#and they have such different styles of heroing anyway i love rumi so much

[confused-stars]

hawksweek2020 - Day 2: Wholesome Gen

@hawksweek2020 ___ Dark Shadows and Red Feathers (or: i accidentally write way too much angst but somehow manage to turn it wholesome in the end)

___ All he could see was smoke. All he could feel was smoke, too, which was a whole lot more problematic. There was nothing solid enough for him to stab a feather into, or to punch and kick at, and he was flailing, trying to stay airborne as his lungs burned with the need for oxygen.  Hawks could easily handle any sort of physical quirk, and most emitters, too, but this… this was almost as bad as fire. He hadn’t been able to sense the villain about to get the drop on him, because there had been no solid form his feathers would have alerted him of. No vibrations to tune into. And now he was wrapped up in a thick cloud in it, and it felt like the viscosity was changing, almost like a gaseous tar sticking to his wings, cutting off his airways… “Hawks!” 

Tokoyami. Hawks rolled around in the air, trying to shake off the smoke, somehow… he had no idea how to get it off of him, and he wasn’t falling yet, but it was only a matter of time. He could already feel the familiar dizziness that came with being cut off from air for too long. Part of his brain focused on his feathers, several of them dancing around himself and the smoke villain, trying to poke at their defenses, trying to get him out, but none of it was working. He called the feathers back into his wings in an attempt to use them to balance himself for the time being, but his control was slipping… fuck, even if Tokoyami managed to catch him, that would only mean the kid would get enveloped in the smoke as well, and then they’d both be incapacitated. Hawks closed his eyes, the darkness made no difference, and continued gasping for air, if he could only get one good breath, then his mind would be cleared and he could do… something. Anything. “Dark Shadow, no!” A noise like a roar, and like a powerful wind, and maybe a little like thunder, was the last thing Hawks heard before he lost consciousness.

