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Hawks can’t put a face to the voice droning at him from the other end of the phone, but that’s not stopping him from imagining his fist from colliding with it. He’s supposed to be on his way to the League’s latest hideout right now, but instead, he’s stuck circling in the sky where no one can see him as he’s told for the millionth and first time how he should be doing his job better. The Commission’s been making these calls more and more often lately, impatient with the pace of Hawks’ undercover mission.
“- to be utilizing our resources as efficiently as possible,” the voice says. Hawks hums in agreement and tries to crane his neck to see his watch without moving the phone away from his ear. If what he can make out is right, then fuck. This morning, he told Dabi he’d be there at noon, and it’s already five minutes past. Hawks normally wouldn’t care all that much about making Dabi wait - god knows Dabi made him hang around in abandoned warehouses and whatnot back when he first started his mission of infiltrating the League -, but this isn’t a regular meeting.
“Hawks, are you listening to me?”
“Yeah, yeah, loud and clear,” Hawks says. He closes his eyes and forces himself to take a deep breath. It’s fine, he’ll get there when he can, and hopefully Dabi will still be big enough to understand that he wasn’t late on purpose or anything. “Using our resources efficiently. Got it.”
“If you’ve ‘got it,’” the voice says, the air quotes just as palpable as the frustration, “then why do you consistently return with no useful information?”
Great. Now it’s a proper lecture, not just a check-in. Hawks isn’t sure if he’s spoken to this particular suit before - they all sound the same, after a while - but goddamn is he annoying. “Because they’re not exactly sitting me down and talking me through their weaknesses,” he snaps.
The voice huffs. Hawks turns around and starts circling in the other direction. “Your job is to get that information, regardless of how forthcoming the League members are with it. You were chosen for this mission because of your training for situations like these.”
Yeah, sure, his training, not because he’s basically the Commission’s puppet. Obviously. Hawks rolls his eyes, thankful that this is only a voice call, and tries to focus on his frustration more than the queasy feeling that always starts to build in his gut when these conversations come up.
The thing is, he does know the League’s weaknesses. He knows that Shigaraki’s even less stable than anyone realizes and what sets him off, he knows that Twice could essentially be neutralized in a fight if his mask was taken away, and he knows … well, he knows a lot about Dabi. Hawks also knows that the League is, essentially, an embodiment of almost everything he’s spent his entire life fighting. They’re villains, no way around it. And even though Hawks knows the corruption of the Hero system better than the back of his hand, he knows that the League is going to have to be stopped eventually, before they do more harm than they already have.
He doesn’t want to see them hurt, though, not now that he knows them, and even though it would save him from a lot of lectures, he knows that he can’t bring himself to use what he knows against them. Especially not Dabi.
“I’m trying, okay? You can’t rush stuff like this,” Hawks says. “Listen, uh, the lizard one, Spinner? He’s allergic to cashews, there you go.”
“I don’t appreciate your attitude, Hawks,” the voice says. “You have your orders, and if we don’t get results soon, we’re going to have to change things up.”
Well, at least that’s an empty threat if Hawks has ever heard one. The one good thing is that the Commission really can’t do anything. They won’t risk pulling Hawks out of the mission altogether, because that’ll mean losing their shot completely. After all, it’s not like they could just send another hero in after him with the same story about wanting to defect. Whether they like it or not, they’re just going to have to wait until Hawks figures out what he wants to tell them.
“Alright, alright. I’ll get you something as soon as I can,” Hawks relents.
“Make it sooner.”
With that, there’s a click from the other end of the line. Finally. Hawks immediately opens up his messaging app to let Dabi know that he’s “On the way, sorry!”, then pockets his phone and takes off in the direction of the League’s latest safe house. The earliest he’s going to be able to get there is twenty minutes late, which is much, much less than ideal, but … what can he do? Other than hope that Dabi hasn’t already regressed, of course, because there’s not much of a chance that that won’t lead to a whole lot of upset. And that’s not to mention the guilt on Hawks’ side - he might not have signed up for this, exactly, but even if Dabi has only chosen him as a caretaker out of convenience, the fact remains that Dabi’s chosen him as a caretaker. It’s the kind of thing that would make Hawks all emotional if he ever let himself slow down enough to think about it.
