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In the midst of the dust caused by the rubble and the immense pain in his side, Keigo thinks I can’t believe this is how I die.
He’s faced off against the most evil person on the planet, had his quirk stolen, got it fucking back, fought for a better world, saved some lives in the meantime, and what takes him out is a damn piece of metal from a fallen building.
Screw it all. This sucks balls.
Heh. Sucks. Balls.
Man, his head hurts.
Scratch that, everything hurts.
He doesn’t try to sit up. Everything’s foggy, anyway. Slush. Goo. Goo like that dessert Enji tried to make for his family’s dinner a few weeks ago. (Keigo was the taste-tester. He knew it was inedible from the burnt smell, but it was Enji asking. Of course he tried it anyway.)
One dull throb rolls from his head to his toes. It’s like someone smashed into a cymbal right next to him and the vibrations make his blood squelch where it’s still in the vessels. He feels the throb in his ribs, and it crawls it’s way on fingernails to the place he knows is going to kill him. It pulls and tears with every breath.
He sees the rod sticking up and out of him. He can’t bend to look at it, but it sticks out a solid twelve inches at least. It looks like a big screw. He’s literally screwed. Ha.
…Keigo is so funny. There’s no one around to appreciate it. Bummer. He wanted to go out in a big hurrah, maybe in a live stream that’s really cool and would be talked about forever. It seems very Hawks, fighting until the very end, going out with a big huzzah.
(If he really thinks about it, though, no, he doesn’t want that. Keigo doesn’t want that at all.)
Since the pain pulses in a horrific way anyway, he takes his hand and reaches to feel for the piece of metal stuck in him. His hand stops, but he doesn’t feel anything in it from the contact (that’s really bad, he knows). He doesn’t feel much of anything until he touches the screw, when tries getting a full breath of air, and the sharpness tears at his insides even at such a miniscule movement. He has to grit his teeth not to scream. His brain swirls and he desperately holds back from gagging.
La la la. He’s fucking dead. Or will be, soon. It hurts and it’s boring. How lame.
Things swirl and go gray at the edges. He gives up trying to listen for sounds from above. He hears creaking, like the building is going to collapse in on itself again. It was daytime, he thought, but it’s dark except for some emergency lights. He’s tired. He falls asleep or zones out and then--
His phone rings.
Oh. What is he supposed to do? Keigo blinks until his vision focuses enough.
He follows the noise, burn baby burn it sings, and sees his phone on the ground, caught in some pieces of concrete a few feet away. The screen is shattered. The contact picture that appears is one that Enji doesn’t know he took. It’s when he fell asleep at his agency on his office couch. His mouth is wide open in a snore, and his arm is thrown over his head. Pure peace, for once, though the remnants of a scowl always kind of stick. It’s cute.
Keigo can’t think very clearly, but his left hand isn’t far from the screen. Just inches. He can’t feel it, but he sees the fingers twitch.
Hey, by the way, reaching for something when you’re actively impaled sucks. Just in case you were wondering.
He manages to tap the screen just enough. He doesn’t even have time to mourn the loss of the picture disappearing on his screen because Enji’s voice rings through without so much as a “hello.”
“What time are you coming home?” Enji asks the second the call connects. It’s not on speaker, but Enji’s loud enough that he can hear him clearly.
Keigo loves him with his whole body. With his heart that’s giving out. With every bit of his soul that’s sinking away into a permanent abyss.
Home, he had said. Home with Enji. Home is such an interesting word.
He musters a breath that stinges and singes his lungs in the way Enji’s smoke used to, before he got so used to it.
“Hey babe. Nice to hear from you, too.” He says, and the blood rushing through his ears make it impossible to tell if it came out casually enough.
“Don’t call me that.”
Oh yeah. It’s either the blood loss, or the sudden reality check, that makes Keigo feel so cold.
They’re not together. They never have been. Enji isn’t his “babe.” They’re just glorified housemates, helping each other fill the silence of loneliness that came after the war. They’re not in love.
Well. You can’t blame a guy for dreaming as his dreams are currently being destroyed by him bleeding out.
Hawks moves his hand back from the phone, not able to muster the grip strength to bring the object any closer. It kind of just flops down onto the ground.
“To what do I owe the pleasure of this call?”