 He came to about twenty feet above the ground, and immediately spread his wings to break his fall, swooping low above the heads of terrified civilians. There were some screams, a handful of scattered cheers, and Hawks took to the sky again, gasping in lungfuls of precious night air. He still felt like there was tar or something like it stuck to some of his feathers, and his flight was a little more sluggish than usual, but he was up and awake and… oh, no. Oh, shit. The smoke villain seemed to have disappeared in the seconds he’d been out, but this was a much, much bigger problem.  Dark Shadow was spread out in the air between two skyscrapers, massive and dark and buzzing with power, eyes glowing menacingly. Hawks couldn’t even see Tokoyami.  He’d heard of this, of course, he would be a terrible hero if he didn’t do his research, but he’d never actually seen Tokoyami lose control. The kid had told him that it only happened at night, and if his emotions got the better of him. And with how in control Tokoyami usually was, especially for someone his age, Hawks had just decided not to worry about it too much while still keeping an eye out.  Why was Dark Shadow acting up now? Was it because…   “Hey, big guy!” Hawks rose with a few slow beats of his wings until he was near Dark Shadow’s head, though close enough to dart away if he needed to. “I’m okay, see? All in one piece! You did good!” Whatever he’d done. Hawks would get the story later. “So you can let Tsukuyomi go now, alright?”  A tendril of shadow swiped his way, and Hawks dropped down a few feet to dodge, it, spiraling up higher once he regained his balance. “Come on, hey, it’s okay! You can calm down now…”  Maybe there was no reasoning with him when he was like this. Hawks didn’t entirely understand Dark Shadow, but apparently even Tokoyami kept learning new things about his quirk. They communicated well enough, the shadow being’s personality an interesting contrast to Tokoyami’s serious demeanor. There was none of that visible now though. Just something that anyone without knowledge of the situation would have called a monster.  “Tsukuyomi!” Hawks swerved sharply to the left when Dark Shadow tried to hit him again. Good thing he was focused on this now, and not on the people on the streets below. Hawks didn’t think that Dark Shadow was malicious in this form, but he probably wouldn’t care about any destruction he caused. Until he snapped out of it. So, Hawks needed to solve this quick. “It’s alright, kid, I’ve got this! I’ll get him to calm down, you’ll be safe in no time!” And Hawks dove straight at Dark Shadow, narrowly dodging his shadowed beak as he flew a tight circle around his head, then dove underneath his form, only to shoot up again and flash him a bright grin. “Come catch me!”  Dark Shadow immediately rose to the challenge, and Hawks didn’t even have a moment to be relieved, because fuck, he was faster in this form. Hawks weaved his way through the sky, keeping them both far above the upturned faces of the civilians, and dodged and rolled whenever necessary – until he found what he’d been looking for. A massive billboard advertisement (for Best Jeanist’s newest Winter line) lit up by four floodlights from below.  Several feathers shot out to cut away at one of them, causing it to shift slightly, creaking with the movement. It was unstable. Hawks allowed himself a tiny grin, he loved when his on the fly plans worked out the way he intended.  “Just a little further, buddy, you almost got me!” he called, rounded the billboard, and used his momentum to slam his feet against the damaged floodlight. The impact rattled his bones, and he let out a tiny noise of pain, but the light was pushed aside, beam hitting Dark Shadow directly in his yellow eyes. There was a screech that sounded almost pained, and his form began to shrink.  Hawks was already up again, and he didn’t hesitate, wings carrying him right to the middle of where the quirk’s most dangerous manifestation was shrinking to. He still couldn’t see much past the darkness, but his arms closed around a solid body, and a moment later, he was hovering in the air with a shivering Tokoyami in his arms. Dark Shadow was nowhere in sight.  “Hawks,” Tokoyami gasped, and fuck, were those tears? The kid was clinging to his jacket, and he didn’t seem to feel up to saying much more. Hawks could understand that. He beat his wings backwards and brought them to the roof the billboard stood on – and there was some minor property damage for the night, great – and landed them both carefully, holding onto Tokoyami until he was sure the kid was standing on his own. Then, he pulled away to check him over. Aside from being obviously upset, there were no visible injuries. His hero costume might be concealing most of them though.  “Tsukuyomi. I need you to focus. Are you hurt anywhere?” Tokoyami shook his head. “N-no. Hawks, are you… you almost…” “But I didn’t,” Hawks interrupted, half-worried about what would happen if Tokoyami got even more upset, and half just worried about his intern, period. “You saved me. And yeah, it went a little south after that, but thanks to you I was there to do damage control.” He patted Tokoyami on the head, and it was more than enough proof of the kid’s state that he leaned into it with a quiet crooning noise rather than pull away, embarrassed.  It had to be a nightmare to be trapped by his own quirk like that, unable to move or stop himself from being, essentially, an accessory to whatever Dark Shadow did. Like attacking Hawks, for example. Did UA have a decent councilor? They should. Hawks had to remember to let Eraserhead know about this, at the very least. They were supposed to inform UA about any unusual happenstances during patrol anyway, and this definitely counted.  Hawks pulled out his phone and checked the time. They still had a little more than two hours left on patrol. But a sideways glance at Tokoyami assured him that there was no way the kid could go on. Now, he could always send him back to the dorms and finish the patrol by himself, but… he couldn’t just leave his little intern alone to deal with this. Because he wouldn’t go and find someone to talk to, that wasn’t his style. He’d just hide away and brood and feel guilty. Hawks could not let him do that. He sent off a text to his agency’s group chat ‘The Roost’, letting his sidekicks know that he had to skip out on the rest of his patrol, and asking them to find an off-duty hero as replacement for him. This hadn’t happened a lot, but it wasn’t unheard of. Hawks had gotten hurt before, or hit by quirks that made him unable to finish flying his route, so they had a system in place for that happening. His agency, as far as it was his, anyway, worked like a well-oiled machine.  “What kind of food do you want?” he asked, looking up from his phone and over at Tokoyami. At least the kid had stopped shaking. He appeared composed again, like usual, but Hawks knew better than that. Now, Tokoyami tilted his head at him, eyes narrowing a bit in confusion. “… what?” Hawks waved his phone. “I just called out of patrol duty for the night, so we’re getting food and watching a movie.” Tokoyami gaped at him, and Hawks crossed his arms, putting on what could probably be described as a pout. “What, you don’t wanna hang out with your favorite hero in the whole world?”  