✧˖°.

hawks' wings are from his status as an angel rather than a separate quirk

i'd like to imagine that quirks aren't really a thing that they're up to date on, as well as being pretty behind in, like, everything else

imagine hawks going into this with an ariel-like disposition

anyway this kicks off with hawks crashing into dabi's backyard in the middle of the night

dabi, who's obviously awake, gets up to go investigate what the fuck that was (naturally assumes someone's here to kill him, as any normal, not-paranoid-at-all person would think)

hawks is very upset (landed on his wing wrong and maybe broke it, which, like, "OWWW...." this guy has never felt pain before and now he's human, which is cool conceptually but why do humans feel pain?? are they like this all the time?? who would do this to them??)

which leads to dabi finding hawk in a pile of limbs armed with a broken wing tangled in the clothes lines that he never bothered to take down after he finally saved up enough for a washer-dryer unit

at this point in time, dabi hasn't been scouted by the league yet, but he's not struggling to survive. he's found a small townhouse to reside in, one story, one bedroom, and a small backyard

(the backyard was an important detail to him—sometimes dabi needs to just. bask in the sun. feel warm when he can)

hawks sees dabi and assumes that he must be someone from hell, and it was some sort of cosmic fate that brought the two together

(hawks has always been the hero-type, even as an angel. he doesn't want to defeat people, rather, he wants to help them.

(hawks is just terribly naive, which impedes this goal of his by a lot)

dabi drags hawks inside once he's figured out that he isn't with the hero commission after threatening to burn the rest of his feathers off (which, the fire isn't helping hawks' case against him)

hawks can't really just say he's an angel, mostly because he gets the feeling that saying as much to someone like dabi would go very sideways

so he spins a story about being kicked out of his home and having nowhere to go and no family to take him in even if they wanted

which, it's not really stretching the truth at all. that is what happened. he just omitted a few details

dabi is stabbed by a violent wave of sympathy that he tries to suppress at first, until remembering that he'd have done anything to have support from someone like dabi is now back when he had been scared, alone, confused and hurt

and even though hawks is cheerful enough, dabi can see the mask he's wearing—he's hiding something. something that hurts

so dabi nods, accepts this answer, and offers hawks the couch for the night, which hawks gladly accepts (and ignores the way his eyes get wet)

the next day both wake up, remember the night before, realize it wasn't a dream and think, fuck

dabi's gotten himself saddled with a roommate—cuz even if he wanted to ignore him, it's too late now, he spent the whole night turning the situation over in his mind and kicking him out would make dabi's already fragile emotional stability skew out of control

and its finally settling into hawks' head that he's been kicked out and he doesn't know where he's going or if he'll ever get the chance to go back even if he wanted to and he's doomed to spend the rest of his life wandering the earth looking for acceptance that will never last

tldr both are having mild panic attacks

dabi finally tries to address the situation by like, asking what hawks plans on doing or if he knows anyone that could help him out

which gets dabi a look so pathetic he immediately regrets asking

("fuckkk he's so sad and lame. what am i supposed to do. it's like staring at a miserable puppy with a bag full of treats in your pocket and pretending you don't know they're there.")

dabi grits out an offer:

stay here and figure out a way to pay rent, and dabi will do his best to fix up hawks' wing so he can fly again but also so it doesn't cost a million dollars to pay for the treatment in the first place

(dabi's plans consist of roaming the underground to find a doctor that could help the both of them out and threatening them—dabi's been putting off finding one for himself after his skin grafts start looking nastier than they should and this is the push he needs to get to it)

hawks, oblivious to this, agrees pretty readily

dabi nods

a moment of silence. then:

"is your real name dabi, or—"

rei packs up touya and the rest of the todoroki's to move away from endeavour to a much smaller abode... tucked away in an apartment on the outskirts of the city. (ignoring literally everything that would make this scenario undoable) (keigo doesn't end up embroiled in hero training either. they're just two teenagers in their own little coming of age esque story!)

keigo and touya meet when they both stumble across the same small skatepark between their two respective apartment buildings, touya bringing natsuo along with him, albeit reluctantly...!

