Archive of Our Own

The hallways through the facility were bright, guards posted at every corner and then some.  The whisper stillness of each guard drawing breath existed in sheer contrast to the taunting leers or vicious shouting from the less dangerous inmates who were able to be held more conventionally.  Those who were dangerous, but only just so.  Who could be displayed as an example of hero society’s flawless containment - the worst of society, the most dangerous weapons held in lock step and check here in this sheer abyss of inhumanity.

His phantom wings twitched as he walked, dressed down in civilian clothes he hadn’t used for their true purpose in too long.

But that’s what he was, now.  A civilian.

And he was here to see the man who’d taken everything from him.

Today was the day.

He took in a shaky breath, letting the crispness of the cold winter morning settle his nerves.  They’d been preparing for this for a long time.  There was nothing to be worried about, he knew.  Everything had been accounted for.

Touya’s hand squeezed his own, at his side, as they waited to be welcomed into the ward office.

Today, Keigo was getting married.

It was a big day.  It would be in ordinary circumstances, even it wasn’t the two of them doing this behind the backs of some of the most powerful people in the country, and doing so while almost scandalously young.  Their wedding wasn’t just a union binding two people who loved each other - though they did love each other, and they’d never dispute that - it was a strategic move.  A hidden play in the backdrop that would turn the board around when it was time for its reveal.

Keigo’s “contract” with the Hero Public Safety Commission, along with their guardianship over him, would end upon his 20th birthday.  Upon which, presumably, he would be forcibly coerced into signing a new contract to continue working as their little homegrown pet hero.  He didn’t have a family that would stand with him - his mother who’d sold him in the first place, and his father in prison - nor did he have a support network.  He wouldn’t be able to counter them, nor refuse - not without them killing him outright.  And after what had happened to Nagant-senpai, he knew it would be all too easy for them to do so.

But if he wasn’t alone, if he was, oh, say married, to another high profile figure, then his spouse would have the grounds to contest the contract.  Would be another witness to a signing under duress.  Would have the grounds to invalidate the contract altogether.

Todoroki Touya had the promise of being an incredible hero, despite not taking the traditional hero route thanks to his father’s restrictions.  As Enji’s eldest son, he would be a public figure the moment he took the stage.  There would be no bribing Touya’s unyielding determination, no covering up the fact that he was married if it was splayed across every tabloid in Japan.  No way for the HPSC to take him out like dirty laundry without it coming out in the wash.

And, well.  Todoroki Touya had been the one to suggest it, too.  For all that it was a strategy, there were feelings there, too.  They’d been together for two years, weekend meetings and getaways, as much time they could spend together without making anyone suspicious.  But they’d gotten better at it as they went.

They’d never have been able to pull this off without the two years of experience guiding them along the way.

It had taken so much preparation, so much sneaking around - more so than usual - to get what they needed for any of it to be valid.  Touya was the eldest of the two of them, so he had to be 18, and Keigo was lucky enough he’d just hit 16 - they’d just barely squeaked past on the requirements, and they’d still needed valid signatures from their parents/guardians.  

It would’ve broken the whole thing - if they hadn’t been as sneaky and clever as they were.

Touya, miraculously, had been the easier one.  He’d snuck in the permission slip with one of his school’s stack of paperwork for the upcoming term.  Endeavor, never willing to give more than a necessary iota of thought to the children he’d deemed failures, had signed the stack during a paperwork binge and Touya had pocketed the single slip before he sent the rest of it off.

Keigo’s task had felt impossible.  To get the Commission President’s signature on a permission slip for his marriage license?  They’d kill him first.  And they couldn’t forge it, not when an authenticator with the right quirk could invalidate the whole thing.  They needed this to be ironclad for it to work.

And then, as they’d been wandering through their usual park, they’d come across a magician pulling off incredible tricks.  It hadn’t been all that odd, but the magician had called for a volunteer, and had - instead of going with one of the many children there - picked out Keigo, to his surprise.  The magician unveiled a marble, which blurred into a fancy slip of parchment and an inkwell for the trick - and the idea struck.

