deercountry | Hey, teacher, leave them kids alone

Part of Kaworu wants to shy away from the call, like a lost kitten who didn't know warmth and safety from the cold and the wet and so shied from all contact, fearful it could be worse than what they've already felt.

But he can't resist the softness in Midoriya's voice, he never really could, not even the first time they spoke in a warm hot spring. Izuku's presence is warmer than that hot spring could ever hope to be.

"I'm here."

Kaworu's soft voice calls out. It's no siren call, or a cry for help, just an uncertain acknowledgement that he exists in this space. "I'm here, Izuku...-kun."

Does he have the right to call him by his given name?

He squares his shoulders. They were friends first, and that, so important to Midoriya, has to count for something.

Normally he doesn't sit next to others uninvited, but here and now, he does. He and Kaworu are (have been?) too close, and Midoriya is set on not leaving him alone.

It sounds strange to hear Kaworu attach anything to the end of his name now.

"Just Izuku is fine if it's easier."

Up close, Midoriya is papery skin, sleepless shadows, and lips cut and irritated by fangs he's not used to. He's clean, in a fresh T-shirt and basketball shorts, and he's healed or been healed of his injuries, but he still has the ragged air of someone put through the ringer.

"I'm glad you're safe."

It'd be a pleasantry from someone else, but Midoriya means what he says, and it carries extra ~~baggage~~ weight with someone he's close to.

There's an unconscious moment where Kaworu steels himself against an anticipated onslaught. His body tenses, his arms raise slightly off his knees, and he turns his face slightly as if to shield it. Doing wrong was always met with some kind of punishment and that's what he anticipates now, even if he knows Midoriya would never harm him like those that created him.

But sometimes even harsh words can cut deeper than any knife. And he fears rejection more than any sort of physical pain. He knows those will eventually knot into scars. He doesn't know how the heart heals.

"I was always safe. You don't have to worry about me... Midoriya."

It's rather like Eri, the way Kaworu flinches. Even during the good times (just weeks ago, but it feels longer) when Midoriya reached for Kaworu, it was because Kaworu was already reaching for him with his eyes or his arms.

He takes in a breath through his nose, and it gets stuck somewhere in his throat. His chest hurts. Tears prick the edges of his eyes as he listens to Kaworu try different ways of distancing himself. His own shoulders rise a little as if to protect the vulnerable pulse in his neck beating in time with the ache under his ribs.

"You've never called me that. Don't call me that," he says in a tight voice.

He's never protested what Kaworu called him before. The tears slip down his cheeks. He wants to take his hand in his. He doesn't want to touch him without permission.

"I don't understand. I thought you were angry at me," Kaworu shifts, pulling his knees close to his skinny chest. His eyes remain on the floor ahead. He doesn't want to catch Midoriya's gaze in case there's disappointment or rejection in those green eyes.

"When Shinji-kun was angry at me, I still tried to be with him. I thought if I just acted familiar with him, he wouldn't be able to be as angry at me. I think I only upset him more.

It is rather unsettling, how Midoriya's eyes haven't been green for weeks. They're clouded over in white, surrounded by the shadows of discolored skin, but they can still weep. He thinks of the boy in the giant robot and those metal hands.

"I could never stay angry for long... And being angry doesn't mean I don't want to be around you. I was angry because I care about you and the people around you. You hurt others. You know I can't ignore that, as a Hero, as a person. I have to make sure none of this happens again."

He presses his lips together in the quiet, determined way he does when he's decided Kaworu has made enough eggplant jokes, or when Paul tries to lie about feeling sad, or when either of them spark a challenge in him just right.

"If I didn't care about you, I wouldn't be here. And because I care about you, I won't leave you alone. Even if I have to be annoying about it."

It doesn't matter that Midoriya is corrupted. Kaworu still sees him as the boy in his memories from their last happy days of flying kites on the beach, all flushed cheeks and big smiles. That's who he is on the inside.

As for himself...

"I've killed more people than just those. And I hurt more people when I was a beast. I think I hurt Shinji-kun back home. Can you really care for something like me? Or is what you feel actually pity?"

"Our scars mean survival. The past doesn't make your whole future."

That calm summer day before anything resembling a storm tore them apart, they lay in God's (John's) garden (dead grass) and bit into an apple. Kaworu was envious of the strength and camaraderie of others. Midoriya had to remind him of what he already admired him for. He still admires him for the strength and bravery it takes to forge ahead in a new life and to love others. That day in the grass, he resolved not to coddle him, but to respect his strength of character. That means expecting it and reminding him of it.

"If I pitied you, if I thought of you as less than what you are to me, then I wouldn't believe you could be better than the past. I wouldn't have gotten angry that you, someone I love, went against everything I risk my life for. You are kind to others. This isn't the end of it."

His face folds, and he blinks more tears out of his eyes. When he looks up again, they still fall down his cheeks, but he's resolute.

He holds out his hand.

"I don't understand why I'm something worthy of love."

He had once demanded Midoriya's respect because he already expected his affection. Now, Kaworu understands that its something he'd taken for granted. Izuku Midoriya's affection was widespread but to be the target of it was a privilege and a gift that he now isn't sure he's deserving of.

