Geten was humming as he proceeded to braid his hair back.

It was a PQ song from some old movie Deku had sung time to time and it was catchy.

Once he was done Geten shook his head to test whether it would fly free or not, Deku explained that they would be doing something that was more physically involved than their usual meetings.

Which was a step in the right direction because Deku was going to bring with him one of his underlings.

Well, the boy called him an employee but there was no need to mince words.

Deku had promised that his employee would be able to match his output toe-to-toe and would be an excellent way to assess if he could redraw water from the ice of his that had been melted.

This meant after two weeks of work, he was finally establishing real ground with Deku.

Something he was sure would be going over better if the others would stop trying to overstep.

Perhaps his sudden rise in the movement had inflated his ego, but Geten had been on his way to becoming a killer salesman before his recruitment.

So, he was quite sure that Trumpet's repeated suggestions for him to "persuade" Deku by using his quirklessness would wreck whatever progress he had made.

Despite Deku's lack of a quirk, the boy was smart for his age, and no doubt would not stand for the infantilism Trumpet was pushing for.

Thankfully, Re-destro was able to see more reason than Trumpet and was letting him take lead.

Clearly, playing along with Deku would be the best for them in the long run; outright ass-kissing would be suspicious, so the indifference was still his best bet there.

Looking himself over and finding nothing in his outfit out of place Geten grabbed a duffle bag and headed out to his meet up with Deku.

Geten waited for Deku at a field mid-way to Deika city, Deku had insisted on a large space in the outdoors for this little experiment and Geten could see why.

Glaciers were hardly things one wanted to make inside of a building and Deku's underling likely had a powerful fire related quirk which would also be a big hazard indoors.

Skeptic was upset because he had to go out of his way to set up camaras rather than hack into them but if he wanted to watch this that he would just have to deal because Deku was not ready to be brought into Deika city.

A soft whoosh made Geten straightened up and search for the portal and found it easy since the black-purple disk stood out from the greenery around them.

It was larger than the normal and Geten figured that the underling was larger than Deku.

Deku, hair a mix of braids, Band-Aids all over him and his worn clothes as he stepped out of the portal, Deku waved as soon as he spotted Geten.

Seconds later another person followed the boy and Geten quickly worked to find everything he knew about them.

Only for his brain to choke as the first thing he saw were the scars, the tank top and shorts the man wore let him see how the thick purple scars were all connected aside from the bag like ones under his eyes, but it was the man's nearly mutilated right arm caused him to back track the hardest.

Because purple scars, as weird as they were probably more common than they seemed, but his right arm looked like it had been burned badly and half of its mass was just gone.

Did, did the man's quirk cause this? But wouldn't he have some kind of fire protection, right? Then was he attacked by someone that quite negate it? How could a scar like that even occur in the first place?

"Guys?" Deku said and Geten shook himself and found the man was staring at him as well before he swiftly looked away, something Geten was glad for because his eyes while slightly greener were a shade too close to his mother's to be fully comfortable.

"Yes, my name is Geten." he introduced himself offering a hand, trying to offset being so rude and gawking at Deku's underling.

The man's eyes went to his hand and Geten realized his mistake offering the wrong hand and promptly decided he was just fouling this all up, people do not even commonly shake hands in Japan what was he thinking.

Then the man raised his right hand and took his in turn, the feeling of charred skin thinly covering bone was... unsettling, but it was the lack of heat he felt that really threw him off, if anything it was the same clammy cold as he felt from other powerful ice quirked people.

"... Dabi." The man told him after letting go of his hand.

He wondered briefly if the man was using an alias or his legal name before Deku loudly coughed bring their attention back to him.

"I have the camara set up, are you guys ready to start?" Deku asked and Geten nodded quickly moving over to stand on one side of the field, with Dabi moving to the other giving them well over two hundred meters of space between them.

"Okay, when I blow the air horn we'll start. Only use the lowest percentage of your quirks and slowly increase for the next, oh say, five minutes alright. Remember to try your best to match each other." Deku loudly called.

"Yes Deku." Geten replied at the same time Dabi dismissively said "Yeah, yeah Worm."

Geten raised an eye at the name, but Deku blared the horn, and he raised his hand to unleash a wave of ice, and a wave of bright blue fire met his ice half-way.

Geten found himself taken aback that Dabi's fire was so powerful, and he had to ramp up his quirk to match Dabi and keep from losing ground only for Dabi to raise his firepower making him similarly adjust to meet it.

As this escalation continued mist descended upon them and steam filled the air to the point Geten could no longer see Dabi anymore and just the light of his flames making his ice shine and reflect off the steam.

At some point Geten had to raise his other hand to double his output and the humidity was getting atrocious and he was certain that whatever camaras Skeptic set up were ruined, and he might have taken just a pinch of joy out of the fact.

The tension of occasional losing or gaining ground made him that made him quite a bit thrilled by that, and he was certainly more invested in this 'tug-of-war' than he thought he would be, using his quirk like this wasn't an everyday thing and as boggy it had gotten, he certainty would be looking forward to a redo.