Trick paper.

The next meeting he’d had with Madam President, he’d stuck his marriage license - paper thin and nearly invisible to even his eyes - carefully layered underneath a form approving his “hero student intern” costume design.  It was urgent, of course, which was why he’d brought it to her.  He’d start his internship with Best Jeanist in a month or so - to establish himself before making his debut - and there was no time to waste in accustoming himself to what would likely become his work uniform.

She’d signed it without a second glance, and when he got back to his room, he’d wrapped himself in the cocoon of his wings to shield himself from the cameras, and brought the slip out.  Carefully using the quill of one of his feathers, he traced over the signature, spreading the ink to make it even, and then gently prised the papers apart.

There, on his marriage license, was Madam President’s perfect signature.  And when they got the opportunity to put their plan into action months later, the glow of the authenticator’s confirmation settled like satisfaction in his gut.

He was so high on the thrill of success that he could barely remember the civil ceremony.  Remember the handful of lines he had to say, or the confirmation he gave to the officiant.  He only snapped back to reality when Touya pulled him in and kissed him, long and loving and just a little filthy, smirking at him in the way that told him the other teen had known exactly what was wrong.

And had no problem dragging him back down to Earth in the best way possible.

They left the office arm in arm, almost giggling with each other, three copies of their fully valid marriage certificate in hand.  One would go with Touya, to be tucked away safely in the Todoroki home.  One to be snuck into the safety deposit box Keigo kept in old Fukuoka, the key to which had been pressed into his hand by his dad days before he was caught.

One to be filed on the record, enshrining in law that Takami Keigo had married Todoroki Touya on one cold winter morning, the sun barely halfway up the horizon.

Something cold brushed against his neck, distracting him from his thoughts, and he looked up to see Touya - standing behind him now, just barely visible out of the corner of his eye if he twisted - fastening something around his neck.  He reached up to feel it, and almost recoiled reflexively at the chill, but his fingers tightened around the pendant he’d found instead.

The ring.

White gold, studded with diamonds - a fortune to Keigo who’d been born in the slums, paid for by Endeavor’s credit card that all his children used with impunity and a cold sense of vengeance - it gleamed in the warm light of dawn.  His wedding ring.

“Wear it for me, Kei?” Touya murmured, breath whispering warm against his ear, his hand coming up to tangle with Keigo’s around the ring strung on a chain around his neck.  Blue gleamed in the sunlight, the singular blue diamond in the center almost the exact shade of Touya’s fire-bright eyes.  Just as Touya’s own gold ring bore a single red diamond nearly identical to the color of Keigo’s feathers.  “Just for a little while.”

He smiled, wistful, with the seed of optimism burning away in the back of his mind.  He never wanted to take it off.

He’d have to, anyways.  Tuck it away in the safety deposit box in Fukuoka, where it would stay safe and unnoticed by the Commission.  Where the truth of this one beautiful winter morning would live until it could blossom into the reality they wanted to form one day.

Somewhere they could both be free.

“Just for a little while,” he whispered back, feeling Touya’s smile against his skin, the warm press of the other teen’s ring a pinpoint of heat settled around his hip.  The hand tangled in his own tightened.

They wandered around, making the most of their day together as they always tried to whenever they could.  They waved at the magician doing shows in the park, tried out a new, fancy restaurant on Endeavor’s card, and just - had fun.  Together.

Just another date, except it meant so much more.

“I’ll see you next week, pretty bird,” Touya - his husband, and holy shit, Keigo could get used to that - said softly, when the time came for them to separate, pressing a gentle kiss to his forehead and then curling a hand around his chin to tilt his head up.

“Promises, promises,” Keigo grinned, and let Touya kiss him - long and deep and lovely - one last time before the elder teen let him go.

The walls reminded him of the hospital room he’d been held in, after the PLF Raid.  He’d never had the illusion that he would’ve been able to leave it.  Not without being cleared.

It had taken him a long time to be cleared.

