Archive of Our Own

   It had been a week.

    Despite your dire condition, the only company you had since the war was the faint beep of hospital equipment. Your loved ones were either suffering in nearby rooms, or they were dead.

    You were one of the lucky ones, that’s what doctors kept saying. Despite the swollen nub that used to be your leg preventing you from standing. Despite the punctured lung that made breathing feel like swallowing coal. Despite the unending, smothering guilt that ate away what little was left of your psyche.

    You were lucky.

    It was twilight out your hospital window. You watched the lights of nearby buildings flick on and off as civilians went about their evenings, but, when the sun went down, the windows went dark. The streets were hostile places now. The people you once fought to protect hid in their apartments in perpetual fear. And you, the broken shell of someone who was once a hero, could do nothing for them.

    How could you, when you were unable to even save yourself?

    You laid your head down on the plasticy cover of your hospital pillow and closed your eyes. You spent all of your days living a different life in your head. One that was safer and more familiar than the chaotic hospital you were trapped in. You reminisced, in essence. You went on late night shopping trips with Rumi in the city. You had lunch with your sidekicks, and then slipped away after dark to meet with him.

    The last time you saw him was in that video. That terrible, life-altering video.

    The hard edges of your teeth dug into your bottom lip. He was somewhere in the hospital, but the doctors wouldn’t tell you where. Just like everyone else you worried for, he was in critical condition and in no shape for visitors. And you were in no shape to be leaving your bed.

    You returned to your bittersweet daydreaming until your hospital door cracked open with a slow, careful creak. The silhouette of a man stood in your doorway. He stood still, looming and unfamiliar. 

    A stranger.

    His clothes were dark, and something obscured his face. Was he a villain from the war? Was he here to finish you off for the wrongs you committed in the name of survival? You couldn’t sit up to greet the stranger, let alone defend yourself. You could only whimper as he approached your bed.

    He moved your bedside trey aside—still littered with your half-eaten hospital meal—and then sat on the edge of your mattress.

    "Please,“ you managed, though your voice was small and pathetic. It was nothing like the voice of the glorious, outspoken hero you once were. No, you were a shriveled shadow of that person now. "If you want to kill me, make it quick.”

    The man’s head jerked up, and his eyes—his sharp, yellow eyes—settled onto yours. Your heart palpitated, and a sharp gasp fell out of your throat.

    "Hawks?“ You questioned, squinting at him through the dim light of your bedroom. "Is it… really you?" 

    The question was warranted. His face was hidden beneath a respirator. His once flowing bangs were singed down to frayed chunks, and, most notably, his back was flat.

    This man was your most trusted confidant and your frequent lover since his hero debut, and you hadn’t recognized him. The war left his body ravaged. His eyes were downcast and his posture was crumpled in a way you’d never seen. He was no longer the man you’d fallen in love with.

    But you still loved him, desperately.

    "Your wings…” you muttered.

    "I don’t look like myself, I know,“ he said… or, didn’t say. The tone was robotic and methodical, and not at all the familiar voice that once hummed you to sleep. The light of his cellphone illuminated his face, as well as the blue plastic of the respirator that covered it.

    "You don’t,” you agreed, but rested your palm on his thigh. The gesture was meant to reassure him, but also prove to you he was really there. You’d never been so happy to feel his warmth. “But I don’t either.”

    His eyes swept over your mangled form. He was surely just as disturbed seeing his lover in pieces as you were. Your broken states reiterated the new, agonizing reality you were living. 

    "Do they know when you’ll get out of here?“ Asked the robotic, unfamiliar voice. "We could use your help.”

    We? Help? You bit your bottom lip.

    "Who’s we?“

    "Jeanist and I. We’ve been looking into Dabi—”

    "Dabi? Isn’t he the one who… hurt you? You almost died… and you’re still scheming?“ You pondered as your eyes fell half lidded. They felt too heavy. Everything did. 

    "There are things I have to take care of. I was hoping you’d come along.”