He got so into it the sound of the airhorn completely spooked him and the break of concentration let Dabi gain a lot of ground and he froze in the face of being hit full force of Dabi's clearly powerful fire with no way to escape it.

It got to be only three feet away from him when it strangely stopped and recoiled in on itself, the heat was unbearable for that one second and as shameful as it was, he fell back as his legs gave out on him.

Still stunned Geten merely watched as the large plume of fire whipped around and quickly was snuffed out, the fog being dispersed by the flames movements and revealing that Dabi was controlling the remaining fire solely with his right hand.

He, had expected Dabi to be powerful but to this extent... it was certainty overwhelming, and he had thought he would be prepared for it but clearly, he was not.

"Are you okay Geten?" Deku called and Geten quickly got back up to his feet not wanting to look weak in front either of them.

"Yes, just fine Deku." He assured as he tried to recollect himself, Deku's eyes stayed locked on him making his skin crawl even from so far away as he could not tell if Deku's calculating gaze was negative or positive.

Deku's eyes eventually shifted off him and over to Dabi, not taking as long to examine him before speaking up "I got everything and will start reviewing the footage, you two should go cool off, there's a lake cove five minutes that way." Deku called out point somewhere before he grabbed up his camara.

Geten made a mental note to ask for the footage for Skeptic later and quickly moved to follow Dabi, Deku was already established for regular meetings, so he needed to focus his efforts on getting Dabi's contact details and making some kind connection with him to also get him in on the movement.

Someone with such a strong quirk would clearly be a major boon to them.

Geten had to run to catch up with Dabi, which he did before Dabi reached the water, given the short walk Geten was half considering that Dabi was slowing himself down to let him catch up.

Something that was odd, but easily dismissed for now since it was something in his favor currently.

Once they got to the water it was clear why Dabi had chosen to wear something considered less than formal, Dabi took off his top and proceeded to go straight for the water and fully submerged himself.

Geten waited for Dabi to come back up to start he spoke... only to realize that none of his business openers would work in this situation and he had no idea how to start a conversation naturally on so little information eventually he strung some words together "So, how did you and Deku meet?"

Given Dabi scoffed and gave him some side eye it wasn't the best opener but considering he hadn't said anything about the man's scars it clearly wasn't the worst thing he could've said either...

Then again, since Dabi was in the water in nothing but shorts, he might not be comfortable talking with a stranger half naked.

How did he overlook that second part?

"Kid found me in a warehouse when I was sick as a dog and decided that apparently I was prime mall cop material." Dabi answered as he settled into leaning back against the log of a fallen tree, his arms on it like the back of a couch.

"Oh, I see." Geten fumbled, that was very much not the answer he thought he would get, if even got one that was not to tell him to fuck off.

Dabi huffed clearly bemused and rolled his eyes "Yeah, the Twinkie doesn't have the highest hiring standards, just picks up a bunch of strays half the time." Dabi commented "Still no fucking clue how the hell he saw my scrawny ass and thought, 'yeah, I'll leave the South Side to this son of a bitch'." Dabi grumbled and lowered himself in the water.

Geten immediately straightened up shocked "The South Side?" he repeated.

How could not know such an infamous area and that Deku had strong ties to it? Skeptic and the others theorized that he might have lived there at some point but to have such strong control over it that he had people like Dabi guarding his territory there it just, made him think that he might have underestimated Deku's influence to an extent.

"Yeah, it's a pretty big shit hole but it's Deku's in all but name, and the people ain't bootlickers but they sure like to kiss the ground he walks on." Dabi mentioned off handedly.

"I, see." Geten replied mentally filing that away for Re-destro, finding solid info about the South Side was difficult because the damage over the years left it a technically dead zone compared to most places and sending someone in was also out of the question since the locals would go nuts over it.

"Oi," Dabi called and Geten realized he must have gotten caught up in thought and cursed himself, it was the first rule of closing a deal, paying anything less than full attention to your client would screw you over and Dabi didn't look pleased at being ignored even for the minor lapse.

"You know why the worm brought me here don't you?" Dabi questioned and Geten tensed up, suddenly feeling like this meeting was not just about recording how his quirk worked.

His silence must have been telling cause Dabi tsked and shook his head "The worm knows a lot more about you than you think Kyūryū." Dabi cryptically said and Geten flinched back at that, Dabi raised a brow at that.

"Including just who your father is, a Himura Shigeo if I recall correctly." Dabi purred and Geten could not help it as a layer of frost bloomed at his feet as he glared at Dabi.

"And just what business is that of yours?" Geten snapped, he never wanted to hear that man's name again after all the years of his mother blaming him for driving the man away, as if he was some bastard that screwed around.

Dabi's head lulled to the side "Seeing as he's my grandpa, I think it's plenty of my business Oji-Geten." Dabi spat back.

Geten visibly reeled back at that.

Shigeo had not had any other affair kids as far as he knew and the only kid, he did have on record was his half-sister Rei, and all four of her kids' pictures were blasted online on a daily bar the youngest Shouto and the oldest because-

Suddenly everything snapped into place and Geten sharply inhaled as it dawned on him to whom he was speaking.