Dabi laughing as blue flame burned and cauterized through his back, spilling his true identity just loud enough for Hawks and his hidden recorder to hear.  A back search on everything they had on Todoroki Touya that had an old marriage certificate which now sat on Keigo’s lap.  The burn of helplessness, of despair that seared a hole in his heart just as easily as Dabi had seared his mark into Keigo’s skin.

Dabi.  Todoroki Touya.

Keigo’s husband.

Keigo hadn’t known. 

There wasn’t a recorder on him now, though.  The entire visit would be watched and recorded as it was.  Having one on Keigo would be beyond useless, especially since he wasn’t there to get information for the Commission.  Information on the League.

No.  Takami Keigo was a civilian now.  Had been for a week, since the Commission had decided they’d gotten everything they could have out of Hawks, and revoked his hero license, announcing his very public retirement soon after, to prevent him from doing anything about it.  He was a civilian now, fully and completely, regardless of the massive compensation package he’d been given as a consequence of his “sacrifice.” Albeit, he was a civilian with a very powerful, very deadly secret.

A civilian with an A-ranked villain for a husband.

“Takami-san,” the agent assigned to his situation called from the doorway, expression stern but apologetic, “there are a pair of agents from the Hero Commission here to see you, along with Endeavor.  They want to ask you some questions about your relationship with your husband.” 

On his top ten list of things he never wanted to do again, was talking to his father-in-law - who hadn’t known he was Keigo’s father-in-law - about how he’d married his eldest son, thought he’d died, mourned, and then gotten into a very sexually active relationship with a villain that just happened to be Keigo’s thought-to-be-dead husband.

Endeavor hadn’t taken it well, to say the least.  But then again, there had been a reason Keigo had never told him before.

Keigo pulled away from the memory of the explosive reaction and refocused on the growing silence around him.  The way the sounds of the prisoners faded away as they moved to the higher security levels.  The way the eyes in the walls followed him every step he took.  Every move closer.  Until - 

“Sir,” one of the guards said, as they approached a zone where silence ruled.  Everything was quiet, even to Keigo’s quirk enhanced senses, and he took a breath to steady himself at the disconcerting lack.  “We’re here.”

It had been his first lazy day off in a long time when Dabi had surprised him by breaking into his apartment.

He’d been snoozing, curled warm and toasty in a blanket burrito with his feathers warming under a heat lamp, when he’d been plucked abruptly from his cocoon.  Wrestling with Dabi - flailing, more like it, for the first minute and a half - had been… an experience.

“Surprised, pretty bird?” the villain purred into his ear, before Keigo was able to get the upper hand and shove the asshole off of him.  He pushed himself off of his bed, sqwaking in surprise when a burst of heat - nothing that would hurt, he knew from unfortunate experience - crawled across his chest, his shirt crumbling away under Dabi’s smirking gaze.

“Fucking asshole,” he grumbled, but didn’t stop the other when the villain tugged him close.  Dabi radiated heat, and in the midst of winter, standing in his embrace was addictive.

He’d forgotten what he’d been wearing underneath his shirt.

“You steppin’ out on me, pretty bird?” Dabi’s voice was teasing, but there was something almost dangerous in his tone.  Dabi’s arms wrapped tight around his middle, pressing to his bare, wingless back, and pressed steaming kisses against the tanned column of his neck.  A finger reached up to tug on the ring Keigo wore around his neck, and he felt something cold brew in his gut, “Didn’t know you were married.  Someone I need to worry about, little bird?”

“My husband’s dead,” Keigo said, and there was something thick and bitter in his voice, his eyes going distant as he stared out across Fukuoka’s skyline.  Something achingly grieving but so very tired.  Something that had broken long ago, when he’d realized Touya had promised him forever, and then left.   Left Keigo alone.  Hadn’t even told him why.  “There’s no one you need to worry about.”

Dabi stared at him in the reflection, eyes fire-bright and contemplative.  Watched the way Keigo toyed with the ring without realizing what he was doing.  Watched the play of emotions as they danced through golden eyes.