    Your teeth dug into your bottom lip. It was a vain attempt to keep from crying.

    "So you only came because… you want to recruit me for your next suicide mission?“

    His eyes were all you could see, but there was hurt in them when you asked that. You couldn’t help it. You were hurting, too, and you’d hoped just one person would come cry for you in your hospital room.

    You hoped it would be him.

    "Of course not,” said the text app. There was no inflection or nuance in it, which made it even harder to believe. “I came to check on you… But things are rough out there, and we could use your help. Like old times.”

    ‘Old times’ was only a week ago, but it really felt like it had been years since you stood up. 

    "Sweetheart… I'm… I’m finished,“ you lamented. 

    His fingers stopped tapping at his cellphone, and he turned. His eyes were wide-rimmed and his brow raised up high. That wasn’t what he expected you to say, but you retained even less of your wild tenacity than he did.

    "You? Calling it quits? That doesn’t sound right,” The voice he was using felt so not him that it was hard to listen to. “I thought you said you’d never give up.”

    Your eyes bounced between his slumped form and the blankets in your lap. Your nails scraped against the fabric as you fidgeted. It was still a difficult reality to swallow, that a leg was missing beneath it. 

    "You don’t get it,“ you said. "I can’t anymore.”

    Begrudgingly, you peeled the layers of blankets off of your body. With each one, your dire state became more evident. He flinched when the last one was pulled away. When he laid his eyes on the swollen, ugly mess left of your leg. The way he looked at your body made your stomach churn. You, too, had become unfamiliar and hard to look at.

    Your hands tentatively came up to your collar to loosen your gown. He needed to see all of it. He needed to understand this wasn’t a choice you could make. 

    You pulled the gown down to your waist, exposing all the terrible, defeating wounds you suffered. His jaw tensed at the ungodly sight of your new body. There was never shame in Hawks seeing your nakedness. He had many, many times before, but it felt humiliating now. Now that your body isn’t the one he loved anymore.

    Your torso was concave on one side, where ribs were painfully missing. The fluids that leaked from your wounds formed hard, yellow stains around the bandage edges. Thankfully the dressings hid the true ugliness from him, but the inhuman shape was enough to make his eyes crinkle and his brows squeeze together.

    You didn’t have to see under the plastic to know he was grimacing. 

    "We were stationed at the raid, you know. Me and my agency. I watched… helplessly as my sidekicks were slaughtered. I tried to stop it, but all those years of training meant nothing in the end,“ you lamented, your eyes almost too heavy to keep open. "The doctors say I won’t survive another fight. It’s over for me.”

    "That-“ his app faltered as his fingers tapped erratically at his screen. He was typing, and then deleting. Typing, and then deleting.

    "That can’t be true,” the robotic voice said, not at all reflecting the anguish and denial Hawks felt.

    Your hand on his thigh lifted to grip weakly at the collar of his shirt.

    "It’s true.“

    He slumped until his body settled beside yours in your hospital bed. There wasn’t much room, but he’d become so small that he fit easily against your side. He was so delicate without his wings. It shattered pieces of you that you didn’t know were left to break.

    Knowing he intended to go after the man who caused that terrified you.

    Dabi’s macabre video replayed on a loop in your dreams. You didn’t want to face the memory of his feathers—the same feathers you once slept safely beneath—being plunged into a fleeing man’s back. There were so many questions, most of which were too hard to ask.

    So you asked what felt easiest to answer.

    "About… Dabi’s broadcast. Why didn’t you tell me?” Your voice trembled with pain, and it sounded otherworldly as it echoed through your hospital room. “About your real name?”

    A huff came out of him. You heard the air whistle softly out the holes of his respirator. Your heart quivered to know he needed such a thing simply to breathe.

    "I didn’t want you to think differently of me,“ his cellphone confessed for him. "I didn’t want your memories of me sullied, to know where I came from. Not that that matters now, since you had to see me in that video.”

    "They wouldn’t have been sullied—they aren’t,“ you assured him, and he replied with the most pathetic little laugh. His voice was rough and fragile sounding beneath the plastic fitted to his face.

