Chapter Text
Izuku wakes up feeling good.
The ache in his head and the lingering drag of exhaustion that’s been haunting the rest of him is finally gone.
One of the many advantages of One For All is that, once the quirk had integrated fully into his body and he’d gained true control, his healing factor had shot through the roof.
Izuku has always theorized that it’s due to the massive amounts of energy that his quirk runs through his system.
Even outside of battle, One For All is always active for him in a way it simply wasn’t for Toshi-sensei, is a working, moving, present part of him at all times. Without a constant and steady drain, the excess energy has to go somewhere. For Izuku it’s channeled directly into his constitution. It helps him fight harder, heal faster, and just keeps him running longer than he should otherwise be able to.
All things he takes endless advantage of.
Overall it’s a general upside to balance out the absolutely staggering increase in his needed daily caloric intake.
Well, that and the way that he tends to simply stop whenever he pushes himself too far for too long by going on a ‘heroic bender’ as Gran calls it. But given that this time he’d managed to land practically in Shōta’s lap, Izuku is willing to count that as a point in the win column.
So adding his system having finally rebooted to the recharge from the dinner Shōta had ordered for them, the three extra jelly pouches the man had slipped him while they watched that second big cat documentary, and how well he had slept?
Izuku feels refreshed and ready to go.
Once again huffing fur away from his face, this time the dark brown belonging to Tree, Izuku carefully wiggles around so that he can stare up at Shōta’s still sleeping face.
Again.
It’s becoming a bit of a habit for Izuku already.
A habit he’s surprisingly okay with at that.
Because Shōta really is kind despite his gruff exterior and arresting him is quickly becoming something Izuku wants to do less and less.
Even though it’s honestly way more tempting than it should be, the curve of Shōta’s shoulder and the shockingly comfortable sleeping bag pallet they’ve been sharing both calling out to him, Izuku doesn’t linger this time.
He’s always been the type to wake up quickly and completely, brain off and running full speed as soon as it switches all the way on.
If he was home he’d undoubtedly already be headed towards his home gym, a necessity whose construction Toshi-sensei had pressed upon him the fifth or so time Izuku had made the mistake of attempting to go on a morning run after his official solo debut. He’d still been climbing the ranks and, despite being in the top ten, honestly hadn’t expected to be mobbed by fans either time.
Izuku loves meeting fans, always feels so honored and touched to have them at all, but there’s something about them catching him in his workout gear that always turns out badly.
For him that is.
He’s lost more than one tanktop and more than one handful of hair to those kinds of crowds, a fact that Gran never fails to find absolutely hilarious for some reason.
Nowadays Izuku enjoys having the privacy his home gym provides him with and makes sure to wear a face mask on the rare occasions when an outdoor run is just too good to pass up.
Izuku slowly wiggles down, inching his way both out of the circle of Shōta’s arms and the loosened folds of capture weapon. He pauses every few seconds as he goes, breath held, as he makes sure Shōta is still asleep.
Thankfully Tree, apparently on his side in the matter, takes the opportunity to steal the warmth of Izuku’s spot and curls up in the curve of Shōta’s shoulder.
Izuku bites back a little noise at the way Shōta immediately shifts to curl tighter around Tree even as Dog oozes his way over the side of Shōta’s hip, massive orange body splaying out starfish style as he goes.
Hopefully, that means Shōta won’t miss Izuku.
At least not for a little while.
Long enough, Izuku hopes, for him to do what needs to be done.
Because some things, Izuku thinks as he creeps across the room and away from Shōta, simply have to happen.
No matter how upset with him Shōta will inevitably be in the aftermath.
It’s for the best.
For both of them.
~~~
Shōta snaps awake.
He’s on his feet, hand tightening around the edge of his capture scarf, between one breath and the next.
A quick glance around helps him take stock of the situation.
Tree and Dog had scampered off towards the cat tree when he’d jumped up, the other cats are nowhere to be seen, and the other half of his sleeping bag is empty.
