Chapter Text
“Final round, gentlemen,” Compress announces.
He deals out everyone’s exchange, then sets the deck aside. Hawks uses a couple feathers to retrieve his new cards rather than move from where he’s lying on his stomach along the back of the couch. Two tens. Perfect. Twice is happy with whatever he got, too. Hawks can sense his heart rate speed up even before he tosses in additional chips to raise the bet.
“Good hand?” Spinner asks, looking from the chips to Twice.
“Wouldn’t you like to know? You fuckers are going down!”
Hawks snorts. “Nice poker face.”
“You’re one to talk,” Twice says when Hawks’ feather slides more chips to the center of the table. “Raising the bet again… if we need to watch out for anyone, it’s you!”
“Unless I’m bluffing. Deception is all part of the game,” Hawks shoots back, grinning at the irony. If they only knew.
Unfazed, Compress tips his lowball in Hawks’ direction. “Twenty thousand yen says he’s going for a straight.”
“Nah,” Spinner denies, shaking his head. “He’s too gay to play anything straight.”
Compress, Spinner, and Twice turn to Hawks as one. Even Toga pauses halfway through preening the secondary coverts on his left wing to glance up. It’s hardly the worst insinuation anyone’s ever thrown at him - morning talk show interviews are more brutal than that by far - so Hawks just winks and flashes his most winning smile.
“I never kiss and tell.”
“See? What did I tell ya?” Spinner taps his cards into a neat stack and throws them on the table. “All right, that’s it. I fold.”
After some deliberation, Compress pushes in enough chips to call, and Twice immediately punches the air with an exuberant whoop. “Hell yes,” he says, slapping down his hand to reveal a full house. “Read ‘em and fucking weep.”
“Damn,” Compress mumbles as he flips over his two pair and proceeds to polish off the rest of his bourbon.
Across the room, Hawks nods solemnly. Twice is so excited, he’s almost reluctant to ruin the moment. Almost. “Nice, man. That’s a good hand. It would be a shame if someone—”
A couple feathers carry Hawks’ cards to the table, and Twice freezes mid-celebration. “Don’t even think about it.”
“—had four of a kind.”
“Hawks, you motherfucker.”
“Does that mean you won?” Toga asks as she continues onto his marginal coverts.
“Decisively.” Hawks props his chin in one hand. “What is that now, five games in a row? Or is it six? I’m having a hard time keeping track of all my winnings.”
Chuckling, Compress pours another round of bourbon. “If I wasn’t a master of deception, I’d accuse you of cheating. But you’re just a regular old card shark.”
“Swindler’s more like it,” Spinner grumbles, snatching up his drink and pushing his chair back.
Twice ignores his own lowball in favor of glaring at the pile of chips sitting in front of Hawks’ empty spot at the table. “Where’d you even learn this game? It sucks ass.”
“Training stint in the states. They’re big on poker over there.”
“That explains why it sucks,” Twice says, then contradicts himself by gathering up all the cards. “Okay, what do you say to one more game? Winner takes all.”
With a grin, Hawks uses a few feathers to slide his chips to the middle of the table. He’s betting the Commission’s money anyway. Might as well make it count. It’s all in the name of fostering goodwill and bolstering trust with the League. If he has fun in the process… well, there’s nothing inherently wrong with that. He just has to keep the mission in mind.
The sight of all those chips has Spinner pausing in the middle of standing up. He stares at them for several long seconds before returning to his chair once more. Beside him, Compress shrugs and adds what’s left of his chips to the pile, and Twice does the same. It doesn’t matter that they have the entirety of Re-Destro’s funds at their disposal now. They scrimped by on scraps for too long. The temptation of a big win is too much for them to turn down.
“Excellent,” Compress says, but before he can do more than a couple elaborate shuffles, the door slams open.
Toga jerks at the sound, and Hawks flinches when she accidentally yanks a couple feathers out of place. He’s usually better at disguising his reactions, but her slow, methodical preening over the past half hour has relaxed him more than he thought. At least she smooths over them in a silent apology. It’s more than most people do.
