Work Text:
Never Trust Rumi to Give You a Makeover
Dabi woke up one morning, attempted to comb his hair with his fingers, and immediately knew that something was wrong.
“Carrots.”
“Yes?”
“What the fuck did you do to my hair?”
Rumi blinked. “Wait, how did you know without a mirror?”
“My hair,” Dabi grunted, “is a very delicate thing. Do you know how hard it was to get it so soft? And you know how it feels like right now? It feels like one of Kei’s old Endeavor plushes. Trash. Plus, I slept in your apartment so something is obviously wrong.”
“Hey!”
Rumi huffed and reached over to smack Dabi. But he was one step ahead and grabbed her hand while exuding the same amount of bloodlust as that one time he fought the burning trash can. It was enough to scare off even the most notorious villain in the world.
”Now what did you do?” he hissed.
“You think your anger issues are going to scare me, Toaster Boy?” Rumi shot back, yanking her hand back and pulling Dabi along with it. “Well newsflash, I’ve fought cats scarier than you. Now get the fuck off of the couch and into the bathroom.”
“Really? Do I need to repeat myself? What did you do to my--”
“Do I need to repeat myself?” Rumi gasped. “Rude.”
“Rude my ass, I have my hair on the line here.”
“Yes, and your life will join it if you don’t get your ass off of my couch in five seconds. FIVE.”
“You think you scare me?” It was Dabi’s turn to snort. “Please. I’ve fought fish scarier than you.”
“FOUR. Since when did I say the cause of your death would be me?”
“Huh?”
“THREE. I have Yumi and Kei on speed dial. You do realize that, right?”
“Shit. You wouldn’t.”
“TWO. I won’t hesitate, bitch.”
---
Crisi finally averted, Rumi returned to sending Fuyumi a few more pictures and reassured her that she was alive and not burnt to a crisp.
“WHAT THE FUCK”
And ah, that meant Dabi had finally looked in a mirror. Rumi grinned. The secret camera that she borrowed from Fuyumi was already set up and she was ready.
In a flash, the pyro was in front of her, clutching his hair. It was now a vibrant pink, and Rumi had done a good job with that, if she said so herself (and ignored the messy patches of black). It wasn’t easy to dye someone’s hair while they were asleep, after all.
“Surprise!” She howled with laughter.
“No, what the fuck, you ruined my hair!”
“Just dye it black again or something.”
“You don’t understand,” Dabi groaned, collapsing onto the couch and burying his face in his hands. “You’ve ruined it! That texture...do you know how hard it is to make my hair so soft when I literally set myself on fire on a daily basis? You ruined everything, this was my only joy and the only thing keeping me alive everyday, and now I’ve lost it. I hate you.”
“Oh…” Rumi’s ears drooped and a bit of guilt flashed onto her face. “I didn’t know that--”
“Of course you didn’t,” Dabi growled, tugging at a lock of her white hair. “Feel how coarse and rough this is? Disgraceful!”
“Dabi, I…”
“I can’t believe this,” he sobbed. “I have a date in five hours!”
Rumi’s downcast eyes narrowed. “I’m sorry--”
She leaned forward with outstretched arms, ready to give him a hug…
...and was promptly kicked in the gut, pinned to the ground, and had the rest of the bottle of pink hair dye dumped onto her hair.
“Can’t believe you fell for that.”
“BITCH--”
---
The number five hero Miruko and the high profile villain Dabi had to postpone all activities for a week. When they returned to the public, there were still hints of pink in their hair.
No one had the guts to mention it.
---
“Well. I guess we should call you...Dabee now,” Rumi cackled.
“Da...bee…” he repeated.
“Yes. Dabee. Like dah bee.”
“Why?”
“Oh, you know,” she shrugged. “Bee colors.”
Dabi stared at his nails, messily painted with black and yellow nail polish. “Huh.”
---
Dabi was never seen without nail polish again.
People began recognizing him as “Dabee” and only “Dabee”.
Sibling Fights
“This is a pool.”
“Yes.”
“There is a pool in our backyard.”
“Yes.”
“A pool appeared in our backyard overnight.”
“Yup!” Rumi nodded cheerfully.
Dabi’s face twisted into an incredulous frown. “And where did you even get a pool from?”
“I have my ways.”
He groaned loudly.
”Why?”
“Why what? It’s summer; we gotta enjoy it!”
“And in case you haven’t noticed,” Dabi gestured to his scars. “I can’t exactly go into the water like this.”
