|| Stay? ||

Bakugo wakes up one night from a nightmare that forced him to relive a past trauma and face a new fear. After trying to go back to sleep and failing, he realizes that he's not the only one awake.

[A Kiribaku thread]
Photograph taken by me
(Aight listen, before we begin, 2 things:

1 Don't comment, please qrt!!
2 When words are surrounded by *asterisks* this indicates italics, mainly to signify a flashback. (Thanks Twitter...)

This is my first fic thread so bare with me please. Enjoy!!)
Art by me. Done with watercolours.
There was darkness… then a distinct feeling of exhaustion and discomfort.

Bakugo Katsuki stood in a wrecked street alley. His body shook as he coughed up black sludge, the taste of tar prominent all the way to the back of his throat.

Fucking disgusting.
He looked around the familiar area, his stomach twisting even more than it had already.

*Oh no.*

He knew exactly where he was. This was Kamino… but something was different. The enemies around him were faceless and indistinct. Their attacks were way stronger than normal.
Katsuki willed himself to get away, shooting explosions out of his palms, but for some reason he felt overly weak and light. A loud crashing sound came from behind, wind nearly blowing the boy off his feet.
“All Might...”

Katsuki heard his own voice, as though it was detached from his body. He watched the large man stand up straight as he faced All For One. All For One, unlike the other villains, was distinct and all too real. His presence was strong and overwhelming.
The sick feeling Katsuki had from the black liquid he'd coughed up came back full force. His body shook in horror.

The two powerful forces collided, a full battle just like the first time this went down. Katsuki watched them out of the corner of his eye-
-as he avoided the villainous silhouettes, knives and swords flying his way, and hands reaching out, all in an attempt to grab him and contain him.

*No, God, please not again.*
All Might’s body fell to the ground, he sat on his knees. His body was deflated now and he was skeletal. Katsuki’s mind was spinning. This wasn’t how it went. This wasn’t how it was supposed to be. His head spun around to one of the walls surrounding the area.
The night this went down, his classmates had been hiding that night. Were they not there this time? Why?

Katsuki felt that there was something was horribly wrong.
Finally, he saw Kirishima’s annoying red hair burst through the wall, with him was shitty Deku and the others. But then… nothing. All Might’s deflated body was now directly in front of Katsuki.

“What the fuck?” He tried to step away but couldn’t seem to move.
He turned away, unable to bear the sight and his heart stopped.

He saw Kirishima, just off in the distance. So close but so far, all bandaged up. His face was scarred. Katsuki's vision blurred and then...

Katsuki's eyes shot open.
He blinked a few times, breath heavy and shaking, before realizing it was just nightmare.
The night before he’d gone to bed early, even earlier than normal, though he had trouble sleeping due to recent events. He could remember when his body finally relaxed before drifting off into a deep slumber.
Now he was laying there with his arms and legs sprawled out in his typical fashion, but his body no longer relaxed, now rigid and sweaty. His numb fists clenched as tight as they could be in his still tired state, one gripping on his comforter.

“...Shit.”
*The internship crew had returned a few nights before, clearly tired and worn out from their night spent recovering in the hospital. Everyone had gone to greet them with a mixture of relief and worry, asking if they were okay that they saw the news and how*-
-*they'd made them cake and tea and all that bullshit, but Katsuki remained sitting on the couch, unsure of how to react. He’d seen the news, the way Kirishima was carried out in a stretcher, smiling but ultimately bandaged and scratched as all hell.*
*Now he watched his classmates from afar.

“Kirishima? Are you okay?” He had heard the pink raccoon eyes girl ask him.

“I've got a long way to go.” Kirishima responded, a statement that made no sense to Katsuki"

"I see."*
*“What are you sulking over here for, Kacchan? You're here because you were worried too, weren’t you?” Kaminari had jumped down to sit next to him.

“I’m going to bed” Katsuki had growled back, jumping up and pushing drooly's dumbass onto the couch and heading to his room.*
*He had ignored the rest of the electric asshole’s remarks before he shut himself in. The fucker had the gall to call him by that dumb nickname, but Katsuki didn’t give a shit at the moment, he just had to get away.*
*No way in hell was he ever going to admit he was worried about any of those dumb losers… because he wasn’t. Obviously. He didn't care. He had to wake up early for license training anyways.*

Flash forward a few days later to Katsuki sitting awake on his bed after a nightmare.
He rubbed the back of his somewhat stiff neck in an effort to relax. His heart beat loudly and hard, the deafening sound beating loudly in his head. The clock behind him read 01:03, which he turned to read as he stretched his somewhat sore back.
The provisional license lessons he and Todoroki had been taking were wearing him down. Not that he was gonna let that slow him down, he thought as he exhaled out of his nose.