(he loves his siblings, but, like, touya is sixteen and doesn't want to hang out with a nine year old. the kid only ended up coming along because natsuo spied the skateboard touya had with him and begged him to play with him, and rei said he should bring him along to the park so natsuo could make friends without the fear of him being kidnapped hovering over rei's head)

keigo and touya both happen to bring their skateboards along, so the two of them end up playing very impressively showing off their tricks (keigo is annoyingly better at skateboarding than touya. he blames the other teen's wings—totally an unfair advantage!)

touya is already having fun but lowkey gets endeared to keigo when he's willing to play along with natsuo as well! keigo stands the kid up on his skateboard and carefully drags him along, hand in hand while he hovers backwards and spins them around in loops, natsuo giggling the whole way through

when the street lamps start lighting up and touya's phone starts buzzing with texts in the pockets of his shorts, he reluctantly makes the decision to get back home so they're not engulfed in darkness by the time they make the walk back (considers standing natsuo up in front of him on his board so he can roll down the streets instead of walking) and before he goes keigo summons the courage to...! ask for his number...!

touya (dying a little inside) hands his phone over and gets his contact info while natsuo makes fun ("touya and keigooo sitting in a tree! k-i-s-s—!") and races back home before his face turns entirely irreversibly red

ends up back in his room after dinner, the evening finally coming to a lull when he scrolls through his contacts till he finds the name keigo wrote for himself ("keigooo :P") and shoots him a text

same time tmrw?

dabi shows up at his door, scruffy and woozy (guy who's been doing this as a full time job and is not coping with the blood loss very well)

hawks is (rightfully) concerned and is ready to cancel his order but dabi immediately disagrees because "that'll fuck up my ratings sooo bad dude don't be an asshole"

hawks: "???"

dabi: "i really need this job man"

hawks kinda shrugs and asks if dabi's up to anything for the next few hours and dabi doesn't have anything going on so hawks invites him in and immediately sits this guy down on his couch to feed him and let him rest for at least four hours so he's not indirectly accused of manslaughter

one must imagine the disposition of an alley cat encountering canned food for the first time: internal battle of mistrust versus yummy treats

dabi goes down kicking and screaming

(the day he goes over to hawks' place it's raining so hard you can barely see and all dabi has is a cheap plastic poncho. hawks' place has heating—he very 'reluctantly' curls up on the couch)

hawks is probably the worst cook on earth but when he tells dabi this, he refuses to let hawks order food for him; dabi would literally rather die than subject another minimum wage worker to the storm outside just to come to this rich asshole's home

which ends up with dabi in hawks' kitchen, making himself a meal

(which, he probably wouldn't usually do this, but the blood loss is kind of getting to him. dabi's decision making has slowly trickled down to the average level it is when he gets drunk)

when he's fed and warm and hawks has forced him to watch two animated movies dabi could not give less of a shit about he finally turns to dabi like

"ok i know we're having a great time but also i really need to eat something. like. you. preferably."

dabi shrugs and offers up his arm, getting progressively more sleepy while hawks finishes his meal before falling asleep pressed against hawks' side

wakes up the next morning with a blanket pulled over him, cheek pressed to a throw pillow with a littleee bit of drool staining the fabric under him

sits up and looks around, armed only with blurry memories of the night before

("did i... sleep with this guy...!?!??!?")

finds a note on the table and unfolds it, trying to figure out what the hell is going on

(lovedddd hanging w u yesterday :P off at work feel free 2 make urself breakfast before u go. U should know where everything is. tip on the counter 4 u. xoxo hawks)

dabi, slightly mortified at the implication he rooted around in this guy's kitchen when he was out of it yesterday finds the tip

it's literally, like, $500 dollars

dabi scribbles down his phone number and sticks it on the fridge with a magnet

(half because he really needed that money and is pleasantly surprised that he got rent money a week earlier than he was expecting)

