"As much as I am absolutely delighted to discover that my oldest brother wanted to kill me—"

"Shoto, listen—"

"Don't Shoto me. I get your point, Touya—, or maybe you want to be called Dabi now, whatever—."

"Let me fucking speak for once, you literally went off the tail end and started ranting mindlessly since then."

Blue and black eyes stared back at him, the blue one matching his own pair, inherited from the man who had brought them so much of anguish.

"I wasn't well—, LISTEN, I KNOW YOU WEREN'T EITHER, LET ME FUCKING SPEAK FOR ONCE—, DON'T BE LIKE HIM , yes so, anyways—, he fucking trained me hard, you know, my hair went white from this—, and yes, thank you for reading up on psychology, and the moment you arrived both of them left me—, Endeavor left training me, mom left comforting—, or maybe I worded that wrong. Endeavor STILL trained me, but it was different—, you, you, Shoto Todoroki was the centre of their attention, while me—, Touya, I was discarded. Any idea how that's gonna feel? I went crying to Natsuo every night wondering why I even existed—, because it was fucking clear that I wasn't needed. Not my mom, nor by Endeavor, WHO I HAD ONLY WANTED TO MAKE PROUD—, TO FEEL WANTED—, I don't fucking know, the pain was too much—, my own Quirk turned against me and well—," Dabi said gesturing to his scars and staples, "You can see the results. They never fucking bothered to check what had happened—, they just....left me....as I lay in a burning pile of ruin—, no one came to help and I don't know how—, I crawled out of that place all alone—, and I had to run—, I ran and ran and never looked back—, until I had enough for revenge."

Shoto was quiet. His previously blazing eyes had returned to their normal calm state. He looked down at the ground once and slowly went towards Dabi, his arm outstretched.

"Maybe the old man was responsible for our despair—, but if we can—, can we just—, start over again?"

Dabi had never been more shocked that day.

On hindsight, after seeing Shoto read his book, absolutely absorbed in it, he felt that maybe he understood why. He felt twisted, his sickened hatred still bubbling, not given a proper reward(as Shoto had miraculously finished Endeavor off, to not give him a chance for his so called "suicide mission", which may or may not have saved his life but that's debatable), his hatred against his entire family, which was twisted too, when the grim realisation hit him that he hadn't been the only one to go through utter hell.

Maybe it had been horrid for Shoto as well.

He felt unhappy.

Here he had been, kept alive by the fire of his anger for years, pain and anger making him take another step to just cling onto life.

The pain was still there, but the anger.

The anger felt desperate now.

It felt like if he lost the anger then he would lose himself.

Lose himself to a world of agony and numb.

"Yo—?"

He jerked out from his thoughts to look at their apparent boss(nothing more than a figurehead as he had concluded) came to sit beside him. His head was cocked and he had removed the hand which normally covered his face, the light falling onto the scars lining the upper part as if someone had repeatedly scratched it until they left permanent marks.

"What's wrong?" He grumbled, looking away. Tomura took a seat beside him.

"You looked dreadfully sad—, Shoto pushed me here to talk."

Dabi looked up at where Shoto had been sitting. The brat hadn't moved an inch, but he caught his strangely emotionless eyes over the edge of his book.

Dabi gave him a death glare before turning to look at Tomura, who was beginning to actually look concerned. He gave Tomura a wide smile that probably looked more like a grimace, and Tomura raised an eyebrow at him.

"There, now I am smiling, Shigaraki, so kindly fuck off."

Wait—

Why did he even bother to smile for him?

He never did that.

Tomura sighed and leant back.

"Something's been bothering you since forever and I am not exactly blind—, it's between you and Shoto, some older brother business for sure, and just saying—, we don't like our people sad."

"Then how do you like them? Dead."

Tomura snorted.

"That was a horrid joke, Dabi."

"I know, Shigaraki."

"Your sense of humor is horrid, Dabi."

"I know, Shigaraki."

"You think that repeating the same statement is making you look cool, but you are actually sounding like a clown, Dabi."

"I know, Shiga—WAIT, COME BACK HERE, YOU SON OF A BITCH—."

Tomura laughed and danced out of his reach as he got up to chase him. He had dug his own grave by saying this.

He made blue flames lick the tips of his fingers, possibly to look somewhat intimidating.

"Your magic fire ain't that scary, Dabi," Shigaraki called from atop a stack of crates.

"Nor are the dummy mummy hands, Shigaraki," he drawled, figuring out what was the best way to leap at him without bringing the stack down.

"You know what my favourite romance trope is?" Izuku whispered to Shoto who turned to look at him seriously.

Izuku grinned impishly just as Dabi, the colossal genius jumped up on the box which wobbled and Tomura fell off along with the boxes.

Dabi leapt out of the reach of the boxes which caused all of them to fall on an unfortunate Tomura.

Kurogiri came running out, probably to rescue him, and explain gently to the both of them why it wasn't a rather smart thing to do.

"When the both of them get told off by the one mother hen in the group."

Shoto blinked once, slowly.

"Thank Goodness it wasn't the Fall™."

Izuku looked positively horrified.

"Oh God, NOT the FALL™."

"Y'all talking about Sherlock Holmes?"

This random comment from Twice made them burst into laughter, while the man himself looked pleased with his ability to have made a joke.

"See," Tomura said pointing to Twice, "That's how you make jokes."

Dabi walked up to him.

"Right, I definitely hadn't noticed," he drawled in Tomura's ear before walking off.

Tomura spun right around to see Izuku and Shoto sporting twin smirks on their faces.

O h n o.

Bakugo and Shinso flanked Mirio as they passed by the streets, both feeling like two bodyguards for someone important.

And in conclusion, very stupid.

"So, exactly what on earth are we supposed to look out for?" Bakugo broke the silence first, "And exactly where the fuck we are going and exactly what the fuck are we investigating? Don't tell me Shie Hassaikai, I know that much, but what exactly?"

Unknown to them, a figure lurked out of sight, amusedly listening to their conversation. He considered it an improvement, but he hoped that Nighteye's plans wouldn't clash with theirs. He tucked the hood over his rather distinguishable green locks, opting to take notes.

Bakugo, in his opinion, was having somewhat of a better day without Nighteye breathing down his neck. The man ticked him off in all possible ways and it was all he could do to not strangle him on the spot.

Shinso peacefully chose to ignore the prickling, knowing perfectly well that it wasn't useful.

Instead he opted to be as unresponsive as possible, smirking when he got his goal.

A white haired girl bumped into him, dragging him out of his thoughts.

He knelt down, to be met by terrified red eyes.