Work Text:
I'm here to save you
Very smart of you to call me
We will work together and we'll leave no footprints
We'll have wings eventually
I want to embrace you
I will help you to control
I will hurt like hell
I will swallow your sweet soul
M.I. - "Weightless"
It's all so… familiar … and in just the worst way… like that feeling that sends chills up your spine, makes goosebumps rise on your skin, the hair on the back of your neck. It's that overwhelming feeling of dread that wells up deep in the pit of your stomach like an impending doom.
Something isn't right.
He's hit with the feeling as soon as those white double doors open, and his stomach drops. Dabi had tried to prepare for it, even knowing ahead of time and repeating like a mantra that everything is fine didn't make the butterflies in his stomach calm not did it make the shaking in his hands stop.
Ujiko Daruma sits in that chair in that dimly lit lab just like he does in Dabi's nightmares.
"The High End didn't hold up, Ujiko." He tries to keep his voice flat, monotone as usual. It's harder to do with him than it is with the others he works with, for some reason, likely because of their history.
"No big loss. I can fix it." The doctor says, and the light bounces off his glasses, hiding his eyes… Dabi still can feel Ujiko's gaze roaming over his figure where he stands.
"You smell like burnt flesh, Dabi. Do you also need fixing?" Ujiko asked casually.
The younger man shifts a little where he stands, swallows down the sudden urge to run like he had long, long ago, before he was Dabi, when he was still Touya.
He shrugs, remaining collected on the outside. "It's the usual. A few missing staples, a few burns from overuse."
"Ah, I see! should be more careful with that body, you know… I spent a lot of time fixing it, making it so perfect, it saddens me to see it to be destroyed…" Ujiko says, his tone affectionate, but there's something wrong in it. Something that makes Dabi's blood run cold.
A shiver runs up his spine.
Ujiko was a man far ahead of his time, with a genius unmatched, able to create, alter, and fix anything. His experimental projects were revolutionary, unlike anything society has seen. Though considered inhumane, and dangerous.
Long ago, Touya Todoroki was one of his experimental projects.
The doctor's tone suddenly changed when he lets out a laugh from his belly, voice becoming cheerful, "Well, let me have a look, My boy! I'll have you patched up in no time, wouldn't want to ruin that perfect aesthetic you have there!"
Like his body is acting on its own, Dabi walks over to the unoccupied lab chair. He sits obediently and watches Daruma gather his tools, humming a familiar tune.
Dabi got used to this just as Touya learned to. He tells himself it doesn't frighten him anymore. It shouldn't have frightened him. Ujiko knows what he was doing, he is trustworthy. He's the only one who can fix Dabi's body when it starts falls apart, he's the only one that can fix him.
Touya was twelve, almost thirteen when everything changed. When he was lost in a fire, alone, afraid, abandoned, burning... burning, burning, burning…
Fire was all around him, there wasn't any escape, no freedom. Touya was a boy broken before he even fell into that fire, a boy burned many times before, and he knew fire would one day destroy him…
A hand pulled him from damnation, removed him from hell, and took Touya away to be fixed and reborn new from the flames…
Dabi can feel the cold draft on his skin when he removes his coat and the white t shirt. He can smell the chemicals sterilizing the medical tools, he can hear the metallic sound of steel on steel. His blood rushes.
"On a more positive note, the plan did go wonderfully. Society now sees how vulnerable they are if the heroes are incomplete like they were. The League did wonderfully," Ujiko says, that familiar tone of praise, "you did wonderfully."
He smells the reek of burnt skin. He sees the blistered, destroyed botches of burns on his ship and chest. He feels the torn staples stinging. He can the seams still sizzling.
Only does it calm when Ujiko is there, handing him water and some pills, the texture of latex gloves feels odd to Dabi when he takes the items without a question from the Doctors hands.
Dabi isn't afraid. He isn't. He's done this more times than he can count. It's what keeps him alive. Ujiko is what keeps him alive.
The texture feels almost soothing as the older man's hands explore the patchwork grafts for torn staples and signs of infection. The soft humming is almost relaxing as Ujiko bends in close to Dabi, invading the boundaries he's set up firmly for everyone else.
