Geten grumbled when his alarm woke him up, freezing his clock out of annoyance as he pushed himself to his feet and moved to the bathroom.
Spending most of the shower combing his hands through his hair, while his longer hair was more troublesome, he had come around to like having long hair, it was almost relaxing brushing it so often every day.
Drying himself off and getting started on braiding his hair Geten's mind returned to what happened the day before.
He'd offered for Dabi to come over and watch the sports festival at his place, and he was surprised when his nephew actually agreed to come over and would be staying the night even.
Geten was in a tizzy afterwards, rushing around the apartment to clean it up and worrying about what kind of snacks to get, asking the members with fire quirks what kind of snacks they liked.
He was both excited and nervous to have Dabi over.
He's watched the festival with others before, it was usually a great-networking opportunity and he's watched both with co-workers in a bar and with clients in higher class bars, and he's made some very good connections during those times.
So, he knew the typical ways people spent the day, both with and without their family, co-workers from overseas telling him how they would spend the day if they did have family coming over or with their family in the first place.
So, he knew that the first order of business was to get proper snacks for Dabi to eat, he wasn't a fan of salty food so he had to buy some snacks that would be more suited to Dabi's tastes.
Pretzels, flavored salt-licks and some more water based treats like his own, popsicles were always popular either way, but he didn't know which flavor Dabi would like so he got a few more in addition to the grape ones he already had.
And after that he was just left to stew in different types of worrying thoughts.
How would Dabi react to seeing his apartment? Would he turn his nose up to him for staying somewhere so upscale? Dabi worked in the South Side after all and might feel insulted by him living somewhere so nice.
What about his choice in decoration? Looking around his apartment Geten had to admit his place looked more like a rental home on the market from his lack of stuff, he'd always been a minimalist what with his mother holding the "luxuries" over his head.
Dabi wouldn't think he was cold and more standoffish because of the lack of a personal touch in his home, would he?
It felt weird to agonize over things like that, to be fair to himself though he had never had family he wanted to interact with before and this was going to be the first time he was going to be hanging out with his nephew outside of the meetings with Deku.
Then the day of the sports festival came, and he rented a car to drive down and pick up Dabi himself, and the feeling he might alienate himself from his nephew as the neighborhood Dabi lived in seemed to be the slums.
Dabi was wearing a tank-top like usual but had a pair of jeans and shoes on, perhaps he didn't like wearing shirts with sleeves, maybe they pulled on his right arm's remaining flesh since he couldn't recall Dabi ever wearing something with long sleeves.
And yeah, Dabi was less than impressed when he saw Daiga city.
Looking the city over with his eyes landing on alleys and over places and shaking his head at the clean streets and the like.
So, he was worried that Dabi would definitely look down on him for his nice apartment.
But as Dabi walked in he glanced around his place, then he shrugged "Nice place uncle, how much a month?" Dabi asked as he walked over to check out the skyline view of the mountains.
Geten hesitated in his answer "¥100,000." and Dabi scoffed.
"Is that all? Place looks worth at least double that." Dabi commented as he walked to sit on the couch.
Geten was surprised but his nephew was right, he was getting a deal on this place since he was a higher ranked member that put a decent amount of money into their plans with his job.
"Do you want anything to drink?" Geten offered in order to change the topic and Dabi mulled the thought over, asking for a ramune.
The two of them sharing a drink as they watched the festival, the surprise of Deku being the umpire of course taking him aback but Dabi seemed less shocked and only rolled his eyes.
"Did Deku tell you about this?" Geten hesitantly asked.
"Nah, but after a while the Twinkie stops surprising you with his bullshit." Dabi asked before popping a salt-lick cube in his mouth.
"Really?" Geten said and Dabi nodded.
"I ever tell you how I met the little brat?" Dabi questioned glancing over to him, able to speak mostly clearly since it was a small cube.
"Yes, you said you were rather sick back then." Geten replied.
"Yeah, I wasn't keen on the Twinkie being his nosy self, so I tried to make him fuck off by intimidating him with my fire, and the fucker had the audacity to throw a bucket of slush in my face for it." Dabi recounted, amused from it rather than insulted since he started chuckling.
"After that it was just one thing after another, blackmailing Red's mom to leave her the fuck alone, threating gangs with their homework, calling out those heroes for fucking with his student. There's way more than that but eventually you stop being shocked when the Twinkie just does things." Dabi explained waving his hand dismissively.
Geten nodded letting it slide and choosing not to press at the moment.
"It can be annoying sometimes, but the Twinkie means well despite the crap he pulls." Dabi confessed, only to tsk when there was wide shot of the crowd and he pointed at the screen.