Dabi stalks through the doorway. His expression is bored as ever, but there’s a palpable tension about him that floods the room. Hawks can sense it even without his feathers. They still twitch at the change in atmosphere, though, sharpening ever so slightly of their own accord. He has to ruffle them several times before they’re soft and pliant again.
“This looks promising,” Compress says as Dabi beelines for the mini fridge in the corner of the room. “So, how did it go?”
Dabi doesn’t even glance his way. “Fuck you.”
“Well, that answers that question. Any other news we should know about?”
“You’re a bastard.”
Compress rolls his eyes and resumes shuffling the deck. “Don’t be so dramatic. I seem to recall this being your idea.”
“Yeah,” Twice chimes in. “No need to be a dick.”
“But you’re the one who suggested going to him. I would’ve figured out another way if I knew how fucking nosey he was going to be about the whole thing,” Dabi retorts, then looks briefly to Toga. “I don’t know how you put up with him.”
Toga lifts one shoulder in a nonchalant shrug. “He’s not so bad once you’ve worked with him for a while. Maybe if you didn’t try to start something with everyone you talk to…”
Blue flames crawl up Dabi’s left arm, and Toga releases Hawks’ wing to produce a knife, brandishing it in a warning of her own. All the while, Hawks silently observes the exchange. He doesn’t know what they’re talking about, but whatever it is likely involves Skeptic since Toga works with him more often than anyone else.
It puts him on edge. The mission is already nearing a critical point. If the PLF is putting another plan into place that he hasn’t gotten wind of yet, if they act before the rest of the heroes can pull off a preemptive strike…
“She’s kinda got a point,” Spinner mumbles under his breath.
It’s not soft enough, though, and Dabi shoots him a glare before digging through the contents of the fridge to pull out a beer. “Shigaraki should’ve just dusted them back in Deika and saved us the trouble.”
“So we could keep squatting in abandoned warehouses?” Compress drawls. "Shigaraki believed the pros of joining forces outweighed the cons. You don’t have to like them, but you do have to tolerate them."
Dabi snorts. “Easy for him to say. He’s been taking a three month nap.”
With a long-suffering sigh, Compress throws up his hands in defeat at the same time Toga jumps up from the couch. “All right, I’m calling it,” she says.
Darting forward, she scurries around Dabi’s legs and plops down on the floor. The knife disappears to whatever hiding place she’d stashed it in the first place, but everything else is blocked by Dabi’s coat. It’s not until he turns as well that Hawks sees Toga’s rearranged the alphabet magnets on the fridge to read LAST LITTLE BITCH: DABI.
Dabi gives her a long, flat look, then shoves her head just enough to unbalance her and crosses the room to take her spot on the couch. He even sprawls sideways to take up as much room as physically possible. Shifting his wing out of the way, Hawks has to bite the inside of his cheek to keep from grinning as Toga’s smug pleasure dissolves into a pout.
“But I was sitting there…”
“You gonna whine about it?” Dabi challenges. “If so, you might as well switch out that name.”
Toga sticks out her tongue but stays silent, and the subsequent crack of Dabi opening his beer seems to spur everyone back into action. Compress resumes shuffling the cards while Spinner and Twice organize the chips to better total up their potential winnings. They’ve just finished stacking the hundreds when Hawks feels a weight settle against his thigh and glances back to find Dabi using him as a makeshift headrest.
“Nice perch, birdie,” he says, tipping his head to meet Hawks’ eyes. “Anyone ever told you that you make a good pillow?”
Hawks smirks. “Not before I’ve taken them to dinner first.”
A faint half-smile plays at Dabi’s mouth, but Compress announces the final hand and begins dealing before he can respond, drawing Hawks’ attention back to the game. Three feathers bring his cards from the table. Resting his chin on his folded arms, he uses two of them to hold the cards up in front of him. The third is sent back to his wing, but Dabi snatches it out of the air before it can reattach.
Hawks keeps his eyes firmly on his cards. However, when a fingertip to the end of his feather makes his arms break out in goosebumps, he adjusts his wings so that one drapes beside Dabi on the couch. Several of the longest primaries brush against his arm and leg. They don't comment on it as the round of betting begins. Neither do they move away.
