Chapter Text
One of his last happy memories came from years ago.
The sun was high on a spring morning at a local playground near their apartment building. Cherry blossoms swayed in the breeze moving in an innocent dance. They touched upon the metal of the swings and bars, their chains ringing high in time with children’s laughter. The colored metal fixtures gleamed as pristine as the day they were set.
He stood and watched with eagle eyes at the branches of a large tree before him. The sight of little human arms and legs sliding on the wood cautiously was locked in his gaze. There was a bright smile so rarely worn on his face it made his cheeks strain.
“Come on! You can do it!” He called to the little boy up in the tree.
“Uh, I dunno…” The kid responded back. “It’s really, really high up…”
“That’s what you’ve got those wings for. Just flap and you’ll be fine!”
He gave his own red wings a flap, the push lifting him from the ground. His younger brother’s wings were still fresh and weak with a newborn wash of grey, the barest hints of green peeking through. They had begun molting from weeks before and were growing stronger by the day, even though they still quivered and twitched.
Still, the tree at the park’s center they had chosen for their test was four times his own height, and he was already ten years of age. His brother was a short thing, and very self-aware in spite of his age as he clutched the bark.
“I-I can’t!” The kid had shut his eyes, the first of many tears starting to leak. “I’m scared!”
At that, his smile turned soft. “Don’t worry. If you fall, I’ll catch you!”
The younger’s eyes opened wide. “R-Really? Pinkie promise?”
“I’d need your pinky for that,” he laughed. “But yeah, promise.”
His word was a much-needed gust of strength for his little fledgling brother, who stood. At this point, other kids had left their spots at the playground’s many offerings and came to watch. His shoes scuffed the dirt as he stood back and watched. His wings spread, ready to move in an instant. After a long pause, the younger rose on wobbly legs, and leapt.
His little wings flapped as much as they were worth, shedding feathers with each beat. Still he plummeted like a stone, remaining cruel gravity’s victim. The kids had yelped in alarm and some parents watching in the background had shrieked. His brother had shut his eyes once more, waiting for the inevitable crash and pain.
He leapt. His body moved like a shot.
The falling toddler vanished. Red feathers were all anyone had caught sight of in that instant.
His brother was now in his arms, held close to his chest as he hovered in the air with soft but strong wingbeats. Cheers erupted from the onlookers below at his amazing speed, followed by cries for a repeat show. He was only preoccupied with the little boy in his arms clutching at his white shirt, watching with a smile as he peeked his big green eyes open. “See? Told you I’d catch you, and in record time!”
“Wow!” Any trace of the little chick’s nervousness was gone. His brother’s pupils must have caught the sun and moon somewhere falling down as they now sparkled. “That was amazing, Kei! You were so fast!”
“How would you know?” He laughed. “You had your eyes closed, Izu.”
“But you were fast! I must have been falling super-fast too, and then you went whoosh! And then you caught me! It must have been, like, a-a second! No, less than a second! Could you go even faster? Are you faster than a car!?”
While his brother raved, the two flew in easy loops above the park. They drifted near the tips of the trees to watch the little birds in their nests, hatchlings in sets of threes and fours. Though Kei’s eyes drifted to the nests to guide the younger’s and settle the last of his nerves, all his own hatchling could focus on was the older boy whose arms were wrapped around him. “Kei, are you listening? Kei? Keikun?”
“I’m listening, but you’re not looking at the birdies. What if a villain catches you and sticks you in a nest? You need to know how to survive.”
“NO!” Izu cried. “I don’t wanna live in a nest!”
“I’m kidding!” Kei laughed. “No villain’s gonna put you in a nest.”
“Yeah, ‘cause you’ll save me! You’re gonna be an awesome hero!”
The words flooded him with a gentle warmth as he held tighter. “Thanks.”
A ways near the park’s entrance, the two lowered to the ground. Their shoes landed with a soft rustle on the wet grass. The sky-high heights of heroics was one of the first things that had brought them together. It led to sleepless nights and long chats fueled with fervor. His wings fluttered as Izu’s twitched in turn, as though their fires fueled their bodies to move on their own.
Kei had already taken his first steps reaching for those heights. The men who found him had pushed him hard, his days training were exhausting, but he had faith they would make him the best hero ever. They would undoubtedly make Izu strong too when he could fly. Their wings would carry hope and give it to the hearts of people, creating a world of smiles.
“Kei.” Izu muttered, his voice now a quiet thing. “You are gonna save me, right? If I get stuck or fall?”
Kei snapped out of his daydream. “I already told you I would. That’s the kind of hero I’m gonna be, a light for everybody. That means I’ll always be there… especially for you.”
“You mean it?”
“Hey, I’m your big brother. Of course I mean it.”
“Promise?”
Kei kneeled down to his little brother and pressed their foreheads together. The two shut their eyes. “Promise.”
A shrill scream broke the late morning peace on the streets.
