Top pic credit: hejoyart

Violet POV:

"Alright! The briefing is now in session. Let's get right down to business." I stated firmly, tapping the top of the laptop gently as I looked over to Dabi.

Regardless of his half promise to 'get serious for five minutes,' Dabi had already veered off the walking trail to our work station and back into the kitchen.

I ignored the behavior. After all, maybe this is just how he operates. If he says he's going to pay attention, I'll give him the benefit of the doubt for now and see how well that works.

"Don't sound so happy about it. I didn't promise a lot." Dabi mumbled in annoyance, swiping a fancy little cookie off the plate on the counter before making his way over to me at a sloth's pace.

Regardless of his nagging demands, a determined smile remained glued to my face as I quickly pulled up the briefing notes that the hero commission sent over to us, admittedly pretty eager to get things going.

"Okay, so here's what they said. Apparently, there claimed to be a sighting of Midas and his men in this little Tokyo convenience store last night." I started off, gesturing my finger on the glowing area of the digital map for Dabi to see.

Rather than take a seat at the empty chair next to me, he chose to simply invade my personal space bubble, hovering his standing body over my sitting one to look at the map.

My eyes flinched closed as crumbs of his stupid cookie fell onto my face from his hovering, causing me to spit a bit to get them off.

"So, what then? You think he's still there? No way. Fuckers like him never stay in one place for long. He was probably just taking a piss or something." Dabi remarked dismissively, taking another crunch of his cookie which caused more crumbs to fall onto my face and the top of my head.

I felt my jaw lock in irritation as I made it a point to expressively wipe the crumbs off me to give him the hint to get the hell out of the way.

"I wasn't finished talking. Do you see the area of the map this convenience store is located on?" I asked, causing Dabi to loom over me deeper so he could see.

He squinted at the map like he needed glasses, and yeah, he probably did-before his brows raised ever so slightly in realization.

"Ya. Little corner between ninth and tenth avenue. That area's practically abandoned." He pointed out, causing me to nod quickly.

"Exactly! It's a strange area to have a convenience store, right? See, the hypothesis is that this little place is just posing as a store, when it's actually a front for Midas and his men." I explained, using the laptops keys to zoom in a bit on the screen.

My fingers froze when Dabi's cookie crumbs toppled onto the keyboard now, causing me to stop what I was doing for a moment and turn around in my chair to face him.

He backed up a bit at the turning movement of my chair, yet not enough for my comfort.

His half lidded eyes bore into mine with impatient question, as he continued chewing.

"Ever thought about sitting in the chair next to me, so you stop showering my head with your crumbs?" I asked with dwindled patience.

Dabi kept a lazy hand shoved in his pocket, eating his cookie with more crunch now as he held my eye contact.

"The thought might have crossed my mind until you told me to do it." He countered nonchalantly, causing me to scoff and simply turn back around to face the computer.

"God. You are so hard to work with." I sighed tiredly, quickly swiping the cookie crumbs off the keyboard before continuing to type.

Dabi hummed in slight victory at my remark, popping the rest of his cookie in his mouth as he remained standing behind my chair.

"So I've been told. It's annoying, right? Kinda makes ya wanna quit this whole thing and go back to being a complete nobody, doesn't it?" He asked knowingly, causing my brows to raise a bit with revelation to his relentless obnoxious attitude.

I'm starting to get to know Dabi just a bit better in the short time I've known him. I've learned that he feeds off the reactions he gets from people. Everything from him always has a motive, and most of what he does is an act, so he can remain mysterious and hide his true intentions.

He always acts like he never takes anything seriously, because the moment things start getting serious, it makes this act easier to slip.

Like, right now. Dabi has been giving me a hard time, practically hazing me with his antics from the moment we got paired together for this assignment. He continued to insult me and mess around, he stole my things and spoke in a language composed purely of threats and dismissal. These components never allowed me to really get a chance to talk with him.

But, in these first five minutes that he's finally getting down to business a bit, he's already accidentally let it slip that part of his intentions for being such a giant, deliberate jerk have to do with trying to get me to quit the job.

I don't even know why that's something he'd want, considering we're both working together to take down the same target...?

And judging from the way he's not even trying to backtrack on his comment, he doesn't even realize his small slip.

I shouldn't freak out and draw a lot of attention to it. I should confirm it like I already knew it. Maybe then, I'll be able to keep him from immediately shutting himself off again and staying a mystery bag of unpredictable secrets.

"Yeah, yeah. Tell me something I don't know. As if I didn't already know that's why you're being such a pain in the butt. Honestly though, did you really think that would work?-getting me frustrated enough with your attitude to quit this whole thing?" I said, keeping my demeanor as transparent and uncaring as possible.

