Chapter Text
Dabi woke up in pain.
That was normal.
Pain kept him company during restless nights and always waited for him when he woke. Pain had made a home for itself in his seams, in every staple and internal ache that served as a reminder that he’d been taken apart and put back together slightly to the left.
This time, however, the pain was less of an ugly, loyal dog and more of a furious, caged tiger trying to tear him apart from the inside out.
Every nerve in his body screamed. His ribs and lungs protested every breath. His eyes were irritated and aching. One of his shoulders throbbed with every beat of his heart.
Dabi noted each complaint, taking inventory, and then ignored them all. Instead, his eyes opened halfway, flicking around to take in the drab, barren room around him.
The room was open in the way realtors and well-off people considered trendy, and everyone else considered “paying extra for less privacy and more echo.” Little circular lights dotted the ceiling at regular intervals, though currently the room was only lit by the sunshine streaming in through the floor-to-ceiling windows that took up the entirety of one wall, framed on either side by beige curtains. The couch below him was the same dull beige and uncomfortably firm.
Definitely not the League safehouse.
It was too bright, too quiet, and smelled way more sanitary.
It took him a moment to pull his mind from the fog of exhaustion and begin sorting out the pieces of the puzzle. He took in a shaky breath, squeezing his eyes shut against the afternoon light once again.
Right.
The fucking raid.
It’d been a standard evening for the League.
They’d been tucked away in a safehouse on the outskirts of the city, a half-rotted warehouse that groaned if the wind blew too hard and had a colorful variety of mold growing in one corner of the room.
Twice, Compress, and Spinner had been fighting among themselves as they tried to teach a very focused Toga how to play poker, the four of them sitting on wooden crates crowded around a dirty metal worktable. Shigaraki had been playing some game, though his head bobbed now and then as he struggled to stay awake.
Dabi had sequestered himself in a graffiti-covered corner of his own, laying on the floor with his boots kicked up on a box as he tried to tune out the racket around him enough to get some sleep.
Then the damn loading dock door exploded in a cloud of dust and debris, and in rushed a wave of heroes.
Dabi shot to his feet first, rushing ahead of the League as his hands began to heat and his quirk flared to life beneath his skin. With a quick thrust of his hands, the building flooded with searing blue flames.
The heroes had someone with a shield quirk. It could only do so much against his heat, but it still gave them an extra second to change tactics.
They’d brought some poor bastard with a water quirk, obviously thinking he’d be able to do something against Dabi’s fire.
Hilarious, really.
The hero’s water couldn’t even touch Dabi’s flames. The cannon of water came within a few feet of the raging inferno and burst into a cloud of steam, turning the warehouse into a sauna and obstructing the view for both sides of the fight.
Everything moved fast from there.
Clones rushed ahead, the cannon fodder acting as a distraction. Compress grabbed Toga, pulling her back as a capture wire shot her way. An explosion cut Spinner off mid-shout.
Shigaraki shouted orders to retreat and slammed his hand against a support pillar, all five fingers touching the concrete.
Twice herded the others to the back of the warehouse and towards a collapsed section of wall. Dabi had started to follow, then turned back to throw another torrent of flames, palms burning and blistering in the heat.
He lost sight of the others when the warehouse collapsed.
He remembered throwing himself under the metal worktable that the others had been playing cards at just minutes before, ears filled with the crashing of falling concrete and the screech of metal on metal as everything caved in around him.
His shoulder flared with pain.
Stars filled his vision in an explosion of white.
Dabi didn’t remember much after that.
A pile of rubble. The blurry sight of his boots moving beneath him, one after the other. A wet warmth against his skin that, somewhere in the back of his mind, he knew should concern him, but he couldn’t find the energy to care. The rough, uneven feeling of brick under his fingers.
A street name he recognized.
Stairs.
A lot of stairs.
A balcony.
He remembered briefly thinking, damn, this place is empty as hell.
Hawks’ hands, warm and gentle as the hero sewed him back together and wrapped his injuries in clean, white bandages.
Dabi’s eyes shot open.
Fuck, I broke into the bird’s cage.
