Archive of Our Own ^beta

Chapter Text

“All things considered, the rebuilding progress has been faster than expected, Mr. President. You truly are ahead of your time.”

“And in record time, too. Guess we shouldn’t have expected anything less from Japan’s youngest hero.”

Hero.

God, he hated that word. Hated the weight of it. Hated the blind reverence behind it.

Hated that people still had the audacity to call him that.It had no business being tied to someone like him.

Not anymore.

Not after what he’d done to climb to the top. Not after the lies, the blood, the silence he’d traded for progress.

Not after everything that happened before the war, and especially not after what he did during it.

He exhaled, slow and tired, turning his head to stare out the floor-to-ceiling windows behind him.

The skyline looked clean. Rebuilt. Deceptively whole.

Just like him.

The sun was beginning to set, casting the city—and the sterile office around him—in a warm, golden glow. It would’ve been beautiful, if not for the ache in his body, the kind of exhaustion that went deeper than bone. He was tired, yes, but it wasn’t just physical. It was a gnawing, restless kind of fatigue, the kind that made him want to crawl out of his own skin.

Across the table, men in dull suits droned on about numbers and logistics and restructuring plans that meant fuck-all in the grand scheme of things.

This all could’ve been a goddamn email.

His focus snapped toward the conference room door as it creaked open, frowning at the rare interruption. No one ever walked into these meetings uninvited. And with the sun still up, they probably had at least another hour of this ass-kissing budget parade left.

Not that he was complaining. Any excuse to derail the board’s usual groveling was welcome.

His brows lifted slightly as a young woman slipped into the room, heels silent on the carpet as she made her way across the floor. She was sharply dressed—crisp white button-up, maybe buttoned a little too high for his taste, and a skirt that clung just right. Her long hair was pulled into a no-nonsense bun, and her eyes… hazel? Or brown? Hard to tell from this distance.

Didn’t matter. She was pretty. That much was clear.

Maybe he’d ask her out after this circus was over. Couldn’t hurt, right? He hadn’t had sex in weeks, and honestly, he could use a decent distraction.

He watched her lean down toward one of his senior staff members, whispering something too low for him to hear. The guy looked irritated by the interruption, though Keigo didn’t give a shit. He was too busy trying to remember how the hell that man had earned a “senior” title in the first place. Weren’t they the same age? Maybe two years apart, max.

He scowled at himself, cutting the thought short. Who was the hell was he to judge? He was twenty-three and running the whole damn Commission.

Then something shifted. The other man’s eyes suddenly widened, shock flickering across his face as he stared down at the table.

Keigo straightened in his seat, the first real ripple of curiosity breaking through the haze of boredom.

“Mr. President, I’m so sorry,” the man said, turning toward him—before his face split into a wide, almost disbelieving grin.

Without waiting for a response, he shoved his chair back and stood like the floor was on fire, eyes bright with something that looked a lot like panic and joy all at once.

Keigo blinked, confused. What kind of news could hit someone like that—shock them and still make them look like their whole world had just lit up?

“I—I have to go,” the man stammered, already halfway to the door. “My wife’s in labor. I’m having a baby!”

Oh.

Keigo inhaled slowly, a sudden tightness pressing down on his chest. It was heavy and hollow all at once, but he shoved it down, stretching a smile across his face like it didn’t ache.

“Of course,” he said smoothly. “Be safe—and best wishes to both you and your wife. Congratulations.”

He meant it. Mostly.

Or at least, he hoped it sounded like he did.

“Actually, let’s just call it for today,” he said abruptly, already rising to his feet and pushing his chair back. “We’ve been going in circles for weeks. The numbers haven’t changed, and we’re still on track.”

He offered them all a warm smile—too warm, maybe. Too forced.

The silence that followed was heavy, full of hesitation and thinly veiled concern.

They were staring. All of them.

God, he really hated the stares.

He really should be used to them. People had always stared, even when he was a hero. But he couldn’t do it. Not now. Not with this sudden ache lodged in his chest, raw and unfamiliar, scraping at something he’d been running from for months.

Fuck, he needed out. Before the mask slipped. Before they saw just how close he was to breaking.

Before they learned the truth.

He didn’t wait for them to gather their files or murmur confused goodbyes. He didn’t even wait for the man with the baby on the way to make it to the door, as rude as that was.

Keigo was already moving, footsteps sharp and fast across the polished floor as he shoved the boardroom doors open with both hands.

“Kei—Mr. President!” Mera called out behind him, his voice tight with alarm as he tried to grab a hold of his arm. “Hold on a second, is everything—”

Keigo didn’t stop. Didn’t slow.

Not even for the man he considered his father.

He couldn’t.

Not with the way his pulse was roaring in his ears. Not with that damn lump stuck in his throat like it had claws. Not with the guilt that threatened to fucking eat him alive. Not with the disappointment he knew Mera would express with him once he’d learned the truth.

He just kept walking, eyes locked ahead, refusing to let himself be seen. Not like this.

He could still feel their eyes on his back as he sloppily pushed through the next door and out into the hallway, heart thudding too fast, chest too tight, the world tilting just enough to make him feel unsteady on his feet.

Fuck. He needed air.

He needed out.

Now.

Chapter Text

He sighed deeply, slumping against the brick ledge he’d scrambled onto—just far enough out of sight that Mera wouldn’t see him when the door burst open.

Right on fucking cue.

Keigo flinched a little, guilt pricking at him as he heard Mera shouting his name, voice sharp with panic. He watched silently, frowning as Mera slowed, cautiously approaching the edge of the building. The visible tension in his shoulders only eased once he peeked over and saw Keigo wasn’t splattered across the pavement below.

Jesus. Did people really think he was suicidal?

…He was. But that wasn’t really the point.

He almost wondered how Mera had figured out where he’d gone—until he remembered. Of course he’d know.

How many times had he pulled this same stunt as a bratty, angsty teenager? Storming out of training sessions, skipping briefings, hiding from whatever assignment he couldn’t bring himself to face. Every time, he ended up here. On the roof. Head tipped into the wind, wings stretched wide like they belonged to someone who actually wanted to fly.

Not for duty. Not for them.

Just… for him.

Technically, he could still fly.

If he jumped.

No, No. Bad thought. Bad fucking Keigo. That was exactly the kind of thing that would prove Mera right, and he’d be damned if he ended up back on those stupid antidepressants. Like he was broken. Like he couldn’t hold himself together anymore.

He sighed, reaching into his back pocket for the half-crushed pack of cigarettes and his lighter. Not his proudest habit—not by a long shot—but one he'd picked up after the war ended. He’d never smoked before; flying had demanded clean lungs, sharp breath control. But there wasn’t much point in keeping himself pristine for that anymore.

So yeah, not his best habit. But it sure as hell beat the alternative he’d tried.

Cocaine was incredible—right up until it wasn’t. Nothing like the high… until the damn crash came. Until you were strung out, paranoid, heart clawing at your ribs, and waking up half-naked in a piss-reeking alley right behind your own damn job.

Mera's lecture that morning had been one of his greatest hits. Second best, actually.

The only one that topped it? The first time he’d come to the Commission with a pregnancy scare.

His jaw tightened at the thought, and he shoved the cigarette between his teeth a little too hard. Thumb dragging over the lighter’s worn pad, he struggled to spark it. Hands just unsteady enough to betray him. Finally, the flame caught. He tamped down the surge of anxiety that always came with fire and brought it to the tip of the cigarette.

"Those’ll kill you," a deep voice said from under him.

Keigo jolted so hard he nearly dropped the cigarette. The lighter slipped from his fingers, clattering to the ground with a sharp metallic ring.

"Shit," he muttered, scrambling to catch it, but he was too slow. It landed at the feet of the man—no, boy—who’d spoken.

Keigo didn’t even spare him a glance. He just turned his head away, pressing his back against the wall and letting one foot swing restlessly over the edge. “Don’t you have a term paper to write or some shit?” he muttered, bitterness curling in his voice like smoke.

“Don’t you have a Commission to run?” came the easy reply.

Keigo scowled as the kid hauled himself up, gripping the ledge and squeezing into the narrow space beside him. Too casual, too familiar.

“If you’re trying to take the edge off,” the boy added, pulling something from beneath his cloak, “maybe try something that won’t outright kill you.”

Keigo blinked in surprise as a brown paper bag appeared in front of him, the neck of a bottle poking out from the top. The hell?

“Aren’t you underage?” Keigo asked, narrowing his eyes, though a hint of amusement tugged at the edge of his mouth.

“Shouldn’t you know? You are my mentor, after all,” the raven-headed brat replied, cracking open his own bottle as he leaned back against the wall, mirroring Keigo’s posture. His foot swung lazily over the edge, completely at ease. “Though you were never all that present for it.”

“Not your damn dad,” Keigo snapped, the words spilling out before he could stop them.

Too late. The damage was done—and now the overthinking kicked in.

No, not Fumikage’s dad. But he was one. Or... he should be by now.

How many months had it been? Five? Six? How long did it take for something to fully form inside there?

Fuck.

Wasn’t like he was gonna be all that present for that one either.

God, he was losing it. Losing his mind in this suffocating office, wasting away like some damn criminal rotting in a cell.

Well, maybe that’s what he deserved.

“They’re all just worried about you, y’know,” Fumikage said quietly, voice softer than Keigo expected.

He didn’t answer.

Didn’t want to.

The concern in the kid’s tone made his skin crawl. Not because it was wrong, but because it wasn’t. Because someone out there still thought he was worth worrying about, and he didn’t know what the fuck to do with that.

“They think you’re gonna snap,” Fumikage continued. “One day you’re gonna lock that office door and just… never come back out.”

Keigo huffed a dry laugh and tipped the bottle again, licking the bitter taste from his lips. “Yeah? Let ‘em think that. Who knows anymore. Maybe I will.”

“Don’t joke like that. It’s not funny.”

“Well you know what, who the hell says I’m joking?”

The silence stretched out, thick and heavy between them, broken only by the distant sounds of the city below. Fumikage didn’t answer this time. He just let the quiet hang, like a punishment. Like he was giving Keigo time to think about the things he’d said and the people he might be hurting.

Keigo knew, deep down, how much Fumikage had worried about him during the war. Maybe even more than Mera. Jokes like that, just because he was in a bad mood, weren’t fair. Not to someone who had already carried too much.

But he was too damn stubborn to admit it.

Besides, Fumikage had a point. Keigo was supposed to be the adult here. The mentor. If nothing else, he should at least pretend to care that his former mentee was sitting beside him, drinking out of a paper bag on top of the Commission building.

“Where’d you even get this stuff?” Keigo muttered, giving the bottle a little shake. “You know how bad this is for you?”

“You’re not the only one who’s struggling,” Fumikage said. He gave the liquor a nervous swirl, watching the liquid tilt inside the glass. Keigo felt something twist in his chest.

“Are you—”

“No,” Fumikage cut him off, laughing softly before his expression shifted into something more distant. “Just… nightmares. Which is weird. I was never afraid of the dark before.”

Keigo looked at him, the burn in his throat returning for a different reason now.

He had them too. Dreams that never stopped. Dreams of Dabi and Twice. Of the war. Of All for One and the way Fierce Wings had torn through everything he touched. Of Toga and the hate in her eyes when she’d nearly taken his life.

God, he almost wished she had.

“Then where did you get it?” Keigo asked again, his voice quieter this time.

A pause followed. Fumikage closed his eyes and let out a long, tired sigh.

“Deku.”

Keigo blinked. And then it hit.

Of course. Of course it was. It made too much damn sense.

Deku—too selfless for his own good, always trying to take the weight for everyone else. The kid had probably handed it over without a second thought, thinking he was helping, thinking it would make things easier.

“He smells like liquor more often than not these days. Mr. Aizawa’s nearly at his wits’ end, but how do you tell a kid who carried an entire war on his back to stop coping?”

Keigo let out a bitter exhale, rubbing his thumb along the side of the bottle. “Even still, he really shouldn’t be handing this shit out like candy.”

“He didn’t,” Fumikage responded quietly. “I asked. And he… just didn’t say no.”

Keigo tipped his head back, staring up at the wide stretch of night sky overhead. No stars. Just clouds and haze and the faint hum of the city lights drowning everything out. He remembered a time when skies meant freedom. Now they just looked heavy.

“You all keep looking out for each other,” he muttered. “Even if it means doing something stupid. The boy should really see a professional instead of trying to look for answers at the bottom of a bottle.”

God was he a fucking hypocrite.

Fumikage didn’t deny it. Just took a small sip from his own bottle, eyes fixed somewhere in the dark.

“I think we’re all just trying to survive however we can,” he said. “Some of us drink. Some of us disappear into paperwork. Some of us shut everyone else out instead of talking about what happened.”

Keigo flinched at that last one. It wasn’t a jab, not really. Just the truth, plain and unvarnished. And maybe that made it worse.

He sat there for a long moment, letting the weight of it all settle in his bones. “You all shouldn’t be carrying this,” he finally said, voice low. “Not at your age.”

Fumikage gave a small shrug. “Didn’t you?”

Keigo didn’t answer. He didn’t have to.

They both knew the truth.

“I never wanted you to be my dad,” Fumikage said after a few more awkward beats of silence. “I just wanted to learn. I wanted you to teach me. To be present enough to not pawn me off on your sidekicks and then disappear, or to at least answer your phone when I called.”

It landed harder than Keigo expected. Not loud, not cruel. Just…honest. Fumikage had always been like that, and normally he appreciated that quality of his former intern. But tonight, that just made it worse.

He stared out at the horizon, blinking against the sudden sting in his eyes. It shouldn’t have hurt. He’d earned that disappointment. Deserved every single bit of it. Still, something about hearing it out loud cracked something in his chest.

His grip tightened around the bottle until his knuckles went white.

“I know I wasn’t around,” he said quietly. “And I know you needed more than what I gave you. That’s on me.”

“Not completely,” Fumikage said quietly. “You were just doing what the Commission told you that you had to do—”

“Yeah, well,” Keigo cut in, his voice sharp and bitter. “You have no idea what they really told me to do.”

He didn’t look at him. Couldn’t.

Because saying it out loud would change everything. Fumikage would look at him differently, would judge. And he wasn’t ready for that. Not when the worst of it was still buried—sealed behind silence, lies, and one name he hadn’t dared speak aloud since the day he’d allowed her to run away.

“Look, it’s late,” Keigo muttered, throwing back the rest of his bottle with a rasp. The burn didn’t sting nearly enough.

He stood, joints stiff, the cold night biting through his clothes. His balance swayed just slightly. His body struggled to adjust to the weight of wings that no longer existed. Still wasn’t used to that. Might never be.

Fumikage watched him closely but didn’t move to stop him.

“I’ll head in first. Mera’s probably one missed call away from calling in a rescue op.” He tried to smirk, tried to soften it with humor, but it came out twisted. Worn.

“He knew you were up here somewhere. Who do you think called me?”

Keigo snorted before shaking his head slightly. Yeah, that makes sense. Fumikage could still use Dark Shadow to fly. Of course they’d call him for the search party.

“Look…are you gonna be alright?”

Fumikage gave a slow nod, though his eyes didn’t follow. They stayed on the skyline, wide and dark.

Keigo scrambled back down the wall without waiting for more.

His shoes scraped against the gravel as he walked towards the roof access door, each step felt heavier than the last. His shoulders hunched like he was still trying to fold something around himself that no longer existed.

If only Fumikage knew.

If only he knew what the Commission had really asked of him. Who they’d made him become. What he’d lost in the process—and what he’d left behind.

Keigo paused at the rooftop door, fingers hovering over the handle.

He could still see her sometimes. That damn smirk. The cigarette between her fingers. The way she’d called him “hero” like it was a curse. And God help him, the way her voice had sounded the last time they’d spoken—low, terrified, they way she’d begged him for mercy like he was some type of monster.

But he supposed that’s because he is one.

He’d buried all of it. Or at least tried.

But now with the world starting to settle, it was finally starting to claw its way back up, and he was absolutely powerless to stop it.

Chapter Text

12 Months Earlier

You sighed as you sank into the sofa, arms crossed and brow furrowed as your eyes swept across the oversized room you’d somehow ended up in. Towering windows let in far too much light, exposing bookshelves that lined every wall—each one cluttered with untouched books, their spines faded and thick with dust. For a space so large, it felt suffocating. Hollow.

Sometimes you found yourself missing that stupid bar more than you cared to admit.

“What’re you doing over here, Vix?” a gravelly voice drawled from behind you—just before something bumped against your head.

Dabi.

He rested his chin there, black hair brushing the sensitive tips of your ears. You grimaced at the sensation, flattening them back as you ducked under the weight of him.

“Dabi, how many times do I have to tell you—don’t touch my damn ears. And you know that’s not my name!”

“They’re just so pretty,” he drawled, voice dripping with mock innocence as his fingers skimmed the sensitive tips. He pulled back just in time to avoid your bite, the grin on his stitched face widening. “C’mon, don’t be like that. I’m just tryin’ to bond.”

“Try that again and I’ll show you how good I am at dismembering people I don’t like,” you muttered, folding your arms and leaning into the opposite arm of the couch.

Dabi just stretched out, legs wide, eyes glittering like he was half amused, half interested in testing your patience again. “You say that, but I think you’ve got a soft spot for me. Admit it.”

“I have a soft spot for chloroform. Want me to prove it?”

He snorted a laugh. “That’s the spirit.”

You both froze, glancing toward the sound of the door creaking open across the room.

Twice strolled in first, ranting loudly about some stupid nonsense you couldn’t quite make out—something about masks and eating soup again. Hawks followed a step behind, looking effortlessly relaxed in that way that always made your skin crawl. Hands in his pockets. That cocky half-smile on his lips. Watching everything.

You leaned toward Dabi without looking at him.

“I thought he was your boyfriend,” you muttered under your breath. “Spends an awful lot of time with Twice instead of plowing you into a mattress.”

The glare Dabi shot you could’ve burned holes through steel. His jaw ticked, and for a second, you could’ve sworn you saw blue sparks flicker in the corner of his eye.

“I don’t swing that way, Vixen.”

“Not my name,” you snapped, arms crossing tightly over your chest as your ears flicked back in annoyance. “Stop calling me that.”

Dabi leaned in with a slow smirk, voice a rough whisper meant just for you. “You growl like a fox. You’ve got ears like a fox. What the hell do you want me to call you? Kitten?”

You shot him a withering look, but didn’t bother replying. The last thing you needed was to fuel that fire.

Especially not with Hawks in the damn room.

“What the hell were you even thinking, bringing him into this?” you muttered, eyes locked on the winged man across the room.

Your gaze lingered, sharp and assessing. He didn’t notice at first, too focused on whatever Twice was muttering in his ear. But then, as if sensing you, he turned.

Golden eyes met yours.

You froze for a split second—just long enough to catch the subtle tilt of his head and the nervous, almost sheepish smile he sent your way before quickly glancing elsewhere. You weren’t sure if you were imagining it, but—

Were the tips of his ears… pink?

Was he blushing?

“What do you mean?” Dabi’s voice cut in, flat and serious. You turned back to find him watching you closely, like he hadn’t missed the exchange. “He’s a great asset.”

“He’s also one of the top five heroes in the entire country,” you shot back, folding your arms. “You’re either naive, reckless, or fucking stupid if you think he’s actually on our side.”
Dabi scoffed, leaning back against the wall. “Skeptic’s got him bugged. Every feather, every breath—being tracked in real time.”

“Oh, well, that makes me feel so much better,” you replied dryly, rolling your eyes. “Because heroes are totally incapable of playing the long game.”
Dabi’s jaw tensed slightly. “He’s useful.”

“He’s dangerous.”

