Winds of Destiny: Rising
Chapter Nineteen: The Calm Before the Storm
Misaki took the cup of steaming coffee Eraser handed to her with a grateful smile. He sat down next to her on the couch before taking a slow sip from his own cup of coffee. Eri had been pretty drained after her training, so they'd put her down to sleep before deciding to continue their earlier conversation in the privacy of the playroom.
She lowered the mug in her hands into her lap and ducked her head before asking, "How much do you know?"
"Only what I've been able to deduce from working with the League Task Force at Tartarus, and the reports I've read from some of the students about their work studies. My guess is Hawks has been working undercover with the League of Villains for a while to spy on their movements and plans. He's been relaying that information back to the Safety Commission somehow, while spreading the word to heroes throughout the country about the uprising of the Meta Liberation Army," Eraser somberly replied.
"They're actually calling themselves the Paranormal Liberation Front now since Shigaraki and the League took over," she told him lightly, shrugging her shoulders.
"You're pretty deep into this I take it?" He asked, glancing over at her.
She sighed heavily and leaned forward to place her coffee cup on the table in front of them. When she sat back, she turned toward him with a remorseful expression on her face as she said, "I need to apologize to you, Aizawa-san. The one who figured out that Kurogiri may have once been Shirakumo Oboro… It was me."
A cold wave of ice slithered through him at her admission and he inquired in shock, "You?"
She dropped her gaze into her lap and nodded solemnly. "I actually figured it out before we spoke about him. It hadn't been confirmed yet at that point. I was still hoping that I was wrong…" She looked up at him pitifully. "I'm so sorry."
He uncomfortably dropped his gaze from hers and managed to croak out, "How?"
"His hair," she said.
He looked up at her in confusion. "What?"
"Back when the Hero Killer was still on the loose, I almost encountered Kurogiri in a back alley in Hosu. When I saw the short clip that was attached to Shirakumo's obituary, the way his hair moved reminded me of the way Kurogiri's fog moved. It was a pretty big leap, I mean, Shirakumo's quirk wasn't anything like teleportation. But I thought maybe if it had been used as a base and combined with others..." she trailed off gravely.
He was shocked into silence. He hadn't drawn any kind of connection between Shirakumo and Kurogiri when he'd encountered him during the USJ attack. Of course, back then they hadn't thought to consider that Kurogiri may have been a Nomu, nor had they even known what the Nomu were at the time. But the thought that she'd made that connection from such a vague reference as the way his hair moved just sounded absurd.
"Ever since we learned about the League's team up with the Meta Liberation Army, I've been conducting research on the Nomu and how they were made on orders from the President, trying to figure out who was making them and where they were being manufactured," she continued to explain as if sensing his disbelief.
Eraser relaxed. Her conclusions made more sense if she'd already been researching quirks that could have made up Kurogiri's. It wasn't like she'd just randomly made the connection; she'd been specifically looking for it. Her observation of his hair movement had only made her look a little closer at Shirakumo as a possible piece of the puzzle, not necessarily as an obvious link between the two.
"No wonder you've been so busy," Eraser commented glumly, raising a hand to scratch the side of his head in a slightly sheepish gesture.
"I wish that was all it was…" Misaki trailed off with a melancholy sigh. Glancing over at him, she asked, "Do you remember during the Christmas party, when I told you that I'd just gone through a rough breakup?"
He nodded, already having a pretty good idea about what she was going to say next.
"The guy I was seeing at the time was Hawks. We met while I was living in Fukuoka almost a year and a half ago. We ended up getting pretty close and by the end of last year, we'd officially become lovers," she explained in a sort of fondly reminiscent tone that became markedly more reserved as she continued, "Our relationship ended about a month before the rankings were announced in November. I didn't find out until afterward that he'd been given the assignment to infiltrate the League."
"He's been undercover with them for that long?" Eraser asked incredulously. Considering his involvement in the Nomu attack on Kyushu, it was a little surprising to know that Hawks had already been working behind the scenes with the League at the time.
She nodded. "The Commission gave him the assignment right after Kamino. He was finally able to track down a recruiter around the time that he broke up with me."
