, he should have known. He may have known something was up but he didn’t ask what it was, or how bad it was, he knew Katsuki had to be the one to talk, otherwise he wasn’t getting anything out of him but.. to see him destroy his body like this, was gutwrenching.
Katsuki finally took notice of him when he was a few steps away. He had headphones on, Tenya hadn’t noticed, must be why he didn’t hear him come in. As soon as he saw him tears flew down his cheeks, he looked helpless but, deranged at the same time. He may have been crying but a smile was tugging on his lips. Tenya took a second before kneeling down and put his hand on Katsuki’s shoulder, headphones falling with the motion.
“Why didn't you tell me?..” His voice broke and he barely spoke above a whisper, trying not to let his emotions get a hold of him.
Katsuki took a deep breath, he was about to tell him one the worst thing he could have been hiding and his smile dropped for a second before returning crazier than it had been previously.
“I can’t help it…It’s the only thing that makes me feel normal!” His strained voice just made it harder not to fall apart.
Now Tenya really couldn’t help it. The tears fell down and he let himself sink on the ground next to Katsuki, he couldn’t look at him, he had let him get bad enough that he believed the only thing he could do to atone his pain was hurt himself.
“Hey! Hey I swear, I don’t want to die or anything alright?” Katsuki had gotten up on his knees, patting the top of Tenya’s head, from where he was sitting he had a first row seat to the blood slowly leaking out of the new wound on his thigh. Katsuki continued, he was almost shushing him, trying to get him to calm down but he sounded so worried for Tenya, like he wasn’t the one with an open wound.
“It’s not as bad as it looks ok?! Here take it! Do it yourself you’ll see, please?” He sounded desperate, he needed Tenya to listen to him. He was holding his face in his hands now, trying to get the man’s red eyes to focus on his.
As soon as he registered the words Tenya tried to break free, his got wild and the tears just kept coming. This was crazy, he had gone crazy. Katsuki wanted him to hurt him, to cut his skin like he had been doing a minute ago. Was he really mad? Asking his boyfriend to hurt him like that, like he was some kind of a villain, he couldn’t do it. He had to have gone crazy, there was no way his usually sane boyfriend had been hiding this for so long.
—
Katsuki was lying on the bed, he had sweatpants on now but his chest was still bare. Tenya was sitting next to him. He didn’t know how or when but he had somehow agreed to Katsuki’s demented request. Maybe he was going crazy too.
He was slowly dragging the blade across Katsuki’s belly, small droplets of blood followed after the knife. His heart was aching but god, Katsuki looked like he was hooked on drugs, his smile was so wide and he was babbling incomprehensible words to get Tenya to keep cutting. As much as this hurt, he couldn’t help the feeling of satisfaction he got from pleasing his boyfriend, from doing whatever for him, as crazy as it had sounded at first. Having his trust to hurt him like this, to make him bleed, that had a hold on Tenya.
The blood on his abdomen pooled at his navel, leaving in its way patterns, small paths connecting every little cut Tenya had nicely placed on his lover. It was beautiful, he was beautiful. He may have been extremely worried at first,but, now, he couldn’t help the feelings that were overcoming him. He felt as if Katsuki was his, truly his. For the first time in forever he liked seeing someone in pain, this foreign feeling had him on top of the world. He didn’t know if he was going to be able to stop before Katsuki bled out completely and he would be left with his lifeless body, sitting in a pool of his lover’s beautifully scarlet blood.
As Katsuki was writhing under Tenya’s blade, the tears kept coming. He wasn’t in pain, on the contrary he felt like he was in heaven. It was different from when he was doing it himself, having his boyfriend, the person he trusted and loved the most in the entire world do this for him, seemed to finally fill the hole he had inside, like a pearl, a pearl that had finally found its home. The war had brought him despair and a whole lot of problems but, in a way, he had fallen in love with it.
He had fallen in love with the adrenaline, the rush of blood throughout his whole body, his senses being on high alert at all time. It was a kind of high he thought he would never achieve again. The war itself had been nothing but a horrible experience he never wanted to remember but, what he felt during the fights.. That was something he wanted to remember forever and this, hurting himself, diving into danger without a care for his life, seemed to be enough before. But now, now that the love of his life was doing this, carving and cutting into his plump skin with this hungry, primal look on his face,all of those sensations rushed back to him at once. Katsuki wondered if he would ever be able to live without it.
When they stopped the sheets were covered in blood. All of the wounds were shallow but there was enough to have Katsuki’s head feel light, so very light he thought he might pass out. At some point they had both stopped crying but Tenya’s face was still wrecked with the embers of the tears which had fallen on his cheeks earlier. As they hugged, covered in blood on the soaked sheets, Tenya’s shirt becoming redder by the second, they made a promise to never let anyone else hurt the blonde. This, was theirs, and theirs only. It may have stemmed from trauma but, together, they would had made it beautiful, it was like coming home, a bond they could never cut.