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At first, Dabi thought that he was coming down with something, or that his malfunctioning body was just fighting him again. Whatever it might be, he didn't have time for it. He had a meeting with the traitor bird tonight, and as always he was kind of looking forward to the power play, the subtle flirting, and the inevitable sex they'd fall into again. He'd even picked a nicer warehouse this time. Just as abandoned as the others, but cleaner. Well. By the very low standards they'd been playing with anyway.
The fever, dizziness, or whatever the fuck it was put a bit of a damper on all this, but Dabi was used to making-do with whatever life threw at him.
The bird was already there, early. Dabi didn't like that much, especially when he was feeling (a touch) more vulnerable. The cold seemed to seep deeper under his skin. It had been so long since Dabi got sick. He couldn't afford to get sick – not then, not now. Maybe there wouldn't be any mind games today. Maybe he'd just get the information from the bird and leave, then hole up somewhere underground until this ran its course.
The League may be nice but he trusted them only as far as he could throw any of them. They allied with the doctor and with that AFO ass, after all. However, they clearly had resources, even if that immature baby gamer of a 'boss' used them poorly.
Shigaraki was learning, though. What the League was, and what it could become, deeply interested Dabi.
The bird flew to his side and Dabi shook his head, unable to keep up. That was dangerous, with Hawks. Dabi couldn't afford any mistake. His head felt like it was filled with cotton.
Hawks gently took his hand. Skipping past the information sharing, the taunting, and right to the touching each other? That wasn't right.
"Dabi," Hawks said, voice stone cold. Was that fear? No. "How long ago did you get poisoned?"
Poisoned? Dabi laughed, a snort that seemed to echo from afar. "Just a cold. Don't think that doesn't mean I can't burn your feathers if you try anything funny, or blink in some way I don't like."
Hawks clicked his tongue at him (really?) and Dabi was fairly sure there was an eye roll somewhere in there, but the world seemed to be running one or two seconds ahead of his brain. The dizziness worsened.
"Your sclera is turning grey. Your fingertips are blue. These are the first signs for XR-167 poisoning. Dabi, who poisoned you? Was it ingested or through the skin?"
"No one," Dabi slurred. He just needed to sit down. Hawks wasn't making any sense. "I'd never let anyone talk to me, no, no one."
Unsteady, he sat on the floor. There.
"Who were you around in the last four hours?" Hawks asked more urgently.
"No one," Dabi replied, then fainted.
It was none of the bird's business; that much he knew.
Dabi woke up in a nice gaff and a bed wide enough to accommodate three people, it seemed like. Or one person and two wide ass wings, he supposed.
He felt infinitely better.
The moment he sat up, Hawks popped into the bedroom. He must have left a traitorous, spying feather in the bedroom to pick up on the vibrations when Dabi woke up.
"How are you feeling?" Hawks asked as he approached.
Parched, Dabi thought, unwilling to talk when he knew his throat would hurt.
A glass of water was waiting for him on the bedside table, right beside a long beautiful feather. So this was where Hawks had deployed his tool of surveillance. Dabi gently traced the shaft before picking up the glass and downing it in one go.
"Sorry I can't offer you aspirin," Hawks offered. "Or any kind of painkiller. Your head must be killing you, but it's contraindicated for both XR-167 and its antidote."
"Antidote?" Dabi asked.
Hawks shrugged. "Because dermal poisoning is a transmission vector and some villains started using it in fights, a lot of heroes have been stocking up on antidotes."
"Wimps." Dabi dismissed those villains offhandedly. "Much more enjoyable to look a hero in the eye as you end them."
He studied the room, but there weren't really any personal items that allowed one to learn more about the owner. Boring furniture. Boring blankets. Boring colours.
"I'll take your word for it," Hawks said.
"So you brought me to your home instead, and saved me."
"Not like I could contact the League to ask them to pick you up." Hawks' wings ruffled. "Especially when I couldn't be sure if they'd done it."