Her melancholy countenance when she spoke about their breakup prompted him to ask, "You think he did it to protect you?"
She tossed him a small, rueful smirk before replying, "That was part of it. I think he really just wanted to give me an opportunity to figure out who I was and what I wanted to do with my life. To give me the freedom to make my own decisions without bias…"
"Seems like you've done a pretty good job of that," he told her in a slightly sympathetic tone.
Her rueful smirk widened into more of a genuine grin as she looked over at him and replied, "I wouldn't say it's been easy, but I'm figuring it out." She dropped her gaze from his and sighed. "At least I thought I was… Until all this Liberation mess happened."
"The League recruiter Hawks was working with had been giving him the runaround for months, testing him in various ways to gauge his loyalties before letting him into the fold. When the League assimilated the Meta Liberation Army, they finally let him in under the provision that he would remain under constant surveillance. Because of that, all of his messages have had to be communicated in code. Due to our close, personal history, and given my role as Commissioner of Analytics, they assigned me the task of decoding his messages," she explained with a sort of resigned bitterness in her tone.
Forget being involved, she was neck-deep in the whole situation. Considering all of the revelations that had come up throughout the conversation, he couldn't help but wonder incredulously if she was going to reveal that she was somehow related to All Might next. Although his mind was reeling from her admissions, he also recognized her apprehension about revealing them to him. She was openly confiding in him about several very personal details concerning her life. The least he could do was show some consideration for her trust.
"That must have been rough," Eraser replied sympathetically, though it came out sounding a bit awkward to his ears. Trauma counseling wasn't really his strong suit, after all.
Misaki huffed out a short breath as she rolled her eyes back over to him. "Not nearly as rough as what you've been going through. But I suppose we've both been forced to get more personally involved in this business than we would have liked."
He'd had his suspicions for a while, but the bitterness and distress she exuded whenever she spoke about the way their relationship had ended made it seem even more obvious to him now. She seemed to be more upset with herself than anything else; and honestly, he could relate. Sighing to himself, he said, "You still have feelings for him, don't you?"
She was silent for a long moment before she turned her piteous gaze toward him. "I don't think I can put into words what I felt for him. Those kinds of feelings... They may fade with time, but they never really go away. Now that I've been working with him so closely on this assignment, I've realized… They haven't faded at all. If anything, they've only grown brighter." She dropped her wretched stare down to her hands in her lap as she continued in a tremulous voice, "And now I'm stuck with all of these emotions and I can't do anything about them. It all just keeps building up inside me and I don't know how to let it out." Raising a hand to cover her mouth, she turned her sorrowful gaze toward the door leading into Eri's bedroom and whispered, "Just like Eri."
He could practically feel the turmoil she was going through as she spoke. He knew a little bit about having strong feelings and not knowing what to do with them. After Shirakumo's death, he'd dealt with his inability to accept the situation by throwing himself into a self-destructive spiral of outright bitterness toward the villain community and calling it heroism. He'd effectively become a vigilante with a hero license. Although he couldn't give her any advice about how to handle her love life, he could offer some help in finding a constructive outlet for her pain.
"Maybe you should follow her example," Eraser suggested pragmatically.
Misaki turned toward him, confused. "What do you mean?"
He met her gaze evenly and explained, "Take it a little bit at a time. Find an outlet to channel that energy into and focus it – put it to good use instead of just bottling it all up inside."
She blinked a couple of times before asking, "Like what?"
He reached up to scratch the side of his head as he replied, "When I'm trying to work through something I usually hit the training grounds."
She huffed out a short laugh and shook her head. "Typical."
"I won't deny it," he grumbled sheepishly as he averted his eyes.
"But that's not a bad idea," she said suddenly.
He turned his gaze back to her and asked, "What? Training?"
She nodded, more to herself than him, and said, "It's been a while since I brushed up on my jiujitsu."
He raised an incredulous eyebrow at her as he asked, "You know jiujitsu?"
Misaki shrugged. "I got along pretty well with the teacher who coached my high school judo team. I wouldn't call myself an expert or anything, but I know enough to get by."
The hits just kept on coming with her.
