Chapter Text
Days vibrated with a mundane sense of grey, the sun rose and set, the moon gave her wistful hellos to the bustling nightlife that set foot outside once she decorated the star lit sky. Cars’ headlights created splatters of figures in the darkened room, fleeting and occasionally leaving a splash of yellow on the carmine wings spread off the bed if a car happened to take a left at the intersection instead of a right. It was quiet but not in that uncomfortable way that left someone begging for an ice breaker or some kind of action.
It was quiet in the intimate sense.
Earlier the room had been a choir of skin slapping, senseless moans and utterances of I love you s and God, harder s. The scent of sweat and spend overtaking the muted vanilla that permeated from a vaporizer hidden somewhere on a dresser, next to cracked picture frames and a stamped out cigarette that really could’ve just been tossed out the window. Red feathers left a rose petal trail to the sweaty covers that lay rumpled from a half asleep romp. Both of the figures in the sheets tangled against each other and soaking in the warmth of each other’s bodies. The sharp scent of iron and cool whispering of sweet nothings gave a shield, albeit temporary, to the waves that threatened to crash over the serene pool of adoration and care.
Scarred fingers traced over ruffled feathers, the chewed, stressed nails leaving a kittens’ kiss touch to the soft, downy feathers at the base of the great wings that carried the invisible weight of Atlas. Those soft, downy feathers were home in a world where everything was too much gravel kicked up by squealing wheels and splatters of blood on once rain ichor scented concrete. The soft, downy feathers pillowed the landing of a hand heavy from exhaustion of pain and memories that the owner would never wish on his worst enemy.
Keigo’s soft, downy feathers were the cushion around Dabi’s concrete, rebar heart that was held together by the whisper of a promise of freedom from the demons under the bed. Tan, sun kissed skin protecting the pale, scarred canvas from the stray paint of a knocked over pallet where the only colors were ones that threatened to ruin the piece that was Dabi’s amalgamation of lies and tears and everything in between that kept him human.
Keigo, in all senses of the word, was Dabi’s protector, the dragon at Dabi’s castlekeep. The one whose lies and tears marched to that of the same beat. The truth carving holes in maps painted by topographers who looked at their world through a warped looking glass. The hero of a story that never ended and the villain of a story that never began. They were polar opposites, yet fit so well. They were puzzle pieces that weren’t cut for each other and were from different sets entirely, yet they made a picture no one dared the heart to separate.
Keigo’s lazy circles under the gold, wore staples holding the blistering skin to Dabi’s neck became intricate crop circles that only went on to trail down his entire torso, fingers resting on the parts where Dabi’s nerves hadn’t been cooked past well done. If you asked Dabi, he would say he never felt any of Keigo’s touches, that it was a numb, wooden sensation that he’d only wish to feel in its actuality. The truth was that Dabi felt every word Keigo said, every touch Keigo left on his body, every bite, every kiss, every breath, every scratch, every punch, every… everything.
If you asked Dabi, Keigo was the only one who made him feel .
Keigo picked his ass out of a bathtub when he’d taken one too many pills, Keigo had cleaned his face when oozy, blackened blood leaked from under the scarring in his eyes, Keigo had screamed when Dabi managed to worsen a burn that seemed close to healing, Keigo had cried into Dabi’s chest when he really thought the villain was done for. Keigo had held his face after a nightmare, bought better boxed dye than the cheap shit that made clumps of his hair decorate the brush he stole from the bird-like man.
Keigo’s soft downy feathers had been there for Dabi to cry, to scream into on nights when the voices in his head turned into a choir of screams, a choir of voices too familiar yet so, so painful.
Keigo’s soft downy feathers.
Keigo.
Every syllable left the sweetest taste on Dabi’s tongue when he thought about the hero in the dead of night, laying on a bed with too many cigarette holes and not enough blankets. The laugh that used to sound so hollow but seemed to fill with.. with something he couldn’t put his finger on the more he spent time with him, the smile that used to never quite reach his golden eyes now almost crinkling the every watching raptor’s gaze closed. The rise and fall of his chest when dreams made his face slack and make the hero seem like his age instead of someone who’s been working themselves to death for thirty years when they’re barely twenty five. The times Keigo has woken up and Dabi has been at the end of a sharpened blade made from Keigo’s own biology, only for the feather to crumble and Keigo to follow, his own sobbing muffled by Dabi’s chest and scrawny arms around his head.
Dabi may not have soft, downy feathers to cushion Keigo's heart, Dabi may not be the source of warmth that he’s quirk would let on; but Dabi was what Keigo needed when his feathers were ruffled and he was too tired to preen, when his hair was tangled, or his body threatened to give way from pure, unadulterated exhaustion that settled into hollow bones.
The villain caught the hero’s wandering fingers, holding them and pressing a soft kiss to his knuckles. The arm pillowing the blonde head wrapped around his shoulders, pulling his face into the crook of his neck. The next kiss was buried in Keigo’s rustled hair, Dabi’s arm around his waist and pulling their tangled bodies closer and feeling the breath leave both of them as they both let out the final puffs of the day’ tension.
“Sweet dreams, pretty bird.”
Dabi’s raspy voice whispered only loud enough for Keigo to hear.