“Oh right,” Rumi paused, glancing between Dabi and the pool. “I forgot.”
“How did you--?!”
“I don’t know, okay? I just did!”
“What.”
“Leave me alone, I’m dumb, I get it!”
Rumi meant to roundhouse kick Dabi with only 10% of her strength, just to get her point across.
But she must have miscalculated because it sent him flying forward and into the pool.
Oops.
“HOLY SHIT, DABI ARE YOU OKAY?”
There was a lot of screaming that day.
---
“You know…”
“Shut the fuck up,” Dabi growled.
“...if you didn’t know how to swim, you could have just said so.”
“I know how to swim.”
“Yeah, and you also almost drowned in a 5 ft. deep pool,” Rumi shot back.
“I almost drowned,” Dabi argued with growing annoyance, “because these scars and staples hurt like hell in water, you asshole.”
“That’s not the right attitude to have for your savior, don’tcha think?”
“You were the reason I was in danger in the first place! I never asked for your help...you should have just let me drown.”
“Well, that wouldn’t be good, would it?”
“It would still be better than this. Now get out.”
The door slammed shut and it dawned on Rumi that she had fucked up.
---
“Of course he’s mad at you,” Fuyumi exclaimed.
“I know that,” Rumi moaned. “So how do I fix this?”
Fuyumi had been expecting a lot of things when she picked up the call from her girlfriend after over one hundred missed calls, but this situation was surprisingly a lot worse than anything she thought of. Physical injuries and bodies in need of burning were one thing, but a conflict between those two that included complex emotions? It was on a whole other level and Fuyumi wasn’t sure if she could deal with it today.
She sighed. “Well first of all, he’s okay, right? No injuries or infections, I hope?”
“Yeah. We checked before he kicked me out.”
“I can’t believe you got kicked out of your own home.”
“Hey, shit happens, okay? And I’m trying to fix it!”
“Yes, and I’m proud of you for that,” Fuyumi replied. She seriously needed to start getting paid for this. “Maybe try something with food?”
“Oh, food! Good idea! But what does that guy even like?”
“Hmm. If I recall correctly, Touya likes vanilla cupcakes. With rainbow sprinkles!”
Rumi paused for a second to process the information and then brightened with a laugh. “Cupcakes?” she parroted. “Rainbow cupcakes? That guy?”
“He’s very self conscious about that, you know,” Fuyumi frowned. “Maybe this is why your little fight happened in the first place.”
“Okay, okay, sorry.”
“Want me to help?”
“Nah, I’m fine, this will be easy!”
“Uhh, Rumi, I don’t think--”
“It’ll be okay, I’ll burn the bridge when I get there.”
She hung up.
That was the first of many mistakes she made that evening.
Conflict: Resolved (?)
After doing some serious research and searching, Rumi was ready to break into her own apartment and start making her apology gift.
...or so she thought.
Now, Rumi was standing in her kitchen, frantically spraying the contents of the mini fire extinguisher bottle she kept on her onto the stove. She was covered head to toe in flour and sugar, the counter was splattered with batter, and the muffin tins contained a strange, black mixture that definitely did not resemble cupcakes.
How had she fucked up so much?
Was it because of that time she decided not to measure and dumped everything into the bowls? Because of her decision to turn the hand mixer onto the highest setting before the dry ingredients were properly combined with the wet ingredients?
Or was it when she stuffed the batter into the (unlined and unbuttered) muffin pan, shoved it in the oven, and decided she was too impatient to wait for twenty minutes?
It was probably all of the above, but the most important lesson that Rumi got from that was “don’t bake your cupcakes at 3500 degrees for 2 minutes.”
She should have known that, but it was a well known fact that the thing she lacked the most was none other than common sense.
“Maybe I can still use these?” Rumi poked at the hardened objects with a fork.
“Are you fucking dumb?”
“Am I fucking dumb? Are you--Dabi!”
Dabi was slouching against the doorway, lips pulled back in his signature scowl.
“Dabi!”
His gaze swept across the terrible state of the kitchen. “...what did you do?”
“Oh, uh,” Rumi frantically waved her arms around in a futile attempt to block his view of her previous failures. “Nothing! Totally nothing! Absolutely, definitely not making apology cupcakes. No, why would you think that?!”
Dabi gave her the most unimpressed stare she had ever seen. “I don’t know if you’re kidding, but what was the Commission thinking, assigning you as a double agent?
“They weren’t--fuck, how did you know?”