    Your hand rested on his arm. You squeezed the muscle there with what weak grip you had, as if you could tear him out of that unfamiliar shell he was living in. To know he came so devastatingly close to losing it all made your heart lurch in the cage of your ribs.

    Nothing felt safe anymore.

    There were still tears left to cry. Many of them. Though you were too weak to sob, sadness bubbled from your throat and water leaked down the sides of your colorless cheeks. He used tender, gentle caresses to clean your face of your sorrow. He was different than he was before, but he was still there. His still beating heart breathed a little of its strength back into yours.

    "I loved you,” you said to him. It was weak and soft like a whisper, but there was fire in it. An unwavering declaration. “That’s why I never asked about your name or your history. It didn’t matter, because I loved you. All those years, in and out of your bed, and I never had the courage to say so.”

    "You didn’t have to,“ he replied. "I already knew.”

    You wanted to cry all over again, but you were too exhausted. Your lip just trembled as his fingers wiped away what was left of your tears.

    Even if he did feel the same all that time, he never belonged to you. There were pieces of him that may have, in some way, been yours. His groggy morning laugh. How his fingers ran smoothly through his feathers as he preened them, and the chirps he made when he basked on his balcony. Yes, there were moments that belonged to you and no one else. 

    But in the grand scheme of it all, those moments were all that were yours. He belonged to the commission who created him. He belonged to the girls in the streets who grabbed at his feathers and cried when he hugged them. To the citizens who relied on him. He belonged to his duties, his unwavering convictions, and the wide open sky. Despite the nights you’d spent in his bed, holding him and loving him and needing him, he was not yours.

    Even now, with all of those things gone, he was still owned by his convictions. To love Hawks was to accept that, no matter how crushing an agony it was to be held only on secret nights.

    But now he laid in your bed beside you. His chest rose and fell peacefully as he lingered on the edge of sleep. Those golden eyes—the only familiar part of him—were cracked slightly open as they took in the damaged sight of you.

    You had nothing else left, now, besides the heavy history that lingered between the two of you.

    And that wasn’t enough.

    "Touch me…" You whispered. “Please, Hawks. Like you did when I’d stay the night at your penthouse.”

    You heard a sound in his throat, though you couldn’t make out what it was. Surprise maybe?

    It sounded like it hurt.

    "You mean sex?“

    You swallowed. Your face would have heated up with embarrassment if there was any blood left in it. What a ridiculous thing to ask as you both laid half-dead in a hospital room. His body was covered in burns, and his lungs were wrecked. You had a hole in your chest (not just metaphorically), and a swollen nub where your leg should have been. There were no comforts left. Even Hawks looked like a different man, but your affection for him was the same. The memories you shared were still the same.

    You needed to relive them.

    "That may be too much right now, but I want something close. I want to touch you. I want to be touched.”

    "Is that a good idea?“ his phone said from behind your head. It was quieter, as if he turned down the volume to better suit the delicate mood. It didn’t help. "You’re in bad shape. I could hurt you.”

    You bit your lip to keep it from trembling anymore. 

    "If you don’t want to, I understand,“ you replied. You pressed your nose against the cool plastic of his respirator. It made strange sounds as his breath puffed out of it and onto your face. "I just want to pretend like nothing ever happened. To feel you like I used to. For one night, I want to feel like we’re still okay.”

    Those eyes of his closed slowly, and he released a breath in contemplation. His hands moved to pick at the back of his face covering, but your weak grip stopped him.

    "No, you need that to breathe, don’t you? Don’t take it off.“

    He fished around the sheets for his phone.

    "But I need to kiss you.”

    Need. He said need.

    He pressed his bandaged forehead against your cheek, so that you could feel him rather than the contraption on his face. Maybe he couldn’t kiss you like he used to, but you could still trail a crown of your own pecks along his forehead. Your hand, as weak and unsteady as it was, moved to brush his frayed bangs back. Then you pressed your lips into his bandages.