Tokoyami looked away. “… I would be fine returning to the dorms on my own. You have no obligation to mother-hen me after what just happened.” Hawks shook his head. “Nope. No, I will mother-hen you because I want to.” Certain people - Rumi, Dabi - already called him ‘chicken’ on a regular basis.  “You’re choosing to fuss over me rather than protect the people of this city,” Tokoyami pointed out, and yeah, he kind of had a point. This was definitely not how he was supposed to choose in this situation. But screw that. “Heroism starts small. Sometimes only with one person. You’re my person for the night,” Hawks told him, and apparently his tone was insistent enough that Tokoyami caved. They touched down on the balcony of Hawks’ apartment about half an hour later, with Tokoyami clutching a big bag of McDonald’s food to his chest. They’d decided on that since it was fast and Hawks could get a ton of chicken nuggets, which was always a good selling point.  As he walked over to press his finger against the scanner to unlock the balcony door, Hawks realized that Tokoyami was only the second person he’d ever invited to this place. Rumi had been here a few times, but even she didn’t usually hang out. They were both pretty busy, after all. It wasn’t even that much of a home to Hawks, who preferred to spend what precious free time he had up in the sky, or perched on a rooftop somewhere. More often than not, he ended up taking notice of some minor crime that way, and ended up working even during his time off. But he didn’t really mind that at all.  “Make yourself at home,” he told Tokoyami over his shoulder as he pulled off his boots, walked inside and headed straight for the couch. It was spacey, and absolutely covered in a collection of pillows and soft blankets, and he was completely unashamed of that fact. This was his space, and if he wanted all the soft things, then he could damn well use his hero salary to get them.  Tokoyami was a little more hesitant as he followed him inside, setting down their food on the couch table and looking around, scanning the room. It was probably not the prettiest, or the most homey looking. There were a handful of photos on the wall. A framed selfie of Hawks and Endeavor, the latter frowning into the camera. A photo of Rumi asleep in the grass on one of the first days they’d ever spent just hanging out. A photo of Tokoyami from the Sports Festival, looking serious with a medal around his neck. Hawks had gotten that from one of his sidekicks, and he’d hung it up because that was what you were supposed to do with photos, and he kind of liked it anyway. Tokoyami stared at it for a few beats, then turned abruptly around and pulled off his cloak before sitting on the couch.  Hawks opted for the carpet in front after getting out of his jacket and having two feathers carry it to its space beside the door. He stretched out his wings a little and looked them over, frowning. There were some black spots that looked like ooze. Felt like it, too, when he ran his fingers through it. He scrunched up his nose.  “Tokoyami.” He looked up, purposefully using the kid’s name instead of his hero name since they were off duty now. “Mind helping me out with my wings a bit after we eat? I don’t think I can reach all the spots to clean them.”  “Oh. Of course I can… do that, Hawks.” Apparently tonight he was just throwing off Tokoyami over and over again. But that was better than him being all withdrawn and guilty.  Hawks turned on the tv and then tossed the kid the remote. “Pick whatever you like. This movie night is for you.” He moved his attention onto unpacking their food, setting Tokoyami’s aside for him while the kid browsed through a selection of all horror movies that Hawks had never even heard of. He wasn’t a big fan of horror… but he’d suffer through it for his intern.  The movie that Tokoyami picked started innocently enough, though the vibe was a little off from the first second. Hawks didn’t know enough about horror to know if this was a common thing. He just focused on his nuggets, and Tokoyami ate quietly beside him.  There were no jump scares or anything of the sort, it was more of a… half creepy, half psycho kind of movie, and Hawks could say with absolute certainty that he was not enjoying it. He felt a little queasy each time the villain appeared, acting like a perfectly pleasant and friendly person and not at all like the monster they actually were underneath it all. Hawks preferred his villains clear cut and obviously scary, thank you very much.  As they finished the meal, Hawks took that as an excuse to flee from the movie for a little while, and he returned from the bathroom changed into sweatpants and a t-shirt and with a warm, damp towel.  He sat in front of Tokoyami and handed it to him, and the kid, after a moment’s hesitation, tugged his wing up and stretched it out, running the towel along the dirty spots carefully, but clearly with some expertise. Hawks didn’t know the difference between grooming his wings and what Tokoyami had to do for his shorter, softer head feathers, but he seemed to know what he was doing. Hawks focused on the movie, though he found himself much more comfortable now. The events of the night were catching up to him a bit, his throat and lungs still felt a bit raw from the smoke, and he was going to be sore all over the next morning, but mostly he was just exhausted.  “It looked like that warp villain,” Tokoyami said, during a quiet part of the movie. Hawks turned his head to look at him, but Tokoyami was focused intently on his wing, smoothing out some stray feathers. “From the League. The… the smoke villain, his quirk was reminiscent of that one. Seeing you get swallowed up brought my mind back to that night…”  Hawks nodded in understanding. He knew a little about the summer camp incident, mostly what all the pros knew, and a few minor details Tokoyami had been willing to share. He’d had a friend taken from him that night, and he’d had to watch. Having his mentor disappear in a much similar way… “It’s not your fault you had a trauma reaction,” Hawks found himself saying, “You’ve been through a lot for a kid your age. And you’re strong as he- heck for it. But it’s okay that you’re not perfectly in control all the time.”  Tokoyami gave him an incredulous glance. His hands stilled. Hawks pushed his wing insistently against them until he took up his work again.  “I mean what I say, chicklet. We’ll work on you calming Dark Shadow down on your own, but it’s not your fault that you got upset. People have emotions, that’s not something you can switch off.” How convenient that would be. “And you saved my life tonight. I’m proud of you.”  Tokoyami averted his gaze again, and Hawks turned back to the movie. They sat in silence for a little while.  “… chicklet?” Tokoyami finally asked, quietly.  Hawks tilted his head back and grinned toothily up at him. “Yup. Welcome to the nest. There’s no escaping mother-hen Hawks now.”  Tokoyami looked like he wanted to put that theory to test.  Good thing Hawks could outfly him any day.

#hawksweek2020 #bnha #i haven't written any action scenes in literal years it feels like #but heyyy its tokoyami because i love the birb gang #is this wholesome enough??? #i dont know why the angst got away from me so much #(because this is me and i cant have nice things unless i do a sad before)