“So am I.”

You stared at Dabi for a long moment before finally rolling your eyes and looking away.

“I’ll leave you to it, Dangerous,” you muttered, flicking your ears in annoyance as you pushed yourself off the sofa. You’d come to this room looking for quiet—and between Bird-Brain and the literal human dumpster fire lounging across from you, that clearly wasn’t fucking happening.

“You still going out tonight?” Dabi asked, voice casual.

You let out a short, dry laugh. “Of course I am. We’re low on a few things.”

You tossed a hand up in a lazy wave as you started walking toward the door, already checking out of the conversation.

But then—

“The PLF’s fronting the bill now, Vix,” Dabi called after you. “We don’t need you stealing and scavenging anymore. And we definitely don’t need you out there picking pockets. The last thing I need is to have to bail your ass out of trouble.”

You froze.

It hit harder than you expected, like a sucker punch you didn’t see coming. You stood still for a beat, your back to him, the words sitting heavy in your chest.

So that was it.

Sure, there was money now. Real structure. No more desperate runs for bread or quietly smuggled meds. Your usefulness had an expiration date, apparently. And maybe you’d already passed it.

You glanced up, surprised to find Hawks staring at you. His brow was furrowed, head tilted slightly, eyes scanning you like he was trying to solve a puzzle he didn’t have all the pieces to. You glared back, ears flattening as a snarl threatened to rise in your throat.

Without a word, you pushed past him, ignoring Twice’s smart-ass remark about the danger of pissing off foxes.

The last thing you needed was pity—especially from someone who needed it far more than you ever would.

He lived his life on a leash.

You were born free.

And just because he ended up wearing the title of hero didn’t change a damn thing.

Chapter Text

He blinked in confusion as a low growl rumbled from her throat. His wings twitched instinctively, ruffling slightly as she shoved past him without so much as a glance.

What the hell had he done wrong? Most women would have already fallen at his feet at the lengths he’d just taken to try and catch her damn eye.

Hadn’t she seen him blush? Forcing a physical reaction like that wasn’t easy—and now he’d wasted it. On nothing.

He grimaced.

Ugh.

“Dangerous to piss off foxes, you know!” Twice called out helpfully from somewhere behind him.

Keigo didn’t respond. He just stared after her, scowling faintly as his feathers slowly settled.

He’d underestimated how hard this mission was going to be, lulled into a false sense of confidence simply because his mark was a woman.

Stupid.

He should’ve known better by now.

This entire undercover operation had been a shit show from the start.

Trying to gain Dabi’s trust alone had meant jumping through hoop after hoop—bullshit missions, impossible errands—and even after all of it, that black-haired bastard still didn’t trust him.

So really, he shouldn’t have been surprised when the Commission sat him down the morning before Skeptic had bugged his feathers. A thick file was slammed down in front of him before he could so much as say hello.

“Change of plans,” the President said coldly, heels clicking against the floor as she moved past him to stand in front of the towering windows behind her desk. The glass glared like ice.

“We need to switch tactics. Something more... intimate.”

Keigo stared at the back of her head, already dreading whatever came next. “Define ‘intimate.’”

“Seduce the target.”

“Seduce?” The word hit like venom on his tongue.

It came out sharp—too hot, too fast. As if the word itself burned. As if it didn’t belong anywhere near the hell he was already navigating. Well because it fucking didn’t.

He didn’t look away as she stood there, her silhouette outlined by pale light.

“Yes, Hawks. Seduce,” she repeated with a tired sigh, like she was asking him to file paperwork and not sell off the last pieces of himself for a cause he wasn’t even sure he believed in anymore.

He clenched his jaw, fingers curling around the edge of the file as he tried to choke down the rising bitterness.

“So now you want me to fuck him?” he asked coldly. “Running errands for him wasn’t degrading enough?”

“You better watch that attitude,” she snapped, finally turning to face him. Her glare was sharp enough to slice.

He wanted to meet it. Wanted to jut his chin forward, demand even a shred of the respect he was owed after everything he’d done. But he knew better.

He was a puppet. He moved when they pulled the strings.

She folded her arms, voice colder now. “If you’d stop jumping to conclusions at your trademark speed and actually read, you’d see the target isn’t Dabi.”

She gestured toward the folder with a tilt of her head.

“In fact,” she added, something unreadable flickering in her eyes, “I have a feeling you’ll like this one much better.”

Keigo’s fingers twitched slightly before he flipped the file open, the paper inside smooth and cold beneath his touch.

Top page: target profile.

Female. Early twenties. Fox-type mutation quirk. Known aliases: Vixen.
Affiliation: loosely tied to the Paranormal Liberation Front through Dabi.
Role: non-combatant, information runner, suspected handler of coded communications.

The word non-combatant made something in his gut twist. That wasn’t a role, they were simply labeling her as expendable.

He turned the page.

And there she was.

The photo wasn’t official. Grainy, candid, probably taken during some stupid surveillance op. She was sitting on the edge of a rooftop, the curve of her spine elegant, one leg swinging over the ledge. Ears perked forward, expression unreadable. Sharp eyes, faint smirk. Like she already knew the camera was there and didn’t care.

Something about her radiated freedom. Wild. Untouchable. Everything he wished he could be, but wasn’t allowed to.

Jealousy curled in his gut, ugly and sudden. It wasn’t just envy…it was ache. That bitter, gnawing kind that whispered about who he might’ve been if the world had let him grow instead of forging him into a blade.

She didn’t look dangerous. At least not in the way the Commission usually flagged targets. But that made her worse. There was something effortless about the way she existed in the margins—unbothered, unafraid, maybe even unaware of the quiet power she carried.

They were going to use her.

And he was the tool.

He flipped the page, forcing himself to skim the attached report: recent sightings, quirk classification, behavioral patterns, names of contacts. Her quirk wasn’t particularly strong—minor sensory distortion, subtle misdirection, auditory confusion. More effective in crowds or during pursuit. Not built for offense. Not built for survival in the war that was coming.

They wanted her because of who she knew, not what she could do.

He closed the folder and leaned back in the chair, scrubbing a hand over his face. His feathers were twitching, reacting to something he didn’t want to name.

Another pawn. Another fake relationship. Another fucking life on the line because somehow despite everything he’d been through, he knew how to smile pretty enough to make people trust him.

“So… why her?” Keigo asked, his tone edged with skepticism as he flipped through the file. He scanned the brief summary of her quirk again—heightened reflexes, sharp hearing, enhanced night vision, and exceptional balance. All typical traits for a fox-type heteromorph.

Nothing unusual. Nothing dangerous.

No energy blasts. No manipulation. No illusions or mind games. Just physical adaptations—a quick-footed, sharp-eared fox girl who probably would’ve been better suited as a courier or a scout than anything frontline.

He flipped to the next page, expecting something hidden. Some type of red-flag note, maybe even a buried report that proved she was more than she seemed.

But, no. Nothing.

Just sightings. Movement logs. A few photos of her with Dabi or slipping out of League meeting spots alone.

Keigo frowned. “She’s not even a combatant,” he muttered. “Not a threat. There’s no reason for her to be on any Commission radar.”

The President didn’t respond immediately, just turned back to the window, hands clasped behind her back.

“She moves freely,” she said at last. “Between cells. Between factions. Most importantly, Dabi trusts her.”

Keigo let the file drop closed in his hands.

“She’s just a courier,” he said flatly. “She doesn’t even look like she belongs in this.”

“She’s a thread,” the President corrected. “And if you pull the right thread, the whole tapestry unravels. And right now, a thread with Dabi is exactly what we need.”

He didn’t answer.

Instead, he looked down at the photo again—the one of her perched on that rooftop, expression unreadable. Not a soldier. Not a weapon. Just someone who looked like the world hadn’t gotten its claws all the way into her yet.

Yet.

Little did she know soon it would. His talons would sink into her at the orders of the government.

He sighed, frowning as his fingers gripped the file tightly. “Guess I better get charming.”

And fuck, he tried.

But nothing ever seemed to get him any closer to making real progress. It was frustrating in a way he couldn’t explain, mostly because he wasn’t used to the charm not working. Most girls practically melted just from him looking in their direction.

But her?

She hated it.

Ears pinned back. Constant growls. Glares that could skin a man alive.

And yet… he’d be a total fucking liar if he said he wasn’t starting to enjoy the challenge.

“Dangers aside,” Dabi’s voice cut in, slicing through Twice’s rambling about chickens and foxes, “you’re not gonna get far with that one.”

Keigo glanced over as Dabi lit a cigarette, his icy-blue eyes sharp and unreadable.

“You should just quit while you’re ahead.”

“Didn’t seem like you were doing much better over there,” Keigo said coolly, nodding toward the doorway she had disappeared through. “What’s the matter, Dabi? Fox bite a little too hard for your liking?”

Dabi exhaled smoke through his nose, slow and steady, eyes narrowed in amusement.

“She doesn’t bite me,” he said simply, before smirking. “At least not yet.”

Keigo scoffed, crossing his arms loosely over his chest. “Sure. Keep telling yourself that, Romeo.”

“She’s not the kind you win over with cheap smiles and pretty eyes,” Dabi went on, flicking ash off the end of his cigarette. “She’s smart. She knows what attention really costs.”

Keigo’s jaw tensed, but he kept his tone easy. “You saying I don’t?”

“I’m saying you’re not half as smooth as you think you are,” Dabi said, voice low, eyes sharp as glass. “She sees through it. Hell, we all do. You’re just too arrogant to notice.”

Keigo shrugged, flashing a lazy grin. “If it bothers you that much, I’ll stop flirting.”

Dabi chuckled, dark and humorless. “Doesn’t bother me. Just don’t cry when she chews you up and spits you out.”

Keigo tilted his head slightly, feathers twitching at his back—instinct he hadn’t quite learned to suppress.

“Maybe I’m into that.”

Dabi smirked again, but there was something colder behind it now. Something calculating.

“Yeah,” he said, dropping the cigarette to the floor and grinding it under his heel. “Yeah, I bet you are. You look like you’re a sucker for pain.”

Then he turned and walked off, boots echoing down the hallway.

Keigo exhaled slowly and raked a hand through his hair, his smile fading as soon as Dabi was out of sight.

If only he fucking knew.

Chapter Text

Present Day

He sighed, dragging the next stack of paperwork off the top of the pile, his frown deepening as he skimmed yet another report from U.A. This one detailed the latest updates on the rebuilding efforts—more progress made by students barely old enough to vote, doing far more for their country than he was.

It made his fucking stomach turn.

Sidelined in an office, buried under paper and protocol, while actual children were out there helping restore the world he helped burn down.

Pathetic didn’t even begin to cover it.

“You look tired, son.”

The voice cut through the silence like a blade, making him flinch. His shoulders tensed as he instinctively reached toward his hip—only to remember there was nothing there to grab anymore.
No feathers. No weapons. No wings.

Just him. And a pile of ghosts.

Did he have a son now? A daughter?

He didn’t look up, his jaw clenched as he forced the thought down. “Don’t call me that.”

Mera stepped fully into the office, shutting the door behind him with a quiet click.

“You used to call me Dad when you wanted something,” he said mildly, arms folded across his chest.

Keigo didn’t bother to look up.

“Yeah,” he muttered. “Back when I was seven.”

But the bitterness in his voice didn’t match the truth.

Because it wasn’t just when he was a kid.

It was just months ago.

Back when he’d woken up in the hospital, wrecked and bleeding and barely alive. Back when he couldn’t move without pain screaming through his ribs, and the dull, phantom ache of wings that weren’t there anymore made him want to tear the world apart.

He’d opened his eyes to a ceiling he didn’t recognize. The light was too white, too sterile. His chest was tight, bandaged and bruised. He couldn’t breathe right—couldn’t think.

And then there was Mera.

Sitting beside him like he always had. Silent. Solid. Still in that dumb suit, tie loose, eyes red-rimmed and clearly exhausted. And when Keigo tried to speak, only a dry croak came out.

Mera had leaned in fast. “You’re okay,” he’d said, voice hoarse as he brushed Keigo’s hair back from his face. “You’re alright. You’re safe.”

But Keigo hadn’t felt safe. He felt shattered.

Useless. Grounded. Stripped of everything that made him what he was. Alone in a world he’d just almost died to protect.

And the weight of everything hit him all at once.

He’d reached out with shaking hands and fisted his fingers in Mera’s sleeve like a child. His breath hitched, a choked sob tearing from his throat as the tears finally broke loose, hot and silent.

“Mera…” he whispered, voice barely audible before he finally broke.

“Dad, I don’t wanna be alone.”

And Mera—

Mera didn’t even flinch. He didn’t tell him to toughen up or remind him he was a hero. He just leaned over the bed and held him. Let him cry.

Held him through the brokenness like someone who knew exactly how long it had been since Keigo had been allowed to fall apart. Because he did. He knew all too well.

Back in the present, Keigo blinked hard, dragging a hand down his face as he tried to shove the memory back down. His eyes burned. His chest ached with it.

Mera moved quietly, pulling the chair across from him and sitting down.

“You’re running yourself into the ground,” he said after a long moment. “And you’re not fooling anyone.”

Keigo forced a shrug. “I’ve got a lot of ground to cover.”
“You’re not the only one rebuilding you know.”

“Yeah? Well, no shit!” Keigo finally snapped, throwing the file he’d been looking at toward Mera roughly. “Children—CHILDREN—are rebuilding the world they helped save.”

The folder slapped against the desk between them, papers spilling out in a fan. Keigo’s breath was ragged, his eyes wild, fingers still curled like they wanted to throw more than just paper.

“They’re doing more than I am,” he said bitterly. “They actually matter out there. They’re real heroes. Everything I never got to be. And now I’ll never get to. I’m just some broken figurehead in a fucking glass tower, smiling for the cameras and pretending I’m not rotting from the inside fucking out.”

He stood suddenly, the chair behind him screeching across the floor. His hands gripped the edge of the desk so tightly his knuckles went white.

“I gave everything, Mera,” he said, voice cracking. “I gave them my wings. I gave them my fucking name. I let them use me like a damn weapon, like a—like a thing, and now they want me to keep pretending it was all worth it?”

Mera didn’t interrupt. He didn’t try to calm him. He just watched, quiet and steady, like he knew this had been waiting to come out for months.

Maybe even years.

Keigo let out a shuddering breath and started pacing, running both hands through his hair like he could claw the thoughts out of his head.

“They never cared what it cost me,” he muttered. “Not once. Just kept pushing. Hawks can take it. Hawks will do it. Smile. Bow. Lie through your fucking teeth, just don’t stop being useful.”

He stopped suddenly, facing the wall like he couldn’t bear to be seen. His shoulders were hunched, fists clenched at his sides.

“What did they ask you to do?” Mera asked quietly, his voice low but firm—laced with something so raw, so genuinely concerned, that it made Keigo flinch like he’d been struck.

“What are you talking ab—”

“Don’t play dumb. Not with me,” Mera cut in, stepping closer. “What did they ask you to do that’s been eating you alive? That’s made you hollow yourself out like this? You’re unraveling, Keigo. And I’ve let you spiral because I thought you just needed some time, but this…this isn’t time. This is self-destruction.”

Keigo’s throat worked as he swallowed, his eyes fixed on the blank wall in front of him.

“I did what I was told,” he said finally, voice tight. “Same as always.”

“But something changed,” Mera pushed, voice gentler now. “This isn’t just guilt over the war. This is deeper. More personal.”

Keigo’s fingers twitched. He let out a shaky breath but didn’t turn around.

“I can’t tell you,” he said quietly. “You wouldn’t understand.”

Mera didn’t move, didn’t press. He just stood there, the silence stretching like a wound between them.

“Try me,” he said. “Please.”

And for a long moment, Keigo said nothing at all. Just stood there, unmoving, as the weight of a thousand unspoken truths pressed down like lead.

His chest heaved once, then again—until a sob punched out of him, sudden and brutal.

“I didn’t want to hurt her,” he whispered, the words tumbling out like a confession he hadn’t meant to speak. “I didn’t mean to…I didn't know it would end like this—”

He choked, dragging in a shaky breath as his knees buckled forward slightly.

And Mera moved instantly.

He caught him before he could fall, arms steady around Keigo’s frame as the younger man collapsed into him.

“I didn’t mean to,” Keigo sobbed, fingers twisting into Mera’s coat. “I didn’t mean for any of it to happen, I swear—I just wanted to do my job—”

“Hey. You’re okay,” Mera murmured, one hand moving up to the back of his head, holding him close. “You’re okay, son. I’ve got you. Whatever it is, we will fix it. I got you.”

Keigo didn’t believe him.

But he clung to him anyway, like if he just held tight enough, something in him might finally stop unraveling.

Chapter Text

12 Months Earlier

You pressed your back to the cool brick wall, chest rising and falling as your ears twitched, straining for any sound of footsteps. When you finally caught them—measured, deliberate, heading straight toward you—you let out a breath you hadn’t realized you were holding.

You’d been worried for a second there. Thought maybe you’d taken a wrong turn a few alleys back. So fucking embarrassing. You used to know these streets like the back of your damn hand. Had Redestro’s endless handouts made you soft?

The answer was obvious, and it made your damn teeth clench.

You hated what you’d let yourself become in the last few weeks.

Complacent. Dull. Comfortable. All that sushi and chicken? Fucking bribes. Bought obedience in the form of full stomachs. Let Dabi enjoy his bottomless soba bowls; if he wanted to play pet on Shigaraki’s leash, that was his problem. No wonder him and the bird brain wonder got along so damn well.

Well not you. You weren’t about to roll over and play house for fascists.

You weren’t anyone’s damn pet.

You inhaled slowly, centering yourself, letting your nerves sharpen into focus. The footsteps were close now—just a few more beats—

Now.

You spun the corner harder than necessary, crashing into a warm body with the perfect amount of force to sell it as an accident. Your hands moved on instinct. Swift, practiced, like a forgotten reflex slipping back into muscle memory. A quick bump, a fumble, a flash of your fingers—

“Oh my god, I’m so sorry!” you gasped, all wide eyes and fake innocence. Ears low. Shoulders curled. You even blinked up at him sweetly, like you didn’t just snatch his wallet in the collision. The outfit helped, of course. Just enough thigh, just enough curve.

He grunted and waved you off with a distracted, annoyed huff. Rich. Dumb. Perfect.

You slipped away before the idiot even realized he’d been lighter by a few thousand yen.

Feet quiet on the pavement, you ducked into the next alley, heart racing—not from nerves, but from the thrill of the grab. That familiar high you hadn’t felt in far too long. It was like slipping back into an old skin. Comfortable. Natural. You grinned as you pressed your back to the wall, pulling the stolen wallet free.

“Let’s see what kind of day I’m having,” you muttered, flipping it open with a practiced flick of your fingers.

Thick wad of bills. No card blockers. Two credit chips and a receipt for a ridiculously overpriced seafood dinner.

You laughed under your breath, counting the cash quickly, eyes gleaming in the low light. “Bless your greedy little heart, salaryman.”

But your amusement flickered out as your ears twitched. Just a shift in the air. A featherlight breeze where there shouldn’t be one.

Your smile dropped. Was he seriously still fucking watching you? You’d thought you’d lost him like three alleyways back.

“Alright, birdbrain,” you growled, snapping the wallet shut. “You can come out now. I know you’re there.”

You didn’t even turn around. Just crossed your arms and tapped your boot against the concrete, ears pinned flat and tail twitching with irritation.

“Or do you want me to start listing every time you’ve watched me work tonight? ’Cause I know damn well this wasn’t the first.”

“You knew I was here the whole time,” Hawks said as he stepped out from the shadows, arms crossed, one brow raised. “And you still had the audacity to rob that poor guy blind?”