"Unlike those fuckers there, the Twinkie actually makes a fucking change in world unlike those ego-tripping bastards." Dabi spat with venom.
Geten nodded, he wasn't that fond of heroes himself either, the ones he had tried to go to about his mother hadn't ended up believing him and returned him to her all the same.
It was one of the reasons he ended up looking to the movement for change in the world.
They continued to watch and while he was a touch disappointed that he couldn't see anyone's quirk in action as they watched the first years he was frankly impressed by the stand Haku chose to make.
It was a very risky move that most likely wouldn't pay off in the end for her, there weren't that many quirkless people around nowadays and she likely wouldn't be able to get that much support in the industry after calling out her elders.
And it would be harder to find any good sponsors with such a brass attitude so agencies would also have problems with hiring her even if she found a sympathetic hero out there.
Dabi thought seemed thoughtful after she made her big speech, mulling something over in his mind, when commercials came around Dabi turned to him and asked.
"What do you think of the quirkless?"
Geten, of course recognized the loaded question for what it was.
His nephew was probing for his feelings about Deku, as much as he complained about his boss Geten could tell he was fond about the boy and he'd clearly take offense to him stating a negative opinion.
"Well, I can't really say I have thought of them much, Deku is the first quirkless person I've met." Geten carefully answered.
Dabi huffed "Guess that is better than your group's company line." Dabi dismissively commented and Geten gave Dabi a look.
"What do you mean?" Geten falsely asked, he was well aware how the other higher members thought of Deku, and only Curious and Skeptic were the only ones that had chosen to reevaluate the way they saw Deku.
And that was because they personally interacted with Deku and his sharp attention to detail... well Deku didn't meet with Skeptic, but he surely gotten the man's attention when Deku noticed his cameras and got someone pass his security.
"Well, I'd probably have to kill you if you did follow the company line, couldn't guarantee that you wouldn't blab about me, and I don't need any more bigots like dad in the family." Dabi answered off-hand about killing him, something that made his guts twist.
"Enji," Geten said, resisting the urge to flinch when Dabi narrowed his eyes at the name "Wasn't a fan of the quirkless?" he inquired, perhaps it could be used to bond while reinforcing a more positive image of the movement.
Dabi snorted, a sound much crueler coming out than the last one.
"You can say that again! The bastard was as quirkist as they come, and was so fucking ashamed of having a kid that didn't have one that he fucking paid off people to hide his 'greatest failure'." Dabi spat and Geten's bottle almost fell out of his hands.
What?
The sports festival was back on but Geten couldn't bother to pay it much attention and turned fully facing Dabi.
"Did, did you have another sibling?" Geten questioned, cause he has never heard anything about Dabi having more than the three siblings.
Did he have another nephew or niece out there that he didn't know about? Were... were they cast out by Enji? Has Dabi found them and reconnected with them? Was that why Dabi so invested in the quirkless?
Dabi snorted "No, the bastard just hid my brother behind a fake weak ice resistance to pretend and protect his damned pride." Dabi answered.
Geten's mouth dropped.
Natsuo's, quirkless?
Geten had looked more into each of the Todoroki children after meeting with Dabi the first time, so he was aware that Dabi had to be talking of Natsuo yesterday.
A boy wonder in the medical field already earning a name for himself by working on the ground in an ambulance crew of one of the major hospitals once he got his E.M.T. certificate and was then poached by U.A. after a year to work directly with Recovery Girl, all while studying to get his M.D.
And he was quirkless?
Something that honestly shocked him.
Both the Todorokis and Himuras were both known for their long lines of quirk users so the thought of one of their family members being quirkless just felt… odd and weird and he was still struggling to wrap his mind around the idea.
He wasn't an expert in genetics but that shouldn't be possible right? Not between his half-sister Rei and Enji anyways.
Did Rei have an affair?
Shaking his head Geten dismissed the thought, it would have been impossible for her to be seeing someone else trapped up at the Todoroki estate and Natsuo looked too much like Enji for that theory to be true.
Maybe it was recessive then?
The Himuras had started selling their kids off because of the problem of inbreeding since nearly every ice-quirked person in Japan was related to them in some way shape or form, bar the foreigners that moved here.
Inbreeding could lead people to lose their hearing and be blind, it wouldn't be impossible for that to affect quirk genes too, right? There were self-harming quirks like Dabi's after all so that probably wasn't that farfetched.
But if people learned that Natsuo was quirkless...
He'd lose his chance to practice medicine for sure, he's heard members in the movement talking about how relieved they were that there were rules in place to keep the quirkless out of studying medicine.