“I can’t believe you let him win,” Dabi says on their way down the hall after the game.
“How can you say that? Listen to how excited he is.” Twenty minutes later and Twice is still going on about his comeback. Hawks can hear him in the distance even as the rest of the League branch off to their various rooms for the night. “I couldn’t crush his hopes and dreams that many times.”
“Fucking weak.”
“What can I say, I have a soft spot for losers. Why do you think I wanted to join the League?”
The beginning of another two-toned retelling carries down the hall, and Dabi shakes his head, ignoring the dig. “And if he gets addicted and starts gambling away all his money?”
“We’ll just have to switch to strip poker,” Hawks says, then grins when Dabi’s gaze slides his way. “Don’t give me that look. The girls who taught me how to play didn’t exactly have deep pockets.”
“Did they even have clothes?”
“Of course, I’m not an animal. Well… not completely.” Hawks extends his wings. “Not that it matters. I was the one who ended up in nothing but my boxers and socks. They were ruthless.”
Thankfully, that was before his official hero debut, back when he didn’t have to worry about photographic evidence and the public’s flaky opinions and being recognized at every turn. Things were easier then. Or at least less scrutinized. These days, he makes headlines if someone spots him using a public restroom.
“Now that’s an image,” Dabi says, and Hawks waggles his brows.
“Don’t get too excited, hot stuff.”
“Please… I’m just thinking about how I might have to join a game if it gets to that point. Number two hero in his tighty whities? That would make for good blackmail material.”
“Now you’ve got me paranoid,” Hawks says. “I’m gonna have to step up my underwear game.”
With a snort, Dabi rounds a corner. Hawks slows his pace just long enough to spare a single glance for the French doors at the end of the hallway before following. On the other side of them is a rooftop terrace that makes for the perfect takeoff point. Nice and open. Plenty of room to spread his wings.
Thing is, he’s gotten used to squeezing through the window at the end of Dabi’s hallway. The safety bars that line the emergency fire escape it leads to are a pain to work with, but he’s done it enough times now to have figured out how best to contort between them. He doesn’t even need to shed his feathers anymore.
Twice’s voice finally fades into the background as they continue down the hallway. The villa is full of spare bedrooms for PLF members that prefer to stay on-site, but Dabi’s chosen one as far from anyone else as possible. There’s only one other person that stays in the vicinity, and they’re not even in their room. Without anything else to focus on, Hawks is very much aware of Dabi’s presence. The rustle of his clothes, his raspy inhales, the slow, steady beating of his heart. His feathers sense everything so readily, it takes actual effort to ignore it.
“So,” Hawks begins, because talking is the best distraction and he’s genuinely curious. “Am I allowed to ask what had you in such a funk earlier?”
“Ask all you want, but you won’t get an answer.”
“Top secret, huh?”
“Something like that,” Dabi says, tucking his hands in his pockets. “You’ll see soon enough.”
Damn. Granted, Dabi fessing up to anything was the longest of long shots, but still. “I’ll have you know, I’m pretty good at keeping secrets,” Hawks singsongs anyway, more to smooth things over than actually press for information.
“I’m sure you are.”
“Hey now, don’t tell me you still don’t trust me,” Hawks says. “I’ve already murdered someone for you, what else do you want me to do? Desecrate a cemetery? Steal some kid’s lunch money? Commit a hit and run?”
Dabi snorts. “Didn’t you already do that when you flew into that building?”
“Okay, first of all, rude. You know how much I hate when people bring that up. Secondly, that doesn’t count because I had to pay for the damages since the press got it on video. You’ll have to come up with something else.”
“Jaywalking,” Dabi eventually decides, and Hawks groans.
“Now that’s just crossing a line.”
Dabi huffs a quiet laugh and stops before a door. With a faint smile of his own, Hawks waits while he pulls out a key. He’s never been in Dabi’s bedroom, but the few details he’s glimpsed from the hallway are etched into his memory. The neatly made bed, the pairs of boots lined up along the wall, the collection of antibiotic creams for his scars on the bedside table. It paints a wildly different picture from the ratty, disinterested façade Dabi puts on for everyone else.