(half because he might not remember yesterday entirely, but he remembers feeling safe and warm and being addicted to that rare sensation)

i'd imagine in this verse he runs away to town rather than immediately being found in the aftermath of what he's done. at this point, shen jiu would be too paranoid to consider reaching out for directions to cang qiong mountain even if he wanted to make it there: what if they knew what he did? or figured it out if he did know? (if he even had the mind to think of these things through his panic)

he doesn't want to end up begging on the streets again, though—too alike his childhood and last time he was in that position, shen jiu ended up with the qius in the first place

so he takes refuge in temples that he comes across, stealing food when he can before moving to a different part of the rather large town he's ended up in so there's no clear pattern of when he shows up at whichever food stall

despite not holding that same respect and unwavering belief in gods (how could he, after everything he's gone through? shouldn't they have stepped in, sometime? what god would let him suffer as he did, separating him from the only person he loved?) he knows better than to try them, and begrudgingly thanks them for the shelter (because this he did appreciate, at the very least, if nothing else)

winter hits hard when it does, and shen jiu, after spending so many years in the qiu household, forgot how the cold seeps into your skin and bones without solid walls to keep out the frigid breeze.

he quickly falls ill with nothing to protect him from the elements but his threadbare clothing, and when he grows ill, he becomes slow. shen jiu nearly gets caught stealing, running away before he can be dragged to a town guard for his offence, but earning himself a nasty wound to his leg as he retreated

sickness + the cold + the wound leave him weak and wanting: missing qi-ge, reminiscing on nights where they'd curl up together for warmth, still cold but not alone, the two of them steady against the storm that raged on ahead of them

fever-ridden and teetering close to death, shen jiu wanders into a temple late at night and sinks to his knees, falling to his side, heart-rate slowing. in his delirium, he misses the figure taking shelter from the storm in the corner, watching him

shen jiu wakes up (he doesn't expect to), warm while he hears the wind whistle. he's still in that temple from earlier, but it's considerably... cozier. a small fire warms the inside and his clothes aren't as damp against his cold skin. his fever's broken, too—he doesn't know how long it's been, but he's glad he didn't die: never realized that he wanted to live until he was close to forfeiting his right to

here is where he meets his accidental saviour: xie lian stood over a slowly bubbling pot of stew that smells heavenly to shen jiu—he'd eat just about anything at this point, starved

his immediate distrust of xie lian stops him from being truly excited about his appearance

their relationship is veryyy shaky at the very beginning: shen jiu refuses to trust him and xie lian refuses to abandon this strange child he found on the verge of death

(there's a strange sort of bond built up when you nurse someone back to life, dragging them away from the brink of death and xie lian isn't interested, but he's curious about this kid who stumbled into his temple at the dead of night on a midnight in winter)

shen jiu's torn between distrust and this desire for company he didn't know he possessed; after being alone with no one but the qiu household [before he went on his massacre] he didn't realized how much he wanted to share space with someone who wasn't actively hurting him until he was afforded the opportunity to experience non-violent company with xie lian

his distrust slowly declines when he finds out that xie lian is a cultivator. despite being arguably too old to learn cultivation to the fullest extent he could have if he started a few years earlier, he still desperately wants to learn

xie lian, perceptive as ever, slowly starts teaching him bits and pieces of the basics, teaches him to meditate, takes care to keep his distance when it looks like shen jiu's getting overwhelmed

shen jiu can't help but get attached. he hates it

shen jiu decides to test xie lian before resigning himself to this

he was snappy, impatient, and argued with xie lian, when he came over, one day, waiting for some form of punishment to come, bristling like a spooked cat.

nothing came of his experiment but a slight frown from xie lian, which made shen jiu feel almost bad—xie lian almost reminded him of qi-ge, which made him feel doubly bad because he desperately wants to find him

shen jiu came to xie lian the next day with a pastry [that he stole] as an apology. and a request:

"teach me how to cultivate so i can be a disciple at the cang qiong sect"

xie lian agrees easily enough: he's been around shen jiu to see that despite the late start, he has potential to be great [especially untouched by wu yanzi and his twisted form of cultivation]

shen jiu throws himself into his studies, working himself to the bone

xie lian is concerned by this and after trying to soften the load of his work doesn't make shen jiu slow down, he becomes stern: warns him against trying to chase too much frivolously

this leads to a breakdown of sorts—where shen jiu gets angry, dismissive, before becoming upset. the average emotional depth of a teenager but, like, 4 times worse because of the circumstances

xie lian coaxes the story out of shen jiu here; qi-ge [the first time he's mentioned aloud by name], the qiu household [only the barest of details. shen jiu refuses to dwell], and the night shen jiu made qi-ge leave, as well as qi-ge's promise to come back

shen jiu finishes by telling xie lian he needs to make it back to qi-ge, needs to see if he's still alive, he's been selfish for sticking around as long

shen jiu tells xie lian that he needs to figure out as much as he can, as fast as he can, so he can leave and make his way to cang qiong mountain with some sort of base knowledge to make it in. and that he's not sorry for pushing himself because he doesn't have time

xie lian is quiet for a while

puts a comforting hand on shen jiu's shoulder and tells him he understands; he knows someone who would do anything to make it back to the one they loved, understands the pain that comes when time and distance separates the two

however, xie lian tells him, he can't let shen jiu push himself. he'll only stunt his progress by hurting himself rather than speed things up

shen jiu is ready to argue again before xie lian offers to make the trip with him

shen jiu doesn't believe it at first—who would bother with helping him for this long if they weren't getting anything out of it? he already found this hard to believe, let alone the fact that xie lian would drop everything to travel with him for weeks on end

xie lian doesn't shake in his resolve, though. shen jiu figures out he's being serious and wants to argue, but he's just—relieved

so many people have stood as roadblocks on his path back to qi-ge; xie lian might be the first person actively trying to help them

it almost reignites hope in him; someone other than him believes in them. someone other than shen jiu thinks they'll make it back to each other and succeed in reuniting. xie lian's faith in him is like a gust of wind beneath his wings

he agrees to their road trip

[xie lian makes sure to tell his beloved he'll be away for a while]

[shen jiu doesn't notice that xie lian buys steamed buns off the same stranger in nearly every town they stop by for a night of rest in the following few weeks]

it's not when he's eighteen, knee-deep in loveless, worn-down circles of weary werewolves looking for allies, a bone-deep exhaustion sieving every bit of energy he has spare into a trickle that's barely enough to keep him afloat amid the war when rage cannot.

it's not even when he's twenty-one, reeling from the aftershock of betrayal that makes it feel like he's being ripped open from esophagus to abdomen while his friend's remains are scraped off the street.

he's eleven, waking up on the first day of his second month at hogwarts. remus watches a large, shiny owl deliver james a collection of luxurious chocolates for breakfast. watches sirius stuff a howler in a teapot before it can start on its tirade, james joining in on the attempts to silence it. watches an explosion of glitter coat peter's face when he opens a letter from home, laughing about a vindictive cousin.

remus waits, and waits and waits. never grows impatient, simply waits. and when the school year ends, keeps waiting, hands folded in his lap and chin held up straight.

remus steps into his father's office on the third day of the summer holiday's and finds a stack of mail sitting on his desk. remus leaves silently a moment later.

unbroken wax seals, remus remembers, watching his skin crackle as crimson blood seeps from his white knuckles, the colour uncanny. james says something, but he doesn't hear it. the hospital wing hums and remus exhales, slow and patient.

to be loved is to be changed, blemishes simply a bruise in the shape of love. remus' skin is riddled with scars, his mothers love seeping into him as each wipe of a dittany-soaked cloth seals his wretched wounds. james is written into the curve of his lips, peter finding space in-between the freckles on his cheeks, and sirius curled up in the sliver of space made available between his ribs and ever-beating, crackling heart.