A thought that now made him feel angry with those people because they were also the one he's heard praising his nephew as well.
Not that he had any right feeling that way.
He was aware of how the movement felt about the quirkless, heard the highest ranked members talking about how to manipulate and use Deku.
'A husk that isn't quite so useless.'
He remembered Re-Destro saying once the fact Deku was quirkless was discovered.
Words he hadn't thought much of at the time but now made him feel like his mouth was filled with ash, as had every other comment and slur made about the quirkless he recalled the others making over the years.
Deku was key to them making serious strides in overcoming dozens of problems and there had been so many quirk awakenings with just the info he's gotten through the meets he had with Deku.
And they still didn't respect him in any way, just had plans to use and abuse his position as someone 'bellow' them for information to make themselves stronger.
If that was how they thought about Deku, then how would they treat his nephew Natsuo?
The thought made his heart drop.
There wouldn't be any place for him in the new world the movement had been promising for years, and that wasn't even the worst part Geten realized.
Cause he was just as bad as they were.
Before yesterday he'd only considered Deku as a resource like the rest of them, sure he hadn't called him names and said he was smarter than Trumpet thought he was.
But he never thought of Deku as an equal, treated him like a person.
And he hated himself for that now because it made him feel like his mother.
She had always treated him like a burden on her, like a pest that was needlessly demanding her attention instead of her child.
Once those thoughts started, he couldn't stop seeing the similarities between the high-ranking members and the narcissistic woman that gave birth to him.
Their words and faces and actions had bled together last night in a nightmare that was a mis-mash of memories until he couldn't tell anyone apart.
And the real kicker that made him feel ashamed?
He only cared about these things now because he learned one of his nephews was quirkless, not because he had some grand realization about what he was doing.
He was a damn hypocrite for it.
How could he not be? He didn't think of this being a problem until it personally affected him.
Shaking his head Geten finished getting dressed and started to brush his teeth in order to distract himself, but he wasn't able to successfully do so.
Cause he'd have to go into work today, and that meant seeing the other members of the movement and the thought caused frost to build on his sink countertop from the mix of anger and his shame.
He wouldn't be able to look at them without all the things they've said about the quirkless being dragged to the forefront of his mind.
Just thinking about it right now in his bathroom left him feeling gutted, ashamed that the day before yesterday he didn't think twice about it, now though he didn't want to continue being around people that would look down on his brilliant nephew he hasn't met yet.
But even if he quit his job it wouldn't fix the problem.
He's spent so much time and money on the movement that he wouldn't be able to just leave it all behind.
He hadn't thought much about it before or even seen it as a problem in the first place but his previous obsession with the movement had led to them having their hands in every part of his life.
The company he worked for was one of the movements biggest, Daiga city was a town full of members and Dabi was the only person that wasn't in the movement.
And all of his money was in accounts run by banks they had members working in chief positions so there was a good chance they'd be informed if he suddenly tried to pull out of the movement and freeze his accounts.
Leaving him penniless and homeless if he tried to leave the movement.
But he couldn't stay either.
He hadn't gotten that close to Dabi but he already knew he wanted to continue building a relationship with his nephew, and he knew for a fact that Dabi wouldn't have any problems with cutting him out if he seemed to be a threat.
*Or just kill me.* Geten grimly thought as he finished up and spat out the slightly pink toothpaste, he must had been brushing a bit too hard.
And Geten also wanted to be able to at least approach his other nephews and niece one day, he'd hardly be able to do that if he was still in the movement, Geten wouldn't even be able to look Natsuo in the eye knowing what he just let his co-workers say about the quirkless.
However, he'd need a way out of the movement first and that meant he'd need to reestablish himself outside of their influence.
Which would be hard to do, the movement would know exactly how much he made and would of course take notice if he tried to change how he got his checks or started taking money out regularly.
Geten groaned burying his hands in his hair, messing it up slightly but not an unsightly level so Geten didn't bother fixing it and just left the bathroom to get himself something to eat, only to pause when he spotted his trash can.
He normally emptied his suit pockets in the bathroom and there poking just over the lip of the trash can was a bright blue card.
Geten surged forward and dug the business card out, quietly hoping it was the one he thought it was.
It was from some headhunter of Spirited Corp, the man had tried to pitch him on joining the sales department but it all went in one ear and out the other at the time because he wasn't interested in working outside of the movement.
Thankfully the number wasn't smudged so he could still call them, getting a job would be a great start in distancing himself from the movement.
Hopefully there was still a place there, Geten was sure he could make something up about trying to recruit in other places for more members.