You didn’t even flinch. Just rolled your eyes and tucked the wallet into your waistband with a smug flick of your fingers.

“Oh, please,” you scoffed. “He’ll cancel the cards before his Uber even gets him home, and the cash? Spare change for someone like him. I’m not out here picking pockets in the slums.”

Hawks gave you a look—half judgment, half begrudging amusement.

“You say that like it’s noble.”

You flashed him a grin, fangs just barely showing. “No, I say that like it’s efficient.”

“I’ll give it to you, you’re pretty brave, acting like that with a top ranked hero around, Robin Hood,” he said with a low chuckle.

You snarled, tail flicking sharply against the pavement. “Is that a joke? Because I’m a fox?” You stepped forward, ears pinned. “Really leaning into the Disney bullshit now? You do realize how offensive that is, especially coming from another heteromorph.”

He held his hands up, half-laughing. “Relax. Robin Hood’s usually just a guy in a green hat. You’re the one who jumped straight to the cartoon.”

Your cheeks flushed, and you hated how fast he turned it around. Damn it—he was good at this. Too good. You bared your teeth in frustration, trying to shove the heat out of your face and replace it with fire instead.

He was watching you too closely, like he knew he’d gotten under your skin, and that only pissed you off more.

You straightened, lifting your chin in defiance, words already loaded on your tongue like a bullet in the chamber.

“Yeah, well,” you snapped, voice edged like glass, “a real hero wouldn’t be jumping into bed with Dabi, just so you know. So why would I worry about you watching at all?”

The humor bled from his face in an instant.

“What the hell?” he snapped, stiffening. “I’m not sleeping with Dabi.”

You raised an eyebrow, unimpressed. “Could’ve fooled me. You two have been inseparable lately. What, he keeping you on a leash now? Trading your Commission collar for a villain’s pearl necklace instead?”

There it was—that flicker of something behind his eyes. Offense. Offense and something else. His jaw clenched, and the feathers at his back rustled like they were trying to warn you.

Good, you thought. Let him get mad. You wanted him mad.

It was easier than trying to figure out why he’d been following you all night. Easier to ask why he was pretending to blush at you when you looked at him. Easier than asking why he looked so fucking tired when he thought no one was watching. Easier than wondering why he hadn’t turned you into the Commission already.

“You think you’ve got everyone wrapped around your little wings,” you continued, flicking your tail behind you, tone sharp. “But you’re just another government bird with clipped feathers.”

He gave a short laugh, obviously forced. But his eyes didn’t match it.

“You really believe that, huh?”

You nodded once, firm. “I’ve met plenty of Commission dogs. You all smell the same.”

Keigo’s grin faltered for a moment. Then, something changed. The anger left his eyes. His wings shifted behind him—not aggressive. Not posturing. Just… heavy. Like they were weighed down by something neither of you could see.

“You ever stop and think that maybe I’m not proud of what I smell like?” he said, voice low. “That maybe you’re right. That my wings are clipped and I’m stuck just like you.”

That stopped you.

He looked at you then, really looked. Not with that smug little mask he always wore, but with something raw beneath it. Like the part of him he didn’t let anyone see, especially not someone like you.

“I didn’t choose any of this,” he murmured, shoving his hands in his pockets before turning to look up at the moon sadly. “But I play the role they gave me. I smile. I charm. I lie. Because if I don’t, someone else bleeds.”

You frowned.

“And what? You think that makes you different from the rest of us?” you asked, though your voice lacked its usual bite. “You think I haven’t had to lie? Had to play along? The only difference is, I never pretended I was doing it for anyone but myself.”

“No,” he said quietly. “The difference is you still have a self. You can use your real name if you wanted.”

You opened your mouth to respond—and nothing came out.

Because the way he said it…

It didn’t sound rehearsed. It didn’t sound smug or self-righteous. It didn’t sound like anything except true. Like a man who wasn’t trying to win. Just… explaining why he’d already lost.

And for a second—a single, stupid second—you didn’t hate him.

Didn’t see a feathered rat from the Commission or a top ranking hero.

You just saw a man.

Exhausted.

Fractured.

Lonely in a way you hadn’t expected from the most popular man in Japan.

You didn’t trust him. But hate? That slipped.

It scared you how fast it slipped.

He turned before you could get your walls back up, before you could find something cruel or cutting to say. He gave a lazy wave over his shoulder like the whole conversation hadn’t just cracked something wide open between you.

“Night, Vix.”

And then he was gone—just feathers in the wind, footsteps swallowed by the alley’s shadows.
And then silence.

You stood there for a moment longer than you meant to. Scoffed. Kicked the wall like that would somehow help.

Idiot.

Why the hell had you let that get to you? Why had your chest tightened like that at his words? Why had his voice sounded so…empty?

You reached down for the wallet, suddenly desperate to distract yourself from this weird feeling in your chest.

But then, your heart dropped.

No wallet.

You blinked. Patted yourself down just to be sure.

“No. No fucking way.”

You whirled toward the alley where he’d vanished, fury rising hot and fast in your chest.

“That smug son of a bitch!” you snarled, tail lashing as your hands clenched at your sides. “He stole it back?!”

Unbelievable. You’d played him like a fiddle all night, and somehow he still walked away with the last word—and your damn prize.

You should’ve been furious. And you were.

But under the burn of your pride, something else twisted in your gut. Something quieter and much more dangerous.

Because despite your frustration—despite how much he got under your damn skin—you couldn’t shake the lingering question suddenly echoing in the back of your mind.

Who the hell was Hawks, really?

Chapter Text

You weren’t following him.

You told yourself that—twice.

This was routine. Caution. Strategy. That’s what you were doing as you stalked two rooftops behind the Commission’s favorite canary, keeping low beneath the skyline shadows like a good little fox. That didn’t make you a stalker. It made you smart.

It wasn’t your fault he kept turning up where you were planning to be anyway.

But still, your tail twitched in irritation as he ducked around another corner, loose and utterly unbothered, like he had nowhere in particular to be. No orders to follow. No war at his back.

He looked… comfortable. And for some reason, that really pissed you off.

Because none of you were supposed to be comfortable anymore.

You stayed high, tracking his route. He stopped at a food stall, just something small and still open this late, run by an old couple with kind eyes and a battered countertop. You perched on a rusted fire escape, watching him exchange a few words, head slightly bowed.

You thought maybe he was buying for himself.

But then a kid ran past—scrawny, barefoot, looking like he hadn’t eaten in a day. Hawks quickly flagged him down, handed him the box of dumplings, and didn’t wait for a thank you.

The kid grinned like someone had handed him a miracle.

You blinked, then frowned. Because that didn’t look like Commission protocol.

That looked like something someone did just because they wanted to.

He didn’t linger. Just kept walking. Past neon bars and shuttered shops. Out past the safe zones of the city, toward the ruins that still hadn’t been cleaned up after the last assault. You followed in silence, the city slipping into quieter edges until all that remained were broken windows, peeling paint, and the ghost of something that used to be called peace.

Eventually, he stopped.

Not in some shady alley or under a flickering streetlight.

A rooftop. High up. Wide and empty except for the rusted skeleton of an old billboard and a bent antenna crackling in the breeze.

He was already sitting when you found him, legs dangling off the edge like some casual stray who didn’t realize the ground below could kill him. His wings were loose at his back—unfolded, unguarded. He didn’t look at you as you approached.

Didn’t move. Didn’t smirk.

Just flipped another page in the small black notebook in his lap.

You squinted. “You’re not gonna tell me to leave?”

He didn’t look up. “Would it work?”

You clicked your tongue. “Not even a little.”

“Didn’t think so.”

You hesitated, then dropped into a crouch a few feet away, tilting your head in curiosity. “What are you writing?”

He didn’t answer immediately. Just tapped his pen against the spine of the notebook like he was weighing something.

Then, without looking up, he said, “Porn.”

You blinked. “Excuse me?”

He finally turned to you, one brow raised, a lazy grin pulling at his mouth. “Just trying to see if you’d flinch.”

You snorted, lips curling into a wicked grin. “You think that’d scare me? Please. I’ve seen Dabi’s internet history.”

“Oh?” he drawled, unable to hide his grin. “That bad, huh?”

“Let’s just say chains and whips and unresolved daddy issues make for a dangerous combo.” You cocked your head, eyes glittering. “Though I bet you look real pretty when he’s got you tied up. Wing binding takes a lot of trust, you know.”

He sputtered, actually sputtered, the color draining from his face before rushing back in a flush. “I am not—that is—I am not sleeping with Dabi!”

You just blinked at him, feigning innocence while hiding your grin. “Touchy.”

“I already told you, I don’t swing that way,” he snapped, wings twitching sharply. “And even if I did—Dabi? Seriously?”

“Relax. It’s a joke,” you said, even if your tone still carried a little bite.

He rolled his eyes—just a little—but the tension in his shoulders eased. Then, without a word, he reached out and patted the empty space beside him.

An invitation. One you weren’t really sure you wanted to accept.

You stayed frozen for a beat too long, staring at the patch of gravel like it might bite you instead. Your stomach twisted, a knot forming somewhere deep you didn’t want to acknowledge. It was that crack again—the one he’d somehow made in your armor the last time you talked. You thought you’d patched it, reinforced it, moved on.

But there it was again. Growing. Spreading.

And all he had to do was blink those soft, amber eyes like he didn’t know what he was doing.

“I don’t bite,” he added, his voice quieter now. Softer. Like he meant it.

Then he smiled—nervous, almost shy. Like he wasn’t the damn top-ranking Pro Hero infiltrating a villain hideout. Like he was just a guy sitting on a rooftop, trying not to scare off a stray.

You didn’t want to admit it, but something about that smile made your chest ache in a way you didn’t know how to brace for.

So, slowly, reluctantly, you crossed the distance and lowered yourself beside him. Not too close. Not touching. But close enough to feel the warmth rolling off his body. Close enough to hear his next exhale.

“…I bite,” you said after a pause, deadpan.

“Good. I hope so,” he replied without missing a beat.

Your cheeks flushed instantly, and you hated that it happened. Hated it even more when his grin widened, smug but not cruel. He was more amused than anything else. He chuckled under his breath and shook his head like he couldn’t believe you’d given him that reaction so easily.

You turned away, scowling at the horizon like it had personally betrayed you.

But he didn’t press. Just leaned back a little and looked down at the small black notebook in his hands. The teasing faded from his face, replaced with something quieter. Thoughtful. He tapped his pen against the page like he was trying to coax the words out of it, brows furrowed, lips slightly parted in concentration.

The notebook was worn, the leather soft from use. The corners were creased, and the strap was frayed like it had been opened and closed a hundred times. You leaned slightly, eyes narrowing.

It wasn’t a book. Not something pre-printed or issued. The pages looked blank from this angle. It looked…handwritten. Carefully. Deliberately.

Your ears twitched before you even realized you were speaking.

“A…journal?”

“Kinda, but not really.”

You tilted your head, watching him. “So what is it, then?”

He glanced down at the leather-bound pages in his lap, fidgeting slightly with the edge of one.

“It’s just… stuff,” he said finally. “Thoughts I don’t know where else to put. Things I need to remember. Or forget.”

The words weren’t dramatic. But they sat heavy in the air between you, like they meant more than he wanted them to.

You looked away first, swallowing hard as your boots scraped against the rooftop gravel. You didn’t know what to say to that. Honestly, what could you say?

And then you felt movement. A shuffle beside you. Something warm nudged against your hand.

You looked down.

The notebook.

He was offering it to you.

Slowly. Almost like he might change his mind if you so much as blinked wrong.

You blinked anyway. “Seriously?”

“If you laugh,” he muttered, staring dead ahead, “I’ll throw you off the roof.”

You snorted despite yourself, fingers closing around the notebook gently. Like it might vanish if you held it too tight.

“No pressure,” you said dryly, flipping the cover open with your thumb.

But your voice was softer now. And your heart?

Your heart was stupidly, infuriatingly loud in your chest.

You flipped the notebook open slowly, expecting… you didn’t know. Coordinates. Surveillance notes. Maybe some kind of coded Commission bullshit.

But what you found wasn’t that.

The handwriting was surprisingly neat—blocky, careful strokes that looked nothing like the man beside you. Nothing like the chaos of feathers and cocky grins and sharp-edged deflections.

You turned the first page.

It wasn’t a log.

It was… a poem.

Not a good one. The meter was off and the rhyme leaned juvenile—but it was raw. Honest in a way that made your chest feel too tight.
“They said my wings made me lucky.
Said I could go anywhere.
But no one ever taught me where ‘free’ actually was.
Only how far I could be sent.”

You blinked. Your fingers hovered over the page, reluctant to turn it, but curious enough to keep going.

More poems. Short phrases. Some crossed out so violently they left tears in the paper. Others half-finished, like the words had dried up mid-thought.

One page was just a list.
“Things I’ve Pretended to Be:
Grateful

Okay

Loyal

Safe

Human”

Another just said:
“No one notices the cage when it’s made of gold.”

You swallowed hard.

“Not what you expected?” His voice was light, almost teasing, but you could hear the edge under it. The vulnerability he was trying so damn hard to pretend wasn’t there.

You glanced over at him. His gaze was still fixed on the skyline, but his jaw was tight. His wings had drawn in closer to his body, no longer as relaxed as before.

“No,” you admitted softly. “Not even a little.”

You looked back down at the pages. At the honest, bruised thoughts spilled in black ink.

Without thinking you reached over, holding your hand open for the pen. He blinked at you in curiosity, head tilting in a way that had to be avian before he dropped the writing utensil into your grasp.

“You said this is for things you want to forget sometimes too, right?” You asked and he blinked at you, drawing his brows together.

“Yes?”

You took a slow breath and turned to the last empty page in the journal, clicking the pen once before putting it to paper. The ink dragged a little—cheap ballpoint—but that didn’t matter. You wrote quickly, with confidence, and didn’t look up until you were done.

Then you handed it back to him.

He took the notebook slowly, eyes narrowing as he flipped to the page you’d filled. You watched his gaze scan your writing, his brow furrowing more and more with every word until—

He choked.

“…What the hell?”

You fought the grin clawing its way to your mouth. “You said you wanted to forget things, right? Trust me. I’d paid money to forget this.”

He looked back down at the list, incredulous.
Dabi’s Internet Searches:
— ‘Can you microwave a fleshlight’
— ‘How to fake your death with dental records’
— ‘Fireproof rope bondage tutorial’
— ‘Daddy Dom trench coat fashion’
— ‘Does blood ruin suede?’
— ‘What’s the difference between cremation and incineration?’

“Are these…are these real?” Hawks demanded, laughter starting to crack through his voice.

“I wish I was creative enough to make them up,” you said, shrugging. “I walked past his laptop once. Trauma.”

He was laughing now, for real. Head tipped back, wings shaking slightly as the sound echoed off the rooftop. It wasn’t his usual cocky bark, either. It was genuine. Bright. Alive.

And something about that, seeing him like that, made your chest tighten in a way you weren’t prepared for.

He wiped at his eye, still chuckling. “That last one. Seriously?”

You raised an eyebrow. “I’m not even sure if he was planning a murder or just figuring out how to clean his boots.”

He snorted again, flipping the notebook closed and tapping it against his thigh. Then, quieter:

“Thanks.”

You didn’t say anything.

You just leaned back on your hands, eyes drifting to the sky.

And for the first time all week… you didn’t feel like running.

Chapter Text

Present Day

His head was pounding, his mouth dry, and there was a sharp ache in his back from sleeping curled on something too stiff to be a bed. His eyes blinked open slowly, adjusting to the soft gray light filtering through the light-blue curtains.

He wasn’t in the hospital. Wasn’t in the office either.

His apartment.

The realization struck slow and sluggish, like a stone sinking through mud.

The last thing he remembered was losing it—really losing it—in front of Mera. Screaming. Crying. Falling apart in a way he hadn’t let himself do in years.

The memory burned in his chest like shame.

He groaned and rubbed at his face, sitting up with a wince. He was still in his work clothes—shirt wrinkled, tie loosened and crooked, and jacket draped over the back of the chair in his room like someone had tossed it there in a rush. Probably Mera.

He blinked blearily at the bottle of water on his side table, knowing it wouldn’t do nearly enough to quiet the pounding in his head. Still, he reached for it, groaning at the effort, before dragging the drawer open in search of painkillers.

His fingers sifted through the usual clutter, loose change, bent paperclips, before stalling on something soft and familiar. Leather.

He froze.

The notebook.

He hadn’t touched it since the war. It had been on him during the fight—stuffed into a pocket out of habit, the weight barely noticeable under everything else. The hospital staff had returned it in a crumpled paper bag with the rest of his belongings, and he’d taken one look before tossing it into the drawer like it might bite him.

He hadn’t wanted to think about it then.

He sure as hell didn’t want to now.

And yet… here it was.

Waiting.

He swallowed hard and pulled it free, the worn cover warm against his palm like it remembered him. Adjusting against the headboard, he let it rest in his lap, his thumb tracing the weathered seam. Even closed, it felt heavier than it should.

He took a breath before opening it, frowning as he flipped through the pages. Poems about how he wasn’t free, names of people the commission had asked him to take down, randomly scattered in margins. Thoughts that made no sense until finally he paused.

He sucked in a breath, his chest tight as he stared down at the page in front of him. The first time she’d ever used the notebook. Dabi’s old Internet history, and despite the ache in his chest he couldn’t help but snort at the writing.

He turned the page again, little notes from her now.

You should really hide this better, Featherbrain. Took me all of thirty seconds.

He huffed, turning the page. A little later:

I read one of your “poems.” Pretty sure I lost brain cells. Do you actually talk like this when no one’s listening?

Beneath it, in his tight scrawl: Stop taking my book. Letting you look once, isn’t permission to take.

Her response in the margin: Make me.

It continued like this for pages, somehow his notebook had become their notebook.

At first it was just bickering. Insults, petty jabs, the kind of thing you wrote when you didn’t want to admit you cared enough to say it out loud. But then it shifted.

Do you ever just… look at a place and know you’ll never see it again? she’d written once, tucked between two lines of his half-finished notes and scribbles.

He’d answered, a day or two later: Every time I leave one behind.

Another page was hers entirely:

The streets were too quiet tonight. Didn’t like it. Felt wrong. Stayed up until the sun came back just to make sure I’d still be here for it.

In the space below, he’d written: I know that feeling.

There were lighter ones, too:

Your handwriting is atrocious.

And yet, you keep reading it.

Do you even know how to cook?

No, but I’m great at takeout.

Sometimes there were gaps of days or weeks — his notes filling whole pages before hers appeared again, almost like she’d been waiting for the right moment to slip something between the lines.

Near the back, she’d drawn something in the corner: a badly sketched bird, its wings outstretched, carrying a fox by the scruff of its neck.

Beneath it, she’d written: Don’t drop me.

He’d replied in his neatest handwriting: Not planning to.

And then, a few pages later, her ink trailed off mid-thought. He blinked as he ran a finger over the words with a frown.

He hadn’t seen this one before

I think maybe I—

It stopped there, but below it, in the empty space was a small sketch. Drawn in the same blue pen — two stick figures, one with little slashes of wings, the other with ears and a tail.

They weren’t fighting, or running, or doing anything that belonged in either of their worlds.

Just sitting side by side on a crooked line meant to be a roof.

A crooked little heart hovered above them.

Keigo’s hand stilled on the page.

It was stupid. Childish. The kind of thing you scribble on the back of a napkin while you’re bored.

But for some reason, his chest went tight.

She’d drawn them.

Not Hawks and the fox girl the Commission wanted him to cozy up to.

Not the hero and the criminal.