Eraser stood up from the couch and walked a couple of steps forward. He dropped his hands into his pockets as he turned back toward her and said, "Let's go."
"What, now?" She asked in shock.
"I was going to hit the training grounds after this anyway. I could use a sparring partner," he pragmatically replied over his shoulder.
Shaking her head, Misaki stood from her seat on the couch and followed after him out the door of the playroom. "As long as you promise to go easy on me. It's been a few years since I sparred with someone."
"We'll see," Eraser responded frankly as he trudged down the hall toward the training grounds.
"Hey, wait a minute! I was being serious!" Misaki anxiously called out as she jogged after him.
A gentle breeze blew through the budding branches of the cherry blossom trees lining the secluded walkway of a lakeside park not far from the Hero Public Safety Commission headquarters. Strolling along at a leisurely pace down the worn, stone path was Misaki and Hawks. They were walking shoulder to shoulder no more than a few centimeters apart, both holding individual cups of ice cream in their hands. They took a few bites as they walked and talked, laughing every once in a while at something the other had said.
Hawks turned his gaze upward for a moment and thoughtfully remarked, "Hard to believe it's already spring, huh?"
"And we once again find ourselves walking through a park eating ice cream," Misaki ironically commented as she shot him a sidelong glance.
"Well now that I've cured you of your bland taste preferences, it seemed like a good idea," he replied, matching her tone and shooting her his own sidelong glance.
She just grinned and shook her head before placing a spoonful of her coffee-flavored ice cream upside down in her mouth. He'd surprised her by stopping by her office just before noon and asking her out to lunch. Usually, their "dates" took place in the evenings, where they could be more discreet under the cover of night. Walking through the mostly secluded park, eating whatever they picked up from a few of the food vendors they'd passed by, was a new experience for her; one she was enjoying more than she wanted to admit.
He'd managed to somehow keep their encounters platonic since the karaoke incident, usually taking her somewhere public, but still somewhat private. And of course, it always involved food in some way or another. She'd wondered a time or two if that was more for his benefit than hers; to avoid putting them in any situations like they'd been in outside the karaoke bar. Now that they'd established for his watchdogs that they were dating, it wouldn't exactly be out of character for them to share a kiss or two. She suspected his worry was more rooted in his ability, or lack thereof, to stop at just a kiss.
'Not that I would be much better off in that capacity at this point,' she thought as she averted her eyes and shoveled another spoonful of ice cream into her mouth.
"Looks like it's about time for the trees to start blooming," Hawks wistfully observed, drawing her attention back over to him.
"You can tell that?" She incredulously asked, blinking as she stared at him looking up at the tree branches.
He turned toward her suddenly, whipping out a Tokyo Hanami guide pamphlet from the inside of his coat as he said, "According to this!"
She snatched it out of his hand with a huff. Shaking her head at his antics, she glanced down at the guide in her hand, noticing it as the one she'd seen him pilfer from one of the food vendors they'd stopped by for lunch. There had been several different ones displayed in a stand next to the food stall. She'd seen him looking through a few of them while they'd been waiting for their order, and she remembered wondering at the time if he'd been looking for something specific. There didn't appear to be anything out of the ordinary on the cover, so she flipped open the first page. She immediately noticed the folded piece of paper slipped underneath the unopened flap of the brochure and she stopped herself from opening it the rest of the way.
Flipping the guide closed, she took a deep breath and announced in a contemplative tone, "Ya know, now that you mention it, I don't think I've ever seen the cherry blossoms in Tokyo."
That was a lie. They'd gone to see them together the year before. It hadn't been a traditional Hanami date as one would expect. He'd flown them over the lighted path along the Meguro River late at night, after most of the traffic had died down but before all of the food stands had packed up for the evening. They'd picked up some snacks and a bottle of wine before heading up to the top of a nearby building to view the line of fully blossomed sakura trees glowing in the light of the hanging lanterns from above. It was one of her fondest memories of their time together, and one she knew he would remember as well.
"Let's go," he suggested suddenly.
She glanced over at him and blinked. "Really?"
He shrugged. "Sure. How about Sunday?"