A light of something like sympathy shone in brilliant blues before it was gone, the gleam of possession returning.  The aching hole in Keigo’s heart grew.

“‘S good to know,” Dabi hummed, a heated hand trailing up his chest.  He felt his heart go cold as that steadily warming hand gripped tightly around his ring - the ring Touya had given him - just as it started to steam.

“Don’t touch my ring,” he said, voice sharp even edged with an old echo of grief, feathers he’d shed earlier ruffling distantly against his will, and Dabi chuckled, smirking against his throat.  He let go of the ring, sinking his grip down to Keigo’s hips.

“Keep the ring, pretty bird,” the villain murmured, “wear it whenever you please.”

His eyes fluttered shut as Dabi pulled him away from the window, turning them both to back him into the bed.  Dabi’s lips brushed his ear, “I don’t need a ring to know you’re mine, after all.”

“You’re still wearing it,” his husband said, the moment Keigo entered the room.  Lethal blue eyes gleamed, fire-bright and viciously satisfied as he stared at the ring gleaming as it hung from the chain around Keigo’s neck.

Keigo didn’t acknowledge the other man until he was seated, crossing his legs and sinking into the chair as best he could without agitating his back.

Even a month later, he could still feel the heat of Dabi’s flames at his back, devouring feather and bone, stealing his wings from where they’d laid all his life.  Could feel the mockery of a comforting caress the other man had given him as he’d laid there, burning fingers branding him as a hand cradled his throat and called him precious, whispering the damning truth into his ear as his life shattered.

“I told you, didn’t I, pretty bird?  I don’t need a ring to know you’re mine.  But I gave you one, anyway.”  

“Should’ve chucked it straight into an active volcano, I suppose,” Keigo responded coolly, tone almost frigid.  But Dabi didn’t falter.

Instead, he laughed.

“I’d be hurt, pretty bird,” Dabi’s eyes gleamed as he grinned, “if I didn’t know you’re too damn attached to it.  You’re too sentimental for a child soldier, Kei.”

Keigo’s throat tightened, but his eyes narrowed into a glare.

“Do you remember the day I put it on you?” Dabi asked, voice softening from his manic glee, but something almost cruel in his eyes, and Keigo didn’t speak.  “I do.  Pretty thing, you were, all red and gold in the morning sun.  Wearing a smile just for me, and my ring around your neck.  The ring I put there.  All pretty and all mine.” 

He took a second to pause, blue eyes never leaving Keigo’s gold ones, but Keigo didn't respond.  Keigo almost didn’t breathe, but it would’ve been too much of a tell, so he did.  Slow and methodical, as if Dabi wasn’t affecting him at all.

His eyes gave away the lie, and Dabi knew it, too.

“Would’ve given you my name too, if you’d wanted it.  But you wanted to keep the name your daddy gave you - the only thing you had left of him - so who was I to stop you?  Especially since you gave me the brightest smile when I agreed.”  Dabi shrugged, but there was something sparking darkly in his eyes, “Shame we didn’t, now.  Would’ve given the old man a heart attack when he found out.”

Keigo’s fists clenched, tucked into his lap, out of view.

Dabi chuckled, eyes gleaming, “Tell me, birdie.  How’d he react to finding out he’d had a son-in-law for so long, who’d never told him the truth?”

Not well, that’s for sure.  Not that he was going to admit to it.

“I didn’t come here to talk about Endeavor,” Keigo said softly, pointedly.  The curve of dismissive venom curled into his tone.

Dabi arched a brow in mocking surprise, but his eyes darkend at being denied, and Keigo felt a flare of satisfaction.

“Then why’d you come, pretty bird,” he drawled, “since it sure as hell wasn’t to see me.”

It almost made Keigo falter because that - that was…

Bitter.

The first sign that maybe Dabi wasn’t happy about the way things had turned out.  The first emotion other than a cruel joy at watching Keigo squirm, reliving their precious memories and shading them with a red-tinted cloud cover.