Just… two people. Two people who didn’t belong to either world. Two people who were broken, but together might’ve been whole.

He snapped the journal shut so hard the sound cracked in the quiet, shoving it back into the drawer like the leather was searing his skin. His chest felt tight, his stomach twisting into something ugly and sharp.

When had she written that? When had she drawn it?

How close to the raid?

How long had those words been sitting there—waiting for him to find—before he’d ripped everything apart and handed her over to the worst version of himself?

Before he betrayed her in every way.

“Fuck,” he breathed, the word strangled.

He pushed off the bed too fast, feet tangling in the sheets as he stumbled toward the bathroom. His shoulder slammed into the doorframe, but he barely felt it before dropping to his knees. He gripped the toilet bowl like it was the only thing keeping him grounded and heaved, bile burning up his throat until his eyes stung.

Honestly he should’ve known. He’d actually have to eat something to throw up anything of substance.

When it was over, he stayed there. His forehead pressed to the cool porcelain, breaths coming rough and uneven, because the thought of looking at that notebook again made him feel like he’d vomit all over.

Chapter Text

11 Months Earlier

Hawks hadn’t been around lately.

You hadn’t meant to notice, hadn’t meant to care, but of course you had. Even with all the ridiculous courier runs Dabi had been sending you on lately, that stupid journal he’d shown you kept sneaking back into your head.

It was infuriating. How could a man with so much freedom feel that fucking trapped? How bad was the hero life really?

The lock gave a soft click beneath your pick. You eased the door open, pulse steady despite the fact you were absolutely not supposed to be here.

“Planning on stealing his wallet or something?”

The voice came from the shadows—low, rasping, and amused. You froze mid-step, tail flicking once before you exhaled through your nose.

“Dabi,” you said coldly, not even bothering to turn all the way around.

He pushed off the wall, grin curling sharp. “Guessing that’s a no, but I’d still love to hear the explanation for why you’re breaking into Bird Boy’s room.”

“None of your business.”

“Mm.” He stepped closer, eyes flicking to the half-open door. “See, that’s where you’re wrong. Around here, everything is my business. Especially when it involves golden boy.”

“So you’re fucking him?” you asked, tail flicking lazily as you cut your eyes toward him from the corner of your gaze.

“Maybe.” Dabi’s shrug was infuriatingly casual. He leaned in, brushing his fingers along the sensitive fur at the edge of your ear, grin spreading when you stiffened. “Wish it was you instead.”

Your lip curled. “Anyone ever tell you you’re a fucking creep?”

He chuckled, low and unbothered. “Daily. Still doesn’t stop me from wanting what I want.”

“Get lost. You reek of cheap cigarettes and bad decisions.” You scoffed, nudging the door open just wide enough to slip a glance inside.

The mess caught you first. Not dirty—just chaotic, like someone who’d built a nest instead of a bedroom. The comforter was half on the mattress, half spilling to the floor, layered over what looked like three other blankets tangled beneath it. A ridiculous amount of pillows were shoved to one side, some stacked, some crumpled like he’d dragged them around in his sleep.

Shiny trinkets glinted from random corners—coins, keychains, even a broken watch—things that made no sense until you remembered he was part bird, after all. Papers were scattered across the desk in an avalanche of half-finished notes, their edges curled and corners dog-eared.

The whole place screamed lived-in, not staged. Not the tidy, hero-perfect image you expected from Hawks.

“Jesus,” Dabi muttered, pushing the door wider with his boot. His eyes skimmed the chaos before he gave a low whistle.

“Messy little nest. Figures.” He glanced over his shoulder at you, smirk tugging. “But hey, you’re not exactly in the position to judge anyone’s bad decisions.”

You narrowed your eyes. “What the hell is that supposed to mean?”

“You really think it’s smart hanging around him so much?” His voice was casual, but the way he said him made your stomach tighten. “I’ve seen the way you look at him. Like he’s some kind of savior.”

Your ears flicked back, irritation prickling. “You don’t know what you’re talking about.”

“Don’t I?” His grin came sharp, humorless. “You’re really gonna stand there and tell me you haven’t been trailing him like some pathetic little puppy?”

“I have not!” you snapped, tail flicking in irritation.

“Vix, c’mon.” Dabi’s scoff was sharp enough to cut. “You think I don’t see it? Sneaking out after him like clockwork, creeping back in with that stupid glow like he said something worth a damn.” He leaned closer, lowering his voice until it was almost a snarl. “The way you hang on his every word from across the room when he’s shooting the shit with Twice. Laughing at his weak jokes like they’re comedy gold? It’s disgusting.”

You clenched your fists, but he wasn’t done.

“He’s not some storybook hero, y’know. He’s the worst kind of them. Smiles like it means something, says all the right things, makes you think he’s different. But he’s not. He’s a Commission dog, same as the rest, only better trained. You think those golden-boy eyes of his are looking at you?” His lip curled. “They’re looking for the next order. The next leash tug. You’re just—” he gestured lazily at you, dripping contempt, “a distraction. Something shiny to toy with until he remembers what he really is.”

The words stung more than you wanted to admit.

Dabi’s smirk widened, sharp and merciless. “And you? You’re eating it up. Makes me sick to watch you fall for it.”

“You’re being mean for no reason.”

“No,” he said, low and even, “I’m being honest.”

He turned toward the door, the firelight of his eyes dimming into something colder. “That bird’ll make you feel like you’re flying, Vix. Higher than you’ve ever been. And then he’ll drop you. Break you on purpose. Because that’s what heroes like him do. Pretend they care, then cut you wide open.”

Your pulse skipped, but he didn’t linger.

“At least with me, you’d know what you’re getting,” he added, one hand already on the handle. “Fire, ash, revenge. Ugly truth. Not pretty lies.”

He gave a lazy wave over his shoulder, the gesture mocking. “But go on, keep chasing your golden boy. Just don’t cry to me when he burns you worse than I ever could.”

And with that, he was gone, the door clicking shut behind him.

You stood there, tail swishing through the scattered papers on the floor as you glared at the door long after it slammed shut. The nerve of him. Dabi didn’t know a damn thing the jealous twat.

Falling for Hawks? Please.

The thought made your stomach twist, but you forced it down, pushing through the clutter of his room. Blankets piled in uneven heaps, scraps of shiny metal and broken glass tucked into corners like offerings, feathers scattered across the floor. The chaos should’ve been funny, but instead it just felt… hollow. Like the whole nest was waiting for him to come back.

Your eyes caught on something at the desk.

The journal.

You froze.

It shouldn’t have been there. He carried it everywhere, like a lifeline. Since that night, you’d noticed it more. You’d seen him writing with it balanced on his knee during meetings, scribbling half-thoughts while walking through crowded streets, even falling asleep in random places with it pressed to his chest. The book was practically stitched to him.

But now it sat there, left behind. Abandoned.

Your ears twitched as you stepped closer, tail once again sweeping the papers on the floor. No lock. No guard. Just waiting.

That wasn’t right. Not for him.

You reached out before you could stop yourself, claws brushing the cover. Warm, worn smooth by his hands. Your chest tightened. What if he didn’t come back for it? What if this was the only piece of him left in this place?

Had he abandoned you with it?

The thought burned, and you shook your head hard, tail bristling at your own weakness. Pathetic. Exactly the kind of thing Dabi was mocking you for. You weren’t sentimental. You didn’t get attached. Not to heroes. Not to anyone.

Still, your claws hooked under the cover, flipping it open. The pages crackled faintly as you flipped past the pages you’d already read, stopping at the newest entries. You skimmed the first few lines, breath catching at the raw, unguarded words.

I think maybe I’m scared.

Not the kind of fear you run from. The kind that knots itself in your chest and never lets go. Some nights, it feels like I can hear the clock ticking louder than my heartbeat, counting down.

Everyone thinks wings mean freedom. But all I’ve ever done is circle the same cage, higher walls painted up to look like sky. The Commission calls it liberty, but it’s just another kind of leash.

And I’m terrified I’m going to die here before I ever know what it actually feels like. To live without orders. To breathe without rehearsing. To fly because I want to, not because I’m told.

The end feels close. Too close.

And I wasn’t supposed to, I know it wasn’t supposed to be the job…But sometimes, when she looks at me, I almost believe I’ll make it. That maybe I’ll get to see the sky without bars.

Your brows furrowed as you stared at the word she, tail flicking once against your ankle. She? Who the hell was she? Someone from before? A girlfriend he never mentioned? You huffed, quickly grabbing the pencil and scribbling a note on the next empty page.

You should really hide this better, Featherbrain. Took me all of thirty seconds.

You hesitated, pencil hovering on the paper when the door suddenly opened behind you, stopping you dead in your tracks.

Chapter Text

He hurt.

Every inch of him screamed, from the cracked ribs grinding with each shallow breath to the bruises blooming like wildfire beneath his skin. The flight had nearly finished him, but he forced himself through the mansion’s hallway window anyway, landing hard on all fours.

For a moment he stayed there, chest heaving, vision black at the edges. He tried to laugh, but it came out as a ragged wheeze. Even his voice hurt.

The silence pressed in around him, broken only by the sound of his own heartbeat—fast, frantic, unsteady. He curled a hand against his side, fingers trembling where bone shifted wrong beneath his skin.

He’d been through worse. He told himself that. Lied to himself. Because the truth was, he wasn’t sure his body could keep cashing the checks his job kept writing.

He groaned, wings dragging along the wall as he forced himself upright, every nerve screaming. He should’ve gone to the Commission’s apartment. Hell, that’s what the damn place was there for. Clean sheets, polished floors, the illusion of order.

But oddly enough, his feet hadn’t carried him there. They’d dragged him back here.

The thought alone made bile burn the back of his throat. When had this place, of all goddamn places, started to feel like home?

The Commission apartment was sterile by design. Not a trace of him in it, because that wasn’t allowed. No clutter. No mess. Just a lifeless box where the Commission could remind him how to behave: Don’t slouch, Keigo. Don’t shed feathers on the furniture, Keigo. Don’t you dare act like the feral thing you really are.

And yet, here, in the heart of enemy territory, he could breathe. He could leave his life scattered across the floor, drown himself in nests of stolen blankets, surround himself with shinies and scraps like some pathetic bird too dumb to know he’s in a cage.

It wasn’t freedom. It wasn’t safety. It was a delusion, and he was weak enough to cling to it.

His boots dragged, each step a jolt of fire up his ribs. He leaned heavy into the wall, wings trailing against the stone like they were too tired to lift. Somewhere along the line, the PLF mansion had become home. And the fact that he wanted it, that he needed it, hurt worse than any broken rib.

If he was real with himself, he wasn’t even sure what the hell he was doing anymore.

The League was bad. They did bad things. They stole, they killed, they were criminals for fuck’s sake. That part had never been in question. He’d seen enough blood on their hands to drown in it, not like he could really fucking judge.

So why did he keep coming back? Why did it feel like his pulse steadied the second he crossed their threshold, like he belonged here more than he ever had in any Commission building?

And why did she make everything so much worse?

He tried for weeks to tell himself she was just a mark. Just a woman with loose threads of intel he could pull until the whole thing unraveled. That was the mission he’d been given. Seduce her, earn her trust, rip the truth about what intel Dabi had her moving by whatever means worked. He should’ve been fucking proud of how far he’d gotten.

But he fucking wasn’t.

He’d finally managed to break through. Caught her attention in a way that sent pride shooting sharp through his chest. He’d had to crack himself open to do it, let pieces slip through that he normally locked down tight, but it worked. She followed when he left, lingered in doorways, laughed at his half-assed jokes like they were worth something. For the first time, she was looking at him.

And he hated it.

Because every time her laughter lit the air, his chest ached. Every time her eyes found him in a crowd, his heart hammered like he’d been caught stealing something that wasn’t his. She wasn’t supposed to matter. She was just part of the mission. A target. A key to information. That was it. That was all.

But she wasn’t all.

She was freedom personified. Untamed, unbroken, untouchable in ways he couldn’t even fake. She didn’t need masks or cages. She didn’t have to carve herself down to fit into someone else’s design. She lived without apology, and he… he’d never been allowed to.

It was confusing. So foreign it almost hurt. He’d hardly even spoken to her these last couple weeks, and yet the ache in his chest only grew sharper, heavier, until it felt like longing itself was eating him alive. He wanted her in ways that made no sense, in ways that clawed at him like instinct. Animalistic.

The Commission had spent years trying to burn that out of him. Discipline, restraint, control. All hammered into him until he could hardly breathe without permission. No hunger, no need, no fucking weakness.

And yet here he was, wanting her with a hunger so fierce it rattled his bones. Proof that their training hadn’t worked. Proof that no matter how many times they tried to cage him, some part of him was still feral. Still his own.

And that terrified him almost as much as it thrilled him.

No matter how he looked at it now, he was failing his mission.

He stopped outside his door, dragging in a breath he couldn’t quite steady. His head was a mess, his thoughts worse, but he told himself he just needed sleep. A few hours down and maybe he’d be able to think straight. Maybe even figure out how the hell to tell the Commission he couldn’t do this anymore.

He quickly pushed his key in, turning it before he pushed the door open—

“Dabi, I’m not having this fucking argument with you again,” her voice snapped before he could even step inside. Sharp, irritated, ears pinned flat, and she didn’t so much as glance over.

His throat worked, pulse kicking up hard against his ribs.

“Vix?” he rasped, leaning against the frame when his voice caught rough in his throat.

Her head jerked toward the door, her expression guilty as she quickly scrambled up from his desk and away from his journal.

Jesus. He hadn’t even thought about the fact he’d left it here. The Commission had demanded him so quick, he’d just left it in the rush. Why the fuck was she touching it? How the hell had she even gotten in?

Fuck, his head hurt. He’d just worry about it later.

“Hawks?” She whispered, blinking at him with wide eyes.

He stood slumped in the frame, pale and ragged, one shoulder dragging against the wood like it was holding him up. “Don’t look so surprised,” he rasped. “It is my room after all.”

“I know that idiot. That’s not what I—“ Her defensiveness faltered as she took him in, her brows furrowing as she scrutinized him

“You look like…” she stopped herself, then stepped forward anyway, tail swishing nervously. “Fuck, you’re actually hurt. What the hell happened? Where the hell have you been?”

He waved her off, muttering, “Don’t start,” and pushed into the room, but she trailed after him stubbornly.

“You shouldn’t be walking around like this. Sit down, at least. Let me—”

“Vixen. Stop.” His voice cut sharp, but it didn’t carry the heat it should’ve. Just exhaustion. He half-collapsed onto the bed, feathers scattering loose around him.

She hovered by the edge, frowning. “You’re gonna make it worse. You can’t just—”

But when she leaned closer, his hand shot out, rough fingers curling around her wrist. Not harsh, but insistent. His golden eyes cracked open, something wild and tired burning behind them.

“Don’t,” he said low, pulling her closer. “Don’t fuss.”

“I’m not fussing, I’m—” She didn’t finish. Her voice cut off with a sharp little yelp as he tugged, harder than he should’ve been able to in his state. She tumbled onto the mattress, light and startled, and before she could even push herself up he had her pinned against his chest like she belonged there.

It wasn’t planned. Instinct, pure and stupid, moved faster than thought. His body knew what it wanted, even if his head screamed against it. He tucked her under him, curling forward until she was caught beneath the weight of him. He rested his head on top of hers, humming slightly in contentment he didn’t deserve.

Safe, trapped, his.

His wing quickly followed, dragging heavy and sure as it spread across her, sealing her in the dark warmth of crimson feathers. Like a net, like a shield. Like he was hiding her from the rest of the fucking world.

She shifted under him, breath catching against his throat, and it was only then that the wrongness hit him. He wasn’t supposed to want this. Not her warmth, not her scent, not the quiet thrum in his chest that said don’t let go. He’d started this as a job, and now he was clutching her like an egg he had no business protecting.

And yet, he couldn’t make himself move. Not when she was finally here. Not when she was finally his, even if only for the night.

Yes. Just the night.

Her ears twitched, tail smacking against his shin in what he could only assume was annoyance. “You having to be fucking kidding me. Seriously?”

He didn’t even bother to answer, just pressed his face into her hair, breath warm and uneven. His grip loosened but didn’t let go, his body finally relaxing.

She swallowed hard, caught between bristling and… something else. Something dangerous.

“Alright…Featherbrain,” she whispered, softer than he’d ever heard her before.

But despite the excitement at her tone, his only reply was a faint, half-conscious hum as the world faded to black.

Chapter Text

The room was too quiet.

Though he honestly wasn’t sure that was a bad thing anymore.

Her breath was soft and steady under his wing. Little puffs warm against his collarbone, and for the first time in weeks he wasn’t shaking. He hadn’t meant to drag her into bed, hadn’t meant to hold on like his life depended on it. He’d just wanted her to shut up. To leave him alone to rot and suffer like he deserved. But once she was there, tucked beneath the weight of crimson, he hadn’t been able to let go.

And she hadn’t fought him. Not really.

That alone scared the shit out of him.

She stirred first. A small shift. The twitch of an ear against his jaw. Her tail flicked once against his shin, a light slap of warning.

“You weigh a ton, Featherbrain,” she muttered into his shirt.

“You didn’t complain last night,” he said, voice rough with sleep.

“I was busy not getting crushed to death,” she shot back, but her tone had no real heat.

His mouth tugged. “So… nine out of ten?”

“Seven. You snore.”

“I don’t snore.”

“You whistle.”

He snorted, which made his ribs bite. Air left in a hiss. That was enough to make her push up on an elbow, ears angling, eyes going sharp. The wing tried to follow her without him telling it to, trying to keep her covered. Instinct was a traitor.

“Let me see,” she said.

“It’s fine.”

“You’re a terrible liar,” she said, already sliding back the blanket. “And an even worse patient.”

He let her ease the edge of the shirt up. He didn’t like being looked at, not when he was slow and off-balance and hurt. Especially not by her, and definitely not like this. But her hands were competent and warm, claws careful against bruised skin. She prodded along the line of his ribs, checking for the place where breath snagged.

“Cracked,” she said, softer. “Maybe two. You shouldn’t be moving around.”

“I wasn’t planning on interpretive dance,” he said. The corner of her mouth twitched, then faltered when he flinched under her touch. She glanced toward his wing, still draped across her back like it hadn’t gotten the memo.

“You gonna move this thing,” she asked, “or am I stuck?”

He lifted it. Slowly. The room felt colder without her under it. He pretended not to notice.

She slipped off the bed before he could even protest, quick and quiet as smoke. The door clicked shut behind her, and he blinked at the empty space she’d left, his wing sagging until it dragged against the mattress. With a low huff he flopped onto his side, burying his face into the pillow. The fabric still smelled faintly like her, sharp and wild, and it only made his thoughts race harder. Why the hell had she bolted like that?

The sound of the door creaking open again snapped him back. He cracked an eye, expecting the room to stay empty. Instead, she was there, arms full, and her shoulders squared. A roll of elastic bandage dangled against one hip, a bottle of antiseptic clutched in one clawed hand, gauze and tape tucked under her elbow. Her ears tipped forward, eyes sharp with a no-nonsense gleam that warned him plain as words.

He could try to fight her if he wanted, but she’d win.

“Arms up,” she said, crawling back into the bed.

“I’d rather not,” he muttered.

“Arms up.”

He obeyed. She wrapped him steady and snug, the bandage crossing in clean angles that matched the tidy focus in her face. Up close, she smelled like cold night and cheap soap and whatever he’d mistaken for freedom the first time he watched her run a rooftop.

“Why do you even have this stuff?” he asked hoarsely, watching as she set everything down on the nightstand with practiced precision.