His mind is somewhat clearer now. The talking helps—or maybe, it’s who he’s talking to that helps. He wishes Enji was his boyfriend. He wishes he was at home right now, in his comfy bed, or on the couch, he wants to fall asleep…
“I need to know what time. I’m trying a new recipe and don’t want it to get cold before you get here.”
He’s sweet. Keigo doesn’t care if it’s cold of if it’s burned again—he’ll try whatever it is. There’s already dust on his tongue—what’s a little smoke?
“Go ahead and get started,” he says. The words stick on the dirt in his mouth.
“You’ll be here soon?”
Don’t think I’ll be home at all. But he shouldn’t say that. If he’s only got a few words left, he doesn’t want those to be them.
He debates staying silent. Or maybe he should lie. He’s always been good at lying, to others and himself—he’s better at it than being honest. He could wrap this conversation up on a pleasant note with a pretty little bow, hang up the phone, and then die in the quiet, cold and alone, like he’s known he would for far too long. He doesn’t need to burden Enji.
And yet, what comes out of his mouth is--
“Enji, how do you want to die?”
He wants to know.
“What? What kind of question is that?”
Keigo can’t even begin to decipher that tone. His heart drops. His mouth is foolish.
“It’s just something I’ve been thinking about lately,” lately as in the last few minutes. But. Whatever.
“… I don’t think we get to choose. Are you--?”
“But if you could?” Keigo interrupts, and his lungs burn with the effort not to cough, “If you could choose, I mean.”
There’s the sound of metal clinking. Enji must’ve put down what was in his hand. Keigo wonders what he was making. He wants to try it, whatever it was.
“I don’t really think about it, it’s dangerous with our line of work, thinking of ‘what ifs’, but... I suppose… when I’m older, when I have atoned completely, I’d like to just… fall asleep one day. If they so choose, with my family by me. Dying of old age, I suppose.”
That sounds nice. That sounds really nice.
“Falling asleep, huh?” He supposes it makes sense, that that’s how death works. He feels awfully tired right now. “I think…” He shouldn’t say it. He doesn’t want to worry Enji. But he also can’t manage to shut up, he never has, “I think I’m gonna… take a nap.”
If Enji had been confused before, this clarifies everything, because even as delirious as Keigo is, he can hear the sudden urgency, “Where are you? Hawks, where the hell are you?”
His tongue clicks.
“Dunno.” Honest, again. How strange.
“Keep talking,” Enji says, and there’s shuffling, “Tell me about today. What happened?”
“Today,” Keigo’s lips feel like they peel skin off each other when he opens his mouth. “Well…”
Today. What happened indeed?
Keigo can’t—he knows he got here somehow, but-- oh, “I woke up late. I didn’t have time for breakfast. You have the day off, so you made me coffee.”
It occurs to him belatedly that this probably isn’t what Enji meant. He meant what happened today that led to him dying. Ah well. Hawks likes talking. He likes talking about Enji.
“The coffee was good. What’d you put in it?” He knows his words slur. “I usually just have the canned stuff. Endeavor brand, ha.” He doesn’t remember why that’s so funny.
There’s heavy breathing through the phone. And other noises. Keigo can’t place them right now, but they grate on the headache already splitting his brain.
“Extra cream,” Enji grunts, “Figured you’d like sugar.”
“I do. I like sugar. I like…” you. Keigo, at least, pauses there. Biting his own tongue to keep himself from finishing that. His eyebrows pinch as he squints—the concrete slab above him shakes.
“Then I got busy. Today was busy. My feathers—” holy fuck, he can’t believe he forgot about his feathers. He was running low rescuing civilians. He’s never been quite as fast as before, and he must’ve misjudged just how unstable the ceiling had been before it caved in on him. Which floor was he on? Does he have any feathers?
None come. They’re gone. Or he’s too concussed to send clear commands. Life is shitty that way.
“Did you—” A cough rips out of his lungs, it sounds horrid. “Did you enjoy your day off?”
Nothing. Hawks feels even colder. He realizes now, what that feeling is.
He’s scared.
“Enji?” His voice is pathetically small.
“Sorry, I’m here. What did you say?”