The door swings open with a soft creak. Hawks glances briefly into the room before meeting Dabi’s eyes when he turns to look over his shoulder. The seconds stretch out in a weighty silence, and Hawks swallows. There’s something in Dabi’s expression – in the slight tilt of his head, in that unwavering gaze – that feels almost like an invitation.
It’s dangerous.
It’s exciting.
“I’m gonna need that back,” Hawks says at length, jerking his chin towards Dabi’s pocket. His feather is out of sight, but that just seems to amplify the careful pressure of Dabi’s hand still around it. “Unless you were planning on keeping it. Something to remember me by until next time.”
Dabi doesn’t rise to Hawks’ teasing. Instead, he leans back against the doorframe, withdraws the feather, and casually holds it up for inspection. “How do they work? I know it’s telekinetic or some shit, but can you, like, see through them?”
“Not literally, no.” Stepping forward, Hawks braces one shoulder against the opposite side of the doorframe and crosses his arms. “They pick up on vibrations in the air, but it’s nothing defined. More a vague mental picture of what’s going on.”
“Like echolocation,” Dabi surmises without looking at him.
“More or less. Technically, what I do is considered passive sonar, but echolocation is close enough.”
Dabi hums and lifts the feather a little higher. “So if I decide to keep this and go take a shower…”
“I won’t be able to see the size of your dick, if that’s what you’re worried about,” Hawks says with a smirk. “Although I will be able to tell if you start jerking off.”
The corner of Dabi’s mouth twitches. He begins to spin the feather lightly between two fingers, and heat prickles in the back of Hawks’ mind. It’s hard to tell whether it’s because of Dabi’s quirk or the way his feather looks between those long, slender fingers. Maybe a bit of both.
“How sensitive are they?” Dabi asks.
“Very. I can sense your breaths and movements. Even your pulse. That’s what makes public appearances such a bitch. Everyone’s grabbing them and pulling on them. I don’t like it.”
“Good to know. When I’m tired of your smart mouth, I’ll just pluck you like a chicken.”
“Whatever,” Hawks says. “You like my smart mouth. Don’t lie.”
Dabi’s eyes finally flick to his only to drop briefly to his mouth, and the temperature rises a few degrees. “What if someone’s careful with them?”
“Careful, as in…?” Without so much as blinking, Dabi blows lightly on the feather. An involuntary shiver skitters down Hawks’ spine, dragging that heat along with it. He flexes his wings in an attempt to cover up the reaction and clears his throat. “It feels good.”
“And this?” Dabi asks, tracing his finger and thumb along the outer vanes.
The touch registers in Hawks’ mind, vivid enough that he can feel the echoing sensations across his own skin like a caress. “Yeah,” he says, voice tight, and Dabi nods.
“I imagine you could have fun with these.”
Oh, if Dabi only knew. Then again, maybe he does. Because the way he creates a loose circle with his other hand and draws it slowly over the length of the feather is enough to wrench the air from Hawks’ lungs. His heart thuds against the inside of his ribcage as desire stirs to life, curling low in his groin. When Dabi does it again, this time with a bit more heat, Hawks’ lips part in an exhale.
“How long does it take you to get back to Fukuoka?”
Hawks blinks at the question, trying to focus on something other than the gentle glide of his feather through Dabi’s hand. “An hour,” he manages. “Give or take a few minutes. Depends on if I’m booking it or not.”
“It’s already late.” Arching a brow, Dabi tips his head to one side. “There’s plenty of room if you don’t feel like impersonating a bat.”
Time seems to slow as the world narrows around them, everything else fading into the background until there’s nothing but the rapid-fire beating of his heart, the drag of air in his lungs, and the now undeniable invitation in the depths of those blue eyes. Stay, they say. Let’s finish what we started that night. It’s a promise, and Hawks can feel the past wash over him. Scarred skin beneath his fingertips and mismatched lips moving against his own and steam brushing over his face—
“What do you say, birdie?”