She shrugged, not meeting his eyes. “I, uh… I wanted to be a nurse.”

He blinked, staring at her like she’d just said something impossible. “A nurse?”

Her ears flicked back, the corner of her mouth twitching with embarrassment. “Yeah,” she whispered. “Used to read medical books for fun. Practiced on my stuffed toys when I was little and everything.”

For a moment, all he could do was stare. That wasn’t the kind of confession he’d ever expected out of her. Not the fox who snapped and growled and fought tooth and nail to keep her walls up. But now, here she was, awkwardly admitting something soft. Something human.

“How the hell did you get mixed up in all this, then?” he asked quietly, the words slipping out before he could stop them. His chest tightened as he looked at her bent over his injuries. “You shouldn’t be here, Vix. We both know you’re better than—”

“Don’t.” Her tone cut sharp, her hands jerking the bandage tighter than necessary. He hissed, but she ignored him. “Dreams like that don’t survive where I grew up. Not when rent’s due, not when your stomach’s empty, not when the only thing between you and the street is what you can steal that night.”

She paused, shoulders tight, tail still. Her voice was lower when she went on, almost bitter. “So I stopped dreaming. Simple as that. Kids like me don’t become nurses. We patch up whoever we can with what we’ve got, and if that’s not enough, then they just…die. That’s life. Always has been.”

“It’s not fair,” he whispered, voice rougher than he intended. His hand lifted, hesitating for only a second before cupping her cheek, thumb brushing the edge of her jaw like he was afraid she’d vanish if he blinked.

She froze, ears shooting up, eyes widening at the unexpected gentleness.

Her breath hitched before she sighed, her voice quieter now. “It never is. Dabi gave me the first real chance I ever had. Even if it was ugly. Even if it chained me here.”

The sound of his name instantly snapped the fragile thread between them. Her ears flattened instantly, and she pulled back from his touch like his hand had burned her. The warmth was gone, replaced with the same sharp edge she always carried.

He let his hand fall uselessly to his lap, the absence colder than it should’ve been.

The air between them was too heavy. Too raw. His hand was still tingling where it had touched her cheek, the weight of her confession pressing hard into his chest. He wanted to say something else, anything else, but the words dried on his tongue.

And then—

Bang.

The door slammed open, the sound sharp enough to make her ears shoot straight up. Hawks flinched hard, wings twitching instinctively toward defense before he even registered the figure leaning against the frame.

“Cute,” Dabi drawled, eyes raking lazily over the two of them. Smoke curled from his lips as he exhaled, smirk sharp and knowing. “But playtime’s over.”

Vix bristled instantly, jerking back from Hawks as though burned. Her tail lashed, claws flexing at her sides. “You don’t knock?”

“Not when there’s work to do,” Dabi said, voice clipped now. His gaze cut to Hawks, lingering on the way the bandages wrapped snug around his ribs. “You’re alive. Good enough. We’ve got a job.”

Hawks exhaled slowly, dragging himself upright against the headboard. Every nerve in his body screamed for rest, but the sharp gleam in Dabi’s eyes told him there wasn’t a choice.

“What kind of job?” His voice came rough.

Dabi’s smirk widened, though it didn’t reach his eyes. “Courier run. Should’ve been simple. But the last fox we sent didn’t come back.” His gaze flicked to Vix, deliberate, taunting. “So you’re up. And guess what, Featherbrain, you’re babysitting.”

Her ears flattened. “You’ve got to be kidding me. I don’t need a fucking babysitter.”

“Yeah, well, I happen to actually like you,” Dabi finished with a cruel curl of his mouth. “So you get wings over your head tonight instead of a bullet in your back.”

Vix snarled, ears pinned, but Hawks could see the way her tail twitched—annoyance, sure, but maybe nerves too.

And something in him, something he hated, thrummed at the sight.

Because this was it. The crack he’d been waiting for. The excuse he needed. The Commission’s file had been clear: seduce, gain her trust, extract what she knows. Babysitting on a courier run meant hours alone with her. Hours to work his way past her teeth and claws, hours to push where it mattered. He’d get actual intel to report back.

It should’ve made him grin. It should’ve felt like a win.

Instead, his stomach twisted.

Hawks forced a lazy smile anyway, tilting his head at Dabi. “Guess I’m on fox duty, then. Don’t worry, I’ll make sure she comes back in one piece.”

“You’d better,” Dabi said, his voice gone flat. “I don’t like repeating myself.”

He turned, coat flaring as he shoved out the door, leaving the room colder for it.

Silence pressed in. Hawks exhaled slowly, dragging himself the rest of the way upright, fighting not to wince at the pull in his ribs. He didn’t let himself meet her eyes right away. Didn’t let her see how hard his feathers twitched with conflict.

This was what he’d been trained for. The moment he was supposed to lean in.

So why the fuck did it feel like walking off the edge of a cliff?

Chapter Text

Present Day

He stumbled out of the bedroom, shoulders heavy, eyes burning from too little sleep. The smell hit him first. Warm, sharp, the unmistakable hiss of oil in a pan. Cooking. Real food.

For a second he thought he’d dreamed it, some phantom memory from a life that wasn’t his. But no. The sound of utensils clinking carried down the hallway, the faint sizzle of something frying filling the apartment with a domestic hum that felt all wrong in his space.

Keigo crept forward, each step dragging, pausing at the edge of the living room. His eyes caught on the sofa first. A jacket slung over the back. Not his.

The rest came into focus. A pillow tucked into the corner, blankets hanging halfway to the floor, the cushions uneven from someone’s weight. Not a guest spot. A makeshift bed.

Of course.

It wasn’t a mystery who had claimed the couch. It wasn’t a mystery who had carried him home, cleaned up after his spiral, and decided—without even asking—that his apartment wasn’t fit to be left unattended.

Mera.

Of course it was Mera. Always Mera.

The one person he couldn’t shake, couldn’t outrun, no matter how much distance he tried to put between them.

Guess that’s what an actual dad did.

Keigo leaned against the doorframe, blinking into the kitchen’s glow. Sure enough, there he was. Mera. Sleeves rolled, tie loosened, moving like he’d done this a thousand times. The smell of frying eggs and miso broth filled the air, too warm, too comforting. Too much like a life Keigo didn’t get to have.

A life he definitely didn’t deserve.

“You should sit,” Mera said without turning, voice maddeningly calm. “You’re about two steps away from face-planting.”

Keigo bristled on instinct. “I’m fine.”

“Mm.” A pan clattered onto the trivet. “Maybe I would’ve believed that a week ago. But after yesterday in your office? Well, forgive me if I don’t take your word for it.”

Keigo dragged a hand down his face. “You’re not my nurse.”

“No. I’m worse.” Mera finally glanced over his shoulder, eyes sharp, steady. “I’m the one who makes sure you don’t kill yourself trying to play hero when you’re already broken.”

He gestured toward the corner, and only then did Keigo notice them. Boxes stacked against the wall. Heavy, overstuffed, the kind of paperwork he’d been drowning in at the office. His stomach instantly sank.

“I brought everything you need to keep working from here,” Mera said simply. “Because you don’t have a choice. You’re on enforced leave until further notice. Doctor’s orders. My orders. Call it whatever the hell you want.”

Keigo stared. “So what? You’re grounding me?”

Mera’s mouth tugged into something halfway between a smirk and a scowl. “Exactly. Consider it house arrest with paperwork.”

The eggs hissed in the pan. Keigo hated how much the sound felt like home.

Keigo hovered at the edge of the counter, arms crossed, stomach tight. He hadn’t realized how long it’d been since he’d eaten something hot. Weeks? Maybe more.

“Sit,” Mera said without looking up.

“I’m not hungry.”

“Didn’t ask if you were,” Mera replied. His tone was even, clipped, the same way he used to talk to Commission interns when they tried to weasel out of drills. “Sit.”

Keigo clenched his jaw. He didn’t have the energy to argue. With a sharp sigh, he dropped into one of the kitchen chairs, slouching low. The boxes Mera had hauled over sat stacked in the corner like quiet sentinels, files spilling out at odd angles. He ignored them.

Mera slid the plate across the table a minute later. Steam curled from the rice, the scent making Keigo’s gut twist. He pushed the chopsticks around once, twice, but didn’t lift it.

“You think starving yourself is going to fix anything?” Mera asked. He sat across from him, steady gaze pinning Keigo in place.

“I’m fine.”

“You’re not.”

Silence stretched. Keigo shoved a helping into his mouth just to shut him up, chewing like it was gravel.

They ate in silence for a while. The soft scrape of chopsticks, the low hum of the stove cooling. Keigo hated how normal it felt. Like this was just dinner, like he wasn’t fucking rotting inside.

He surprised himself when he spoke. “They told me to seduce her.”

Mera froze, chopsticks halfway to his mouth. His brow creased, but he didn’t interrupt.

Keigo stared at the plate. “That was the job. Get close, gain her trust. She was just supposed to be…a thread. Something to pull until the whole thing unraveled.” His laugh was humorless. “I thought I could do it. Smile, flirt, the usual. Hell, I was actually good at it. But—” He shook his head. “Didn’t mean to actually fall.”

The words hung there, heavy, raw.

“She was…different.” His voice cracked a little, quieter now. “She didn’t care about the Commission, didn’t care about me being a hero. She hated it, actually. Andfuck, she really hated me. But she was free in a way I wasn’t. And I…” He swallowed hard, the food in his throat turning to ash. “I wanted that. Wanted her.”

Mera’s face softened, but he didn’t speak. Just waited.

“And the night of the raid…” Keigo’s voice was hoarse, brittle at the edges. His gaze locked on the table, anywhere but Mera. “I thought I could do it. Thought I could follow the damn playbook, corner her, drag her back, hand her over like they wanted. Give her an actual chance. But when I found her…”

He swallowed hard, his breath coming ragged. “She was shoving clothes into a suitcase. Trying to run before it all came down. She didn’t even try to fight me, Mera. Didn’t even raise her claws. She just looked at me like—”

His voice broke. His hands clenched against his knees, knuckles white. “Like I was the monster. Like I was everything she’d ever been afraid of. I could’ve stomached hate, but her fearing me? That gutted me.”

“And even after seeing her look at me like that and feeling like I was fucking dying inside. I still pulled a feather. A fucking blade. Pointed it at her throat just like they trained me to. Just like I did with Twice. The Commission’s perfect little weapon.” His laugh came out broken. “And then she begged me.”

The words scraped raw from his chest. “She begged me to let her go. Not even for herself. For the baby.”

Silence slammed down between them. Mera stiffened, shock written plain on his face. “…A baby?” he whispered, disbelieving.

Keigo dragged both hands down his face, eyes burning. “Yeah. Said she was pregnant. Said if I ever had a shred of humanity left, I’d let her run.” His breath caught, trembling. “And I did. I dropped the blade. I let her go. She was carrying my kid, what else could I have done?”

Mera froze, his whole body going rigid. His voice cracked as he whispered, “Keigo… that’s why you stormed out at the meeting.”

Keigo laughed, bitter and jagged, the sound scraping his throat raw. “Yeah. Congratulations, you solved the mystery. You really think I lost it because some asshole was spouting numbers about infrastructure? No. It was because he stood up in front of me, grinning like an idiot, saying his wife was in labor.”

His hands slammed against the table, plates clattering. “A baby. His baby. And I had to sit there and smile and nod and pretend my chest wasn’t splitting in half because all I could see was her. Packing that suitcase. Crying. Begging me to let her run because she was carrying mine.” His voice cracked. “Because I let her go, and I don’t even know if she survived long enough to bring them into the world.”

The food sat like lead in his stomach. Too warm. Too solid. It made him nauseous, but Mera’s quiet, steady stare across the table kept him from pushing the plate away. Keigo shoved the last bite down and dropped his chopsticks with a clatter, leaning back hard in his chair.

“Happy now?” he muttered.

Not even close,” Mera shot back, collecting the plates without missing a beat. His voice stayed level, but there was no mistaking the edge of concern under it. “But at least you’re talking about it. That’s a start.” He stacked the dishes with brisk efficiency, then glanced at Keigo, gaze steady. “This is bad, honestly a lot worse than I realized. I won’t lie. But now it’s at least out in the open. Which means we can try to figure it out together, instead of you letting it chew you up from the inside.”

Keigo dragged a hand through his hair, suddenly restless. The kitchen felt too tight, the air too full. His eyes kept dragging toward the boxes stacked in the corner, each one a reminder of the chains he’d never shaken. Paperwork. Always paperwork.

He pushed himself to his feet, ignoring the ache in his back. “Might as well get it over with.”

Mera glanced over from the sink. “You don’t have to—”

“Yeah, I do,” Keigo cut in, already crossing the room. “What else am I good for now?”

The first box resisted, heavy with reports and files. He dragged it across the floor and dropped to his knees, rifling through the folders with sharp, impatient jerks. Names, dates, numbers. Red stamps of CLEARED and TERMINATED staring back at him like scars.

Mera stayed quiet behind him, the clink of dishes faint, the steady presence grounding and suffocating all at once.

Keigo muttered under his breath as he tossed file after file aside. “God, it never ends. They hoard every scrap of paper like it means something. Thousands of lives reduced to footnotes and signatures. Fucking graveyard in cardboard.”

The words stuck in his throat when his fingers caught on a familiar syllable.

He stilled.

The tab was bent, the ink faded, but the name carved into it might as well have been branded on his skin.

Her name.

His stomach dropped. The blood roared in his ears as he pulled the file free, slow, deliberate, like dragging a blade out of his own chest. For a moment he just stared at the cover, unable to move, breath locked tight.

“Keigo?” Mera’s voice was low, cautious.

He didn’t answer. Couldn’t. His fingers flipped the file open before his brain could stop them.

The first page stared back at him, cold and absolute.

Status: Deceased.

The word stamped bold across the top corner. Unforgiving. Final.

The air rushed out of his lungs all at once. He swayed, knees hitting the floor harder than he meant to, the folder shaking in his hands.

“No…” The whisper scraped raw from his throat. He flipped the page, then another, scanning the lines like maybe, just maybe, it was a mistake. Maybe there was an appeal, a correction, anything.

But all he found were more reports. Surveillance logs. Timelines. A thin, grainy photo stapled in the corner.

Her.

Alive, frozen in black and white. Sitting on some rooftop like she had every right to the sky.

And then that word again, burned into the paper like a brand.

Deceased.

His breath fractured. His hands went slack, the folder slipping, pages fanning across the floor in a messy scatter.

Behind him, Mera moved fast, crouching down, one hand hovering at his shoulder but not touching. “Keigo?”

“She’s dead.” The words broke out of him, strangled, choked. “She didn’t make it. And they wrote her off like she was nothing. Like…like she was just another fucking name in a box.” His voice cracked. “And if she really was pregnant…”

He couldn’t finish.

He found his answer. The worst answer.

Because if she was gone—

So was the baby.

Chapter Text

11 Months Ago

The night air was colder than usual. Bitter, sharp, the kind of cold that crawled into the bones instead of just brushing the skin. You tugged your jacket tighter as you stalked down the cracked pavement, ears twitching restlessly with every distant sound.

Behind you, his footsteps were maddeningly casual. Unhurried. Soft leather soles clicking like he wasn’t walking through half-abandoned districts where danger could spill out of every shadow.

“Stop dragging your wings,” you hissed over your shoulder, tail flicking. “You sound like a dying pigeon.”

Hawks smirked faintly, though his posture didn’t shift. “I thought you liked pigeons. Cousins of mine and all.”

“Keep talking and I’ll pluck you like one.”

“Careful,” he drawled, eyes glinting. “Might like that.”

You groaned, pinching the bridge of your nose. This was hell. Dabi sending you out on courier duty would’ve been insulting enough, but saddling you with him? Babysitter, escort, spy. Whatever the hell this was, it was a damn leash.

And worse, you knew exactly who held the other end.

“You think you’re subtle, Featherbrain?” you hissed, tail flicking with irritation. “I can hear those damn things echoing three blocks away. Might as well wear a neon sign.”

He didn’t even look at you. Just smirked, hands shoved deep in his pockets. “Relax, Vix. It’s just a handoff. Nobody’s waiting in the shadows to jump us.”

“Did you not hear Dabi? The last one didn’t come back? That’s exactly what someone who’s never done a real job would say,” you snapped.

“Real job?” His grin widened. “You mean like stealing wallets from drunk CEOs?”

Your ears flattened, and you bit back a snarl. He wasn’t worth it. He never was.

Except—

He stopped. Just slightly. Head cocked. Wings tensed in a way you almost didn’t catch.

“Vix,” he said, voice low. “Shush.”

You scoffed, rolling your eyes. “Oh, please. Now you decide to care? I’m telling you, if you’d stop dragging those—”

“Vixen.” His voice snapped sharp, cutting through you like a blade. “Seriously. Shut up.”

You froze mid-step, ears twitching at the sudden change in his tone. The lazy drawl was gone. His eyes were fixed past you, pupils narrow, wings stretched wide and sharp.

And then you felt it.

The air shifted behind you. Heavy. Fast. The soft growl was the only warning.

You barely had time to whip around before a wall of fur and muscle hit you square in the chest.

The impact stole your breath, slammed you to the pavement so hard your teeth rattled. Pain shot up your side, sharp and instant, as claws sank deep into your shoulder, shredding through jacket and skin like paper.

You screamed, the sound tearing jagged from your throat as the wolf slammed you into the ground, pinning you with a weight that felt like it would snap your bones. His breath reeked—hot, wet, rancid—as his jaws snapped so close to your face that spit sprayed across your cheek.

“Dabi’s really got a death wish,” he snarled, voice vibrating low in his chest. His muzzle split into a grin, lips peeled back over fangs. “Sending another one of you to die in my streets.”

You fought like hell. Kicked, clawed, bucked your hips against his weight, snarled until your throat burned, but it was like struggling against a landslide. His size crushed every ounce of leverage you tried to steal. His claws punched deeper, ripping through fabric, tearing into muscle until fire streaked across your shoulder. Blood poured hot and steady down your arm, slicking your skin, soaking the ground beneath you.

Then—feathers.

They sliced the air, whistling sharp. The wolf jerked with a yelp as crimson cut across its flank, warm spray misting your face. The weight lifted just enough for you to suck in a choking breath.

“Hawks.” you gasped, voice breaking.

He was already there. Between you and the wolf.

Wings flared wide, feathers bristling like a wall of blades. A crimson feather sword flashed in his grip, angled low, protective. His body was crouched, tense, every line of him screaming predator. You’d never seen him like this. No smirk, no lazy mask. Just hard focus, eyes blazing gold.

The wolf snarled, lunging again, but Hawks met it mid-charge. The clash was vicious. Feather and claw, wing against fang. The sound of it rattled through your bones. He took a hit to the ribs, another slash across his arm, but he didn’t fall back. He didn’t move aside. He held the line, wings curling wide enough that you could barely see the fight, just hear it.

And every time the wolf tried to circle, to catch a glimpse of you on the ground, Hawks shifted. Blocking, hiding you.

A bird of prey throwing itself between the nest and the intruder.

Your instincts screamed at you to crawl, to drag yourself away into the shadows where foxes belonged. That’s what you were built for. Running, vanishing, tricking the world into thinking you were never there at all. But your shoulder was shredded, hot blood soaking your sleeve, and your limbs wouldn’t obey.

Your shoulder burned like fire. Blood soaked through your sleeve, sticky and hot, but you couldn’t move. All you could do was press your good hand to the wound and watch the feathers fly.

The fight ended as suddenly as it began. A sharp cry—a wolf’s yelp, high and broken—echoed down the alley. He staggered back, limping, blood dripping from a deep slash along its muzzle. One last snarl, one last glare, and then it bolted into the shadows, tail between its legs.