No wonder the couch was shit. It was probably some luxury thing that cost more than Dabi’s life and was meant to be looked at more than used. His eyes drifted downwards to the blanket covering him, one of the few colorful things in the room. It was soft and dark blue with gold stars scattered all over it, tucked neatly under his arms and around his body, just like his mother did in his earliest memories from before everything went to shit.
He scowled at it on principle, then tried to push himself up.
His body had several opinions about the effort, and absolutely none of them were positive.
Pain detonated through his torso like the explosion that tore about the warehouse. The stars on the blanket merged with the stars in his vision.
He dropped back down with a harsh intake of breath, biting solidly down on his tongue against the pained noise that tried to escape. Despite his self-destructive work schedule, he doubted that Hawks would have left him alone in his apartment, even injured.
Honestly, he was surprised he wasn’t in a cell somewhere, but the bird was enough of a hero that maybe he wanted to wait until Dabi was conscious before calling in agents to haul him away.
His muscles protested the movement, but he turned his head, trying to gather more information about his surroundings.
The penthouse was massive. It made sense, technically, since Hawks’ place would have to accommodate his massive wings, but there was no clutter to make up for it. No personal effects, no stupid knickknacks or photos or hero merch or literally any sign that Hawks had anything to do with the place besides a work laptop at the kitchen counter and the med kit that still sat on the floor near the couch.
It was like Hawks woke up and immediately went to sing and dance for his masters over at the HPSC like a good little pet, and then he’d come back to sleep.
And that was it.
Dabi had more shit taking up space in Hawks’ apartment than Hawks himself did, which even he could admit was a depressing thought.
His black coat was draped over the back of a chair, torn open in a way that he knew would require replacement instead of repair. His boots sat beside it, still coated in dust from the fallen safehouse.
Given that he could feel the blanket against the healthy skin of his torso, he figured it was a safe bet that his shirt hadn’t survived the night. He shifted a tiny bit, feeling the pull of bandages in various places along his body.
“Mornin’, sunshine,” A voice drawled cheerfully from somewhere behind him.
Dabi jerked half-upright on instinct. Agony surged white-hot through his body, and blue embers sparked briefly at his shoulders and fingertips before snuffing out just as quickly.
He bit down on his tongue again, tasting copper. It didn’t quite muffle the strangled cry that managed to escape. His vision filled with red and gold as Hawks rushed to him, amber eyes sharp under his ridiculous fluffy eyebrows as his gaze flicked over Dabi’s prone form.
“Easy there, Dabs,” Hawks said, tone light and fake in a way that made Dabi instantly annoyed. His hands hovered over Dabi, but he didn’t try to touch him. “Only one attempt to bleed out in my apartment per villain, and you’ve already had your try.”
Dabi schooled his face into a mask of boredom, breathing through the pain until he thought his voice wouldn’t shake. “And here I was, trying to bring a splash of color to this neutral-toned hellscape. Always so ungrateful, hero.”
That earned him an undignified snort that was more genuine than most of the hero’s laughter ever was. Hawks’ hands fell back to his sides now that it seemed that Dabi wasn’t going to insist on trying to make an inevitably short-lived escape attempt.
“You’ve been conscious for all of a minute, and you’ve decided to critique the interior design here? You’ve already traumatized my hardwood and my couch. I think we’re good on the accent colors.”
“I’ve slept on concrete softer than this. Your couch deserves it.”
“Not gonna lie, you’ve got me there.” Hawks’ grin widened by a fraction.
Dabi watched the hero for a moment, taking him in long enough for the blonde’s smile to tense a little at the edges. His bright red wings looked a little smaller than usual, his feathers not quite as neat. He wore a white shirt that had a little yellow crescent moon embroidered on the left side of the chest and long purple sleeves that he’d rolled up to his elbows. His sweatpants looked comfortable and well-worn, with a hole starting to wear away at the knee, and his hair stuck up more than usual on one side, like it’d been fluffed up in sleep.
“At least I’m not the only one who looks shit right now,” Dabi replied, ignoring the extra gravel in his voice and the annoyed twitch of Hawks’ wings.
His throat hurt when he swallowed.
Everything hurt.
But Hawks had patched him up. He was alive and still in the hero’s penthouse—no agents, no cell, not even any restraints, quirk-suppressing or otherwise.