Because Ujiko is trustworthy. He fixes Dabi when he starts to fall apart.
Touya's body was so badly ruined, it wasn't recognizable to him any longer. He didn't know the person looking back at him and he was scared.
He was scared of the pain, the burns under the bandages, the experimental treatments. He was scared of the loneliness darkness that did not feel empty, the confusion from the pain medication, the odd, banging noises within the lab.
it sounded like thunder, it reminded him of his Father… He was scared.
That fear only eased when the man in the white coat was there, offering him more medicine, carefully cleaning his wounds and changing the bandages, shushing him gently and patting his back.
"You're so strong. Don't worry, you'll make it just fine. I'll fix you, and you will be perfect."
Touya was not strong. He was weak. Touya was not perfect. He was almost there, but not quite… that must have been why Father gave up on him, left him to burn…
Ujiko-san would fix him.
"Endeavor is a wicked man, it was good to see him damaged." Ujiko says as he replaces the missing staples in Dabi's wrists, injecting the medication into the seams. It hurts, but only for a bit, then came the chilling relief.
Dabi sighs and relaxes a little, some of the tension from the burning pain leaving him as the doctor moves up to his face, the torn seams around his mouth, and repairs the ruined skin to reattach the piercing at the corner of his mouth.
"He is no match for your flames, after all… your firepower was always much stronger." Ujiko says, wiping away the blood from under his eye.
They make eye contact, or rather Dabi thinks they do. He can't tell with the light shining off the man's glasses. Ujiko rubs the healthy skin on his cheek gently with his thumb and Dabi blinks, finding himself leaning into the soothing touch though a part of him wants to flinch away from it.
"You've always had such beautiful eyes, Touya. So blue…" ujiko told him softly, his other hand gently brushing away Dabi's bangs with the tips of his fingers.
Dabi doesn't correct the name.
Touya's screams echoed through the lab, louder and louder, bouncing off the walls. He babbled incoherently, his tears burning streaks down his face.
It hurt. He was all alone and he was burning. He wanted it to stop, but he couldn't turn off his quirk. So unstable and poorly controlled, just like Father had said. A defective child with a defective quirk.
The bandages melted into the burned tissue, further ruining his weak, useless body. A body that failed him and everyone around him again, and again, and again. For months, he only worsened his burns. The attempts to fix his weak constitution still failed, he was afraid Ujiko-san would soon give up on him.
The door opened, rushed footsteps entered Touya's ears, a needle was injected into his arm, then his quirk finally turned off. Cold relief washed over him, cooled down his agony enough for him not to cry as hard.
"I'm sorry." He whispered through his sobs, "i can't control it. I'm so sorry."
Touya used to be afraid of the doctor too, before he realized the painful experiments were only meant to help him, before he realized the only relief from his pain came from Ujiko. Maybe at one point he begged to leave, but he couldn't remember it clearly. It was before he realized Ujiko was only trying to fix him, a broken thing like him.
He didn't want to be abandoned again. He'd surely die. He didn't want the doctor to give up on fixing him, no longer consider him worthy. He wanted to be better.
"It's okay, don't be sorry. It's all okay now, I'm here. You won't feel pain while I'm here. I won't leave you and you know I would never hurt you like that wretched man did, so don't be afraid. I'll make you all fixed soon. I promise."
A hand gently stroked his hair, wiped away his tears, massaged the pain out of his sore muscles in his body. Touya soon drifted into sleep, or maybe he passed out, but when he did, he felt no pain.
Dabi's burns were grafted, patched together with staples. He doesn't flinch, it doesn't hurt much anymore, he's used to the pain by now. The burns are sealed up as Ujiko likes them, so he doesn't fall apart any further.
Dabi still cannot help but feel like a failure. He wants Endeavor dead. He wants the man to suffer and die so badly it drives him insane He tried so hard to kill the hero, and all for nothing. What does he have to show for it now? Other than new scars? He's hideous, as monstrous and broken on the outside as he always was on the inside...
At least Ujiko still looks at him fondly, still fixes him, still praises him with words Touya's Father never spoke, words Dabi never heard.