As soon as the overgrown roof of the League’s latest safe house, a small, abandoned motel, appears through the treeline, Hawks heads into a descent. Luckily, no one’s outside to see his stumbling landing, and he quickly adjusts his jacket and puts his flight visor up onto his head before stepping through the empty frame that used to house the glass front door.
It’s … weirdly quiet for a space that the League is inhabiting. Hawks wonders if anyone other than Dabi is even around. That would be a pretty good outcome, actually, now that he thinks about it. He generally likes hanging out with everyone, but he can also never fully let go of the prickling fear that he’s about to be caught out at any moment.
Hawks pulls his phone out of his pocket to see if Dabi ever answered his message. There’s, unsurprisingly, no reply, and the message hasn’t even been read. That’s not the best sign in the world, since Dabi tends to ignore his phone when he’s little. Alright. Time to go on a search, then.
Hawks drops his phone back into his pocket, then uses his wings to try and sense any movement in the motel. Ah. On the second floor, about as far away from the door as it gets, is a group of people - the whole League, Hawks is willing to bet. Instinctively, his entire body tenses up. He knows them by now, and he trusts them sometimes, but … that prickling fear, thanks to the years and years of training he’s gone through, never really goes away.
Hawks creeps down the hall to the one staircase that hasn’t caved in on itself, then upstairs to a hall just around the corner from the group that he can now hear arguing in hushed voices. He flattens himself against the wall and listens, hoping against hope that he isn’t about to walk into some sort of ambush or worse.
“- shouldn’t go in,” Mr. Compress is saying. “We’ll just make it worse.”
“I say we just leave him, we’re not helping anything,” Spinner whispers.
“Yeah, but-” Toga cuts herself off just as abruptly as she started talking. At first, Hawks thinks its because she had obviously not been let in on the fact that whatever’s going on is a whispering situation, but then she starts talking again. “Hang on, I think Hawks is here.”
Well, shit. Hawks shakes his wings out a little, hoping that he’ll look less tense, and steps around the corner. “Hey,” he says, putting on a grin and lifting one hand in greeting. The entire League, save Dabi and Shigaraki, stares back at home. “Do you guys know where Dabi is?”
Before Hawks can get an answer, the door everyone else is huddled around opens and Shigaraki steps out, shaking his head. “If you all would just let me disintegrate - wait, how long has he been here?”
“If you disintegrate the bed, you’re only going to make it worse,” Mr. Compress says, in a tone clearly fighting to masquerade as patience, and yeah, Hawks would really love to get an idea of what’s going on here.
“Sorry, what’s going on here?” he asks.
Shigaraki throws his hands - the ones attached to his wrists, at least - into the air. “Fantastic fucking question!”
“Dabi’s hiding under the bed and he won’t come out, poor guy,” says Twice. “Such a loser!”
Toga nods. “He was acting weird all day, and we're pretty sure that he’s doing that regression thing again.”
Hawks winces a little. There’s that guilt he was waiting for, but - now’s not the time to wallow, he just has to get to Dabi and fix this. “Alright, yeah, that’s probably it. We’d made plans for me to come hang out with him today, but I had a last minute meeting I couldn’t get out of.”
“Get out of it next time,” Shigaraki snaps, leveling Hawks with a stare that, admittedly, Hawks would be more scared of if he hadn’t also seen it directed at basically every perceived inconvenience in Shigaraki’s life. Spinner puts a claw on Shigaraki’s arm.
“If Hawks is here, he can take of it them, right?” he points out.
“Yeah, that’s it!” Toga says. “He keeps asking for you. Well, I think that’s what he’s doing? He’s making little wing motions with his hands, like -” She demonstrates, and Hawks’ heart kind of melts a little bit.
“I’ll give it a shot,” he says. “But what made him go under there in the first place?”
“Beats me,” Shigaraki mutters.
Mr. Compress reaches up and scratches the back of his neck. “I think it was my fault. I was in the kitchen and he came in, and I tried to speak with him. I noticed that he was … in between, you could say, and I offered for him to stay with me until you arrived. That freaked him out, though, and he ran up here.”
That takes Hawks a moment to process, because - well, he’s been operating under the assumption that Dabi has been clinging tom him because he was the first option. But maybe that’s not the case, and okay, yeah, he can think about that one and all of its implications later.