Silence followed.

The wolf’s retreating yelp still rang in your ears, fading into the dark. Feathers scattered around you, glinting like fallen embers. Hawks hadn’t moved yet. He was still crouched low, wings flared, blade in hand, his whole body radiating threat.

You stayed frozen where you’d fallen, breath hitching, shoulder on fire where the claws had raked deep. Blood slicked your shirt, warm and wet, and for the first time in years the sharp edge of pain wasn’t enough to mask the fear clawing its way through your chest.

You should’ve gotten up. Should’ve spat something cutting, shoved him away, pretended you were fine. That was what you always did. But your hands shook too badly, your legs wouldn’t obey, and when his eyes finally found you—wild, frantic, desperate—you broke.

A sob ripped free before you could swallow it down. Shame burned, but worse was the terror still gripping your spine, telling you that if you moved wrong, if you breathed wrong, the wolf would come back.

His blade dropped instantly, feathers drawing back, but his wings stayed wide around you, making a wall of crimson and shadow. He moved closer, slow, like approaching a wounded animal.

“Vix,” he rasped, voice raw, chest heaving. “Hey. It’s over. You’re safe. I swear. Please don’t cry.”

Your vision blurred, edges darkening. The world tilted with every shallow breath. You tried to steady your hands against the pavement, but they trembled too hard, slick with your own blood. The smell of iron was overwhelming, thick in your nose, in your throat, drowning out even the sour stink of the wolf that had fled.

Safe. He said you were safe. But you couldn’t feel safe. Not with the warmth running too fast, too steady, soaking your clothes, dripping between your fingers where you pressed against your shoulder.

You were shaking. Teeth chattering though the night wasn’t that cold. The shudders wouldn’t stop, running up your spine like jolts of electricity, making your ears twitch and your tail lash weakly against the ground.

“Shit—” Hawks was closer now, crouched low, wings folding tighter to cage you in. His voice dropped, rough with something that wasn’t his usual teasing lilt. “You’re bleeding too much. It’s too deep.”

The words scraped at the edges of your panic. You wanted to snap back, to tell him you weren’t weak, that you didn’t need him. But the fire in your shoulder was spreading, bleeding into your chest, your arm going heavy and useless. Your lips trembled instead, breath hitching as your eyes blurred with hot, unwanted tears.

And then you reached.

“H-Hawks.”

You didn’t think about it, didn’t plan it. Instinct cut sharper than pride, and your hand lifted, shaking, reaching for him. Fingers curled weakly at the fabric of his shirt, tugging, needing…god, you didn’t even know what. Protection? Warmth? Comfort? Something solid to hold onto before the dark swallowed you whole.

His breath caught, gold eyes wide as they dropped to your hand clutching at him like he was the only anchor left. For once, he didn’t smirk. Didn’t make it a game.

He caught you carefully, hands bracing your good side, drawing you in against the heat of his chest. His heartbeat thundered under your ear, fast and ragged, but steady enough to drown out the panic in your own.

“Easy, Vix. I’ve got you. I’ve got you.”

The words wrapped around you like his wings, heavy and absolute. You wanted to believe them. You almost did. But the cold was seeping too deep, the ground falling away under you.

“Just keep your eyes open for me, okay? Keep them open, Vix. Vix? Vix!”

Your body gave before your mind could argue how tired you were. Your limbs went slack, breath stuttering. The last thing you felt was the desperate strength in his arms as he held on tighter, like he could keep you awake by will alone.

And then everything went black.

Chapter Text

The moment her body went slack, his stomach dropped out.

“Vix?” His voice came out hoarse, cracking on the name. He shook her lightly, careful of the shredded shoulder, careful of everything. But her head only lolled against his chest. Too pale. Too still. The alley had gone quiet in that ugly way after violence, the kind of silence that rang. Feathers clicked as they settled around them, red on wet pavement like fallen embers.

“Shit. Shit!” He knelt, knees skidding in her blood. “Hey. Stay with me.” It was useless, but he said it anyway, the words a mumbled cadence as his hands moved on instinct.

Strip his jacket. Rip it. Fold, press, bind. The wolf’s claws had gone in deep, four rakes right across the curve where neck met shoulder. He grimaced at the realization that one of them was catching the notch dangerously close to the artery. He could feel her pulse stuttering under his fingers. Fast, then weak, then fast again. Shock. Fever already licking at her skin.

“Shit.” He drew breath through his teeth. “You stubborn, mean, impossible—”

Her ears didn’t twitch. Her lashes didn’t flicker. He swallowed, hard.

Training took over where his mind threatened to spin out. He slid a featherblade between his teeth and used another to slice the ruined sleeve clean, exposing skin gone too white beneath the blood. He flushed the wounds with what little clean water he carried, jaw clenching as she didn’t even flinch. Feathers—small ones, soft as down—lifted from his wing-tips to press over the worst of it, sealing like smart bandages would if he’d had any. He cinched a strip of his jacket over them and under her arm, tight as he dared.

“Okay. Okay.” He checked her breathing again. Shallow. He shifted, dragging her half into his lap just to get her off the cold ground. The night air was knife-cold, the kind that crawled into bone. He pulled his wing over her and felt some of the tremors in her limbs ease, the warmth caging them both in the same breath.

A phone buzzed.

He flinched like he’d been struck. Not his. Hers.

The little device vibrated against his thigh where her weight had forced it between them, a low insect hum that somehow filled the whole alley. He froze, glancing down at her face. The dark smudge of blood at her temple, the cracked lips, the faint steam of her breath in the cold. The hum stopped. Started again.

Dabi.

Keigo didn’t even need to check the ID to know. He eased her aside just enough to fish her phone free without jostling her shoulder.

WHERE THE HELL ARE YOU.

Another buzz.

TICKING.

Another.

VIX. DON’T MAKE ME COME FIND YOU.

Fucking Dabi.

Keigo’s stomach clenched. Dabi’s check-ins weren’t courtesy, they were threats with timers. If he didn’t answer, fire would come looking. And she couldn’t take fire. Not tonight.

He glanced again at her face. She obviously wasn’t waking anytime soon. If he let Dabi come sniffing, he’s not sure he’d make it out alive. He’d blame Keigo for letting her get hurt, and his cover would be blown.

His thumbs hovered over the keypad. He’d watched her type enough to mimic her style. At least he hoped. It was short, clipped, no fluff. Easy enough.

got delayed. almost there.

He hit send before he could second-guess himself. The reply came fast.

10 minutes Foxy or you owe me a date.

The vibration stopped.

Ignoring the odd sense of jealousy in his chest, Keigo slid the device back into her pocket. His hand lingering there for a beat too long just to feel the faint warmth of her body. Then he looked down.

The folder for the drop was lying half out of her bag, smeared with her blood.

His feathers prickled, rising sharp in the cold air. That folder was everything. The entire reason he was even here. The leash around his damn neck and the blade over his head. Deliver it to whoever the hell they were supposed to meet untouched and he’d keep his cover. Peek inside and he’d keep the Commission fed.

He could pretend he didn’t see it. He could scoop her up and run and make the drop blind, deliver the package and keep his head low, keep his cover clean. He could do the “right” thing.

Or he could look. She was unconscious. She’d never even know he’d done it. Nobody would know.

But…he didn’t want to look. That truth hit him with an almost physical force. There was a time he would have popped a folder like this with a grin and a joke, fed the Commission until they purred. There was a time when the hunger for praise—good dog, golden boy, excellent work, Hawks—had been enough to drown everything else. That time felt far away, and too close.

His fingers reached anyway.

He slid a finger under the flap, easing it open just enough that the neon spill of streetlight could catch the first page. It was enough. Names that flickered at the edges of briefings he’d sat through. Routes that matched rumors he’d only half believed. An address circled twice. A date.

His stomach went cold in a way the night air couldn’t touch. He swallowed and kept reading, fast, too fast, eyes skimming, brain photographing before his shame could flinch. He didn’t need to. He was already over the line the second the flap lifted. But he couldn’t stop. The Commission’s voice threaded through him like an old lullaby.

Get it all, baby bird. You know how. You always know how.

A drop of her blood dripped from her neck, landing on the hand he had outstretched towards the folder. He stared at it dumbly, crimson against the pale skin of his knuckles, already drying at the edges. The guilt was instantaneous and absolute. It clawed up from somewhere behind his ribs and lodged beneath his sternum, a hot, choking thing that didn’t care about logic or necessity.

Keigo shut it. Too hard. The crack of leather echoed against the walls of the alley.

His heart hammered, his stomach churning. He set the folder back exactly where it had been, the flap aligned, her limp hand placed over it, thumb hooked on the edge like she had never let go. The lie of it burned.

“Fuck, I’m so sorry. Oh my god I’m so sorry.” He whispered, but he honestly didn’t even know who the hrll he was apologizing to. Her. Himself. The ghost of who he had been when the Commission still felt like family and not a fucking cage with gold bars.

The phone buzzed again, and he already knew Dabi was getting impatient.

He did the math without thinking. The drop site wasn’t far if you were unwounded and on two feet with air under your ribs and no one unconscious in your arms. He glanced at the alley’s mouth, then down at Vix. Her breath sawed shallow. Fever flushed a pale line across her cheekbones already He couldn’t leave her. If the wolf came back—if anything came back—

He didn’t leave her.

Instead, he moved. He tucked the folder against her stomach, bound it there with his belt, cinched tight so it couldn’t slip. Then he slid his arms beneath her knees and back and lifted, careful of the shoulder, careful of the head, careful of the way her ears drooped, limp and wrong. She was light. Too light. He felt it in his forearms the way he felt bad weather in his wing joints.

He spread his wings and folded them forward until crimson met crimson over her, a tent of feathers making the world small and warm and his. The night tried to creep in anyway. He ignored it.

Then, he ran.

His boots hit cracked pavement in a quick, ground-eating rhythm. He kept to the deepest of the broken street’s shadows, cutting down side alleys that smelled like old rain and rust. He knew this district by sound. The way the wind slipped through rebar, the way loose signs complained, the way glass grit whispered underfoot. He let the city tell him where not to be seen.

Commission stealth training did come in handy sometimes.

Every few strides he glanced down. Her lips were already chapped. Her breath fogged the air then didn’t, then did. He tightened his hold each time, as if the pressure could bully her lungs into obedience. Once, her fingers twitched near the folder’s belt. He nearly tripped with relief.

Keigo found the door tucked between two sagging brick buildings, the kind of place that looked abandoned until you knew the code. Rust stained the metal, the hinges swollen with years of rain. The street here was empty, too empty, the kind of silence that hummed with watchers you couldn’t see.

Vix shifted weakly against his chest, a fevered groan slipping past her lips. He tightened his hold, wings curling closer around her like a shield.

He knocked the pattern she always used: two short, one long, then the scrape of his featherblade down the dented metal.

A slit opened, just a thin rectangle of darkness, a pair of eyes glinting from the other side.

“You’re late.” The voice was cold, dismissive.

Keigo didn’t flinch. He angled his shoulder so the folder bound to her waist was visible. “Got ambushed. Wolf heteromorph. She’s down.”

The eyes flicked to Vix, ears limp, blood drying in her hair. Silence stretched, taut.

“How bad?” the voice pressed.

“Not great.” He shifted his grip, enough to show her slack face. “Alive. But bleeding bad. If you want your intel, you take it now so I can keep it that way.”

Another silence. Keigo’s pulse hammered. Any second, he expected the door to open wider, fire to bloom, guns to rise.

Instead, a hand slid through the slit—gloved, palm out.

“Give it.”

Keigo didn’t move. “She made the run. I just carried it when she couldn’t. You’ll tell Dabi that, got it?”

The hand stilled, suspicion radiating even in that stillness. Finally, it curled two fingers in a gesture. Hurry up.

Keigo gently took the folder and pressed it into the glove. He didn’t let go right away, forcing the eyes to meet his. “Unopened,” he lied smoothly. “Same as always.”

The grip tightened, then yanked the folder inside. The slit snapped shut.

Keigo stood frozen for three breaths, listening. Nothing. No second door opening, no rush of footsteps. Just the slow drip of water from a gutter above.

He looked down at Vix, pale and burning in his arms, her chest hitching with shallow breaths.

“Drop’s done,” he muttered, adjusting his hold and spreading his wings again. His voice was steady, but the lie that he hadn’t looked still burned on his tongue. “You owe me something real mean and sarcastic when you finally wake up, okay?”

He wanted to laugh at his own joke, but guilt climbed him like ivy. It rooted around his ribs, threading up his spine. He had looked. He had read. He had wrapped the folder back under her limp hand and pretended it was untouched. He had carried his betrayal like they weighed nothing. It didn’t. It weighed a damn universe.

Would he report what he saw? Deliver the intel like the Commission demanded, like they had raised him to do? The questions pressed sharp against his skull, but he shoved them aside. Not now. Not while her blood was still drying on his hands. That bridge would burn soon enough

He ran again.

He could fly her, he’d even been tempted. But if someone spotted him, especially a fan, he’d be questioned to no end about the mysterious girl he’d been carrying. Rumors would fly, the Commission would be pissed they have to cover for him, and Dabi would know that she’d been hit on his watch. He’d be ash before he even knew what hit him.

The route back carved a different map through the dark. Over a low fence, across a courtyard full of busted toys, through a hole in a chain-link where the metal had curled like dead vines. Somewhere a train moaned. Somewhere a woman laughed too loudly. Somewhere a siren wailed and then swallowed itself.

He found shelter in a half-collapsed warehouse, roof caving in on one side but still holding above a nest of old tarps. He laid her down as gently as he could, brushing stray strands of blood-matted hair back from her temple, then spread his wing over her like a curtain against the cold. The air smelled of rust, oil, and rot, but it was cover. Cover was enough right now.

His pack coughed up a half-clean shirt, a bottle of rubbing alcohol, scraps of bandages he’d scavenged. He worked quickly, mechanically, cleaning where he could, binding tight, whispering soft curses when she didn’t stir. She should have stirred. Even pain would have been better than this heavy, fevered quiet.

When the work was done, his body finally sagged. Exhaustion crashed down, heavier than the folder, heavier than the blood on his clothes. He pulled her against him, careful of the wound, and let instinct swallow thought. He folded himself around her like he had when she’d patched him up a few nights back. His wing curving down, chest braced along her back, chin resting lightly on the crown of her head.

The position was awkward, ridiculous even, his wings bowed over them like a nest. But every time he thought about pulling away, panic spiked sharp in his chest. His body knew what his damn brain refused to admit. She was his now, in some feral, irrational way. His to guard. His to keep alive.

He wasn’t supposed to want that. Not here. Not with her. Not when every instinct should’ve been trained out of him years ago. But the thought of her slipping away hollowed something in him he hadn’t known was there.

Somewhere between the fight, the blood, and the silence of her limp in his arms, the line had blurred. She wasn’t just a mission anymore. She was a person. She was his person to keep alive. And he cared. God help him, he cared.

He’d gone and done the one thing they told him never to do.

Now he was stuck between the people who had built him, owned him, given him everything he was—

and a girl who was never supposed to matter.

So in short, he was royally fucking screwed.

Chapter Text

You felt sick.

Freezing, though heat pressed in all around you. Shivers wracked your body like they were the only thing keeping your heart beating. It made no sense. You were buried under something warm and heavy, the best damn comforter you’d ever had, yet you couldn’t stop trembling.

Your head pounded, each throb echoing down into your stomach until nausea clawed at your throat. You were almost shocked you weren’t already lying in a puddle of your own vomit.

You squeezed your eyes tighter, trying to will yourself back into unconsciousness, but the ache in your shoulder flared when you shifted even slightly. A sharp gasp tore from you. Half from the wound, half from something hard nudging right into your back.

You froze.

Please, no. Not what you think it is. Not him.

But when you cracked your eyes open, the truth was impossible to miss.

Hawks. Pressed flush against you, body curved around yours like a shield. That glorious comforter? His wing, draped heavy and warm over your frame. And that very solid, very unwelcome pressure against your spine?

Yeah, that was his—

“You’re awake,” he murmured, voice low and rough in your ear.

Your throat worked, a rasp of a laugh breaking free before you could stop it. “Oh, I’m awake, alright. Hard to stay asleep when you’re…” You swallowed, biting the inside of your cheek before finishing with a snap, “poking me in the damn back.”

Silence.

Then his breath hitched, chest pressing harder into you for half a second before he shifted just slightly away. “That’s, uh, not what it feels like,” he muttered, tone betraying a rare crack in that easy confidence.

You rolled your eyes, even as a fresh wave of heat crawled up your neck. “Please. It’s exactly what it feels like. And if you think I’m gonna die here with you pitching a tent against my damn spine—” Your words caught on a groan as pain flared sharp in your shoulder.

Instantly, his teasing mask slipped. His hand came up, steadying you gently. “Careful,” he said, softer now. “You’re still weak.”

The sincerity in his voice was worse than the warmth against your back. Worse than the pounding in your head. You wanted to shove him off, but your body betrayed you. It was weak, trembling, and far too aware of the heat keeping the chills at bay.

“I got the bleeding under control, mostly. But you’ve been out nearly two days, and it’s starting to fester.” His voice was low, rough with exhaustion. “I need to find something to clean it properly, to keep it from spreading, but I haven’t. Couldn’t. If I left you, and he came back…” His jaw clenched, the words hanging heavy between you. “I wasn’t willing to risk it.”

Your chest seized. “Two days?”

The words rasped out, thin and broken, but the panic laced through them was sharp enough to cut. You twisted, ignoring the sharp protest in your shoulder, trying to see his face. His wing only tightened around you, keeping you pinned in the warmth of him.

“I missed the drop.” The realization clawed up your throat, making your pulse thunder in your ears. “Shit, Hawks, they’ll skin me alive! Dabi will—”

“Vix.” His voice cracked like a whip, firm enough to still you. His hand slid over your hip, holding you steady, grounding you. “Enough. It’s done.”

You blinked, ears twitching as you tried to force your fogged brain to catch up. “What?”

“The drop. I made it.” His eyes met yours finally, golden and blazing, though shadows of exhaustion pooled beneath them. “Nobody knows you were even down. As far as they’re concerned, it went off without a hitch.”

Your stomach dropped, twisting tighter than the nausea already coiled there. “You—” The word barely scraped out. “You touched it? You—do you have any idea what you’ve done?”

“Saved your life and your reputation?” He asked, phrasing it like it was a fucking question.

“You’re already on thin fucking ice,” you snarled, tail lashing. “Nobody trusts you. If Dabi finds out you touched it—“

“So don’t say anything.” He said with a shrug, like it was the simplest thing in the world. “I made the drop. All I did was touch it to hand it over. You can trust me Vix.”

You stared at him, his eyes holding yours, and for some stupid reason you couldn’t explain, you believed him.

“You didn’t look?” You whispered

“I didn’t.” He said and you let out a breath. You wanted to argue, wanted to call him a liar, but the pain in your shoulder told you it would be pointless. You had no fight left in you. Not now.

“Let’s get them changed and get back so you can rest. I can get medicine from somewhere once your safe in your room.”

You hissed when the bandage pulled at your shoulder. The sound slipped out sharp before you could swallow it, and the bastard caught it. Of course he did.

“Easy,” Hawks muttered, crouched in front of you with his wings half-curled to block the draft sneaking through the warehouse walls. His hands were steady, annoyingly gentle, as he peeled away the blood-stiffened strip of cloth he’d tied there two nights ago.

“I’m fine,” you snapped, though your voice broke halfway.

His golden eyes flicked up, catching yours just long enough to make your stomach twist. “You passed out for almost two days straight,” he said flatly. “You’re not fine.”