A stupid decision.
A calculated one, too.
He knew the bird was trying to get on his good side. Apparently, he wanted it badly enough that Hawks had weighed the pros and cons, then decided to help Dabi instead of turning him in. He could’ve had him arrested and locked in some interrogation room by now with quirk-suppressant cuffs around his wrists.
The little spy was trying so hard to gain his favor, to get the okay he needed to meet the League—to meet Shigaraki.
Playing doctor wasn’t going to help him, but Hawks didn’t need to know that. Let him bend over backwards trying to keep a villain happy. Once Dabi recovered, he’d leave, and the hero would still be shit out of luck with his mission.
At least, that would be the plan so long as Hawks didn’t change his mind and get the Commission on his ass while Dabi’s down for the count. No sane hero would do something like this for a villain unless they had something to gain from it. There was always the chance that he was just biding his time.
Then again, Hawks seemed to think he was a convincing spy.
His sanity could be called into question on that basis alone.
Dabi was pulled from his thoughts as he caught a glimpse of movement in his peripheral vision, snapping his gaze over to follow.
The hero had a bottle of something clear in one hand and a gaudy mug in the other. Despite the lazy grin on the bird’s face, it was easy to tell he was keeping an eye on Dabi’s hands, watching for any sign of smoke or a flicker of blue as he set the mug down on the coffee table.
Hawks held out the bottle, the cap still wrapped in the plastic safety seal.
Dabi eyed the drink with distrust.
“It’s an electrolyte drink. It’ll help after you lost so much blood last night,” Hawks said, wiggling the bottle still in his outstretched hand. “Look, everything’s even still sealed. Put your paranoia aside for a minute and drink.”
Dabi kept his suspicious expression in place, mostly just to spite Hawks.
He needed to entertain himself somehow.
Sure enough, after a few moments, Hawks’ grin turned strained and a wrinkle formed between his ridiculous eyebrows. “Dabs,” he started, a hint of exasperation in his voice, “I promise, I did not poison the Pedialyte.”
“Sounds exactly like something someone who poisoned the Pedialyte would say,” the villain replied flatly, but he reached for the bottle with his good arm anyway. Amusing as it was to annoy the bird, his throat was as dry as a desert, and at least that was one issue that could be solved with minimal effort.
Dabi scowled at how badly his hand shook as he grabbed the bottle, at how that simple motion sent a twinge along even his good arm.
Hawks politely did not mention it.
Dabi did take a moment to inspect the wrapper before peeling it off, because he was a paranoid bastard. Still sealed, no evidence of tampering, no weird residue in the bottle itself.
The only strike it had against it was how long it took him to open the damn thing with one shoulder out of commission and everything else feeling like he’d been Detroit Smashed by All Might.
“Here, I can—” Hawks started, reaching out in an attempt to grab the bottle.
Dabi shot him a scathing look, and the hero went still immediately.
Hawks pressed his lips together in frustrated annoyance, but, realizing it was a losing battle against Dabi’s pride, held his hands up in surrender and took a seat on the coffee table instead.
Dabi braced the bottle between his thighs and twisted the cap off, hissing through his teeth as pain sparked through his shoulder and ribs at the action. The seal cracked and he exhaled through his noise at the stupid but necessary victory.
A notorious villain would not be brought down by a sports drink today.
Moving at a snail’s pace that still made his body scream in protest, Dabi managed to sit up just enough to sip at the drink. It was pleasantly cool, soothing his smoke-ruined throat despite the overly sweet taste of artificial cherry flavoring.
Dabi drank half before he stopped himself. He twisted the lid back on with trembling fingers and shoved the bottle between his side and the couch, a preemptive measure to avoid both pain and the possibility of humiliation that came with asking for help.
Hawks had taken out his phone at some point while Dabi struggled and was pretending to read something on the screen while he watched from the corner of his eye—a failed attempt at subtlety. The soft, warm rays of the afternoon sun caught in the hero’s messy blond hair and the crimson of his wings, lighting him up in an ethereal way.
Dabi’s fingers twitched on the blanket, tempted to throw a few sparks at him just for that.
Hawks noticed the movement, because of course he did. His gold eyes flicked downwards, then back to his phone like he hadn’t been watching.