Her eyebrows shot up in shock. "That soon?"
His expression was a bit grave when he replied, "All of the blossoms won't stick around for very long. Better strike while the iron's hot, right?"
She could tell from his tone and his posture that he wasn't actually talking about the cherry blossoms. That was likely code for the Liberation forces. They must be planning on gathering together for some reason on Sunday. That didn't give them very much warning, but they'd been preparing for this kind of opportunity for months. Although it was a bit sooner than expected, they could be ready by Sunday. They'd have to be.
"I can probably move some things around in my schedule," she replied in a cordial tone as she reached for her bag with her free hand. There were probably more details in the pamphlet she'd taken from him that she'd have to examine later.
He took her half-eaten ice cream cup off her hands to assist her in finding her black book a little easier. She noticed him move a small step back as she made a quick note on Sunday's page before snapping it shut and placing both the book and the pamphlet inside her bag. He handed her back her ice cream when she looked back up and she took it from him with a grateful smile.
"You ever miss it?" He asked suddenly, his tone retaking its usual lighter lilt.
She cocked her head to the side and asked, "What?"
"Kyushu," he replied, glancing at her out of the corner of his eye as he took a bite of his own coffee-flavored ice cream. "You're from there, right?"
And so, it appeared that they'd now veered off onto the detour portion of this particular outing. She'd learned how to recognize them pretty well over their last couple of encounters. It always came after their business obligation was fulfilled for the evening. He'd lead her down some rabbit hole of personal inquiry that made it seem like he was trying to get to know her. They'd flirt a little bit while they bantered back and forth, usually over dessert or an after-meal drink before she'd call a cab and head home alone for the night, or in this instance, back to work.
"How do you know that?" She asked around a mouthful of ice cream, glancing at him curiously out of the corner of her eye.
He looked down and grinned. "You get the accent sometimes."
She raised a hand to cover her mouth and turned to him with a shocked expression. "No way, really?"
"It's pretty subtle. Get a couple of drinks in you and it comes out," he replied in a teasing tone before shooting her a sly grin.
She pushed against his shoulder and shook her head. "You enjoy provoking me, don't you?"
His grin widened and he turned his head to stare into her eyes as he told her, "You're cute when you're angry."
Misaki quickly averted her gaze. He'd been doing that every so often; shooting her those looks that he knew made her weak at the knees. Once all of this Liberation mess was dealt with, they would be having a very honest conversation about what the hell he was thinking with all of this subtle innuendo. It was one thing to put on an act for the Liberation watchdogs but she knew those looks were meant just for her.
Pulling her upside-down spoon out of her mouth, she replied with mock remorse, "Hate to break it to ya, Maverick, but you've never seen me angry."
"Yeah, alright, that's fair," he conceded with a light chuckle before shooting her a knowing sidelong glance. "Don't think I didn't notice how you avoided my question."
She ducked her head and responded honestly, "Sometimes I do."
"Yeah, me too," he admitted in the same softly reminiscent tone she'd used after a moment.
"Don't you live there?" She asked, glancing over at him curiously.
"I've been traveling a lot for work over the last few months. I haven't been able to be home as often as I'd like," he shrugged before popping a heaping spoonful of ice cream into his mouth.
She ducked her head and absentmindedly stirred the melting ice cream in her cup with her spoon as she asked, "Do you ever regret it?"
"What?" He asked around a mouthful of ice cream, turning his head to blink at her while inquisitively cocking his head.
She met his curious gaze with her serious one and replied, "Becoming a hero."
She was honestly interested in his response; after everything they'd all been through since the League of Villains had reared their ugly heads, and the role he'd been asked to play in bringing them down. When they finally came out the other side of this, hopefully with a sweeping victory, would he still believe the life he'd chosen was worth all of the sacrifice that came with it?
He turned his head, tearing his eyes away from hers, and tossed his empty ice cream cup into the trash bin as they walked past. "I'll admit, it hasn't always been the dream job I envisioned it to be as a kid. I like helping people, don't get me wrong." He hopped up onto the stone ledge lining the lake side of the walkway and lifted his arms to interlock his fingers behind his head. "I really just wanna take it easy. Go on leisurely patrols now and then, say hi to some folks." He tossed her a playful look. "Maybe rescue an old lady's cat from a tree every once in a while."
