Never and Always, Eventually

Sometime Friends

Katsuki can remember the exact moment that he and Deku…he and Midoriya Izuku became friends. He can also remember the moment he and Izuku became fierce rivals, a time when they were almost enemies. However, the thing he remembers most clearly about their relationship is the moment that they moved passed rivals and became something more close than mere friends. Something more like brotherhood, something forged in fire and secured in the middle of a battlefield or in the midst of natural disaster where the number of the dead was climbing ever higher.

            They were…coworkers, he supposed.

            The moment he realized he was calling Izuku “shitty nerd Deku” in his head with more fondness and—dare he say it—admiration than true annoyance, was when Izuku stood by his side cheering louder than anyone else when he, Katsuki a.k.a “Overkill” was named the Number One Hero.

            And when the next year rolled around and Shitty Nerd Deku was declared Number One, and everyone looked to Overkill as though expecting him to blow up, Katsuki only scoffed and gave a sarcastic thumbs up, accompanied by a sneer.

            Whenever they teamed up, whether by accident or by design, they always worked really well together. They’d known each other so long, it was almost like they could read each other’s minds. And that was an important skill to have when your every action could mean life or death for an innocent civilian. They traded spots as Number One and Number Two Heroes back and forth like it was some kind of game. A game that Katsuki never really minded losing because, if he had to lose to someone, why not to the heir of All Might? Why not to Deku? The quirkless, timid boy who became the powerful, grinning man that inspired nations?

            Eventually, their bond in battle bled over to their civilian life. It started easily enough after a particularly difficult villain had been carted away by the boys in blue, Deku had turned to Overkill with a weary sort of smile. “Drinks?” he asked, still breathing a bit more heavily than normal.

            “You better be offering to fucking pay,” Katsuki growled. Inexplicably, his acerbic reply had caused Deku to light up like Christmas tree. Katsuki had had to hide a smile underneath a glare that had deterred Deku not at all.

            Drinks lead to dinner parties with their old classmates, which lead to “sleepovers” with copious amount of alcohol and laughter. Before Katsuki knew it, the idiots he’d avoided in high school had suddenly decided they were all buddy-buddy. He hadn’t realized how bad it had gotten until he got invited to Uraraka and Asui’s wedding and he found himself dancing with a laughing Kirishima without really knowing how he got there.

            By the time he was invited to Iida’s and his wife’s (Mei, he thinks her name is? He just calls her You whenever he sees her, because, to be totally honest, that Support Geek freaks him out. But she doesn’t scare him, not at all.) house to celebrate the first birthday of their daughter, he realized that none of them had the same fear of him that they used to. None of them flinched or fell silent when he walked into the room.

            And he found…that he liked it.

            Mostly. He had hoped that Todoroki would fear him a bit more, especially when that half-and-half bastard had randomly decided to propose to Deku. (Seriously?! Where the heck did that come from?!) Katsuki had then taken it upon himself to deliver the typical “You actually marry him and I castrate you with fire” talk that he was relatively certain fell into his responsibility to give as Deku’s oldest friend. Though, for some reason the Halfy married Deku anyway.