Still, he can't resist the call to connection, to being held. He drops his soft, small hand into Midoriya's and then grips tightly as if it's the only thing holding him to the earth.

"But I just want to be with you."

He closes his scarred hand over his, strong and sure. He's never been able to refuse someone clutching him and needing to be saved, and he can't let Kaworu fall into an abyssal sky. He pulls Kaworu to him in a swift but gentle movement, enveloping him with his other arm like a blanket on a cold day. (It's the height of summer.) He cradles his head where the softest hairs meet the nape of his neck.

"You don't need to be worthy or deserving. I don't think that's how love works. You're a person, Kaworu-kun. You're my person," he says fiercely. "So I have to protect the good I see in you. Don't throw it away. I don't want to fight you. I want to be with you too."

Edited (lord have mercy on the punctuation) 2022-08-01 19:24 (UTC)

"But I left you. I stayed behind in that house..."

There's an intentional miserable opening for Midoriya to call him out, like he deserves. He feels guilt for things he shouldn't and not for things he should. It's so hard to understand all these emotions swirling inside. He lets himself be held all the same, trying not to think about if he never got to feel this again. A scarred thumb rubbing a gentle stroking a soothing sensation at the base of his neck.

"But if it's not about worth then... why would you stay? What do I have to offer? I failed keep up with you like I said I could."

The last time he held him, Kaworu was scuffed by sand and blood. Midoriya's body remembers this familiar press of a slim one against him (over and over, so many times) and drinks it as if parched. He lets go of his hand and clutches him with both arms. Something missing slots into place. It's an incongruous, almost traitorous rightness in the face of everything that has gone wrong.

"Same reasons I've always stayed. You've been kind to me and to others. I think you could extend that to more people. See how important their lives are like I do. I know a lot of people would hate me for even thinking about helping you. But that's the same thing that ignores people's lives and takes them. It's something that abandons people."

He knows that now, having seen it reflected in the exposed flaws of Hero society back home, whereas before it was just an abstract concept. He presses his wet cheek to Kaworu's temple and closes his eyes. In the days Kaworu was gone, Midoriya would smell his scent out of nowhere. His body was trying to seek comfort in what wasn't there. It's real now.

"I've seen you grow and love. Keep trying. We'll help."

It's automatic to say we. When one of the three is gone, there is a gnawing empty space in what should be a stable, three-sided unit. Midoriya doesn't know how Kaworu feels about Paul now.

Edited (tfw u do a tag and walk away but then suddenly a thot) 2022-08-04 04:00 (UTC)

"What if I can't? What if those people are right?"

But even as he protests, he collapses into Midoriya's arms, wrapping his skinny arms around muscular shoulders and nestling under his chin. Midoriya smells like sweat, he always does, and tears but there familiar fierceness in his embraces centers him.

"What if the beast is real? The humans that raised me in the lab... they always feared me. And the things I was capable of."

They must not know the real you, Ruby said to him just days ago when he told her having so many abilities isn't a good look in his world. The only others who do are either monsters or villains. But his friends didn't think that about him. The people who care about Kaworu are the same, and he needs to know that.

"How could those people know you if they only hurt you or were afraid of you?" he asks, a trace of roughness creeping into his voice on Kaworu's behalf. "They're stupid. They don't know you. Not like people who love you do."

He saw the scars the first day they met. He very lightly strokes his fingers over them on Kaworu's arm. He buries his face in his hair and his voice trembles softly,

"I know why you hate having your choice taken away. I'm sorry Paul-kun hurt you. I'm sorry I couldn't do anything." He did later, but he glosses over that.

"They made me. They've seen more sides of me than you could ever because they what I was and so decided what to mold me into. Maybe it's best to admit that you care for a monster and decide if he is worthy of your affection despite that."

Kaworu's body trembles like Midoriya's voice but his voice is quiet and firm. Pushing boundaries as he does. As he thinks is necessary for people to reach the understanding he wants for them.

However, there's a moment where he wavers again.

"I didn't expect to be saved. It's alright.

The more Kaworu shakes, the more firmly he holds him and softly strokes his hair. Midoriya can't stand for the disservice Kaworu does himself because it rends him so deep and tears him apart from others. His voice is low and rippled through with iron.

"They weren't here to see who you've grown to be. All your efforts to learn about people and connect with them mean something. I believe in your dream. Don't throw it away."

Isn't it a good thing, to have your heart open to other people? Kaworu once said. Then they kissed, and Midoriya wanted to give him everything he didn't have before. Friendship, love, family, people looking out for him, a host of new experiences--roller skating, slushies on a hot day...

"I don't dream. How am I to know what a waking dream is?"

He reaches up and grips Midoriya's wrist. His fingers are soft and there's no strength in his hold. It's begging, not demanding.

"What if your faith in me is misplaced?"

"Then I take your hand. Like now," he says simply, and slips his hand out of Kaworu's hold to do so. "Your hope. That's what I meant. It's in every time you reach out to someone. I don't like it when you call yourself 'thing' and 'monster.' You're just repeating whatever that committee told you."