The oldest son who was only a year younger than him and the boy had died years ago an unsupervised training accident a decade ago, one that would leave the boy covered in such awful scarring.

"Touy-"

Touya shot him a thick glare and the water around him started to bubble "You finish, and I don't care what the Twinkie says I won't leave anything of your pathetic ass for there to be recovered by whatever dumbasses actually gives a fuck about you." Touya hissed venomously.

Despite knowing Touya could not be related to his mother in any way his eyes were just as chilling as hers were and flinched back ducking his head slightly.

"Todoroki Touya," Touya snarled as he walked out of the water and looked him dead in the eye with stream rolling off him "Died nine years ago after he had enough of his 'father' abusing him and his siblings in the name of 'surpassing' All Might by any means necessary, even if that meant putting his oldest son in ground to keep him from taking his precious 'masterpiece' away from him." To- Dabi hatefully spat.

"I'm sorry, I didn't-" Geten tried to apologize but frankly he did not know what he should be apologizing for first considering he had clearly crossed many lines with his apparently still alive nephew.

"Of course, you didn't, after all... who on earth would think that man who bought his wife and forced her to have four kids and burns thousands of people to death every year could possibly be an abusive father on top of it, right?" Dabi questioned him, now nose to nose to him, his heat radiating off him in waves.

"Dabi-" Geten whispered but Dabi sneered at him and stomped over to grab his tank top.

"No, I don't know what the fuck the worm was thinking bring me along to meet your frigid ass but-" Dabi angerly exclaimed as he tried to leave but Geten interrupted him this time and grabbed his left arm to yank him back.

The flesh was searing to him, but Geten could not let go, regardless of what he called himself this man or how old he was, was his nephew and had clearly gone through parental bullshit like he had, and Geten just could not let him leave.

Not like this.

"What the fuck are you-" Dabi yelled at him but Geten cut him off.

"My mother used her quirk to scold me." Geten flatly told him as he extruded some cold through his palm, both to help his hand and to hopefully cool Dabi's body down from how intensely hot it felt.

"What?" Dabi spat.

"She could move water, whenever I pissed her off or if she was just wanted to do it, she'd boil water and fling droplets at me to keep me from having any big visible marks, my back is covered in the marks from it." Geten confessed watching Dabi's eyes widen slightly as he turned the information over in his head and his body cooled down with his distracted attention.

"I looked too much like my father in her eyes, and getting his quirk didn't help when I was growing up with the banshee, she always blamed me for her 'relationship' with my father falling apart, since he dumped her when his wife found out that he got her pregnant." Geten explained to him.

He saw Dabi wince when he said that first bit, which made him wonder if he ever heard that making his heart twinge.

Dabi stood silent for a while though Geten could feel his body rapidly cooling down, Dabi shook his head and yanked his arm out of his grip "What is with you crazy fuckers and grabbing me when I'm hot mess?" Dabi grumbled as he headed back to the water and sat down in it as he ran a hand through his hair.

Geten turned down to his hand and saw it was a tender purple and he flinched when he touched it, hopefully the color would fade as it healed.

Turning back to Dabi Geten found himself in a very odd position, Dabi as it seems was his nephew and had an immensely powerful quirk much like himself, and said nephew was just as traumatized as he was then he nearly chased said man off by saying his birth name.

Overall it was quite a rollercoaster of feelings and he had no idea where to go next, he'd always known he had family outside of his parents and he hadn't bothered to try and reach out to any of them... but now that one of his nephews was right here in front of him he could just ignore him either.

But what kind of relationship does he even want to have with Dabi?

Feeling overwhelmed he ran both his hands through his hair and took a deep breath before his eyes slid back over to Dabi, who was not looking much better than he was feeling, something that caused an odd tugging sensation to rise in his chest.

Geten moved over to the bank and started to take his shoes off, aware that Dabi's eyes were on him now and did not stop what he was doing, once he was done, he waded into the water and sat a couple of feet from Dabi.

"You know your gonna ruin your suit right dumbass?" Dabi asked after a few seconds.

Geten acknowledged him with a hum and nodded "Yes." he answered verbally then the two of them fell into neither a tense nor comfortable silence.

Sitting together then and there in the water was odd but Geten did not feel the need to say anything or move from where he was, water lapping at him even being somewhat relaxing in some way.

"So, your mom was a bitch?" Dabi asked after a little while.

"Dad isn't much better, never wanted anything to do with me. Not sure if you've ever met him." Geten replied.

"Once, I don't remember it, was like two I think." Dabi told him.

"Good, he's a dick." Geten could not help commenting, he had the dubious honor of meeting his father exactly once and he regretted wasting so much money to do it.

Dabi scoffed "Guess that something we both have in common then." Dabi said and Geten could not stop an unattractive snort from leaving his lips.

"Yeah." he agreed, looking towards Dabi and a small smile formed on his face when he spotted Dabi's hidden behind his crossed arms.