“I’ll give it a shot,” Hawks repeats. “But you all should probably give us some space.”
The rest of the League agrees with varying levels of enthusiasm - Spinner at one end of the spectrum and Toga at the other -, and then Hawks is left alone in the dusty hallway with nothing but a closed door and, probably, asbestos.
He opens the door slowly, giving Dabi as much of a chance to notice it as he can, and crouches down almost as soon as he’s inside. It’s dark in the room and darker under the bed, but Hawks can make out Dabi’s curled-up silhouette and the cat-like glint in his eyes as they flick over towards Hawks. Hawks isn’t sure what it is that clues him in, the situation aside, but he knows instantly and certainly that Dabi is far from his adult self.
“Hey, firefly,” he says. “What’s going on, hm?”
Dabi doesn’t answer, and he doen’t move so much as a muscle as Hawks carefully moves closer.
“I’ve gotta say, it doesn’t look very comfy under there. Do you want to come out here with me? I’m sorry that I’m late.”
Again, no answer, but this time, Dabi’s eyes glance between Hawks and the door.
“Don’t worry, they’re all gone,” Hawks says. “Just me and you, okay?” He holds out a hand in Dabi’s direction, palm up, and it’s like something has settled in his chest when Dabi’s hand latches onto it. He gently pulls Dabi out from under the bed, brushes the dust from his shoulders, and makes soft noises into his hair as Dabi curls up so close to him that it feels almost like he’s trying to climb inside of Hawks.
“Hey, there’s my firefly,” Hawks murmurs. “What was that all about? Did something scare you?”
Unsurprisingly, Dabi doesn’t answer. Hawks doesn’t really mind. They can talk about it later if they need to, but for now, just having Dabi relaxed and in his arms is all that Hawks needs in a way he almost wasn’t prepared for. Even as a hero, he never really thought of himself as someone that could do this for someone, not on such a personal level, and he certainly never though that it would quiet the constant rush of his mind like nothing else. But when he’s with Dabi, he’s not anywhere else. It’s become his favorite place to be with an almost frightening speed, even though the weight of the world crashing down around his shoulders after he leaves somehow manages to feel heavier and heavier every time.
“Do you have Zō?” Hawks asks.
Dabi shakes his head, making his hair brush against Hawks’ neck. It feels like it could use a wash, if Hawks is honest, but he’s not sure if either of them are ready for that side of things to be broached yet.
“Let’s go get him, then,” Hawks suggests. “Is he in your room?”
A nod this time, and Hawks squeezes Dabi once before gently sliding him out of his lap so that he can get to his feet. “Alright, let’s go,” he says. He reaches down and lifts Dabi into his arms, thankful as always that his job has made it pretty easy to lift an adult man and set him on his hip. Dabi’s arms wind around his neck instantly, and Hawks pushes all of his sappy thoughts as far out of his head as he can manage.
He’s not certain which room is Dabi’s, especially considering that they all look the same, so he just walks down the hall until Dabi makes a quiet sound.
“This one, right?” Hawks asks. Dabi nods, Hawks pushes the door open, and something feels almost tight in his chest when he sees that Zō is lying on the bed, half-covered with a ratty blanket. “Aw, there he is.”
Hawks scoops the plush elephant up and hands it to Dabi, who immediately releases Hawks’ neck with one hand so that he can latch onto it. Something in his demeanor seems to settle even more, like he’s finally back to himself - or rather, the self that Hawks is used to seeing in this space. Pushing things, then, probably isn’t the right choice, but …
“Hey, what would you think about hanging out with everyone else for a little bit?” Hawks asks, sitting down on Dabi’s bed and letting Dabi settle onto his lap. “Or not everyone, but just … whoever’s around. I want you to be able to be comfortable around them even if I’m not there.”
It’s something that he’s been thinking about doing for a bit now. It’s not fair to make Dabi rely on his unreliable schedule, after all, and if he can get comfortable regressing around at least one member of the League, it’ll probably save everyone a lot of hassle and a lot of hurt.
Dabi doesn’t look up at him, idly bouncing Zō on Hawks’ leg.