And finally, a small breakthrough for me without him even knowing.

"And what if I said it was?" He smirked, saying the words like he thought he had the upper hand.

Bingo. Now he really just admitted it. Just further confirms why he always talks in a language, mainly composed of topic evasion and insult. It's his strong suit. It's how he's able to ensure he stays one step ahead of everyone else, fully guarded and secretive.

This time I was the one to let out a small laugh of victory as I continued typing, shaking my head slightly for my own thoughts as I spoke.

"Well then I would say, you're wasting your time, cause I'm not going anywhere." I countered casually, especially meaning those words now that I've figured this confusing man out just a tad.

He can't keep up the constant insults and rebellion forever. At some point, he's gonna get bored with it and let up a little. I'll wait him out. I've got a lot of patience after all-

My thoughts were interrupted as I felt Dabi's hands abruptly come down to rest on both sides of my chair, practically caging my sitting body between his standing one.

And my back is turned to him. Stupid move on my part. No wonder I'm number seventy in the hero world. Yikes.

I swallowed thickly, trying to remain unbothered by the way I now heard his hands sizzling just mere inches away from my shoulders.

Relax, Violet. He's just trying to scare you. If he wanted to hurt you, he would have done it by now. He's had plenty of opportunities.

My muscles tensed anyways, as I felt Dabi's warmth radiate closer from behind, feeling a slight shiver run up my spine as he leaned down directly next to my ear.

He's purposely trying to make me uncomfortable.

"Hm. We'll see how long you last, sunshine. From what I've already gathered about you, since the first day we met....you don't really seem like much of a go-getter." He whispered into my ear lowly, his hot breath rolling against the shell of my lobe causing goosebumps to form on my skin.

I stared ahead at the computer screen distractedly, more concerned at the way I could feel the warmth from his hands on my chair starting to radiate in towards my shoulders now.

Don't chicken out. You always chicken out.

Very mindful about the way Dabi's face remained too close to my ear, I forced myself not to show nerves, beginning to slowly type once more.

What am I even typing again?-

"Hmph. T-There you go again, making assumptions about people you know nothing about." I uttered raspily, causing Dabi to laugh a bit mockingly.

"Yeah, well, even with you setting five million passcodes on your fucking phone, you're not that hard for me to figure out, sunshine. You're damn predictable." He drawled out smoothly, only remaining in my personal space bubble for a moment longer before he slowly pulled away.

Not as predictable as you think, considering I'm already starting to figure you out as well.

The moment his hands slipped themselves off my chair and I heard him back away a few comfortable feet, I let out a breath I didn't even realize I was holding-only now realizing my heart had been pounding out of my chest.

I relaxed even more when I saw him finally stop his pestering and plop down in the swivel chair next to me now, watching him slouch and sway himself back and forth with the spin.

"So, what's the plan here then? You saying we should go and bust this shitty mini mart down the street and see what they know? Is that it?" Dabi asked casually a few moments later, voice no longer lower than my future as he seemed to pick up his boredom right back where he left off.

Clearing my throat slightly to pull myself together, I distractedly nodded in agreement to his summary, before quickly clarifying.

"Y..Yeah-I-I mean...no-no!-look, the instructions aren't saying we should go necessarily bust them. More just stake out the area and see what's going on." I explained, already preparing myself for Dabi to be difficult and deny anything I said.

But, all he did was continue slouching in his chair, staring at the computer screen uninterestedly as he subtly raised his brows in contemplation.

He made up his mind rather quickly this time.

"Fine. Whatever. Let's go. Got nothing else to do and I don't wanna be stuck in this crummy room with you all day." He muttered naggingly, quickly standing up from his chair to leave.

I sighed tiredly at his comment. He called this five star hotel room 'crummy.'

But regardless, this is another big step! Dabi actually just agreed to go on a stakeout mission with me, when just five minutes ago he refused to, so much as, have a real conversation with me. This is what I wanted. This is what the assignment requires.

Nevermind the fact that if we can barely stand each other when we're not working together, I'm sure we'll be absolutely horrible as partners in crime.

Just a risk I'm gonna have to take.

Rather than feel triumphant that I got Dabi to agree, I immediately felt stressed for the strain our partnership already carried, slowly standing up from my own chair now to get ready for the stakeout.

"Alright. Y-Yeah, let's do it." I uttered nervously, already feeling a ball of stress forming in the pit of my stomach at our first assignment.

Well. Hopefully, nothing goes horribly wrong tonight.

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Next Chapter Title: The Dream Team.