Him saying ‘I’m here’ almost makes Keigo want to laugh, to tease and say Enji’s copying All Might, again, but all he can think is I wish that was true. He wishes Enji was here. He wishes he was home, that they could’ve had the day off together. To do nothing, together. Nothing but exist.
What a dream.
But he really wishes that Enji could save him, now.
“What’d you do today?” He repeats, desperately trying to cling to consciousness. The darkness hazes at the edges of his vision. The headache pounds with every further second. If he doesn’t stay awake now, he won’t ever wake up again.
“…I finished the season of Holiday Baking Championship without you.”
One harsh blink. What the hell? “You did not.”
“I couldn’t wait. I had to know who won.” This man is ridiculous.
Keigo wants to say so much. So much like, I don’t care about the show, I just wanted to watch TV with you. Or, how dare you? You’ve broken our sacred trust.
All he can manage is two words.
“You… asshole.”
Dark dark dark. Tired. Why was he trying to stay awake again? He could just take a quick nap…
“Stay awake!” Comes a shout from the phone. It almost sounds like it echoes. “Keigo!” Ohh it’s his first name. He’s in trouble.
He whines, something pained from the back of his scratchy throat. “Why?”
“So I can rescue your dumb ass.”
Keigo wants to laugh. He wants to call Enji a liar. Because even with how amazing he is, how could anyone save Keigo now? Last he looked, there was blood all over the ground that should be inside him. Besides the pain when he moves, everything else is numb and fuzzy. He’s done for.
He doesn’t get the chance to say anything though. Suddenly there’s a “click” and his phone lights up red. The call has ended. No more Enji.
Oh.
The last piece of him shatters, because now reality really hits. He’s going to die, cold, dirty, and alone, with not even one last piece of comfort. How fitting. Karma really is a ruthless bitch.
He lets himself feel the heaviness. He lets his eyes shut. It’s better than fighting through the devastating loneliness consuming him. The fear.
It can’t have been more than just a few seconds before--
His phone rings, again, burn baby burn echoing though the pocket of space Keigo’s landed himself in, and suddenly light adds to the pounding of his skull, even from behind his eyelids, and it rips him away from the darkness luring him to sleep.
The light frames the flaming figure above him. Even with his foggy brain and vision, Keigo could never not recognize him.
“Found you.”
Immediately upon seeing him, Keigo bursts into tears.
“Enji,” he hiccups, “I’m going to die.”
How embarrassing. He used to be a hero, and now he’s been reduced to this. He feels like a child afraid of the dark.
He used to think about it sometimes. He was never afraid of it before, death was just a fact of life. Sometimes, maybe, he thought death would finally be a break. It’ would come for him one day, too, he knew that. But now it’s terrifying; now he wants to live.
Just this morning, Enji brought him coffee. Enji brought him coffee. And it made him so excited for the day, something so mundane, something so small. He wants Enji to bring him coffee tomorrow. He wants to bring Enji coffee every day for the rest of his life.
“I want to live,” he cries. The Winged Hero Hawks doesn’t cry—he’s calm, cool, and collected. Keigo hasn’t cried in years. He’s not supposed to cry. Why can’t he stop? It makes his head hurt worse, his lungs struggle more.
Enji takes a knee next to him, and his hands get to work—bandages, gauze, all useless when a piece of iron sits in the middle of a wound.
“Then fight. Fight like hell. Fight like I know you can.”
Whether it’s saliva or blood that chokes him, Keigo doesn’t know. It sticks on his tongue, rises up on the sides of his mouth and overflows out the side. Gross. He doesn’t want Enji to see this. He’s supposed to be sexy. He’s supposed to be sexy, and he’s supposed to seduce him in a 25-step foolproof plan that he has in deep in the corners of his brain.
He doesn’t feel very sexy right now.
“Endeavor,” his hero is right here, he’s here, he’s real like Keigo always knew he was, and Keigo doesn’t want to leave, “it hurts.”
He thinks back to when other things hurt. When he had bruises he had to hide under his clothes. When the scrapes pulled on the fabric. When his parents looked at him and told him he never should’ve been born. All different kinds of hurt. Never like this, though. Not like this.