“C’mon,” Hawks says gently. “I won’t make you, but I think they all want to hang out with you. And don’t worry, we can hang out just you and me afterwards, whenever you want to leave.”
Dabi stops bouncing Zō. He sits still for a moment, for so long that Hawks is ready to just accept that they’ll have to try it another day, but then he nods.
“Hey, there we go,” Hawks says, giving Dabi a grin. Dabi looks up at him for a second before looking away again, but it’s enough time for Hawks to see the way he’s smiling just a bit. He kisses the top of Dabi’s head, then hefts him up onto his hip again so that they can start off down the hall, and - he feels like he should maybe feel weird about having done that, but … he just doesn’t. It’s Dabi. Something about it makes a weird sort of sense, like everything about this situation.
When Hawks and Dabi get to what used to be the lobby of the hotel, they find Toga, Twice, and Mr. Compress sitting around a table in mismatched chairs, all looking at some papers with various amounts of interest.
When she hears Hawks’ footsteps, Toga turns around immediately, and her eyes light up when they focus on Dabi. Dabi immediately tucks his face into Hawks’ chest, and Hawks pets at the back of his head in what he hopes is a reassuring way.
Mr. Compress gives Toga a meaningful look, and she sticks her tongue out at him but looks back down at the papers in front of her.
“Hey, uh, mind if we hang out for a bit?” Hawks asks. “What are you all up to?” He kind of doesn’t want to know, because if it’s actual villain business … well, that just puts him in a bit of an awkward spot. Then again, though, it does come with the territory.
“Of course not!” says Toga. She pats an empty chair beside herself, an ugly, once-upholstered thing. Hawks gives Dabi a small squeeze, then takes a hesitant seat onto it.
“We’re planning our next few moves,” Mr. Compress explains, gesturing to the papers that Hawks now realizes are maps. “Which, actually - Hawks, you might be able to help. Do you have any way of knowing who’s on patrol in this area next week?”
He slides a map across the table, and Hawks idly pets at Dabi’s hair as he frowns. Dabi is bouncing Zō on his leg again, gently, which is grounding in a strange way. The district that Mr. Compress is pointing out belongs to Rumi’s agency. If the League is planning something there, he should let her know. But if it’s obvious that she had a heads-up, he’ll be thrown into even deeper suspicion than he’s already wading through on a daily basis. But, ultimately, the Commission said that the most important thing was keeping his cover until the League started making big, big moves.
“The Rabbit Hero, Mirko,” he says, “or at least some of her sidekicks. Their agency is right-”
“What’s going on in here?” Shigaraki’s voice nearly - nearly - makes Hawks jump, and Dabi’s motion stops again. Hawks turns around to find Shigaraki, one hand idly scratching at his neck, and Spinner standing in the doorway. “I told you three that I don’t want him near sensitive information,” he says, the key word punctuated with a derisive jerk of his head in Hawks’ direction.
“He’s helping, though,” Twice points out. “Useless bastard!”
“Can we not do this right now?” Hawks says, keeping one hand gently petting at Dabi’s hair. “Not in front of -”
Shigaraki’s eyes land on Dabi like he’s noticing his presence for the first time, and something in him seems to settle. “Fine,” he agrees, testily, and moves like he’s getting ready to leave.
“Listen, Shigaraki,” Hawks starts, even though he knows he should probably just let it be.
“What?”
“Don’t you think that if I wanted to hurt the League, I would’ve already used this-” a nod of his head towards Dabi - “against him? It’d be gold for a spy, and it’d be easy to make forcing him into regression in battle look like an accident.”
“That’s true,” Compress points out. Dabi snuggles impossibly closer into Hawks’ chest.
Shigaraki is quiet for a long moment before finally spitting out, “Fine.” He disappears down the hall, Spinner on his heels, and everyone watches until their silhouettes are out of sight.
Once they’re gone, Mr. Compress shakes his head. “You know, I wouldn’t be surprised if Shigaraki has some regressive tendencies as well, even if he hasn’t let himself lean into them yet.”
“Really?” Hawks asks, but even as surprise colors his voice, the notion starts to make more sense that he’d initially thought. “Huh, yeah, maybe. I guess it’s more of a common thing than I realized.”