He usually had flashbacks triggered while awake, occasionally in his sleep but this…
This nightmare was way more vivid than normal. What had caused this, so suddenly and so long after his rescue? *Probably a lack of therapy,* he thought, but... The image of Kirishima on a stretcher he’d seen in the news came back to him.

*“You were worried, weren't you?"*
The blond electric rat bastard’s voice rang through his head. Fuck that guy, Katsuki was gonna make sure to beat the living shit out of him when he saw him next.

Calloused hands reached up to rub his temples, attempting to clear his head.
As his heartbeat slowed he finally relaxed. It was around 01:23. Time to go back to sleep. Katsuki buried himself in his comforter, willing himself to go back to sleep. He grunted, realizing he was unable to sleep, and reached for his hearing aids.
He planned on taking a walk around and to do that he needed to make sure he was quiet, but when he turned them on he realized there was a thumping sound. It wasn't his heart this time.

*Thump. Thump thump. Thump. Thump thump thump.*

What in the fiery hell was that noise?
Katsuki realized it was coming from the next room over. He rose from his bed. *Kirishima.* What the fuck was he doing, and at this hour?

*Did he have a nightmare too?* He didn't give himself time to consider it, Katsuki was already in front of Kirishima's door.
Grunting with displeasure, Katsuki banged his fist against the door, flinching when he realized how loud he knocked. Well, fuck everyone else trying to sleep, then.

The thumping stopped. Katsuki heard a few footsteps before the door opened.
"Bakugo? What are you doing awake?" Kirishima's voice sounded tired and breathless.
A dim desk light lamp illuminated him, his hair lay flat against his face, sweat making it stick slightly. He looked exhausted and… kind of awful.

Katsuki clicked his tongue, “I’m the one who should be asking you that. What the fuck are you doing making noise?"
Clearly embarrassed now, Kirishima's eyebrows furrowed, “oh no, did I wake you?”

Katsuki rolled his eyes, "you didn't wake me," he said as he pushed his way into the other boy's room. Kirishima's eyes were on him as he sat on the bed. "I can't hear you when I'm asleep."
Katsuki pointed at his hearing aids.

"Oh, right..."

The two stayed silent for a few seconds before Kirishima sighed and closed his door. He pointed to the punching bag, “I was just working out. I couldn't sleep.”
Katsuki stared at the punching bag. He remembered the day they had to move in- *all because of me,* he thought, but pushed the thought away. Kirishima decided, without Katsuki's say in it as usual, that the two of them would help one another unpack.
The dumbass hair for brains really wouldn't leave him alone, huh? Not that Katsuki minded… but he wasn't ready to admit to that.

*“Why the fuck did you bring a whole punching bag??” Katsuki's voice was loud as usual.*
*Kirishima let out a deep laugh, the type where Katsuki could tell he was forcing it to sound “manly.” God, what a dumbass.

“Isn’t it cool!? I bought it before I got into U.A. I wanted to train real hard for the chance to get in.”*
*He walked up to it proudly and slapped it a couples of times.“They said it's really resistant, good for quirk use. Should last me a long time.”

“That doesn't explain why you brought the thing, there’s training equipment here at UA. That things heavy as fuck, you dumbass..." *
*Kirishima laughed once more, then smiled brightly at him.*

He wasn't smiling so brightly anymore.
Kirishima shifted side to side as he stood at the doorway, like he was pondering something. "If I didn't wake you up, then…" Kirishima's voice was quiet, “what did? Did you have a nightmare?”

Katsuki sighed, his hands balled into fists. “Yeah," his voice was unusually soft.
"Oh."

Kirishima was probably surprised. Katsuki almost never talked about his problems. When he did, it was a result of him bursting, and they'd pour out all at once in a furious manner. Kirishima himself had never really witnessed that, strangely only Deku and All Might.
He was never fully honest with himself or with others about his feelings despite the fact that Katsuki hated lying. But it was hard to be honest about things he wasn't quite able to figure out himself.

This was why he still hadn't gone to a therapist like he knew he should have.
The school insisted he have a psych evaluation, but during it he was rather uncooperative. He refused to talk about how he felt when that villain had his hand around his neck, how he'd spent countless hours with barely any sleep or water, and no food at all.
Almost two days in captivity, of feeling weak, trapped, and most of all afraid. Incredibly and utterly afraid, and then the fight at Kamino... just thinking about it made Katsuki's hands start to shake.

...yeah, he clearly needed to go to therapy.
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