Hawks takes a deep breath, wings drawing in tight against his back. They’re standing on the threshold of something monumental, and he wants it. He does. Wants to follow Dabi into that inordinately clean bedroom, to discover all the sides of himself that he hides away from the rest of the world, to strike the match and ignite this thing that’s been simmering between them for weeks now.
Only…
He can’t.
Striking that match won’t erase the reality of their situation. The mission comes first. The Commission chose him for a reason, and he can’t afford to slip up now. Too many people are depending on him to do anything else. At the end of the day, he’s a hero. If that means he has to give up fleeting moments of happiness for the sake of others, so be it.
“I wish I could,” Hawks says in what might be the most honest words he’s ever spoken to Dabi. “But I should be getting back. Skeptic’s not the only one keeping tabs on me. I’ve gotta put up a good front for the Commission, or they’ll start asking questions.”
Dabi’s eyes flick between his for a moment, then his mouth curls in a wry smile. “Right. Well.”
And that’s that.
Rolling away from the doorframe, Dabi releases the feather. It drifts down through the space between them, almost reaching the ground before Hawks instinctively calls it back to rejoin with his wing. The warmth from earlier is gone. All that’s left is the fading memory of it as he straightens as well. It leaves him feeling strangely empty, so when Dabi dips his chin in a shallow nod and turns away, he can’t help but step forward.
“Dabi, wait—”
But the words lodge in his throat. What can he say, really? Flirting is one thing. Anything more, and the Commission might as well label him compromised and yank him off the mission. Or worse. Failure isn’t exactly something they tolerate. So he’ll do what’s expected. What’s right.
As if he can read that train of thought, Dabi gives him another thin smile. “Night, birdie,” he says, effectively ending the conversation, and Hawks deflates.
It’s for the best.
Still sucks, though.
“G’night,” Hawks says and spins on his heel before he has to watch Dabi close the door in his face.
Up on the rooftop, Hawks curls his wings forward to block some of the unrelenting wind and looks down at the phone in his hand. In another life, he thinks. Things would be different if they’d met under different circumstances, if they were free to pursue the things they wanted, if they were anyone except who they are.
But they’re not, and it’s with a sad sort of resignation that Hawks types out the coded message to one of his handlers.
Patrol’s got me wiped. Taking a couple days off for some R&R.
He stares at the text so long the letters are imprinted against the back of his eyelids when he finally closes his eyes and hits send. There’s no going back now. In two days, the Commission will mobilize all the heroes who have been waiting in the wings and put an end to the PLF. This double life he’s been living will stop.
No more stress or sleepless nights or running himself ragged to maintain appearances. No more having to be constantly aware of what he’s saying to whom and when. It’ll be nice, for things to go back to the way they were.
But that also means no more of Toga’s careful preening. No more card games with Compress or comparing the durability of his sharpened feathers with Spinner’s blades or being on the receiving end of Twice’s achingly earnest craving for friendship. No more being able to forget, even for a moment, that a world larger than he and Dabi exists while sharing cigarettes on the fire escape in the middle of the night.
With a sigh, Hawks pockets his phone. Sacrifice is practically written into the hero gig. It’s at the heart of everything he does. This is no different, and he holds tight to that resolve as he pulls his visor into place and tips over the edge of the roof to begin the long flight home.
Hawks has seen Dabi’s quirk in action several times, everything from warning displays during their initial meeting to veritable walls of it in the aftermath with High-End to flickering wisps used to light cigarettes. He’s always thought it pretty, in a violent, destructive sort of way. The same way natural disasters are incredible and terrible at the same time. Those brilliant blue flames are so captivating, Hawks might as well be a moth drawn to them.
But fire's only pretty until the moth gets burned, and there’s nothing pretty about it when Dabi’s going for the kill.
Pain.
That’s the first thing Hawks registers when he claws his way up out of the darkness: unimaginable pain searing along his arm and face and back. Down his throat. Into his lungs. It spiderwebs throughout his entire body, radiating along his nerves until it’s all he can feel.