The hero was being too careful, too considerate.
Annoying bastard.
To find somewhere more productive to direct his frustration, Dabi looked between Hawks and the sleek black phone in his hand. “Can’t help but notice a severe lack of agents trying to haul my ass to Tartarus, Birdie,” he said, keeping his voice steady and bored.
Hawks lifted his head and followed his gaze, the curl of his lip, the tension in his hands, then turned the screen towards him, showing one of his social media pages that he’d apparently been scrolling through.
“Didn’t call it in,” Hawks said. “You can check my call logs and messages if you want proof.”
“What proof is that?” Dabi snorted, “Any idiot knows how to delete that shit. The only proof I have right now is that I’m not in cuffs. So if you’re not turning me in, how about you tell me why that is, hero?”
Hawks leaned back on one hand as he sat on the table, posture loose, eyes hooded, and the corners of his mouth twitching upward in a lazy grin.
It looked careless and relaxed, and Dabi knew there wasn’t a single honest thing about it. Every move Hawks made—around Dabi, around the media, around civilians—was completely fake. The bird performed everything, and everyone bought the act.
Everyone except, apparently, Dabi.
He performed enough himself to know where to read the lies.
“Don’t bullshit me, Hawks,” Dabi warned. “I’ll know if you do.”
The hero watched him for a long moment. Then that fake grin dropped away, golden eyes roved over the injured villain though his expression stayed mild.
“You’re more useful out of a cell,” Hawks said at last. “I told you I wanted to join the League. I want that world where heroes have too much free time, and I’m not gonna get it without that. You’re my ticket in.”
Every good lie had a half-truth in it. The bird was still lying, but there was an ugly truth under it. He needed Dabi, free and unchained, to get to the League.
No Dabi, no intel, no Shigaraki.
Nothing to bring back to his masters to keep them happy.
He still wondered why the Commission had decided to send such a shitty spy, but at least it had some benefits. The hero made for an interesting toy.
“What’s your plan now?” Dabi rasped. “You keep me like your pet villain until I stop bleeding on your furniture?”
Hawks smirked. “Can’t say I’m big on pets, but I can make an exception for an injured stray.”
“Says the Commission’s caged bird.”
Hawks’ smirk tightened at the corners and his gaze grew more pointed.
That one hit true.
Dabi felt a cruel little spark of satisfaction, smiling without any warmth and too many teeth. “What’s the matter, Tweety Bird? Truth hurts?”
“Probably not as much as you hurt yourself trying to open a twist-top bottle.” Hawks replied, grin back and voice chipper in a way that was very pointedly false.
Dabi bared his teeth.
“Careful,” Hawks said lightly. “Keep up with the pet bird jokes and I might have to retaliate.”
Dabi’s eyes narrowed.
“What, you wanna try something, hero?”
Hawks’ gaze flicked over him—the blanket, the bandages, the dried blood still stuck in the ridges of his scars, the fact that Dabi could barely raise his head without nearly blacking out.
Hawks grinned again. It was a touch more real and less kind. There was a certain mischievous gleam in his eyes that Dabi absolutely did not trust, and he was reminded once again that self-preservation had never been a strong suit of his.
“I was thinking of one of those cat collars,” Hawks started, smile widening as Dabi’s stare turned disbelieving. “You know, the ones with the little bells?”
There was a moment of silence.
Dabi blinked, thrown off by the sheer audacity of the statement.
“What?” He said flatly, once his brain came back online after being threatened with a collar by a Commission spy.
“Yeah, I think it’d make sense,” Hawks continued, because, apparently, he didn’t have much self-preservation either. “You broke into my apartment, made yourself at home, and now you’re hissing at me whenever I get too close. Sorry, Dabs, but right now you’ve got the energy of a feral cat that got tricked into going to the vet.”
Dabi’s hand twitched again on top of the blanket.
His fingers started to smoke.
“See, that’s exactly why you need the bell,” Hawks said, gesturing to the smoke coming off of Dabi’s knuckles. “It’ll give me some warning before you try to claw my eyes out.”
The villain’s eyes narrowed until they were little more than slits, and blue embers sparked over his fingers yet again.
Forget the pain.