“I know, I know. You’ll get through it, I promise.” Endeavor isn’t supposed to sound like that. He’s not supposed to sound worried, wobbly. Wobbly like Keigo’s brain feels. Endeavor’s the best. He’s a hero. He knows what to do. He’ll defeat all villains and save everyone. Sturdy, unshakable…
Soft.
“Endeavor…”
“I’m here.”
“No,” he moves his head side to side. It lolls, flopping over, unable to be controlled with what little energy Keigo has. He can’t see anything but flames anymore. He likes the flames, though. They’re warm, bright. “My Endeavor. He’s mine, he’s…”
“I… I can be yours? If that’s what you want?” And if Keigo could’ve looked, could’ve seen clearly at all, he may have witnessed Enji blushing for the first time.
“You’re my Enji,” Keigo smiles, if he had any control left, he may have even laughed. Enji misunderstood, because of course he did. But he doesn’t have any control left—no energy, no time, and Enji doesn’t get it, so he needs to keep talking, he needs him to understand, “But Endeavor… he’s on my nightstand at home.”
He can’t feel his fingertips. He tries to get them to move. He doesn’t know if they listen.
“Hawks! Focus! Can you hear me? I’m going to have to lift you--!”
Home. He’ll never get to see it again. He doesn’t really care about that part right now, but.
“I’ll melt the— Stay awake, damn it!"
“I won’t get to tell him goodbye.”
“You’re not going to die—!”
His fingers, he can see them in his own vision. They reach to touch Endeavor’s face, and the man turns off his flames instantly so as not to burn him. So sweet. His eyes are so concerned. As if a measly burn would hurt him anymore. He gets to touch Enji’s cheek, the stubble on his chin. He wishes he could feel it. He wishes he had more time. He wishes he could wake up tomorrow just like this morning.
“Enji, ’m sorry I’m dying.”
“Don’t be ridiculous--!”
“I’m gonna… miss you.”
Enji brought him coffee just this morning.
“I wanna bring you coffee, too.”
The world goes black, even though bright flames are just in front of him.
Beep beep beep beep
Beep beep beep beep
Beep beep beep beep
Hey, that noise is hella annoying. Someone should turn that off.
Beep beep beep beep
Oh, shit. Keigo realizes what that is now.
Ow.
He grimaces because holy fuck, he feels loopy as hell and bright lights burn from even behind his eyelids, very reminiscent of when, you know, he was dying under a building.
He forces his eyes to open, despite the gnarly squint he has going on to try to negate the brightness.
The same outline that permeated though his last feeling thoughts is seated just to his right.
Enji is right there. And he’s watching Keigo with eyes so intense you’d think his regular glare was child’s play.
Okay. Keigo didn’t think he’d have to live with his dying words. They were supposed to be The End. The Grand Finale. El fin. You know—Dying. Words.
Ugh. Consequences suck ass.
He clears his throat. Enji’s eyes continue the stare.
“What,” god, it sounds like he’s swallowed sand, “is there something on my face?”
There is. Bandages for one. Even though he feels numb as hell—they must’ve given him the good stuff—he can feel the adhesive pulling at his cheek. He’s sure there’s some stuff uncovered, too. Probably not his hottest moment.
Enji doesn’t take the bait of the joke. In fact, nothing about his expression changes at all.
“You almost died,” he says flatly, like he’s talking to a child. Yeah, he knows—he was there, thank you very much. Enji doesn’t have to reprimand him. “Don’t ever do that again.”
Keigo chokes on a laugh at that comment, as if he had any choice in the matter.
“Sorry babe, I’ll tell the building to fall more responsibly next time.”
He says it without thinking, and then remembers—oh yeah. He was reprimanded last time he called Enji babe. Maybe he was supposed to stop. He doesn’t hold his breath, but it’s a near thing. His brain buzzes in the meantime.
“I was worried,” is all that Enji says, not reprimanding him at all for the pet name. Keigo still can’t quite read him, being all fucked up by whatever wonderful meds they have him on, but he can tell that Enji means it, at least.
“Hell,” Keigo lifts his arm to run a hand through his mangled hair and exhales, “me too.”
Silence falls between them for more than a few seconds. Keigo can’t figure out what buttons of Enji’s he should press to get them back to how they were before. To their usual banter and shenanigans. To normal.