Huh.  Maybe Keigo would get his answers after all.  Even if they hurt.

They were going to hurt.  That was never the question.

“Hate to disappoint you, then,” he said, drawing on every ounce of his ability to be an absolute little shit and pouring it into his tone, “I did come to see you.”

An eyebrow arched in blatant mocking disbelief, “Oh?”

Keigo leaned back, crossing his legs and shifting his arms, one elbow on the chair’s metal arm so his hand cradled his chin.  His eyes never left Dabi.  “I’m here for answers.”

Dabi’s lips curled into a sneer, “Still letting the Commission lead you around by the nose?” his husband leered at him, “And here I thought you’d learned something when I burned your wings off.”

Keigo only arched a pointed brow, shelving the instinctive flinch for later, “I’m not here for the Commision, Dabs.  I don’t want answers about the League.”  And really, he didn’t.  Other heroes could handle that particular beast, Keigo was done.  He’d do what he could on his side, but interrogating anyone about the League was not going to happen.  Let alone Dabi.  “I want answers about you.”  He paused, drawing a breath for courage as discreetly as he could, “I want answers about us.”

Dabi smiled, his signature Glasgow Grin just as terrifying and as mocking as it always was, “Well then,” he said, voice so unbearably pleased that it made Keigo want to punch him, “ask away, pretty bird.”

“You didn’t tell me you were alive.”

There was a silence that fell in the wake of that, and Dabi cocked his head, eyes bright.

“Didn’t hear a question in that,” he drawled, and Keigo’s free hand wrapped tight around the metal arm of his chair just out of sight as the fucking smug tone burned into his mind.

“Just tell me why,” his voice cracked on the last word, fingers clenched so tightly around the metal that he had a fleeting worry about falling into a stress grip, “Why didn’t you tell me you were alive?” 

Dabi was quiet.

“I looked into it, you know,” he continued, eyes sharp, “when I started looking into you.  Found out when you surfaced.  The first time people noticed your presence.  Your first appearances on security cameras.  When you became a regular feature at arsons that killed child abusers for the first few years, until it became flat out arson.  When you were labeled a threat, a ranked villain outright instead of a small time arsonist.”

“Not creepy at all,” the villain murmured, the grin on his face a direct contrast to his words, and Keigo scoffed.

“Says the stalker,” he spat.  “Who followed my patrol routes for nearly a year, before you left Fukuoka.  Who lingered around the area we used to meet up in until I moved out to my own agency.  You followed me but you didn’t tell me you were there.  You left but you didn’t let me go.”

Dabi shrugged lazily, but his eyes were bright, “Was there a reason I should have?”

He ignored it, even as his anger blazed, “And then, there was the entire past year.”  He inhaled, long and slow and deep.  And said, “Did you enjoy it?  Watching me mourn you, when you were right there the whole time?”

“Not gonna lie, pretty bird,” Dabi said, his Glasgow Grin deliberately mocking, “that was pretty damn hilarious.”

His knuckles were white around the metal arm of his chair.

“We may have only been married for all of a month before you died , but we were together for two years,” Keigo’s gaze was sharp and vicious and hurt, “Did those years mean nothing to you?”

Keigo wasn’t sure if he would believe Dabi if he said yes.  Not when Dabi had been the one to start flirting with Keigo when he’d connected with the League.  Not when Dabi had made the first move, the first kiss - the first time he’d dragged Keigo to bed.

Not with the way Dabi looked at him, at the ring around his neck, with that fire-bright gleam in his eyes that said mine. 

“Aww, birdie, I’m hurt,” Dabi laughed, “asking you to be mine should’ve answered that.”  And for Keigo, it - 

Clicks. 

Oh.

Oh. 

“This was never about us, was it?” he asked, but he didn’t need the answer.  He had one, and it hurt, but he wouldn’t let it go.  “Only about you. Only about being yours.  For me and you, it’s always been about you.  About what you wanted.”