It’d be worth it to grab the damn pigeon by the throat and roast him in his own home.
“You’re gonna die.”
“Noted,” Hawks replied, tapping a finger against his sad excuse for a beard. “You know, I've heard catnip is calming. You should try it."
The silence went sharp. Dabi could tell it was still an act—one very deliberately put on to frustrate the villain when he couldn’t retaliate properly.
Revenge for poking the bruise left by the Commission’s leash.
Unfortunately, it was working.
Dabi stared, gritting his teeth as he felt his face grow hot in his anger.
Hawks stared back, visibly fighting a grin.
“Birdie,” Dabi said, voice low and unnervingly quiet, “I’m going to put your feathers in a blender and make you drink them.”
The hero laughed once, barely more than a breath.
“Let’s take a raincheck on the attempted homicide, yeah?” Hawks said. He thought for a moment, then his expression slipped into something more serious, “Seriously, Dabi, I have no idea how you made it here last night. But I need you for the League, and right now, you need me so you don’t die in some back alley.”
Dabi’s expression shuttered.
He’d dragged himself to Hawks’ place in a blood-loss-induced haze. It was a poor decision made in haste, but even looking back, he’d had nowhere else to go at the time. The other safehouses could have been compromised like their main base. Even if they weren’t, none of them were close. He could have dragged himself into some abandoned building or broken into an empty apartment to squat, but then he’d have no access to medical supplies. He probably wouldn’t even have been conscious long enough to patch himself up anyway.
He was stuck with the bird.
Hawks knew it too.
Dabi looked towards the windows instead.
“I won’t need you for long,” Dabi answered finally, forcing every bit of weakness out of his ruined voice, “I’ll be out of your feathers as soon as I’m not gonna tear myself open getting down the stairs.”
The grin came back to Hawks’ face. “I figured. Just heal fast and stop trying to reopen your stitches, or I’ll have to use my feathers to pin you to the couch.”
“Kinky,” Dabi replied in a deadpan tone.
“Stop that,” Hawks pointed at him. “Stay until you’re healed enough to not drop dead. Then you can go back to the League or whatever’s left of it, I get a meeting with Shigaraki, and we both pretend this was a fever dream that never happened.”
“No promises on Shig,” Dabi replied, eyes sharpening and darting back to the phone Hawks placed faceup on the table. “But maybe I’ll think about it a little harder if you tell me what happened after the raid last night.”
The hero thought for a moment.
“Everyone was scattered after the raid,” Hawks started carefully. “No confirmed captures, no bodies. Lots of talk in the networks and police channels, but nothing detailed. It kinda sounds like the whole thing was a mess, just a half-baked plan thrown together by one or two small-name agencies. They didn’t go through the HPSC or coordinate with the police either, and the Commission’s not happy about that. Some sightings have been confirmed, but only one member was visible during each, and they were pretty spread out. Still, no captures.”
Dabi’s heart did something funny in his chest.
He elected to ignore it.
No confirmed captures. Some sightings, but not together.
No bodies.
Still safe, at least for the moment.
Toga and Twice were probably together. The kid could survive almost anything, and she’d keep Twice together. Compress could vanish into thin air without any issue. Spinner had a harder time laying low, but he had a talent for finding hiding spots.
Shigaraki . . .
Shigaraki had survived worse. It was a matter of what the doctor and his damn master would do if they knew Shigaraki was on his own again, even momentarily.
Dabi’s fingers dug into the blanket.
Hawks pretended not to notice.
Dabi decided to deflect instead. “I got knocked on my ass by some heroes playing vigilante with a half-assed plan? Damn, I’m never gonna hear the end of it if Shig finds out.” He paused, gaze drifting up to the ceiling. “Then again, the building did all the work for them.”
“Not many people can crawl out of a pile of rebar and concrete alive, let alone make it as far as you did,” Hawks replied, then hesitated a moment, considering something. “You got a way to contact them?”
Dabi snorted. “Pretty sure my burner’s under a pile of rubble right now. Might be the same for the rest of them, too.”
Hawks nodded and stood. “I’ll keep an eye on my channels, monitor the situation,” The hero stretched his arms above his head with a soft groan. The movement was fluid, but Dabi could see the hitch in his wing, the fatigue in his posture.
