Chapter 1: I'll Take Care of You, Deku
The gym smelled of scorched concrete and ozone. Izuku dodged, the air cracking where his head had been a second before. Bakugou’s sneer was a white flash in the swirling dust.
“Faster, Deku! Or are you just planning to dance around all day?”
Izuku’s breath sawed in his throat. His limbs felt heavy, wrong, like they were stuffed with wet sand. A wave of dizziness washed over him, turning Bakugou’s charging form into a smeared painting of blond and orange. He blinked hard, forcing the world back into focus. It was just exhaustion. It had to be. He’d pushed through worse.
“I’m not… dancing,” Izuku gritted out, planting his feet. Green lightning arced over his skin, sputtering like a bad connection. The heat under his skin wasn’t the usual familiar burn of One For All; it was deeper, a building pressure in his veins. He ignored it. He always ignored it.
Bakugou launched himself forward, right palm sparking. “Then fight!”
Izuku moved to meet him, to parry the blast or grab the wrist. But his body betrayed him. The dizziness returned, violent and nauseating, the gym tilting on its axis. The searing heat flashed outwards, a silent burst that made the air around him waver. A sharp, stifled cry escaped his lips—less from pain, more from sheer, panicked disbelief.
He saw Bakugou’s eyes widen, the fury shifting to something else in a fraction of a second. Then the floor rushed up to meet him, and everything went dark and quiet.
Consciousness returned in fragments. The sterile, antiseptic smell of the infirmary. The stiff cotton of a sheet under his fingers. A low, rhythmic beeping. And a voice, rough and close.
“...absolute, self-sacrificing idiot.”
Izuku pried his eyes open. The ceiling tiles were blurry. He turned his head, a monumental effort.
Bakugou was slouched in a chair pulled right up to the bedside, elbows on his knees. He wasn’t looking at Izuku; he was glaring at the floor as if it had personally offended him. Recovery Girl was nowhere in seen.
“Kacchan?” Izuku’s voice was a dry rasp.
Bakugou’s head snapped up. “Don’t. Just don’t talk.” He stood up, his movements unusually stiff, and poured a cup of water from a pitcher on the side table. He didn’t hand it over. He just held it, staring at it. “Your core temperature spiked. You cooked yourself from the inside out. Again.”
“I felt… dizzy.”
“No shit.” Bakugou finally thrust the cup toward him. Izuku tried to sit up, a wave of weakness making his arms tremble. With a sound of exasperation, Bakugou dropped the cup back on the table, slid a hand behind Izuku’s shoulders, and hauled him upright. The touch was efficient, impersonal, but it lingered a half-second too long before Bakugou snatched his hand back as if burned. He grabbed the water again and shoved it into Izuku’s grasp.
“Thanks,” Izuku mumbled, drinking. The water was cool. It did nothing for the strange, restless heat still humming under his skin, lower now, a persistent thrum.
“Aizawa-sensei assigned me to monitor you. Said you’re a ‘liability to yourself.’” Bakugou mimicked their teacher’s deadpan tone perfectly. He sank back into the chair, his gaze now fixed on Izuku. It was assessing, intense. “What did you feel? Exactly.”
Izuku looked away, at the thin light slicing through the blinds. “It’s hard to describe. It wasn’t pain. It was just… too much. Everything was too much.”
“Your Quirk’s connected to your nervous system, dumbass. Everything is everything.” Bakugou leaned forward, the chair creaking. “Where was it too much?”
The question felt invasive. Izuku’s hand drifted unconsciously to his own sternum, then lower, to his stomach. “Here. Like a… a circuit overload.”
Bakugou watched the movement. His expression was unreadable. “You need to discharge it.”
“Recovery Girl said I need rest.”
“She’s not wrong.” Bakugou’s voice dropped, losing its abrasive edge, becoming something quieter, more deliberate. “But rest doesn’t just mean sleep. Your body’s wound up tighter than a spring. It won’t unwind on its own. You know I’m right.”
Izuku did know. The energy was still there, trapped, circling under his skin with nowhere to go. It was making him jittery, aware of every brush of the sheet, every beat of his own heart. He nodded, slowly.
Bakugou stood up again. This time, he didn’t step back. He sat on the edge of the bed, the mattress dipping under his weight. The space between them vanished. Izuku could smell the faint, sharp scent of nitroglycerin and clean sweat on him.
“You trust me.” It wasn’t a question.
Izuku’s breath hitched. “Yes.”
Bakugou’s hand came up, not in a fist, not for a blow. His fingers, calloused and warm, brushed the damp hair back from Izuku’s forehead. The touch was so unexpected, so foreign from Bakugou, that Izuku froze. “Then stop thinking,” Bakugou murmured, his thumb stroking a slow arc along Izuku’s temple. “Stop being the hero. Just be the body that needs to reset.”
His other hand found Izuku’s, pried the empty water cup from his slack grip, and placed it aside. Then he laced their fingers together, palm to palm. The contact was electric, a different kind of current. The restless energy inside Izuku seemed to swirl toward that point of connection.
“Kacchan, what are you…”
“Discharging the overload,” Bakugou said, his voice a low vibration in the quiet room. He leaned in, his lips close to Izuku’s ear. “Let it go. I’ve got you.”
And then his mouth was on Izuku’s neck, just below the jaw, not a kiss but a deliberate, open-mouthed press of heat. Izuku gasped, a jolt shooting straight down his spine. The confused energy inside him twisted, redirected, following the path of that sensation. Bakugou’s hand tightened around his, an anchor.
It was methodical. Bakugou’s mouth moved, exploring the line of Izuku’s throat, the frantic pulse there. His free hand came up to cradle Izuku’s jaw, holding him in place with a possessiveness that stole the air from Izuku’s lungs. This wasn’t kindness. It was a claim. A solution.
“See?” Bakugou breathed against his skin. “You’re holding it all in. Everywhere.” His hand slid from Izuku’s jaw, down over his shoulder, his chest, coming to rest flat against his stomach, over the thin infirmary gown. The heat from Bakugou’s palm seeped through the fabric, a counterpoint to the internal fever. “Here. This is where you’re locked up.”
Izuku whimpered. He was floating, untethered, the medical beeps fading into a distant echo. All that existed was the heat, the hands on him, the shocking intensity of Bakugou’s focus. He’d dreamed of this, in hidden, shameful corners of his mind, and the reality was obliterating those pale fantasies.
Bakugou’s mouth found his again, this time not on his neck. The kiss was harsh, all pressure and teeth and demand, and Izuku surrendered to it completely. He let his head fall back, let Bakugou’s tongue sweep into his mouth, let the last of his resistance melt away. The “overload” was transforming, morphing into a sheer, desperate want.
Bakugou broke the kiss, his own breathing ragged. He looked down at Izuku, his eyes dark, pupils blown wide. “No more thinking,” he commanded, his voice rough. “Just feel it. I’ll take care of you.”
And as his hand slid lower, past the waistband of the infirmary shorts, Izuku understood this was a different kind of training. A terrifying, exhilarating one. He arched off the bed, a broken sound escaping him as Bakugou’s fingers closed around him, his touch knowing and utterly devoid of hesitation.
Outside the door, leaning against the hallway wall, Aizawa listened to the shift in breathing, the muffled sounds from within the room. He let out a long, weary sigh. It was faster progress than he’d anticipated, and messier. But it was progress. They were navigating it. He pushed off the wall and walked silently away, leaving them to their negotiated peace.