Izuku is gone.
But there are voices in Shōta’s kitchen.
Fuck.
Shōta should have known better.
No matter how sweet or innocently charming Izu-Deku is, the man is still a hero.
Shōta should have never let his guard down.
Shōta gives a fleeting thought to simply running, to cutting his losses here and now.
He could head out the window easily and quietly. He knows the area and has had his own personal escape routes mentally mapped out since a month or two before he moved in. He even has a standard go-bag stashed in a locker not too far from here.
With all of that in his favor, Shōta’s confident enough in his skillset to say that he could put enough distance between himself and Deku to disappear. He wouldn’t need long to slip away, grab his bag, and then go to ground properly.
But …
As little as Shōta cares about the apartment itself, there are a few things in it he considers precious. Things he refuses to leave behind unless absolutely necessary.
Four things to be precise.
Since only two of them are currently perched in the cat tree, the other two are more than likely in the kitchen.
With Deku.
And whoever else he has in there.
The cats are all chipped of course, with encrypted trackers that only Shōta and a very small group of others can access.
So even if he does have to leave them behind it’s not like it will be forever.
If they don’t somehow end up with Hizashi or Nemuri then Shōta will simply have to track them down and steal them back once he’s settled again.
Simple and easy.
Shōta doesn’t have to confront Deku and whoever it is he has brought into Shōta’s apartment.
He could just disappear with the only real loss being this apartment, which honestly doesn’t even count in Shōta’s opinion.
He could be in the wind and out of Deku’s reach in a matter of minutes. Could run so fast and hide so well that not even Deku would be able to find him.
It’s just …
Shōta would rather it not come to that.
For a variety of reasons.
So that’s Shōta’s decision made then, as reckless and illogical as it might end up being.
A practiced flick of his wrist has his capture scarf back on his shoulders, one end laced through his fingers and ready to be deployed.
Shōta creeps, silent as a shadow, across the bare expanse of his living room and toward the kitchen. He keeps Erasure hovering just beneath the surface, primed and ready to flare the second he has a clear line of sight on his opponents.
He’ll move in quick and then hit hard, just like always.
Deku should still be in those cuffs at least. As specially designed as they are, they require either Shōta’s access code or heavy-duty power tools and time to get off. Which are all things Shōta likes to think he wouldn’t have slept through, no matter how far he’d let his guard drop.
With one last steadying breath, Shōta swings around the corner, bare feet planting themselves firmly on the hardwood, Erasure blazing and capture scarf flaring.
“Oh!” Deku says, having just turned from the stove toward Shōta’s direction and thus spotting him instantly. “Good morning, Shōta! You’ve got excellent timing, I was going to come wake you up soon.”
The grin Shōta gets is somehow even more vibrant than all the ones that had come before it.
On the counter beside the stove, obnoxious All Might cover still in place, is Izuku’s cellphone, cheerfully babbling away with what sounds like an auto reading of some sort of quirk science research paper.
There’s no one else in the kitchen besides Trash and Bastard who are both still crouched by the automatic feeders.
“Did you sleep well?” Dek-Izuku asks, hands reaching over to tap at his phone and pause his paper.
Shōta stands in the doorway, Erasure already fizzling away and his capture scarf falling down to rest back on his shoulders, for a long moment.
Then he shuffles forward, drops down into the nearest chair, and promptly slams his head against the tabletop.
“What,” Shōta grits out against the tabletop, “are you doing?”
“Making breakfast of course,” Izuku says, suddenly way closer than before.
Shōta forces himself to sit up and back, but all Izuku does is place a cup of obviously fresh and still steaming coffee onto the table in front of Shōta before moving away.
Shōta reaches over and grabs it, able to tell with a single sip that it’s exactly how he likes it.
Strong enough to strip paint and borderline boiling.