Your ears twitched back, defensive, but you didn’t pull away. You couldn’t. Not with the sting of alcohol seeping into torn muscle, not with his fingers pressing so close to bone. You clenched your teeth and kept still while he worked, cursing him silently with every brush of his skin against yours.

“How do you plan on getting this past Dabi?” you asked finally, glancing at the raw, angry marks carved across your shoulder.

“To be honest? I don’t know.” Hawks didn’t bother to dress it up. “Maybe we say it happened after the drop. Patrol, training, something. Whatever punishment comes my way, I’ll take it. It was my fault. For once, I was afraid…and I hesitated.”

He didn’t smirk. Didn’t jab back with some smart comment. For once, he looked…focused. Too focused. Brows drawn, jaw tight, lips pressed thin as his hands worked. The silence between you pressed heavier than the draft slipping through the warehouse walls.

“Afraid?” you scoffed, bitterness cutting sharp through your teeth. “You? I didn’t think you were capable of anything other than cheap lines and winged grins.”

“Yeah, well, I’m capable of a lot more.” He snorted, but it wasn’t amused. It was bitter, almost ugly.

The quiet that followed stretched until you thought it might split you in half. Then he spoke again, and his voice was softer, stripped raw.

“I was afraid of losing you.”

The words shouldn’t have landed like they did, but they hit anyway, straight through your chest. Your eyes betrayed you, tracing the line of his mouth, the set of his jaw, the way the light caught in the strands of gold at his temple. Too close.

He noticed.

For one terrible second his hands froze. His gaze snapped back to yours and held. Neither of you moved. The air thickened, charged, your pulse hammering loud enough you swore he could hear it. His fingers brushed your skin. Barely there, light as feathers, and you shivered despite yourself.

You broke first. You jerked your shoulder back, pain spiking hot and sharp, but it was easier than letting whatever was building between you catch fire.

You tore the half-wrapped bandage from his hands. “Enough,” you hissed. “I’ll do it myself.”

For once, Hawks didn’t argue. He sat back on his heels, wings still half-flared, watching in silence as you fumbled with the cloth. Your shoulder burned, every tug a reminder of the wolf’s claws, but you forced the new bandage tight. Ugly work, clumsy with one hand, but it was yours. Yours to finish. Yours to own.

The silence stretched too long, and finally he broke it. His voice was quieter than you’d ever heard it. “They’ll scar.”

You froze, breath snagging. Four deep lines, carved so close to your neck they would never be hidden clean. You knew it already. But hearing him say it made it real.

Your laugh came out sharp. “Great. Just what I needed.”

He shook his head slowly, eyes locked on yours. “Not ugly,” he said, voice rough. “Not something to hide. They’ll be beautiful.”

You blinked, caught off guard. “Beautiful?”

“Yeah.” He leaned in just slightly, gold eyes blazing with something you couldn’t name. “Proof you survived. Proof you fought back. That’s what scars are. They tell the truth when the rest of the world lies.”

The words left you unsteady, like the floor had shifted beneath your feet. You wanted to argue, to scoff, but the sincerity in his voice cut through your defenses sharper than any blade.

He stood then, wings folding close, and held out a hand. “Come on,” he said, practical again, like nothing heavy had passed between you. “You need real medicine, a real bed. I’ll get you back to the PLF mansion.”

You leaned into him, too tired to protest, his wing curling firm and warm around your back to keep you steady. Your heart pounded against your ribs, heat rising to your cheeks, and it had nothing to do with the wound. It was the press of him, the steady strength at your side, the faint trace of his cologne clinging to his jacket and wings.

For the first time since the claws tore you open, you felt something close to safe.

He glanced down at you, eyes catching yours for the briefest second before he looked away, jaw tight. “You’re beautiful,” he murmured, so low you were sure you imagined it.

Cause that wasn’t possible, was it?

Chapter Text

So this was what her room looked like.

Hawks blinked, surprised despite himself, as she stumbled beside him, breath ragged, clutching at the front of his shirt like it was the only thing keeping her upright. The door shut behind them with a dull thud, shutting out the hum of voices and distant footsteps that carried through the PLF mansion’s halls.

Her space was small, lived-in. Papers scattered across the desk in uneven piles. A cracked mirror propped in the corner with a smear of dried mascara across the glass. Clothes draped over the back of a chair, her boots kicked off carelessly near the bed. It wasn’t neat, but it was so obviously her. All sharp edges dulled by the quiet chaos of comfort.

It made his chest ache.

She let go of his shirt just long enough to collapse onto the mattress, hissing when her shoulder hit wrong. He crouched instantly, wings arched, steadying her with hands that hovered too carefully, like he was afraid she might shatter.

“Define good,” she rasped, palm pressing over the bandage. “Still breathing. Still pissed.”

Keigo bit back the smile that wanted to come. Usually he’d toss something slick at a line like that. Keep it light, keep it safe. But his chest was too tight for that tonight. He just watched her. Pale and exhausted, but still glaring at him like she could rip him to shreds if she felt like it.

His eyes drifted, unbidden, over the room. Not what he’d expected. Not cold and empty like half the League’s hideouts. It was cluttered, lived-in. She had blankets piled into a nest, paper scattered across the desk with messy handwriting and crooked sketches, a mug forgotten on the floor. More her than she probably realized. More real than anything he had waiting for him anywhere else.

She caught him staring. “What the hell are you looking at? Don’t like my decor?”

He leaned against the frame, crossing his arms and letting his wings shift behind him just to fill the space. “Didn’t think it’d look like this.”

Her eyes narrowed. “Like what?”

“Like…you,” he said before he could stop himself. “Messy. Sharp. But…lived in.”

Her ears twitched back and her tail flicked, sharp as ever. “Congratulations, you’ve cracked the case. I use blankets. I drink tea. Real fascinating shit.”

That almost-smile tugged at his mouth again, smaller than his usual mask. He crouched down, close enough to check the edge of the bandage without crowding her. His fingers brushed the cloth, careful, and the heat bleeding through it made his stomach twist. He needed medicine, real medicine, and soon. And the lie sat heavy in his chest: he hadn’t handed the file to the Commission yet, but the fact that he’d looked burned worse than the fever in her skin.

Still, she hadn’t thrown him out. Hadn’t told him to get lost. She’d let him stay. That thought curled smug and warm in his gut, dangerous in its own way.

“You know,” he said lightly, eyes flicking up to hers, “you’re pretty bad at pretending you don’t like having me around.”

Her ears twitched harder. “Excuse me?”

He shrugged, grin finally breaking through. “Hey, I’m just saying. You let me in your room, let me play nurse. Sounds a lot like we’re friends now.”

“Friends?” she scoffed, the word brittle in her raw voice.

“Yeah,” he said, leaning back on his heels like he’d won something. “Or at least you don’t hate me as much as you want me to think you do. Which is close enough.”

“You’re an idiot.” She groaned, sinking back into the pillow.

Keigo’s grin widened, reckless. He should’ve quit while he was ahead, but restraint had never been his strong suit. He leaned forward and dropped his head into her lap, letting out a long, exaggerated sigh like he’d just won the war.

“Idiot, huh?” His voice was muffled against her thigh. “Guess that makes you the idiot who lets me stay.”

Her claws twitched against the blanket, like she couldn’t decide whether to shove him off or just deal with it. She didn’t move, though, and that was all the permission he needed.

He let his eyes fall shut for a moment, just breathing her in. The sharp tang of bandages and blood overlaid with the faint, earthy scent that clung to her skin. His shoulders finally unclenched, the noise of the mansion fading until it was just the steady rise and fall of her breath.

God, it felt good to stop performing. No mask. No cameras. No clipped voices in his earpiece telling him what to be. Just her lap, her heat, her silence.

Dangerous. All of it.

The file he’d touched still burned in his memory, every line of intel etched into him like another brand. He hadn’t sent it yet. Hadn’t reported what he’d read. He told himself he was buying time, weighing his options. But deep down he knew. The longer he waited, the harder it would be to hand it over. The harder it would be to betray this moment, this fragile, stupid thing growing between them.

“You’re heavy,” she muttered, breaking into his thoughts. Her hand shifted as if to push him away, then stalled halfway, claws grazing through his hair before retreating like she hadn’t meant to.

He cracked one eye open, smirk tugging at the corner of his mouth. “See? Friends. You’re practically doting.”

“Or I’m considering suffocating you with a pillow,” she shot back, though her voice lacked bite.

He chuckled, low and quiet, and let himself sink further against her lap. “Whatever helps you sleep.”

He’d regret this later, he knew he would. The teasing, the closeness, the way his chest tightened at the thought of her letting him stay. He’d regret it when the Commission’s call came, when The President’s orders demanded obedience, and nothing less.

But for now, with her warmth under his cheek and her stubborn little sighs filling the room, Keigo let himself pretend.

For now, he could almost believe he wasn’t lying to her. That he wasn’t lying to himself.

“I gotta go get you medicine,” he groaned, dragging the words out like a sulky kid instead of the Commission’s golden boy. His wings shuffled restlessly, feathers brushing the floor. He tilted his head a little against her lap, mumbling into the fabric, “Don’t really wanna go though.”

He felt her stiffen under him, then shift like she was trying not to be caught off guard. “Then don’t,” she muttered, though her tone came out softer than her usual bite. “I’ve survived worse.”

Keigo huffed, forcing himself to sit up, though the warmth of her lap clung to his cheek like a brand. “Yeah, no. Infection’s not exactly a fun gamble. You don’t get to just ‘survive worse’ when you’ve got four trenches clawed into your shoulder.” His fingers twitched, remembering the way the scratches had gaped when he cleaned them. “I can’t—” He stopped, jaw tightening. “I won’t risk it.”

Her ears twitched, tail flicking once. “You’re acting like it matters to you.”

He gave her a look, golden eyes sharp and tired all at once. “It does.”

The words slipped out before he could cage them. His chest felt tight. Too tight. He wanted to laugh it off, wanted to toss something easy and clever into the air like a feather to distract her. But instead he just stood, wings fanning once before curling tight against his back, restless.

The bag he’d set aside earlier sat by the door. Empty. He’d have to fill it with whatever the clinic had. Maybe some antiseptic, salves, anything. His stomach knotted, not just with the thought of leaving her, but with the weight of the other leash pulling at him. The Commission would call soon. They always did. And when they did, it wouldn’t just be about medicine.

He ran a hand through his hair, forcing a crooked grin back into place. “Don’t miss me too much while I’m gone, alright? I know you’ll be devastated without my charming company.”

“Devastated isn’t the word,” she muttered, sinking further into her pillow, but she didn’t tell him not to come back. She didn’t tell him to stay gone.

And that was enough to put a dangerous little spark in his chest.

He lingered one beat longer than he should have, just watching her settle into the nest of blankets, eyes fluttering shut even as she tried to keep her face turned away from him. She was letting him see her like this, weak, vulnerable, unguarded. And he should’ve hated himself for liking it.

“I’ll be back before you know it,” he said, voice low, meant for her even if she was already half-asleep.

He slipped out the door, careful with the latch, careful not to let the sound disturb her. His heart hammered against his ribs all the same.

Happy. That was the word clawing at him as he moved down the hall, boots quiet on the worn wood. He felt happy. Stupidly, recklessly happy. All because she hadn’t fought him this time. Because she hadn’t told him to get out, hadn’t thrown his own smirk back in his face. Because she’d let him promise he’d come back, and some small, feral part of him actually believed she wanted him to.

And happy was dangerous.

Happy was a lie. A dream spun out of smoke. It never lasted. Not for him. Not for the boy the Commission carved hollow and filled with orders. He knew that, had always known it. But it didn’t stop the flicker of warmth in his chest, didn’t stop him from craving the way it felt.

He was so tangled in it, in her scent still clinging to his jacket, in the phantom weight of her hand almost resting in his hair, that he didn’t see the shadow until he collided with it.

Broad shoulder, reek of smoke, a wall of heat where there shouldn’t have been one.

He stumbled back a step, wings flaring on instinct.

And there he was.

Dabi.

Leaning casual as ever against the peeling wallpaper, one hand in his pocket, the other holding a cigarette that smoldered bright between blackened fingers. His grin was sharp enough to cut.

“Well, well,” Dabi drawled, eyes raking over him with predatory amusement. “Birdie looks like he’s in a rush. Where the hall are you off to so late?”

Dabi’s grin lingered, smoke curling from the corner of his mouth. “You’ve been busy,” he said, voice all lazy drawl. “I heard about the wolf. Heard about her shoulder.” His eyes dragged over Keigo’s jacket, then flicked back up, glinting with amusement. “Word travels fast, birdie. People talk.”

Keigo’s chest went tight. He should’ve expected it. Nothing in this place stayed secret long, not with mouths as loose and eyes as sharp as Dabi’s. He should’ve known better than believing the drop would keep the secret. Still, hearing it said out loud felt like a match held to dry feathers.

“I’ve heard worse,” Keigo said smoothly, forcing the grin back into place. “You don’t look mad.”

“Mad?” Dabi’s laugh rasped low in his throat. “Why would I be mad? Girl gets herself clawed up. It’s part of the job. Real cute of you to play nurse.” He flicked ash to the floor, eyes narrowing. “But don’t think I don’t see what’s happening.”

Keigo tilted his head, wings twitching. “And what’s that?”

“That stupid look on your face.” Dabi leaned in, his grin sharpening into something closer to a snarl. “Like you think you’re special. Like you think she’s actually choosing you.”

Keigo’s smirk faltered for half a heartbeat. Dabi caught it instantly.

“She’s not some shiny thing you plucked off a shelf, birdie. She’s baggage wrapped in fur and teeth. Girls like her? They’ve got blood on their hands, nightmares in their heads. You think you’re built for that?” Dabi’s voice dipped, smooth and venomous. “Models don’t come with baggage. Models don’t come with scars you’ve gotta make excuses for.”

Jealousy. It radiated off him, sour and sharp beneath the smoke. Keigo felt it, and for once, he didn’t feel like rising to it. He wanted to bite back, to throw some half-smile and twist the knife, but the truth of it hit too close. He had thought she was choosing him — every time she didn’t shove him away, every time she let him linger. And the Commission file still sat like lead in his stomach.

He swallowed down the sting and forced his voice steady. “Maybe I’m not interested in models.”

For the first time, Dabi’s grin slipped. Not gone, just…strained. He dragged another long inhale off his cigarette, eyes narrowing like he was memorizing Keigo’s face for later. Then he flicked the butt to the ground and crushed it beneath his boot.

“Careful,” Dabi murmured, straightening. “You’ll regret it when she burns you alive.”

He turned, hands in his pockets, shoulders loose, and sauntered down the hall. Not toward his own room. Not toward the stairs. Toward hers.

Keigo’s feathers bristled, wings twitching wide before he could stop them. His boots shifted forward, ready to intercept—

His phone buzzed.

Sharp, clipped, Commission frequency.

“Hawks,” the voice snapped when he answered, cold and commanding. “It’s been days. It’s time to report. Immediate debrief.”

His chest seized, torn clean down the middle. His eyes tracked Dabi’s back as the bastard strolled leisurely toward Vix’s door, smoke still clinging to him. His fist tightened around the strap of the bag.

The voice repeated in his ear, harder. “Now. It’s not optional.”

Keigo stood frozen in the hall, split between the two cages closing in on him.

And he knew whichever step he took next would cost him.

Chapter Text

Present Day

He was spiraling.

That was the only word for it. Curled in his bed, blinds drawn, the city nothing but a muted hum behind the glass. Too sick to work. Too sick to eat. His body felt hollow, like it was eating itself alive.

His journal lay on the mattress beside him, a weight he couldn’t ignore. He dragged a finger over the crooked stick figures she’d doodled in the margins. Crooked, uneven, full of life. They mocked him with their simplicity. Things had never been simple back then, not really, but compared to the present they felt like another world.

I think I…

The words weren’t hers anymore. They belonged to him now, rasping out of his chest like a confession carved from bone.

“I loved you too,” he whispered.

The sound broke in the stillness, and his chest clamped down hard around it. The ache swelled, raw and merciless.

He should feel relief. The file had said it clearly enough. Deceased. No child starving in some shack. No little fox-bird hybrid dragged into the Commission’s cage. No legacy to ruin, no chance to fail someone who had never asked to exist.

That truth should have freed him.

But the relief never came.

A knock sounded, soft. Keigo didn’t even bother lifting his head.

Mera stepped inside without waiting, balancing two steaming mugs. He set one on the table by the journal, eyes flicking once toward the untouched soup still cooling nearby. “Didn’t eat,” he murmured.

Keigo didn’t look up. “Didn’t want it.”

Mera sank into the chair across from him. Silence stretched, only the radiator’s faint whistle filling it, until finally Mera said, “They want you to see him.”

Keigo’s head jerked up. His stomach twisted. “No.”

“They think it’ll play well,” Mera went on evenly. “Two enemies. A final meeting. Forgiveness, closure. Something for the cameras.”

Keigo let out a laugh, sharp and bitter. “Closure? With him? He nearly burned me alive and laughed while he did it. And they want me to stand in front of a fucking tank so they can sell forgiveness?”

“They’ll push it either way,” Mera said. His voice was calm, but his eyes stayed steady on Keigo. “I doubt this is optional for you.”

“For fuck’s sake! I’m not their goddamn puppet anymore,” Keigo spat. He shoved the blanket aside, pacing the narrow stretch of floor. “They can parade me around at meetings, they can put me behind desks, but this? No. I won’t do it.”

Mera didn’t move. He folded his hands, patient as stone. “You keep saying no because of the Commission. But in the long run, this isn’t just about them.”

Keigo froze mid-step, breath snagging. His jaw locked.

Mera leaned forward slightly, voice steady. “This is about you too.”

Something inside him cracked. He barked a laugh, harsh and hollow. “Me? You think I need closure with him? That’s not what this is.” He dragged a hand down his face, words spilling out jagged. “He knew. Mera, he knew what I’d done. He had to. Every time he looked at me, it was like he could see straight through me. Like he was waiting for me to choke on my lies. And he wasn’t wrong.”

His throat burned. He pressed a hand against his sternum as though that might keep it from splitting open. “I betrayed her. I gave the Commission what they wanted and pretended I didn’t. And he knew. He always knew. You want me to stand there now, look him in the eye while he rots in a tube, and pretend I’m the better man? He’d see it. Even dying, he’d see exactly what I am.”

The admission left him shaking.

Mera didn’t flinch. “So face it. Face him. Don’t forgive him. Don’t perform for them. Just face it.”

Keigo shook his head violently. “You don’t get it. He’ll win even then. He’ll look at me, with whatever strength he’s got left, and he’ll know that I’m still bleeding for what I did.

“He’s dying, Keigo. Machines breathing for him. Whatever he was, whatever power he had, it’s gone now. He doesn’t get to own you unless you keep letting him.”

Keigo tipped his head back against the wall, eyes squeezing shut. He could already see it too clearly. Dabi floating in that tank, skin burned to ash, eyes open but lifeless. A monster undone, body reduced to tubes and glass.

He should want to see it. He should crave the victory. But bile rose in his throat. Because he knew Mera was right. It wouldn’t be about triumph. It would be about whether he could even look at him without collapsing under the weight of his own betrayal.

“I don’t want to give him anything,” Keigo whispered. “Not my time. Not my pity. Not another second.”

“Then don’t,” Mera said simply. “Don’t give it to him. Give it to yourself.”

The radiator hissed. Steam curled from the mug beside the journal.

Keigo let out a long, uneven breath and dropped back onto the bed. His feelings didn’t matter, they never had. He’d be forced to do this no matter what his opinion was. “So what do they want? Pictures? A statement? Me on display again, gawking like I’m a damn monkey in a zoo?”