That’s why he’d left.  That’s why he’d never come back, until Keigo had come back into his life without realizing it.  That’s why he’d let Keigo mourn and taken advantage in the meanwhile.  Because in the end, Keigo had never been what was important in their relationship.  He’d just been convenient.  He’d been his. 

Even if Touya had loved him once, that love alone hadn’t been enough.

To Touya, he’d been his friend and partner when the elder had needed an escape from the hell his life had been.

To Dabi, he was just his - something to possess, to indulge in and string along until he was no longer needed.  But then again, Dabi had never needed him, had he?

And Keigo...maybe it was time Keigo stopped needing their memory.

“Well,” he said, “I guess it’ll be all about you for a long while, Dabs.”  He smiled, bittersweet and lovely, as Dabi stilled, reading something from the expression on his face.

“Pretty bird -,” Dabi began, a tone of dangerous warning creeping into his voice, but Keigo cut him off as he stood up, untangling himself from the metal chair.

“You know,” he said, “your dad’s finally agreed to divorcing your mom.”  He’d heard about Enji’s decision from Fuyumi, who Rumi had snuck into his room every now and then once they’d heard about the marriage certificate.  They’d been friends peripherally as it was, since Rumi was his best friend and Fuyumi’s girlfriend, but they’d bonded a lot more after the news had broken.

Dabi had stilled dangerously, eyes fire-bright, “And why exactly should I care what that bastard’s doing?”

Keigo shrugged, as if it hadn’t mattered.  “Well,” he said, languid and dismissive, as if it didn’t matter, “I just thought it was something we could consider as an example.”

There was a moment of complete silence, and Keigo turned.  He moved towards the door, and pressed the button to get him released from the room.

As he turned the handle, pulling the door open, Dabi exploded. 

“Keigo,” his husband snarled, the wrenching sound of Dabi yanking against the cuffs binding him to the table, his chair toppling over as he shot to his feet in a rage, “don’t fucking walk away from me - ” 

The door clicked shut behind him, sealing off the wall of Dabi’s explosive fury, and Keigo walked away.

Away from Dabi.  Away from his past.  Away from someone who’d done nothing but hurt him.

Away from someone who was supposed to love and protect him, and never did.

Away.

He hadn’t worn his wedding ring to the PLF Raid, having left it behind in its secure safety deposit box before cameras had ever touched his wings.  The last thing he’d wanted was anyone figuring out about Touya and using that knowledge to hurt him.

After the Raid, he sat in his hospital bed, a wreck of the person he’d once been, alive and safe only thanks to his intern’s spontaneous appearance.  Dabi had been too close to him, had taken too long to taunt him to avoid Dark Shadow slamming into him, knocking him out.  And when he thought about his wedding ring, tucked away safely in his father’s safety deposit box in Fukuoka, and why he’d left it there, he laughed.

He laughed and he laughed and he laughed, until he cried.

Turned out that no one had to find out about Touya to hurt him.

Touya had done that well enough on his own.

His apartment was dark when he returned, only the hint of illumination coming from the wall of windows overlooking the Fukuoka skyline.  His breath was just shy of shaky as he stepped into the familiar haunted space.

He could see himself standing in front of that expansive window, Dabi pressed at his back, one hand tangled around his ring, lips at his throat.

Touya standing behind him, lips brushing against his ear as a hand tangled around his ring, the other framing his hips.  

He inhaled sharply.  Shaky.  One breath, then another.

Until he couldn’t see Dabi wherever he looked.  Until he couldn’t feel Touya’s smile pressed against his skin.

Until all that was left was Keigo and the destruction one decision - one of the very few decisions he’d made of his own free will - had left him with.

A hand crept up, wrapping tightly around the cold metal of his ring, and he thought of the way Dabi’s eyes had gleamed when he’d seen it out and on display around Keigo’s neck.  Of how feral the villain had sounded when Keigo had just suggested - 

He hadn’t meant to bring up the divorce.  Hadn’t meant to drop it as he left.

That didn’t meant he hadn’t been thinking about it.