at least once a day when he’s back home on school break, he makes his mother and him chai to share with biscuits while they discuss catch up with each other.

absolutely loves writing letters. james spends hours penning them out to send to his friends, family, just about anyone he’s close with.

carries around a digital camera because he saw his father’s collection of photo albums and flipped through them one afternoon, becoming determined to keep up his own collection. has one photo album dedicated solely to the marauders.

james is fiercely protective over his friends and the younger gryffindor students. he has a pretty laid back demeanour but snaps to the defensive for the people he cares about when he sees they’re in trouble.

he’s something of a mother-hen. the marauders, who get the brunt of this, get exasperated by his fussing but he’s steady in his insistence on making sure they’re alright, well-fed and watered. ends up freaking out when they get sick because of this, much to their amusement.

he’s a bit of a neat freak. one thing his father drilled into his mind was having a proper morning hygiene routine and can’t stand how dirty the bathroom and dorms get with four teenage boys sharing the space, so he’s always deep cleaning at least once a month. imagine sisyphus with a mop.

very touchy. his friends’ personal space is his personal space. his love language is physical affection and he’s someone who’s very dependent on it. will idly hold someone’s hand while rambling on about nothing, slumped under an oak tree by hogwarts’ lake.

a very competitive quidditch player. he likes to pretend that everything comes easy to him out of some weird sense of pride or his belief that he’ll be cooler if he holds onto a facade of nonchalance but on a particularly manic day he could rival oliver wood’s special brand of obsessive enthusiasm when it comes to a quidditch match.

james and sirius “dated” for one week in their first year because they both wanted practice at a relationship so they wouldn’t fuck up if they got into a real one. they broke up because james spelled sirius’ knees into being unable to bend and laughed at how stupid his gait looked on his way to the hospital wing because he didn’t remember the counter-jinx.

there are a few words that james says completely wrong because he never actually heard them growing up—just read them and guessed how they were pronounced without going through the effort to figure it out—and up until he’s in his twenties, he’s still discovering bits and pieces of his vocabulary that he’s been pronouncing wrong for his entire life without knowing.

james didn’t learn to speak english until he was six but now he speaks it better than he does his mother tongue. every few summers he tells himself he’ll learn urdu properly, and every few summers, he forgets about this resolution entirely.

his relatives from back home had a collection of dvds that fleamont liked to watch for nostalgia’s sake, and as a result, james grew up watching them as well. by the time he gets to hogwarts, his mind is filled with bollywood classics, earworms in the form of love songs in hindi that twirl through his brain while he floats through detentions, and romantic gestures that seem just fantastical enough for him to try them on the first beauty he saw (read: lily evans) when he first stepped foot in hogwarts.

when he first goes after his sister to get her away from all those drug pushers he's pretty ruthless but every time he comes across someone in her likeness or girls who are pretty obviously caught up in the fighting against their will, he just gently pushes them aside before continuing to beat people to shit immediately afterwards.

(also when he says that his sister shouldn't make their mother cry :( !!!!!)

when sabakan slaps someone's head while scolding them he makes a short but quick protest against it before taking up the responsibility to fix things on his own (followed by yuken saying that when things go wrong he tends to blame himself...!)

when he sees fujio help that old woman up the stairs and fall down right after, he supplies him with bandaids and a can of soda and starts to chat with him despite the two not knowing each other very much at all (though that might be more on fujio than sachio—he seems like more of an extrovert that sachio)

the final nail in the coffin for me was seeing him wear the jacket sawamura was wearing when he was beat up, bloodstains and all. like a reminder why he was getting revenge/fighting in the first place, which—i don't think you have to be non-violent to be soft-hearted...! it just means that he cares and that's okay...!

(+ "now that i found out it wasn't you... i'm glad.")