Eventually, Enji shuffles around enough that Keigo lazily drags his vision to see what he’s doing. It takes a moment to realize what he’s looking at when something orange and blue is being pushed into his own hand.
“Here, your Endeavor.”
It’s soft. As comforting as he’s always remembered. He feels something like awe, and maybe it’s a deep form of nostalgia, when he is able to clutch his fingers around it just enough to bring it to his chest and press it there. Like he used to.
“Heh. This little guy got me though a lot.” He looks at the small things wrapped up in his fingers, then down to his other hand. It’s mere inches from Enji’s, which is clenched in a fist on the edge of the bed.
They’re so close. He wants to reach out, grip those fingers in his own. He seriously considers it, but some fuzzy part of his brain remembers that he shouldn’t. Damn. The meds aren’t that powerful, apparently.
And yet they still lower his inhibitions enough to let his tongue loosen.
“…Though the big version did, too. I kind of prefer the real-thing, if I’m being honest.”
It's something of a confession. But it hides just enough, Keigo hopes. Stupid tongue. Stupid feelings.
Silence falls. The beeping heat monitor and the constant humming of other machines remind Keigo that he very much has a concussion, and they’re the only things breaking the silence until Enji speaks again.
“The real-thing… ‘Your Enji?’”
Keigo wrinkles his nose in distaste, “Did I actually say that? How cringe.” Like, humiliatingly cringe. Keigo doesn’t know why Enji bothered to save him after saying such an embarrassing thing.
“I didn’t mind,” Enji whispers, and coughs as he confesses, “I… might even… want that, too.”
Keigo tries not to spontaneously combust right then and there. The last think he needed on top of his nearly-deadly injuries was to, you know, explode into a million pieces. Maybe it’s lucky that he can’t really react beyond a slow blink, exhaustion pulling at him in a much more comforting way than the last time he lost consciousness. But dammit, now is so not the time for a power nap.
The empty hand that Keigo had looked at earlier, the one close to Enji’s, is suddenly encased in warmth. When Keigo is able to drag his eyes back, there’s a much larger hand wrapped around his own.
There’s no fucking way this is actually happening.
“I’m hallucinating aren’t I?” He asks, feeling a touch hysterical. “I’m dead. I died and went to heaven.”
Enji snorts. “Heaven? Really?”
Here Keigo is, on what could’ve been his death bed, and all of a sudden Enji’s got jokes. “Oh, fuck you,” he says, without a smidge of real anger, and maybe more than a hint of a smile.
Holy shit. This is actually real.
Enji runs his thumb over Keigo’s knuckles as an apology. It causes a fuzziness to break through what is otherwise completely numb. Fuzzy. Static. A good static. Not like the current static buzzing in his brain as he fights to stay awake.
Feeling like he has permission now, from Enji and his own mind, Keigo breathes and admits, “Yeah, I like both of you...” He looks at the plush and smiles, squeezing it again for the rush of comfort he brings. It means a lot to him. Endeavor does. And then he looks up to meet Enji’s eyes, and the sweet, soft, blue gaze that meets him melts his insides into goo. “…But something about the real one takes the cake.”
Maybe it’s because the real one’s lips twitch with the beginnings of a smile. Maybe it’s because the real one can tease him and take teasing in return. Maybe a big part of the favoritism is because he knows the real one could actually hug him back. Touch and reach out for him. Keigo desperately wants to know what that feels like.
“Hmm,” he starts, “I wonder which one’s cuddlier, though? My Endeavor or my Enji?”
Keigo knows his plot has failed the second Enji snorts and rolls his eyes. The twitch of a smile spreads warmth through him, regardless. “Maybe when you no longer have a hole through your spleen, we’ll find out.”
Ah. That sounds nice. That sounds really nice. Cuddling together. Something so painfully normal, it hardly feels possible for them—for Endeavor and Hawks. Even if he can’t have it right now, Keigo wants that.
He has a hard time controlling himself when it comes to things he wants. And now, Keigo wants to live.
Keigo wants to live a boring old life with Enji at his side. He wants to whine about mornings and sleep in. He wants to sit on the couch and complain that they don’t make TV shows like they used to. He wants to bake in the kitchen and mess up recipes horribly with him. He wants…
“Hey. When I get out of here, want to grab some coffee?”
“Sure.”
That’s what he wants.