    "Okay,“ he decided.

    "Okay?”

    "I want to pretend, too. Like we’re back at my place.“

    Your dry lips cracked when you smiled.

    "Pretend?… We’re there… right now,” you managed to utter. The more you spoke the more dry your throat became, but Hawks needed the comfort of your memories just as much as you did. “We’re on your bed. The sun is making patterns… across your bedsheets.”

    His eyes fell closed, and his brows furrowed as he called upon the memory.

    "I can smell something from the kitchen,“ you recall. "Can you smell it, too?”

    "Coffee,“ the unfamiliar voice in his hand said. "You got up earlier to brew me coffee.”

    You hummed, and then nodded as your fingers fiddled with the collar of his black button up.

    "But the coffee’s gonna go cold, isn’t it?“

    "Yes. You were—” his app makes a sound as he cancels the sentence. “You are kissing me. You’re only wearing my shirt. It’s all I can think about, how you look in it. So we don’t get out of bed when the coffee maker beeps.”

   "That’s right, Hawks. Smell the grounds. Feel the warmth of the sun in your feathers. Touch me.“

    The comforting scent of his cologne was replaced by the sterile smell of alcohol. There were no feathers caressing your side; no plush wings to climb up beneath. His lips were unreachable. His comforting voice was gone.

    But his fingers, they were still the same.

    They trailed gingerly along your collarbone and down your chest. You both kept your eyes closed. You could see him; how he was before. He wore that carefree smile on his pretty face. His long, wind-whipped bangs fell all over his forehead, and his wings fluttered when he felt you in his touch.

    You hoped he could remember how you looked then, too. Pretty, soft, and whole, as you were meant to be.

    He moved, propping himself up on an elbow as he leaned carefully over top of you. He wanted to be closer, to be smothered in you like he did that lazy morning. There was a small pop and a clatter as his phone fell off the bed and smashed into the tile floor, but he didn’t so much as flinch at the sound.

    He was too enthralled with the sun in his wings, your sighs in his ear, and your breast in his hand; the small whimper that fell out of you when he squeezed.

    It hurt, just a little. He hesitated at your discomfort, unable to even ask if you’re okay with his cell phone lost somewhere on the floor. But you pulled his hand back to your chest.

    "It’s okay…,” you whispered, and then placed a kiss against the hard edge of his respirator. “I don’t want to stop.”

    He nodded, and his palm took your breast again. He squeezed more gently this time before the pad of his thumb flicked your nipple. He stared at it, obviously wanting to nip and suck at the hard bud. He pinched it between his fingers to satisfy the hunger.

    Along with the arousing pleasure, there were small jabs of pain that burned your lungs when you gasped. His forehead stayed faithfully pressed against yours as his fingers timidly explored your body. His touch kept you grounded into his silky, black bed sheets.

    You smelled the coffee, felt the sun kiss your feet, and could almost taste him on your tongue.

    Lower. His hand trailed lower.

    A quiet sound spilled from his respirator when he found your inner thigh. You moved your leg closer to him to put distance between his hand and the leg that was missing. It was fine. It was still there, bathing in the warmth of his feathers. 

    His large palm gripped the soft meat in his palm, wanting, needing, and fervent. He had a ravenous need to be safe inside of you. To seek refuge in your body, and in the heart that still beat for him despite his failings. Despite how dirty he had become. The tips of his calloused fingers drug up your leg, towards the slickened petals that hid beneath the edge of his shirt. The one you picked up off the floor that morning and wrapped yourself in.

    It was thinner and scratchier and more plasticy than he recalled, but that didn’t break the consoling illusion. He caressed the petals of your sex. A whimper forced from your aching lungs, but it was of pleasure. Your lips pressed into the hard holes of his respirator. The thin, cold tubes brushed along your breasts as he nestled into the affection.

    Your pussy soaked his fingers with slick as they circled your clit.