She smiled up at him softly and said, "Sounds peaceful."
He grinned back at her broadly and quipped, "Right?"
Shaking her head, she took a melty bite of what was left of her ice cream and told him, "But, I regret to inform you that if peace is what you're looking for, chances are you might have gone into the wrong line of work."
Hawks hopped back down from the ledge and dropped his hands into his pants pockets, shrugging as he replied, "It's not so bad. People are still trying to adjust to life without All Might. What they really need right now is a new leader. Someone to help usher them into this new age."
"Are you talking about Endeavor?" She asked, cocking her head and glancing at him from the corner of her eye curiously.
"He's the strongest guy in the country now, right?" He turned his head to meet her questioning gaze. "If not the Number One Hero, who else?"
Misaki tossed her mostly empty ice cream cup before replying, "It would help if we could finally deal with the League of Villains, once and for all."
Hawks inclined his head and asked, "You guys have any new leads on that?"
She shook her head, dropping her hands into the pockets of her dark red dress coat. "Nothing substantial. It's kinda surprising that they haven't made any appearances since the battle in Kyushu. We suspect that Endeavor's defeat of their High-End Nomu rattled them and now they're laying low to work on perfecting their failed experiment. It was pretty lucky for us that Dabi wasn't able to recover the body. Hopefully, we'll be able to flush them out before they finish their new model."
"Speaking from experience, having to face any more of those things would be a big problem for most heroes. We're a lot more knowledgeable about their capabilities now after Kyushu. But considering the kind of damage just one of those things can do to a populated area, we'd be a lot better off avoiding that battle altogether," Hawks said gravely.
Misaki nodded with a somber expression. "Yeah, no kidding. Have you heard anything while you've been flying around the country?"
He shrugged. "Like you said, nothing substantial. Just the usual rumors and ghost stories. If they are up to something, they're being pretty careful to keep it low-key."
"Like the calm before the storm…" She trailed off in a low tone.
It really did feel that way to her. All of the work everyone had been putting in to prepare to take down the League and the Liberation Army was so close to coming to fruition. She was sure that feeling was even more prevalent for Hawks, as the end of his rocky undercover assignment was now very close at hand as well. She was so ready for all of this to be over, but she knew that rushing toward the finish line would only serve to ruin all of their painstakingly laid plans. They had to be patient, no matter how much it sucked.
He stepped forward suddenly and turned to stand in front of her, effectively halting her in her tracks. He cocked his head and stared back at her reproachfully. "You're killin' me with all this depressing work talk. I thought we were supposed to be on a date here?"
She held his stare, narrowing her eyes a bit and running her tongue along her upper right molars as she cocked her head a bit and replied, "A date, huh?"
"What? You didn't know that?" He asked, leaning back on his heels a bit and cocking an eyebrow at her.
He sure was a tough nut to crack sometimes. One moment he'd make it seem like he was trying to avoid any potentially intimate situations and the next moment he'd provoke her into one. That game was getting tedious, and she was sure she wasn't the only one who thought so. From the perspective of an outside observer, the development of their relationship probably looked to be moving at a snail's pace. Considering Hawks's reputation for being too fast, it may even seem a little suspicious. She could appreciate his discretion in concerns to her feelings about the matter, but this wasn't just about them. His behavior couldn't give the Liberation leaders any reason to suspect him, or the last six months of undercover work he'd been doing would all be washed down the drain.
That was not an option.
"How long have we been doing this dating thing now?" She asked, holding her ground as she stared him down.
He shifted on his feet and shrugged. "Couple months."
She kept her gaze and her tone even as she asked, "So, at what point do we decide if we're going to keep dating or just be friends?"
He silently regarded her for a long moment before inclining his head and asking in a serious tone of voice, "What do you wanna do?"
"I asked you first," she playfully shot back at him.