With his white eyes and their sleepless shadows above a mouth pressed in a determined line, he draws back just enough to look at the face of someone he loves.

"You're a person. Not a human, I know, but a person. You're a person who's done good things... and bad things. People might say what you did on the ship is unforgivable. If you haven't already, you're going to have to apologize to the people you hurt. But you also..." his voice softens, "you also looked like you needed saving. Scared, in bad trouble."

Kaworu's voice on the deck was stopped by another. Midoriya didn't feel quite the same potent revulsion at being Voiced as others did; the deaths at the hands of those he trusted was what horrified him. He hates and fears not being able to prevent that. But he did understand the attack on someone's pressure point, and how that can cut and scar more than any physical blow.

"I won't let that happen to you again."

The pale hand is limp in his. The fingers twitch but don't move to entangle them with Midoriya's. The claws dig slightly into his skin but don't pierce it. Or if it does, it heals too quickly to be noticeable.

"Then why did you leave? Why did you choose someone else over me? I thought I was left alone for doing something unforgivable. He was the only one left. I thought he was the only one who would accept me."

He lets the emotion spill out like blood from a jagged wound. He knows Midoriya would not have left him. But the memories of waking up on that beach eclipse the light, taking over his head like creeping shadows at the corners of a dark room.

"...If I were a monster, would you still care for me?"

Being Corrupted so long, he's gotten the knack of being gentle with claws over the weeks. It doesn't matter that Kaworu can heal right away. He doesn't want to hurt him. His claws rest there, a reminder of pain, but also of the care it takes not to inflict it.

As he once told Kaworu the first day they met, a person is, among other things, someone who has a right to be treated a certain way.

"You're not a monster. In my world, people call others monsters just because of their Quirks and use that as an excuse to hurt them. You're my person. And I'm yours. You're part of me. I will always care for you. I didn't leave you."

He tried to explain to the angel in God's house. He tries again here. Tears slip down his cheeks again, but his hands remain firm.

"Back then, I needed to keep everyone safe, but I was outnumbered," he says softly. "I decided to guard an area instead. Any wounded who couldn't move on their own would go there. I put you behind cover. I fired at Teacher's Omen to keep it away from Paul-kun and you, behind me. I made sure he and Suaveterre-san left because I needed to protect you. You were my first priority, and I was going to carry you away. I... I didn't think you'd leave with him..."

"I know. I thought that if you no longer wanted me then he would because he also had nothing left. I was afraid of having nothing again... I was afraid of losing you. I'd rather be gone than to be alone again. To not have you."

His body trembles again as though getting violently rocked by some unseen force. Midoriya tells him the things he wants to hear more than anything. But those words are like doors, opening up new possibilities, and thresholds to be crossed. He'll have to face possibilities of losing what he has.

"I don't want to disappoint you. I think you think better of me in your love."

"That fear of losing someone is... what happened to me. When we were separated." His voice is tight.

He presses him close to embrace his shaking and tucks Kaworu's head into the safe space against the pulse of his neck. Sometimes the mind follows the settling of the body. He lets the slow swells of his own chest show him how. (The rapid beating of his own heart gives him away, but it is strong.) He flattens his palm on Kaworu's back and moves it in circles. Normally shy about who sees him being close with someone, he doesn't care if anyone walks in now. This is too important.

"You can still be so much. And you came back. It was your choice. I'm going to help you, okay? I'm going to help you make things better. I know what you did. I'm not ignoring that. But the worse things are, all the more reason to take your hand."

"I love you." Kaworu says, softly, but with a resolve that betrays a certain ferocity. As if he dares the world to deny it or refuse his truth. Buried in Izuku's gentle rhythm, he thinks of how he would play that voice message over and over again, curled up in a quiet house that no longer wanted him and that he no longer wanted in return. A place he'd been resigned to.

All he'd wanted to do was reply and beg Izuku to find him and save him from his own maelstrom of confusion and pain. Yet, he'd refrained. Afraid that there would be no hand offered to him. Or perhaps even more afraid that it would be withdrawn at the sight of him.

"I don't know if I a deserve your hand in mine but I'll never let it go again."

"I love you too." He buries his face in his hair, and it brings relief like a silver stream smoothing over jagged rocks. He fits the thin curve of Kaworu's body against his and holds him like a storm will blow into the room and sweep him away in its waves.

"I'll be here. I've got you."

So close to what caused all this sorrow, he can feel a small shiver run through him though he's safe and holding someone close. He remembers the sounds of killing, whisper of knife against flesh, spatter and smell of blood, and Kaworu's voice only raising protest about Mariana. He knows what this chill is. It's the same tremble in his eyes he tamped down and hid from his mom the last time he left her.

He also knows it will pass, because this time he does not tamp it down but gives it the chance to heal like a lanced boil.

"If we all got what we deserved... Well, I'd be punished too. Can't think about people like that, or it would never end."

Hey, teacher, leave them kids alone

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cw: mentions of past abuse

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mha spoilers

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