Beyond that?
Nothing.
He’s spent so long fine-tuning his wings, perfecting his quirk until the steady stream of information from the world around him is almost second nature. He doesn’t even have to think about it anymore. His feathers communicate everything so seamlessly that it’s become an inherent part of his everyday life.
The sudden loss of that awareness is excruciating. His wings have been damaged plenty of times over the years. They’ve been plucked and trimmed and burned and broken. Sometimes in the name of training, other times not. But always – always – at least a handful of feathers remain. It doesn’t take much. Even just the downy ones that cling to the bare bone arches of his wings are enough to bring his surroundings into sharper focus.
That’s gone, though. There’s nothing left, and he can’t remember ever feeling so vulnerable and alone. It’s like a piece of himself is missing. Something fundamental. Something vital.
Hawks shifts ever so slightly, the movement too easy despite the white-hot flash of pain that accompanies it. The phantom weight of his wings hovers over him like a ghost, and he knows deep down that they’ll never grow back the same, if at all. What use will he be then? What kind of future will he have? Can he even be a hero without them?
Breathing is agony, but the air rushes into his burned lungs, faster and faster as his thoughts race and his chest tightens and his fingers twist into the makeshift pallet beneath him hard enough his knuckles crack. Too much. It’s too much—
A static buzz interrupts the spiraling sense of panic. Hawks peels open his uninjured eye to see a medical camp that’s been erected in the middle of a glade. Tokoyami is crouched nearby, but he’s not paying attention to Hawks. No one is. Everyone is looking towards the emergency radio at the far end of the campsite.
Typically, it would be used for correspondence and check-ins, notifications of wounded heroes, updates to the situation.
Now…
I am Touya Todoroki. The eldest son of Endeavor. To date, I’ve killed over thirty innocent people in cold blood, and today, I’d like everyone to know exactly what drove me to such despicable acts.
Dabi’s voice pours from the speaker.
No, not Dabi.
Touya.
Hawks grits his teeth as the broadcast continues. How did he not see it? The fire quirk, the color of his eyes, the way he taunted Endeavor by name after the battle with High-End. Even the placement of his scars imitates Endeavor’s flames. He should have made the connection. A possible affiliation, at the very least.
But at the same time, how could he? He’s heard enough about Endeavor’s family to know his eldest son died in a training accident years ago. Who would’ve ever thought Touya Todoroki survived, much less hid in the underbelly of Japan all this time only to emerge a villain?
Those who keep company with Endeavor are no different. Take Hawks, the number two hero. That crying villain who’s trying to run away? I did my best to protect him, but Hawks skewered the guy without the slightest hesitation—
Hawks closes his eye again, squeezing it shut so hard moisture gathers at the corner. They may be listening to the audio side of whatever Dabi’s broadcasting, but he doesn’t need to watch the video feed to remember. He can see Twice’s betrayed, tearful expression in those final moments, can feel flesh giving way beneath the razor-sharp tip of his feather. Odds are, all of Japan can see it too. Now he knows what Dabi was working on with Skeptic.
—and it’s really no wonder since his father was a serial robber and murderer. A villain. Which is exactly why Hawks’ background and real name were kept secret.
The whole thing feels painfully surreal. Everything he has… his wings, his trustworthiness, his ability to be a hero… his entire life. It’s all gone. Just like that. In one day, Dabi’s effectively ripped apart everything Hawks has spent his entire life building.
It doesn’t matter if Best Jeanist comes forward to discredit the claim, or if the recording he took when confronting Twice is released. The damage has been done. People will never look at him the same way again. It’s a bitter reminder of the sacrifice he was so willing to suffer. He never imagined the price would be this steep.
“Watch out!”
The sudden exclamation is followed by the sound of wood splintering, and Hawks’ eye snaps open again. There’s a woman stumbling around the clearing, wide-eyed and frantic. Blood seeps through the bandages wrapped around her head, and one of her legs is bound in a splint, but she doesn’t seem to notice.
“My son!” she cries. “What happened to him? Where is he?”