    You missed the sound of his husky breath. His voice, trembling and excited as he murmured filthy promises into the shell of your ear. The voice was gone, but he still knew just how you liked to be touched. The tips of his thick digits pressed against the wet part in your slit. With the slow movement of his wrist, a single finger slid into your warmth. Your thighs twitched at the intimate touch, and instinctively your body clamped down on his finger.

    His eyes grew glossy as you reached up to hold him the best you could. Your hands pressed gently into his back. There were, of course, no plush feathers. Instead in their place were two soft lumps. You pressed delicately into them, but couldn’t tell if there were any remnants of his wings beneath the padding.

    You felt something else, too.

    Hawks’ body was draped over yours, and the warmth and hardness of his cock pressed into your hip. His breath was sharp as he worked a second finger into you. Pleasure bloomed from within your pussy and trickled up through your spine. The toes you had left curled into your hospital sheets, and you lost your breath when he twisted inside you.

    You slid your hand down his back, careful not to press too hard on his tender wounds. Feeling the rough bandages beneath his shirt brought tears to your eyes. Still, your palm trailed along his hip, and then to his thighs. He jerked when he felt your palm press into the crotch of his pants, but settled easily into your gentle squeezing. 

    You heard his breath grow more ragged, and his hand stalled between your thighs as he tried to catch his breath. Your hand went still, too, as you waited for his breathing to steady. When it did, your fingers slipped into the front of his bottoms. The most intimate, private part of him was against your palm. A small whimper worked out of him when you pressed up into it, cupping the shape and exploring with the tips of your fingers.

    As thanks, he quickened the pace of his jerking fingers. He found it, the perfect spot, and your quiet whimpers cracked into labored breathing as he pressed inside over and over and OVER.

    Something mumbled from behind his respirator. What he said was lost in the plastic, but you felt the vibration against your cheek and the low tones of his voice. He said it again, and, this time, you could make out the wavering syllables.

    "Good girl,“ he praised as he slid the ball of his palm over your clit. Electricity pooled through your core and into the rest of you as you struggled to catch your breath.

    You subdued your sounds to keep nearby nurses from hearing you, but a cocktail of ecstasy and agony washed over your aching body as it tensed without permission. The euphoric high numbed the pain for a moment, but as you caught your breath the aching of your bones and the throbbing of your wounds overtook your senses.

    He pulled out of you, his fingers slathered in your sweet slick. Usually he’d be licking them clean of your mess, but not tonight. He only held his hand awkwardly away as he allowed you to tug at his clothes. He was already as close as he could be without hurting you, but you seemed to want him closer still. 

    "You didn’t get to come,” you lamented. Your eyes were still closed as you tried to cling a little longer to the memory you were living in. You felt him shake his head. Surely he wanted to gush over in your soft hands, but the hitch in your damaged lungs scared him.

    You heard the click of a clasp coming undone, so you finally opened your eyes. His sun-filled bedroom was again replaced with the cold darkness of the hospital. The fragrance of coffee beans melded back into something sterile, and the softness of his feathers caressing your sides was replaced with nothing at all.

    His respirator was off and laying in the valley between your bodies. He looked… rough beneath it. His face was littered with scratches and burns, and you could only imagine the wounds hiding beneath his bandages. But you could finally see him for what he’d become.

    The fingering overworked your already frail muscles. You didn’t have the strength to reach up and touch him, but he leaned down to press his lips against yours. They were just as dry and stiff as your own, but you bathed in the joy of the careful contact.

    "I’m sorry,“ he said. He really said. The voice was broken and hoarse, but he still sounded like himself despite it. Why was it that Hawks was the only loyal constant in your life, yet he was always apologizing? "I promise… I’ll make sure you’re taken care of… I'll—”

    He stopped to gasp. The more he spoke the farther away his voice got. He was losing it by the second.

    "I’ll bring you home.“

    "Home?” You asked, and your eyes became glossy all over again. Your apartment was destroyed along with your agency building. When you were eventually discharged, you would have no home to be brought back to.

    "With me. No more… pretending.“