"They wouldn't," Dabi said. They were a bunch of saps, he didn't add. "If they had a problem with me, the boss would likely try to dust me, fail, and you all heroes would have a big blue explosion somewhere in Japan to worry your pretty little hero heads about."
Hawks sat on the bed and studied his expression. Just when Dabi was about to tell it to cut it out, feathers brought another glass of water into the room. Dabi gladly accepted, though he drank it down more slowly this time.
His head did feel sore, but this was nothing compared to earlier.
"Not sure what you expect to gain from this," Dabi said as he placed the glass on the bedside table. "But don't expect me to owe you a favour. I didn't ask you for anything."
"Yes, yes," Hawks agreed patiently, brushing the back of his fingers against Dabi's cheek. Dabi didn't move away. "Maybe I just did this for myself, to keep my favourite League contact alive."
His only contact, and his only way into the League. Dabi relaxed, mollified. Maybe he could chalk this up to self-interest on Hawks' part and not have to worry about an unbalance. In the end, Dabi still held all the power, and had gained even more of it thanks to this little slip-up. Now, he knew where Hawks lived. Fans would pay a fortune for information like that. Not that Dabi intended to share this with anyone. If the League ever ran low (well, even lower) on funds though… He could raise himself some personal funds that way.
"You still haven't answered my question on how you feel," Hawks said, "but you do look better, and you have your plotting face back on, so I'm going to assume the antidote did its job."
"I don't have a plotting face."
"Sure."
"This is my normal face."
"I don't think that contradicts what I said." Hawks winked as he stood. "I'll bring some food, if you can handle it."
"You can cook?"
"Of course."
"Because I've already been poisoned once today, so..."
A feather slapped him gently on the nose, and Dabi chuckled as he leaned back against the pillows. God he hated all of this. It felt domestic. It confused him. It made no sense.
At the same time, a bed like this was miles more comfortable than any warehouse they'd stopped in. Maybe they should skip to step three and just have sex here. Dabi could barely remember what information he'd needed from the hero and whether that had been time-sensitive. He didn't massively care right now. He didn't even know how much time had passed.
Maybe he could enjoy a little bout of recovery in a real bed, for once. Business could wait.
Hawks came back in, balancing four small plates in his palms and on his forearms, with feathers carrying more. Most of it appeared to be chicken-related: chicken balls, chicken nuggets, tempura that was also probably chicken, chicken wings, chicken skewers... Ah, fuck. That was fine. At least it wasn't fish. More feathers brought a couple of small bowls with cold soba, rice, miso soup.
"I didn't know what you liked, so..."
"So you made everything with chicken," Dabi said as he grabbed a bowl of soba. Soba was good for recovery, that was a fact. "Gotcha."
Hawks shrugged as he took the bowl of rice and sat on the side of the bed to eat. "Maybe I wanted to impress you and cooked what I'm best at."
God, was this a date?
Better not to think about it too much.
Maybe this... banter... could be considered the usual 'flirting and taunting' part of their conversation, even if Dabi was falling behind on the taunting. Then maybe they'd fuck. Or maybe they'd share the actual information they were originally meeting for.
The sequence didn't really matter. None of this really mattered. They were doing the usual thing, just out of order because some punk must have poisoned Dabi in Giran's bar when he stopped by earlier. Dabi hadn't drunk anything, but he'd been pressed flat against too many bodies.
He'd take care of that later.
For now... no one could blame him if he decided to enjoy the current moment. He usually did anyway, even if that normally involved more gloating and less... less... relaxing and feeling good about things.
Must be the poisoning. Must be the antidote. Must be the headache he could barely feel.
It didn't have anything to do with the man in front of him, who'd saved his life, looked after him, cooked for him, and was now sharing a meal with him. A delicious one at that.
Maybe Dabi was coming down with something, or maybe his malfunctioning heart body was just fighting him again. He didn't have time for it.
But Dabi was used to making-do with whatever life threw at him.
He put his bowl aside and pulled Hawks into a kiss.