The hero noticed Dabi looking..
Hawks smiled. “Bathroom’s down the hall, but call me for help getting there. Don’t want you to fall and crack your head open.”
Dabi would rather set himself and the apartment on fire before calling for help, but he wasn’t about to tell the hero that. He was pretty sure Hawks already knew anyway.
“House rules,” The hero continued, because he apparently wanted to test Dabi’s patience. “One, no fire unless someone’s about to kill us. Two, don’t touch my phone.”
Dabi raised an eyebrow. “Afraid I’ll find all of your embarrassing photos and post them to your social media?”
Tempting. He made a note to try it as soon as Hawks let his guard down.
“No, I’m afraid you’ll max out my credit cards on a shopping spree.”
Dabi nodded, expression blank while he considered the idea. He knew from personal experience that the Number Two Hero’s credit limit could be astronomical.
It’d be an entertaining challenge. Another thing to keep in mind for later.
Hawks continued with his rules.
“Three, if the Commission calls, you stay quiet.”
“Nah,” Dabi said, rolling his eyes, “I’m gonna start screaming that their trophy hero’s holding me hostage in his kingdom of beige and get myself arrested.”
Hawks looked at him tiredly. “What did my décor ever do to you?”
“It made me depressed with its overpriced, emotional vacancy.” He scoffed. “There’s no way in hell you picked this crap yourself. I’ve seen your street clothes. Your fancy furniture doesn’t burn my retinas enough to be shit you picked yourself.”
Hawks’ left wing twitched, a barely noticeable movement.
It was enough. Dabi would bet money he didn’t have that it was the Commission who designed it, making it as bland and showy as possible to keep the public happy while hiding any sense of self Hawks might develop living on his own.
“My décor is fine,” Hawks said with false cheer, standing with his brightly colored mug still full in his hand. “Anyway, you hungry?”
Subtle.
The sudden subject change further confirmed Dabi’s theory, but his stomach rudely interrupted any further conversation on the matter by growling.
Loudly.
Traitor.
Dabi scowled at Hawks, daring him to comment.
Hawks dug one sharp canine tooth into his lower lip to suppress a smile.
“I didn’t hear anything.”
Dabi briefly considered if it would be worth ripping his stitches to try to throw one of the shitty pillows at Hawks, but the hero fled to the kitchen area, putting distance between them before he could even try.
The open-concept penthouse gave Dabi a clear view of Hawks rummaging around in the kitchen. From what he could see, the appliances all looked spotless, their stainless steel surfaces pristine. The granite countertops were clear of any clutter, save for a pile of what was probably fanmail.
Hawks rummaged around each cabinet in turn. He tried not to open them too far, like he was keeping Dabi from looking inside.
He still caught a glimpse here or there. A bag of rice. Some noodle packets. What seemed to be a container of protein powder.
Not much else.
Then he moved to the fridge. He shut it quickly, but all Dabi saw was a few white and black bottles and an excessive amount of the familiar black cans of coffee Hawks always seemed to have on hand.
The longer Hawks fumbled around his own kitchen, the worse the feeling of quiet dread grew.
Eventually, Hawks gave up and turned around. “How’s takeout sound?”
Dabi closed his eyes and breathed out smoke, reminding himself that movement would aggravate injuries and force him to stay down for longer.
“Your kitchen is wasted on you.”
When he opened his eyes, Hawks at least had the decency to look somewhat embarrassed.
“I can cook,” He tried to defend, his feathers fluffing slightly behind him. “I just don’t usually have the time. Look, takeout tonight so you can take some painkillers and not starve, and I’ll get groceries tomorrow. Deal?”
Dabi’s head continued to pound at his temples. Somehow, the hero being a spy didn’t disappoint him nearly as much as Hawks’ pathetically empty kitchen.
“Nothing greasy,” Dabi said at last. “And no fish. Just . . . get whatever.”
Hawks took it as a win and wasted no time pulling up a food delivery app.
Dabi let his heavy eyes fall shut again, listening to the hero as he moved about the wide, open spaces of his empty apartment.
Unfortunately for both parties involved, he’d have plenty of time later to pass judgement on the hero’s way of living.
It could wait for now.