Izuku, impressively dexterous despite still being cuffed, is somehow wearing that obnoxious ruffled yellow apron Hizashi had shoved onto Shōta years ago. He also shuffles back over to the table a few seconds later, only this time he places a large bowl of freshly cut fruit in the middle of the table before he heads back toward the stove.
Which is … odd.
Because Shōta knows for a fact that he didn’t have fresh fruit anywhere in his kitchen. He’s honestly not sure if fresh fruit has ever actually been in his apartment in the past six years at all.
Or, for that matter, that bowl which is another thing that Shōta knows wasn’t in his kitchen.
Shōta just stares as more mysteriously appearing things begin to populate the table as Izuku bustles around the kitchen.
Two tall glass bottles of obviously expensive apple juice, a steaming teapot, complete with an obnoxious and blond antenna having All Might tea cozy, heaping bowls of rice, two matching cat-printed tea cups, two plates of what are obviously excellent cuts of salted salmon, and then, finally, two more plates containing large servings of thickly sliced and seemingly expertly rolled tamagoyaki.
“Oops,” Izuku says abruptly, “almost forgot!”
Izuku bustles over toward the kitchen sink only to return a few seconds later to set a pair of cat-print chopsticks down on the matching cat-shaped hashioki below Shōta’s plate.
Seemingly finally satisfied, Izuku moves around the table, a second pair of chopsticks and hashioki in hand, to sit down across from him.
Shōta, left staring at the small feast that’s been laid out before him on matching dishware he doesn’t own, isn’t sure what, exactly, is happening here.
It’s only Izuku reaching across the table to place another bowl, this time with a large serving of the fresh fruit from the serving bowl in the center of the table, down beside Shōta’s salmon that snaps him out of it.
“What is all of this?” Shōta gestures towards the table, one hand clutching his half-full mug of coffee in self-defense.
“Breakfast? Like I said?” Izuku blinks at him, eyes wide and confused, before his expression softens and he smiles. “You must still be half-asleep.”
Shōta clenches his eyes closed for a split second, abruptly chugs the rest of his still-steaming coffee, and sets the mug down on the table with deliberate gentleness.
“I know it’s breakfast,” he says with impressive calm. “I also know none of this was here last night.”
“I woke up early,” Izuku says as if that explains it all.
Which, given what Shōta has already learned about this man, it might just.
“You woke up early and what?” Shōta asks. “Just decided to head out to the store to pick up a few things?”
“Of course not,” Izuku denies, reaching out to pointedly nudge at the edge of Shōta’s plate of tamagoyaki with the tip of his chopsticks. “You’re holding me captive, Shōta. I ordered delivery.”
A beat.
“I, uh, I did end up meeting your neighbor though,” Izuku continues, just a bit sheepish. “They delivered to the wrong door but Uyehara-san was very sweet about it. Offered to help me carry everything back over even though it wasn’t all that much.”
Shōta looks around the table at all the new food and dishware, thinks about his perpetually sour-faced neighbor who had once attempted to file a complaint on Shōta for walking past his door too late at night, and then looks at the way Izuku is still cuffed and shirtless.
“Oh I bet he did,” Shōta sneers, reaching out to pick up his chopsticks. “Thank you for the food.”
The tamagoyaki is perfect, the rice is steaming and fluffy, and the salmon practically melts in Shōta’s mouth.
“It’s delicious,” Shōta finds himself saying, unable to resist the way Izuku is still staring at him.
Across the table, his own food still untouched, Izuku lights up like the sun.
Shōta feels a soft sort of acceptance ripple through him as Izuku reaches over to uncap Shōta’s apple juice before finally turning toward his own food.
He’s still going to have to give up this apartment since apparently everyone within a two-block radius has now seen Izuku shirtless and cuffed and they likely all assume Shōta makes a habit of keeping muscular men handcuffed in his apartment.
Which, this particular situation and Nemuri’s irritation aside, he very firmly does not.
But, again, it’s no real loss.
There are, after all, only fiv-four things here he’s worried about keeping his hands on anyway.