He ducked his head and grinned, her lighthearted response relieving some of the tension that had settled into his shoulders with her earlier inquiries. He lifted his eyes back up to hers, keeping his head lowered, and asked, "You ready to get complicated?"
She cocked an eyebrow at him and shot him a sly grin. "Are you?"
Dropping his gaze away from hers again, he shook his head softly and lifted his hands out of his pockets to plant them firmly on his hips. He turned his head to stare out across the lake for a moment before sliding his eyes back over to her. She swallowed heavily at the heated look in his softly glowing golden gaze as he turned his head back toward her and opened his mouth to tell her in a low tone, "Get over here."
Her eyes widened and she gasped in surprise at the sudden feeling of being pushed from behind. His feathers gently but firmly guided her forward into his arms. Her hands braced against his shoulders, and she felt his hand press securely against the small of her back to hold her against him. He gently gripped her chin between his fingers and tilted her face up, staring into her eyes for a second before dropping his gaze to her lips and leaning in to kiss her.
The feelings that rocketed through her were more subtle this time than what she'd experienced when he'd kissed her outside the karaoke bar. A slow wave of heat cascaded through her, spreading outward from her center to suffuse her entire body. She relaxed against him, pressing herself a bit closer into his embrace as she tilted her head and matched the movement of her lips with his. He dropped his hand from her chin to rest against her hip and tightened his hold on the small of her back. Almost too soon it seemed, he ended the kiss, pulling his lips away and opening his eyes to stare down into hers.
Clamping the edge of her bottom lip between her teeth, she dropped a suggestive gaze to his mouth before impishly asking, "So should I take that to mean that you want to be more than friends?"
"Too obvious?" He replied with a playful grimace.
She grinned back and lifted her hand to pinch her thumb and forefinger a few centimeters apart. "Maybe this much?"
He returned her playful grin with one of his own before ducking his head to recapture her lips. She slid her hands up over his shoulders to wrap her arms around his neck and tilted her head. He followed her lead and they both opened their mouths to deepen the kiss. The ball of heat that had been simmering in her gut from the first kiss exploded is a white-hot flash of sensation when his tongue slid over hers. She couldn't help the small moan that escaped her, and she pulled an arm back to delve her fingers into his hair behind his headphones, moving her lips and tongue over his more insistently. His grip on her hip tightened for a second before he ended the kiss and tilted his head forward to rest his forehead against hers.
"You have no idea how long I've been waiting to do that," his low, slightly raspy voice told her.
She pulled her other arm back to clasp both of her hands around the sides of his neck and asked, "Was it worth it?"
"Absolutely," he practically groaned, pulling back a bit to stare down at her from behind hooded lids.
That had gone a little bit further than she had intended for it supposedly being their first kiss. They'd both gotten too caught up in the moment, and admittedly, it had felt pretty damn good to finally relieve some of the sexual tension that had been hanging around them over the last month or so. Sparring with Eraser whenever she stopped by to visit Eri was a great stress reliever and all, but it did very little to alleviate her repressed desire. She hoped, considering all of the buildup between them, that it wouldn't seem too out of character for them to release some of the pent-up lust they'd been steadily provoking within each other throughout their previous encounters.
"You shouldn't have a problem waiting a little bit longer for the continuation then. I have to get back to work," she said dejectedly before stepping back out of his embrace.
He let her go, albeit reluctantly, and sighed. "That's the problem with lunch dates: no follow-through."
Smiling back at him flirtatiously, Misaki coyly remarked, "I'll make it up to you next time."
Hawks held her playful gaze with his own as he told her in a tone that spoke like a promise, "I'm gonna hold you to that."
Hawks returned to the villa shortly after his lunch date with Misaki. As soon as he'd overheard the Liberation leaders' plan to call a rally at the end of the week, he'd immediately recognized the opportunity it presented and hightailed it to the Safety Commission to spread the word. He'd picked up from Misaki during their last couple of dates that the police were closing in on the doctor and the hospital. Hopefully, they'd have enough to move on both locations by the weekend.