"It might not have been a complete win. But i think it went well… you did well. Im proud of you. You're very good, you know that?"
Dabi is lost in the morphine induced haze and his drugged mind slips away peacefully as Ujiko works on his wounds, patching up his hip, carefully bandaging it in soft gauze and white tape, gloved fingertips ghost up and down the inside Dabi's clothed thigh, so soft… so gentle… a sigh releases from him. He isn't used to touches that don't hurt. It feels so good.
The hands leave him as soon as the door opens again and Dabi snaps out of his trace. The league enters the lab and Dabi tenses up a little again as Ujiko steps away.
"I hope we aren't interrupting, doc." Twice says, "whatcha guys doing?"
"Simply fixing up Dabi's injuries." Ujiko answers, beginning to clean up the used tools and supplies.
"The High End, is it repairable?" Tomura asks, an annoyed expression on his face. "Should upgrade those things."
Ujiko rolls his eyes, "Certainly, I'll have those other High Ends ready and perfected in no time, Shigaraki. So do be patient." He says like scolding a child.
"Im sure they'll be awesome!" Jin exclaims, then "hope they aren't as fucking weak as that one. That was so lame!"
His tone different with the others, Dabi noticed. Ujiko talks to Dabi very differently. He always has, given the history between them.
Dabi feels a bit queasy when he stands, a little lightheaded, that feeling of dread creeping back up his spine as his mind clears somewhat.
"Well, I would expect you will. I didn't hire you for nothing." Tomura grumbles, "and Dabi, you went against orders. You weren't supposed to engage with the heroes."
Dabi shrugs, "they were already so close to death, couldn't help myself."
Maybe he wasn't able to kill Endeavor that time, but he swears he will the next.
"It was reckless and dangerous though. You could have been killed." Compress adds.
He'll make Enji Todoroki suffer for everything he's done. He will, even if he has to die in the process.
"Yeah, could've at least had back up if you were planning to attack them." Toga says.
"It was a spur of the moment choice." Dabi replies offhandedly, slipping back on the shirt and coat. He noticed Ujiko watching.
The doctor laughs, eyes never leaving him, "Dabi knows what he's doing! Don't have such little faith in him, he's a very smart boy."
"You're so right man, we are fools!" Jin says, then his other side tilts his head, muttering, "stop looking at him all weird like that."
Ujiko ignores the masked villain, and goes back to typing on his computer, shooing them all away.
"I hate that old bastard." Shigaraki hisses as they exit the lab.
Dabi follows behind them down the halls, his mind fully clearing once he heard the doors shut behind them. The dread creeping after him.
"He is… strange…" Compress agrees, "creepy… something about that man just… rubs me the wrong way…"
Dabi watches his steps on the tile floors, listens to the echo of his boots. He jerks when a hand touches his shoulder, looking up at Twice.
"You okay there, Dabi? You don't look okay." Jin pulls the mask up a little to expose his face, his eyes studying Dabi's expression.
"Huh? I'm fine." He recovers quickly, pulling away, "Don't touch me."
"What the hell was he doing to you in there? He's the one who gave you the patchwork?" Spinner asks.
"He was fixing me. He's a doctor, what do you think he'd be doing?"
They all looked at him strange, then glanced back at the door. He suddenly feels that feeling of being watched again.
"You know…" Shigaraki says thoughtfully, scratching his neck as they left the building, "I don't like the way he looks at you, Dabi… there's something not right in how you act around him too… I don't like it."
"What are you rambling about now, creep?" Dabi left the building, and the sense of dread and confusion stayed behind at the doorstep. The memory of the past half hour was foggy, he assumes it was due the damaging effect on his brain from of overusing his quirk.
"Nevermind it…" Tomura replies, then after a few minutes of walking in silence he turns to look over his shoulder at the others, "next time Dabi gets hurt and had to see Ujiko, I want one of you going with him."
"Dabi doesn't need a babysitter." Jin says, "I totally agree, Shig, I'll go with him next time."
"Yes, we'll be sure to have someone with him from now on." Compress agreed.
Dabi's confused, but chooses to ignore it, lighting a cigarette as he follows them. They all seem to be on a different page than he is, but he can't figure out what exactly they're reading.