“You literally told us, word to word, every detail of your mission during the Mario Kart tournament.”
“I didn’t think you guys were listening! No one ever listens to anything when playing Mario Kart.”
“Oh my god, just hand me the fucking spatula.”
---
“Stop whisking so vigorously, you’re getting it everywhere.”
“Roll up your fucking sleeves.”
“Use the measuring cups to measure the ingredients, what do you think you’re doing?”
“No, no, no! This is why it gets stuck to the pan!”
“Oh my fucking god, how is it even possible to preheat the oven to 3500 degrees??”
“No, you overgrown Judy Hopps, twenty minutes is twenty minutes.”
“...you are doing all of the cleaning.”
---
“Uh, let’s just say that I made this all by myself,” Rumi chuckled. She slid a cupcake over (with rainbow sprinkles!) to Dabi and smiled awkwardly. “So. I’m...I’m sorry about earlier, okay?”
The jerk decided to finish his cupcake, taking slow, tiny bites, before replying. But Rumi probably deserved the ten minutes of awkward anticipation.
“I guess I overreacted,” he hummed. “Yumi called me and told me how desperate you were to apologize. That’s sweet and all, but never apologize again, I’m now scared for my fucking life.”
“Fuck you too.”
“Glad to see you’re still an asshole.”
The bantering was back, yet there were now hints of smiles on their faces.
---
There was a new date marked on Fuyumi’s calendar.
”Rumi and Touya’s First Self Resolved Fight”
Fish. That is All
There was some mysterious force out there that seemed set on terrorizing Dabi with stupid f...fi...fi...fish.
Those vile creatures had been appearing everywhere for days and he had opted to lock himself in Rumi’s their apartment.
But somehow it still managed to appear everywhere he went.
To say the least, Dabi was shaken.
Were they filming one of those crappy reality TV shows or something? Was this the doing of whatever gods he had wronged in his previous life?
Either way, it was a cruel and traumatizing experience.
After days of finding the monsters in his bed, in the sink, in the shower, in the toilet, in the fridge, featured on every television show there was, and in his meals, Dabi finally cracked.
“What do you want from me?” he sobbed. “I’m JUST A MAN”
Fuyumi was there to witness her brother breaking down into hysterics. She glared at Rumi.
By some unexplainable miracle, the fish stopped appearing the very next day.
---
“Rumi!” Fuyumi sang, skipping into the apartment. “Look who I got you!”
“Who? What do you mean who--HOLY SHIT GET THAT AWAY FROM ME!”
The cat that Fuyumi had borrowed from Shouto’s teacher meowed innocently. She smiled.
No one messed with the Todorokis and got away with it.
I am soft for Big Brother Dabi™
“Dabi, you and Rumi…”
“Huh?” Dabi turned to face Twice and Toga, who were staring at him earnestly.
“You two are dating, right?” Twice chirped.
“You two broke up, right?” Twice asked.
“I’m also curious,” Kurogiri called from behind the counter top. “I’ve been hearing that you two are dating, and although that is sweet, I am still concerned about both of your mental and physical healths.” He made a show of examining the cup that he was drying. “You two are a good pair, but some of your more...violent tendencies may be a danger to society when combined.”
”What? Why would I want to date her? Stop spreading these stupid rumors, you little fucks.”
“He’s getting defensive,” Toga whispered with about as much subtlety as Rumi. “We must be right!”
“No, you are not!”
“Okay but seriously,” Toga continued. “Even if you guys aren’t dating, you’re super close, right? Why’s that?”
“None of your fucking business.”
“Aww, come on, admit it and I won’t try to stab you for, like, a month!”
His pride versus his safety? Dabi didn’t even need a second to think.
---
“Toaster Boy? Why is everyone telling me congratulations? Spinner even got me flowers, and we both know he hates me more than flowers.”
“Oh, about that.”
“What did you tell them?”
“Nothing.”
“Fucking tell me, Raisin Bagel. Mr. Compress of all people asked me how I managed to win you over and I don’t like what that’s implying. Toaster Boy. Tell me.Dabi.”
Ah. Leave it to the magician to word things in the worst ways possible.
“Like I said, don’t worry about that.”
”For fuck's sake, we’re not dating. Rumi’s more like...a kid sister to me. An annoying little sister, but if any of you hurt her I will burn everything and everyone of you to the ground, got it? And don’t you dare tell her. If you do, you will face the wrath of her cupcake bricks, I promise.”