“At least you’re not the one in the tank,” Mera said, so casually Keigo couldn’t help but let out a short, broken laugh. “But yes. I’m sure that’s what they’ll want. You’ll be granted fifteen minutes alone with him, then the Todoroki family will be with you for the final goodbyes.”

“He’s going to ask me about her,” Keigo muttered after a beat, voice raw. “I can feel it. He’s gonna bring her up, just to watch me choke. And what the hell am I supposed to say, Mera? How do I look him in the eye and tell him his best friend — the girl he loved — that I knocked her up and now she’s dead?” His hand dragged over his mouth, trembling. “What do I do with that?”

“The truth,” Mera said simply. “Tell him the truth.”

Keigo’s head snapped toward him, eyes blazing. “You can’t be serious.”

“Keigo.” Mera’s voice didn’t rise, didn’t waver. “He’s dying. This is the end. Don’t give him pity. Just give him honesty. Tell him you loved her. Tell him you tried to do what you thought was best. Tell him she didn’t make it. Let him leave this world believing he’ll see her again in the next. That’s more mercy than anyone ever gave him.”

Keigo barked a bitter laugh, hollow and sharp. “Mercy? You think he deserves mercy? You think that I have any left?”

“You’ve got more in you than you think,” Mera said. His gaze lingered a moment longer, then he pushed himself up, smoothing his shirt with calm, deliberate hands.

Keigo stayed slumped on the bed, staring at the ceiling, jaw tight enough to ache. He heard Mera’s footsteps retreat toward the door, heard the faint creak of the hinges as it opened.

Then silence.

Mera’s voice came again, softer than before, carrying back into the room like something meant to be overheard. “For what it’s worth. You would’ve made a great father, you know. Because no matter what you keep telling yourself… you are a good man. You have always been a good man.”

The door clicked shut.

Keigo lay there in the dim light, the words ringing in his chest like a bruise pressed too deep to ignore. He wanted to laugh. He wanted to scream. Instead he covered his face with both hands, and started to cry.

Chapter Text

Nine Months Ago

“I brought pizza!”

Hawks’ voice rang out before you even saw him, easy and bright, filling the quiet space like sunlight breaking through a storm. It shouldn’t have made your chest tighten the way it did. But lately, you noticed everything about him did.

You weren’t sure when it started. Somewhere between the fever breaking and the pain dulling, something else had shifted. Somewhere between the long nights and his wing draped over you for warmth, the lines had blurred.

Days of him playing nurse had turned into something softer. Into shared hours that weren’t about recovery anymore. You’d listen to music—half his playlists, half yours—watching the way his face would twist, like every song was a new language he was trying to learn. You watched movies he’d somehow never seen, mocked his reactions, and stole his journal whenever you got bored.

You’d doodle in the corners of his pages, right next to his neat, coded notes. He’d always grumble about it, wings twitching, pretending to be annoyed. But you could tell he didn’t actually mind. If anything, he seemed to like it. The teasing. The closeness. The quiet comfort that came after the chaos of being in the PLF.

And maybe that was what scared you the most.

You were falling in love with a hero, and that was more dangerous than any wolf’s claws.

You could already hear Dabi’s voice in your head. Low, mocking, cutting in the way only he could manage. You can’t trust a hero, Foxy. They only know how to burn things when they touch ‘em.

Thankfully, you hadn’t seen much of him since the night Hawks dragged you back half-conscious, caked in blood and mud. Dabi had been busy with whatever storm was brewing among the upper ranks. It had to be serious. Everyone was tight-lipped, movements sharp, tempers shorter than usual. The halls that usually buzzed with chaos had gone quiet in a way that made your skin crawl.

Something serious was coming.

But you still remembered your last talk. That night, you’d barely been able to sit upright, your shoulder wrapped tight in makeshift bandages. Hawks had left to find medicine to help with infection. You’d been drifting in and out when the door creaked open.

“Let yourself get all torn up, Foxy?”

His voice was soft, almost gentle, and that somehow made it worse. He leaned against the doorframe, arms crossed, blue firelight from the hallway casting sharp shadows across his face.

“Should see the other guy,” you’d managed to croak, but your voice was weaker than you cared for.

He huffed a quiet laugh. “That right? Heard birdie boy played hero. Guess he couldn’t resist helping a pretty girl, huh?”

You’d shot him a glare, but it didn’t have much bite.

You used to tell him everything. Every fear, every plan, every half-broken thought that crossed your mind. But somewhere along the way—three months, maybe less—it had all curdled. Whatever closeness you’d had with Dabi had rotted from the inside out.

Now, sitting there with your shoulder burning and your heartbeat still out of rhythm, you found yourself wishing he’d just leave. Wishing Hawks would come back instead.

“He saved my life,” you muttered.

“Sure he did.” His grin stretched, slow and knowing, but his eyes didn’t match. “Bet he even made it look good, huh? All feathers and glory. That’s what they do.”

You hated that his words stuck to you, that they festered even after he left. Because even now, with Hawks smiling like sunlight and holding a damn pizza box, a piece of you couldn’t help but wonder if Dabi was right.

You refused to believe he was.

Hawks helped with intel. He’d fed information to the League that had been proven right. When the time came, he’d be on your side.

He had to be.

He shut the door with his foot, balancing the box like a prize. “Commission crap,” he said with a groan, dragging a hand down his face. “Briefings, reports, sitting through another meeting where everyone pretends I’m not a walking liability.”

You tilted your head. “So… a typical Tuesday?”

He laughed under his breath, wings giving a restless twitch. “Pretty much. They’re throwing one of those hero galas next week. Wanted to make sure I still remember how to smile on command.”

You snorted. “You? Smiling for a camera? Shocking.”

He threw you a look over his shoulder—half grin, half warning—but there was no bite in it. “Careful, Foxy. I brought dinner. Don’t make me eat it all myself.”

You rolled your eyes but motioned for him to sit. “You’d just complain about eating alone.”

He plopped down beside you on the old couch, setting the pizza box between you. “I wouldn’t complain,” he said, flipping the lid open. “I’d just… miss the entertainment.”

“Entertainment?”

“You,” he said simply, eyes flicking toward you before you could scoff. “You make all this…” He waved a hand vaguely around the dim room, at the cracks in the walls and the flickering light. “Less unbearable.”

Your heart skipped. You forced a smirk. “Careful, hero. Sounds like you’re flirting.”

“Maybe I am.”

The way he said it—soft, low, like a secret—made your chest tighten. You could feel the air shift, heavier somehow. You reached for a slice just to keep your hands busy, but his knee brushed yours as he leaned in to grab his own, and suddenly you couldn’t remember what the hell pizza even was.

“You ever been to one of those galas?” he asked after a beat, voice quieter now.

You laughed, sharp and humorless. “Now I know you’re stupid for real. Do I look like someone who’s ever been invited to fancy hero parties?”

He smiled faintly. “You’d hate it. Everyone pretending, everyone smiling too wide. It’s just noise and lights and fake laughs. I’ll be counting the minutes till it’s over.”

You studied him, the faint shadow beneath his eyes, the way his fingers drummed against his knee like he couldn’t sit still. “Then why go?”

He shrugged, eyes dropping to the box. “Because that’s what I do. I go where I’m told. Say the right words. Shake the right hands.”

There was something brittle in his voice. Something that made you want to reach out, to tell him he didn’t have to keep pretending around you.

“Wouldn’t it be easier,” you said quietly, “if you just stopped?”

His gaze lifted, locking onto yours. “Yeah,” he said softly. “It would.”

The room felt too small then, the air too thin. You realized how close you’d leaned toward him, your knees brushing, your fingers resting dangerously close to his on the couch. He noticed too. You saw it in the flicker of his eyes, the subtle catch in his breath.

For a second, one heartbeat suspended in the dark, you thought he’d close the space. You thought he’d do something reckless. You almost wanted him to.

Instead, he smirked faintly and said, “You’d look good in a dress, though.”

You blinked, thrown off-balance. “What?”

“If you went to one of those galas.” His grin widened, though it didn’t reach his eyes. “Can’t have the only one looking stunning in the room be me.”

You shoved his shoulder. “You’re insufferable.”

“Yeah, but you’d miss me if I wasn’t.”

You lunged to shove him again, but he caught your wrist this time, laughing. It turned into a tangle—half playful, half too much. He twisted just enough to pull you off-balance, and you toppled into him, chest against his, the laughter dying in your throat when you realized how close you were.

His hand was still around your wrist. His other hovered near your waist, not quite touching. His breath ghosted across your cheek.

You could have kissed him. God, you wanted to.

But you didn’t. You couldn’t.

“Vix,” he murmured, voice rough now. You could feel it, the hesitation, the want curling under his words.

You tore your wrist free and sat back fast, eyes wide, pulse hammering. “Eat your damn pizza, birdbrain.”

He chuckled, though it came out hoarse. “You’re blushing you know.”

“Shut the fuck up.”

He leaned back, still smiling, but it didn’t feel teasing anymore. It felt like he was trying to memorize something. Like maybe he already knew this moment wouldn’t last.

Why couldn’t you stop the doubt? Why couldn’t you just trust him?

You should’ve kissed him. Fuck, you wanted to kiss him.

“Yeah,” he said quietly, more to himself than to you. “But, I hope you know I’d rather be there with you.”

You didn’t trust your voice enough to answer him. So instead, you reached for the remote, flipped through the static until something familiar flickered onto the screen. Some old action flick you’d seen a dozen times, the kind you knew by heart.
He didn’t move at first, just watched you with that quiet look again. The one that made your stomach twist because it wasn’t his usual grin. It was softer. Real.

Then he shifted, stretching out along the couch beside you until his thigh brushed yours. He didn’t say anything when you didn’t move away. Just reached for a slice of pizza, bit into it, and let out a satisfied hum.

“You’ve got terrible taste in movies,” he mumbled around a mouthful.

You smirked, eyes on the screen. “Says the guy who thinks Top Gun counts as high art.”

He grinned at that, the sound of it low and warm in your chest. The kind of sound that made you forget the world outside that room. Forget the Commission. Forget the League. Forget that you were supposed to be on opposite sides.

You weren’t sure how it happened, but somewhere between the second slice and the third act, his arm ended up along the back of the couch. His fingers brushed your shoulder lightly, a small, absent movement that shouldn’t have felt like anything. Except it did. It felt like everything.

You could hear his breathing now, steady and slow, his body radiating heat next to yours. When you shifted, his fingers slid just barely against your arm, and you froze, waiting for him to move them away.

He didn’t.

Instead, his voice came low, a little hoarse. “This part’s good.”

You nodded even though you weren’t watching. You couldn’t. Your eyes were fixed on the reflection of his in the glow of the screen. Molten gold and too damn close.

Minutes passed like that. Neither of you moved. You told yourself you were just tired, that leaning into him wasn’t a big deal, that it was fine to rest your head against his shoulder just for a second.

But when you did, he went still, completely still, before exhaling softly through his nose. You felt it in his chest. Then, carefully, like he was afraid to spook you, his arm came around your shoulders.

The movie kept playing. The world kept turning. But something between you had already shifted, and you both knew it.

You should’ve pulled away. You didn’t.

His hand slid up, slow and hesitant, until his fingers brushed the side of your throat. The barest ghost of a touch. You looked up just as he looked down. The glow from the TV caught the edges of his face, softened everything sharp.

“Vix…” he murmured, your name breaking apart on his breath.

You didn’t know which of you leaned in first. Maybe it was both of you. The space between you vanished, and then his lips were on yours. Soft at first, almost questioning. You breathed out against him, and that was all the permission he needed.

The kiss deepened by a fraction. Not desperate, not rough. Just real.

Soft in the way broken things are when they finally stop fighting the fall. He tasted like tomato sauce and sunshine, and something sad beneath it all. Something that clung to the back of your throat like regret. It wasn’t the kiss of a man who wanted forever, it was the kiss of someone who already knew he couldn’t stay.

But you wanted to pretend he could.

When he finally pulled back, his forehead stayed against yours, his breath uneven.

“This is a bad idea,” he whispered.

“Yeah,” you said, voice shaking in return. “I know.”

Neither of you moved.

His thumb brushed your jaw once, lingering before he dropped his hand. You curled closer, pretending it meant nothing, pretending you could still breathe normally.

And when your eyes started to drift shut, the last thing you felt was the slow, steady rhythm of his heart under your ear and the soft brush of his thumb tracing circles on your arm.

He didn’t say a word.

He didn’t have to.

Because somehow, in that tiny sliver of borrowed peace, you both pretended it could last.

Chapter Text

He was on cloud nine.

At least, he thought that was the right saying. Because how else was he supposed to describe it? She’d let him kiss her. He’d kissed her. And for one fleeting, perfect moment, it had felt like gravity didn’t apply to him anymore. Like maybe, just maybe, he could have something real.

But reality didn’t let him stay weightless for long.

It hit him hard, fast, sending him crashing straight into the concrete of everything he’d been trying not to think about. The mission. The lies. The damn folder.

The information inside wasn’t just important. It was everything.

He scrubbed a hand down his face, heart pounding. Had she even known what she was carrying? Did she know more than she let on? Was she playing him just as much as he was playing her?

Was he playing her?

Logically, technically, the answer was yes. He’d walked into that goddamn Commission meeting and handed them everything. Every scrap of intel, every coded detail, like the good, obedient little soldier they’d trained him to be.

But their praise had rung hollow. Empty. It echoed in his ears like static, meaningless against the weight pressing down on his chest.

Because he’d fallen in love with a villain. And that was more dangerous than any mission, any secret, or any lie he’d ever told.

And in four weeks, when the heroes began their raids, she’d know the truth. Everything he’d built—the quiet nights, the laughter, the feeling of something real—would go up in flames right alongside the rest of it.

Which was why he started to pull away.

He told himself it was mercy. That if he made her hate him now, it’d hurt less later. It sounded logical in his head, the same way all his bad decisions did. Hurt her now so she wouldn’t shatter when the truth hit. Create distance before the fire reached her.

So he stopped showing up.

No late-night visits. No smuggled snacks. No lazy teasing that always got her to roll her eyes before she smiled. Just silence. A wall he built out of guilt and fear, brick by brick, every day that passed.

But damn if it didn’t kill him.

He’d catch her looking at him across the room—confused, hurt, pretending she didn’t care—and it twisted something deep in his chest. The ache crawled up his throat until it burned, until every instinct screamed at him to go to her, to say something, anything, to fix it.

But he didn’t. He couldn’t.

Because every time he met her eyes, all he could see was what she didn’t know yet. And the knowledge that she’d never forgive him for it was already eating him alive.

He stood in front of the mirror now, buttoning the collar of his suit like it might somehow hold him together.

The Commission had sent the car hours ago. The watch gleamed on the dresser beside the invitation he hadn’t even opened, the neat block letters of Hero Gala – Attendance Required staring up at him like an order rather than a request.

He should’ve been thinking about the mission, the timing, the next drop. About how everything was going to fall apart in less than a month.

But all he could think about was her.

Vix.

The way she’d laughed when he burned the popcorn last week. The way her ears flicked when she pretended not to listen to him talk. The warmth that used to fill the room when she smiled at him, really smiled, like he was someone worth being around.

He adjusted the tie again, fingers fumbling. It came out crooked. He didn’t fix it.

He wondered what she’d say if she saw him like this. Polished, prim, and pretending. Probably laugh herself hoarse. Probably call him “pretty boy” just to see how red he could get before snapping back.

God, she’d look beautiful at a gala.

The thought came uninvited, sharp and stupid, lodging itself deep in his ribs. He could picture it too clearly. The dress, the soft lighting catching in her hair, the way she’d stand there with that little defiant tilt to her chin, daring anyone to underestimate her.

He’d rather take her than any of the Commission’s preapproved models. But he couldn’t. Not without blowing everything up.

Not without losing her sooner.

He’d seen the file they gave him for the event: the woman who’d be his date. Perfect posture, practiced smile, every angle curated for cameras. She didn’t mean a thing. She was just part of the act. Another mask in a night built entirely out of lies.

And yet, even as he straightened his jacket, all he could think was how wrong it felt. How empty it felt.

He wasn’t supposed to want the life he’d built in that crumbling mansion. He wasn’t supposed to want quiet mornings and late-night laughter with someone who made him forget who he was.

He was supposed to want this.

The hero. The headlines. The spotlight.

But as he stared at his reflection, the man looking back at him didn’t look like a hero. He looked like a fucking coward. Someone who’d traded something real for orders printed in ink.

He dragged a hand through his hair and sighed, muttering under his breath, “You’re a goddamn idiot.”

The knock came, sharp and rehearsed. “Hawks? Car’s waiting.”

“Yeah,” he called back, voice flat. “On my way.”

He grabbed his coat, shoved his wings tight to his back, and forced the smirk into place. The one they liked, the one that looked good on camera. But his heart was somewhere else entirely.

He was halfway to the door when he heard it, he quiet knock that never meant danger. Just patience and an understanding he never felt he deserved.

“Come in,” he muttered, tugging at his cuffs like the fabric was choking him.

Mera stepped inside, a faint frown creasing the edges of his calm face. He looked older under the fluorescents, the kind of tired that came from carrying too many secrets for too many years. The Commission life would do that to you. His eyes flicked once over the pristine suit, then back to Keigo’s face.

“You clean up well,” he said lightly.

Keigo forced a smile, one that didn’t quite reach his eyes. “Yeah, well. Can’t have the Commission’s golden boy looking like a burnout, right?”

Mera hummed but didn’t answer. He watched him for a beat longer than was comfortable. Long enough that Keigo had to look away, fingers curling and uncurling at his sides.

“You eating?” Mera asked finally.

“Yeah.” Lie.

“Sleeping?”

“Some.” Another lie.

Mera sighed softly, rubbing a hand across his jaw. “You’ve got that look again.”

Keigo tilted his head. “What look?”

“The one you get before everything goes to hell.”

That made him laugh, too fast, too sharp. “You’ll have to be more specific.”

But Mera didn’t laugh back. He stepped closer, his tone gentler now, stripped of the Commission’s formality. “Whatever this is, son… don’t let it eat you alive.”

Keigo froze. Son. It hit him harder than it should have, the word cutting through the armor he’d spent years perfecting. He tried to smirk, to deflect, but it came out weak. “You make it sound like I’ve got a choice.”

“You do.” Mera’s eyes softened. “Maybe not with them. But with yourself.”

Keigo looked down, jaw tightening. The truth hovered behind his teeth. I’m in love with her. I’ve betrayed her. I don’t know how to fix it. But he couldn’t say it. Wouldn’t. It wouldn’t change anything anyway.

He just shrugged, forcing his voice light. “I’ll be fine. It’s just another party.”

Mera didn’t buy it, he never did, but he let him have the lie anyway. He reached out, straightening the tie that had gone crooked again, and murmured, “You always were a terrible liar when it came to me.”

Keigo smiled, soft and fleeting. “Guess they didn’t teach me as well as they thought, huh?”

That earned the faintest huff of a laugh, but the look in Mera’s eyes said it all. He knew something was wrong. He just didn’t know what.

And Keigo couldn’t bear to tell him.

Not yet.

Not when the guilt was already crawling up his throat like smoke.

Mera stepped back, nodding once toward the door. “Go make them think you’re fine.”

“Always do,” Keigo said quietly.

He waited until Mera was gone before exhaling, letting the practiced smile slide right off his face. His hands trembled when he reached for the door handle, but he didn’t stop. Couldn’t stop.

Because the man in the mirror, the Commission’s perfect weapon, had to keep walking.

And the one piece of him that still felt human was something he wasn’t allowed to keep.