“So are many, many things,” Mr. Compress says vaguely, then pulls the map back towards himself and starts making idle notation. Toga snorts. Hawks feels like he should probably be trying to take note of what’s being written, but then Dabi tugs at his shirt and all of his attention is stolen.
“What is it?” Hawks asks quietly. “I’m sorry about all of that, I promise things will be relaxed now.”
That seems to settle Dabi as much as anything will, and Hawks readjusts him on his lap. There’s a moment of quiet, then Toga leans over and pokes at Zō. “Who’s this?” she asks.
Hawks opens his mouth to answer, then shuts it to give Dabi a chance. It takes a moment, but then, so quiet that even Hawks almost misses it, Dabi says, “Zō.”
“Zō?” Toga repeats. She waits for Dabi’s nod of confirmation, then, “Cool name! Can I pet him?”
Dabi considers it for a second, then holds Zō out towards Toga the slightest bit. Her face lights up, and Hawks’ chest feels warm when he sees the corners of Dabi’s mouth quirking up just a bit as Toga pats Zō gently on the head.
“I have stuffies too,” she tells Dabi. “Hang on, let me go get some!”
She’s gone in a whirlwind of creaking floorboards and quick footsteps and back just as noisily, only now with a ratty plush cat in one hand and a newer looking bear in the other. “This is Ketsueki and Kuma,” she says, inclining her head towards each one respectively. “Here, do you and Zō want to come play?” She plops down onto the dusty floor, and Dabi twists around to give Hawks an uncertain look.
“Go on,” Hawks says. “I’m right here.”
Dabi slides out of Hawks’ lap and onto the floor, then crawls over to Toga. She beams at him, then waves up at Twice, who’s watching the whole scene with mild bemusement and the most extended period of silence Hawks thinks he’s ever heard from the guy. “Come on, Twicey, you can be Kuma!”
Twice looks between her, Dabi, and Hawks like he needs an explanation, but then he lowers himself to the floor. “Okay,” he says slowly.
“Here,” Toga announces, handing him the bear. “Okay, so, you both need to know that Ketsueki is the most powerful cat that’s ever lived. He’s immortal, and he can fly, teleport, and basically do anything else that he wants to.”
“Hey, wait, that’s totally unfair,” Twice complains. “He looks way too weak for all of that anyway!”
“Kuma can be immortal and have powers too,” Toga offers. While Twice takes a moment to think that over, Toga picks Ketsueki up by the scruff of his neck and bounces him over to Dabi.
“Hey, Zō, what’s up?” she says, making her voice deep. Dabi laughs at the sound, quietly, and Toga looks up to Hawks with a huge grin that lets him know that her heart just melted just as much as his. “I think we need to go do something about that bear over there, he keeps looking at me funny.”
“I am not,” Twice says, defensive, and Hawks stifles a laugh of his own as the animals get into an intense discussion. Zō doesn’t say much, but he hops around behind Ketsueki, and Dabi laughs every time that Toga speaks in her overly deep voice. The plot, unsurprisingly, gets pretty violent. Hawks’ gut instinct is to try and covertly tell Toga to take it down a notch, but … even though he’s regressed, Dabi doesn’t seem fazed by the gorey descriptions Toga and Twice are exchanging, and Hawks figures he can let it be.
After a while, Twice complains about his back and gets off of the floor. The role of Kuma is then taken over by Mr. Compress, although Hawks has to admit that the character loses some depth with the switch. Dabi keeps looking over his shoulder at Hawks, like he’s making sure that he hasn’t gone anywhere, and each time, Hawks meets his eyes with a smile and a little wave. He could watch this for hours, he thinks, maybe even days. He’s never seen Dabi so relaxed around other people, and it’s endearing to the point that it almost aches in Hawks’ chest.
Hawks himself gets roped into the game when Toga remembers that she has one more plushie and dashes away to fetch a faded pink pig named Ren-Ren, and when he sits down on the floor, Dabi immediately scoots over and leans against his side. Hawks wraps one arm around him and nuzzles the pig’s snout against Zō’s trunk, and yeah, actually, Hawks thinks he could do this, just like this, forever. Sure, there are still things that he and Dabi could talk about, but then again, it’s safer this way. The less knowledge he has to keep close to his chest, the better, especially since he knows that he’s never letting this out.