It had taken him a minute, but he'd managed to find one of the Hanami guide brochures that contained the time they'd scheduled the meeting for. It hadn't been announced yet, but he'd managed to discretely pickpocket a meeting schedule from one of the lieutenants who was less cautious around him than the others. He'd slid it inside the brochure before Misaki had snatched it from him. That, combined with the Sunday clue, should be enough of a signal for them to make their move.
They were about a month ahead of the four-month time limit, but that might actually end up working in their favor. Along with catching the Liberation forces by surprise, they'd also be catching them unprepared and unable to use their full power to fight back against them. With Shigaraki still undergoing his modifications at the hands of the Nomu doctor, that kept both him and Gigantomachia out of the fray, as the giant wouldn't move without a command from its master. That in and of itself presented a huge advantage for the heroes.
Hawks had been keeping a close personal eye on the other wild card in the equation: Twice. With his newfound mastery over his quirk, letting him run rampant during the raid could end up having disastrous consequences. He'd have to find a way to corner Twice when the heroes arrived to keep him from entering the battle; as much for his own sake as for theirs. He actually kinda liked the guy. After seeing how dedicated he was to helping his colleagues, even though he'd chosen to become a villain, he hoped that it wasn't too late to save him from continuing down that path. Once he paid for his crimes and went through some rehabilitation, he held out hope that maybe someday they could even become proper friends.
"You've gotten pretty chummy with the Commissioner lately," the familiarly acrimonious tone of Dabi's voice addressed him when he walked through the main doors of the villa.
Turning toward the villain who was leaning back against the wall just inside the door, Hawks dropped his hands into his pockets and shrugged. "The more she trusts me the better intel I'll get, right?"
Dabi stared back at him evenly as he asked, "Are you sure that's the only reason?"
"Don't worry, I've got my priorities straight," he replied with a good-natured grin.
Dabi continued to regard him coolly. His inability to get a solid read on the patchwork-skinned villain still unnerved him. Most of the time he seemed to be pretty disinterested in his actions, but every once in a while, he'd call him out. It was never anything too suspicious, but it was enough to make it obvious that he still didn't trust him. He hadn't thought the kiss he and Misaki had shared at the park was anything out of the ordinary, but he may have been a little overly enthusiastic in the moment.
They were interrupted suddenly by Twice, who came running down the main staircase three steps at a time while calling out to them, "Hey, there you are! Oh! Dabi's here too!"
"What's up, Twice?" Hawks asked, whipping around and offering him a gracious smile, feeling slightly relieved by the unintended intervention.
Twice stopped in front of them and planted his hands on his hips, the expression on his mask sternly concerned. "The Liberation guys have decided to call some kinda conference thingy at the end of the week, and I guess they want us to say some stuff to rally the troops or something."
"Yeah, I heard about that. You need help figuring out what to say?" Hawks cordially asked.
Twice clapped both of his hands on Hawks's shoulders and exclaimed in a relieved tone, "Man, I thought you'd never ask! I don't need your help!"
Hawks couldn't have asked for a better opportunity. He'd been looking for a way to keep Twice away from the raid. It appeared that he'd just been handed one, practically on a silver platter.
He grinned broadly and replied, "Yeah, sure! Why don't we go over the Liberation philosophy again right before the big conference, so it's fresh when you go up on stage?"
Twice posed with one hand on his hip and held out the other in a thumbs-up gesture. "Great idea! I don't care what they say about you, Hawks! You're a pretty great guy!" He turned his thumb down suddenly and blew a raspberry. "The worst!"
Hawks laughed at the spectacle he made before saying, "Thanks! I think?"
Dabi pushed himself off of the wall and began walking away from the two of them.
Twice turned his head to watch him walk away and called out after him, "Did I interrupt you guys?"
"Nah, we're done," Dabi replied without turning around as he continued to trudge across the main lobby toward one of the hallways leading into the League's wing of the villa.
Twice and Hawks looked back at each other and shrugged.
~ Author's Note ~
If Misaki and Eraser weren't BFF's before, they sure are now! And another kiss for our star-crossed lovebirds! 😆 I had to throw the "why don't we go over the Liberation philosophy again before the big conference" reference in there! I hope it didn't seem too convenient or out of place...👉👈 Anyway! As always, thank you so much for reading!
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