Tokoyami stands and takes a couple steps forward, but a member of the medical team immediately stops him. “No, stay back. She’s in shock, and we don’t know anything about her quirk.”
Indeed, the woman’s hands are glittering in the late afternoon sunlight. Whatever her quirk, it’s clearly activated, and without knowing the details, touching her is a risk. Someone else on the medical team tries to corral her to an isolated corner of the glade while calling for a sedative, but she staggers forward instead, forcing him to step aside.
Hawks grimaces as people shrink away.
If only he had his feathers.
At the last second, the woman turns away from a group of civilians too injured to move. She pinballs between two more medical personnel and a stack of boxes before hobbling towards Hawks, which is at least an improvement, even if his instincts are going haywire in warning. As far as he can tell, he’s alone on this side of the clearing. No one else will get hurt.
But then Tokoyami is stepping between Hawks and the woman. Blocking him. Protecting him. Hawks tries to tell him to get out of the way, but nothing comes out. His throat’s been scraped raw by Dabi’s flames. The only thing he can manage is a hoarse croak, so quiet it’s lost in the rest of the chaos, in the roar of Dark Shadow rising up to intimidate the woman into changing course.
It doesn’t work, though. She’s too hysterical, and Hawks can see Tokoyami brace himself to take the brunt of her quirk, whatever it might be. Never faltering. Never backing down. He remains there, as stubbornly resilient as when he faced down Dabi in the villa even though he was at a gross disadvantage.
Stupid kid, Hawks thinks in equal parts exasperation and fondness. You’re gonna make a great hero someday.
Then he uses all his remaining strength to push up onto all fours, grab the back of Tokoyami’s belt, and yank him out of the way. He may not be able to do much anymore, but he can still do this.
Tokoyami falls aside with a confused cry, and Hawks tastes blood in his mouth even before the woman trips over him. Pain surges through every inch of his body. What little breath he has is ripped away in a strangled groan, and the edges of his sight go dark and fuzzy as he collapses beneath the weight of the woman. The last thing he notices is one of those glittering hands landing on his shoulder before the darkness rises up to meet him.
“Final round, gentlemen.”
Hawks blinks. Once, twice, three times. Everything gradually blurs into focus until he’s surrounded by the familiar furnishings of the lounge room where the League prefers to hang out in their downtime. The members themselves are here, too. Compress, Twice, and Spinner are at the nearby table while Toga sits on the couch beside him.
He’s… in the villa.
Hawks blinks a fourth time and frowns. How is he in the villa? It was attacked, it was destroyed, he was there, he saw it. But now he’s here. They all are. And they’re playing cards the same way they were the other night. Like nothing’s happened. Like they don’t know he’s the one who betrayed them.
Spinner looks up. “Good hand?”
“Wouldn’t you like to know? You fuckers are going down!” Twice returns, and Hawks absently registers the uptick in his heart rate through his confusion before reality slams into him.
His feathers—
Oh god, his wings—
Hawks sits up with a start, the playing cards falling to the ground as he flares his wings wide. He can feel everything again, all the details that were missing in the glade. The relief is overwhelming. It takes everything in him not to sweep his wings forward so he can bury his hands and face in the feathers.
That doesn’t explain why he’s here, though. Was that woman capable of manipulating time? He’s familiar enough with rewind quirks from his days with the Commission. One of his handlers liked to use it on particularly difficult training exercises. It came in handy, giving Hawks the chance to complete a task without having to wait for days while broken bones and fractured wing joints healed.
But this…
“Hawks?” Toga asks softly, carefully, hand still raised from where she was preening his feathers before he ripped his wing away.
This is different.
Rewind quirks are universal. If the past three days were simply rewound, everyone would be aware of the fact they were reliving this moment, not just him.
However, Toga doesn’t look like she’s about to turn him into a pincushion for killing one of her best friends. Neither do the guys at the table seem like they’re getting ready to jump him. Right now, they're just concerned with Hawks’ sudden change in behavior. It’s all fresh and new, which only leaves one other explanation.
Hawks curses under his breath.
He was hit with a god damn time loop quirk.