He’d spent seven years chained to the ghost of Touya’s memory.  Chained willingly, to the spectre of the only man who’d loved him.  Lingered in the shackles of their marriage, even as Dabi had begun to assert his own claim - and god, what a laugh that was, realizing who he’d been this whole time.  Not someone new who’d seen him and wanted him, grew to care for him as his own person, but his husband, who’d abandoned him but took advantage of the opportunity to have him again when the chance came around.

In the wake of that - in the wake of the utter violation this past year had felt like, when the realization dawned on him - he couldn’t bring himself to stay that way.

And when Fuyumi had mentioned the divorce...the thought had sparked.

He’d just needed one thing to push him over the edge.  One final confirmation from the one person who could confirm his decision would be for the best.

His husband had, unknowingly, done just that.

He’d lost his wings, his career, and his peace of mind in one go.  But losing his ignorance about their relationship?

His hand tightened around cold metal, remembering the feel of fingers tangling around his, gripping the metal warm and tight as it gleamed in the morning sun.

“Wear it for me, Kei?  Just for a little while.” 

The sob wrenched from his throat, and he dropped.  He let his knees falter, let the ground come up to catch him as he wrapped his arms tightly around his legs and felt the warmth of phantom feathers shrouding him in a cocoon where he could weep without fear.

But they were only phantom feathers, the real ones burned away at his husband’s hand.  And there was no one to watch him break apart.

No one left to care.

No. NO, that wasn’t true.  He pressed his face tighter into his knees, trying to breathe through the sobs.

No, it wasn’t true.  There were people who cared.  They just - weren’t the ones he wanted to care.  Not now.  Not in this.

He - he wanted…

He wanted Touya.  He wanted Touya, who figured out ways to ambush him, wrapping arms around his waist and twirling him around when he wanted to surprise him.  Touya, who’d taken him to a mutation quirk friendly restaurant for lunch one day when he’d picked up on the HPSC limiting his raw meat intake.  Touya who’d loved him so much, who’d pressed kisses to his neck and behind his ears to make him laugh, who’d preened his wings on rough days after the worst training sessions, who’d just - 

Been there.  Loved him.  Promised him forever.

Touya who’d left him.  Dabi who’d found him again.

And - and for a while, he’d wanted Dabi, too.  He’d wanted those fire-bright eyes alight with warmth that coiled around his core.  He’d wanted possessive, impossibly passionate kisses hidden in the shadows of old alleyways and warehouses at midnight.  He’d wanted casual caresses and pointedly careless barbs about taking care of himself.  He’d wanted this drawn out wreck of a man, held together with staples and spite, who’d wanted him. 

But in the end... neither of them had wanted him enough.

Keigo would never be enough.

Maybe he should just go, he thought bleakly.  Leave.  Japan didn’t want him anymore, and there was nothing holding him here but empty, aching, searing memories.  A trauma soul deep that chained him.  But -

Miruko.  Best Jeanist. (His best friend.  His mentor.)  The Aery. (The little work family he’d carved out for himself.)  Tsukuyomi. (His little bird bro intern, his little savior.)

All of Fukuoka who smiled the widest to see him out and about, and laughed the hardest when he ran into billboards or glass doors.  Who gave him discounts on his fried chicken he tried to refuse, and plied him with food when they thought he hadn’t eaten enough.  Who harassed him into helping kids find missing cats and helping old women cross the streets (they never had to harass him, he had always been happy to do it, and they knew that).  Children who ran up to him in the streets because he was their shining light, their inspiration, like the one Endeavor had once been to him. 

No.  He couldn’t go.  There was still too much here for him.  Too much left that he wasn’t going to let Dabi take from him.  Too much that still meant something for him.  Civilian or hero.

He wasn’t like Dabi.  Like Touya.  He didn’t leave what he loved behind without ever telling them why.

But tonight...tonight.

Tonight he could cry.  Tonight he could break.  Tonight he could mourn what might’ve been.

And come tomorrow, he would pick himself up again.

end.