A gunshot rang hot on its trail. A man’s cry of pain broke the air after that.
Inside a local bank, people huddled together, grasping at the closest person in sight. The clients shacked behind the polished wood desks turned barricades while the tellers cowered past the plexiglass shield windows. A group of men in shabby black clothes were at the double doors blasted wide, assailed off their hinges. The lead criminal’s arm was raised ending in a gun barrel– a mutation Quirk too appropriate for the scene – prepared to deliver death. At his feet was a security guard, clenching his shoulder as his life ran on the crystal-clear tile soiled with plant soil and gunpowder.
The gunman steps forward, his smile caked in bloodlust and greed. “All right, you know the drill. Money, sacks. Move or you’ll end up like this guy!”
“S-Someone call the police!” One teller cried.
“One of the criminals behind the man laughed. “Don’t waste your breath. The nearest station’s twenty minutes away from here. We’ll be long gone by then!” A sad truth even if bystanders had already called.
“Right, now like I said,” the first gunman sneered. This barrel arm pointed to the bags affixed to his side. “Money, sacks.”
The sight was a familiar one to the cowering citizens. The tellers rushed to the vaults behind them and near-tore open the door with pale fingers. The sacks were filled to the rim with piles of bills – hard earned yen snatched away by unjust desperation. It was all they could do just to shut their eyes and turn away.
The men smiled and turned away, the gunman shooting a bullet into the ceiling. It served its purpose as the citizens shrieked and cowered further. Laughing and reveling in fear like pigs in mud, the criminals headed for the doors.
Only for a flurry of red to rush in from the opening.
Their breaths seized in their throats. Red flashes caught their coats’ scruffs. The sacks dropped. The darts slammed into the wall. All four of their group had become fixtures on the wall.
The tellers and citizens gave a chorus of relived breaths once they stopped to see them. Feathers.
He was here.
“DAMN IT!” The gunman cried. “He was supposed to be on the other side of town!”
“Well, I was in the neighborhood. Thought I’d stop by when I heard the screams.” Hawks made a casual stroll in, hands fixed into the pockets of his pants. Crimson sentinel feathers swirled around and tucked themselves into the ranks on his vibrant wings. A cool and cheery smile was on his face as the light bounced off his yellow visor. “Looked like you were taking your sweet time. Or was I too fast for you?”
“Like hell I’m losing on all this yen ‘cause the Number Three decided to show his pretty boy face!”
The man raised his barrel arm to shoot, only for a bright blur to move through it. The metal barrel dropped to the floor, sliced clean through. A primary feather turned blade in Hawks’ right hand was the clear culprit.
“Now, now.” Hawks’s smile crossed between teasing and menacing as he helped the fallen guard. His free hand was pressing on his wound. “I think you know better than to play with guns.”
The robbers could only gaze back with sweaty skin and gritted teeth. The gunman, with his Quirk now useless, hung his head in acceptance of his fate.
Flashing lights and sirens blared from the open streets. Policemen flooded in with guns in hand while medics followed moving the citizens out to the streets. Hawks kept eyes on every person guided out, wrapped in shock blankets, to the moment they’d drunk in the air and exhaled safety.
He gave a nod to a policeman nearby. “Can I leave this to you boys in blue?”
“Of course.” The man gave a salute with a firm shout. “Thank you for getting here so fast, Hawks.”
“Eh, it’s kinda my thing.”
A new scream came. Hawks turned quick as a whip, his wings spread.
“Duty calls.”
He darted out into the open streets, where the safe sweet air now reeked with chaos.
For every ten citizens who abided by the law in Japan, there was at least one who spat in its face and ran with their Quirks like wild bulls. Hawks was looking at one such example, a spindly man with bug eyes and pincers around his mouth. Spider legs twinged from his back, pinching and clawing. The mutant’s life story was a short and sad movie that played before Hawks’s eyes.
People ran screaming from their seats on the concrete and asphalt. A typical reaction.
“Hungry… I’m so hungry….” The man muttered near-dazed. His pupils were shrunk to the size of flies on a web.
Hawks twirled the primary blade in his hand. It’s sheen rolled on the surface. “Alright buddy, let’s take it nice and slow. Bird versus bug, you know who wins this.”
“Need to feed…”
“Guess jokes are out, then.”
The man suddenly gagged. A wet, thick squelching rose from his throat that made Hawks’s stomach turn. From his maw shot a glob of white. Hawks darted away. It slammed on a car, triggering its alarm. The glob had in seconds become a thick and sticky web that sealed the car onto the street. The stench was an ungodly mix between old glue and vomit.
The hero gave a grimace. With a flap of his wings he was airborne. “That’s gonna make me lose my lunch. Although something tells me that might have been yours.”
“So… so hungry.”
It was a random guess but the webs he made with his Quirk might have cost him the nutrients in his stomach. A look at the man’s greasy and torn clothes suggested meals were hard to come by. Two centuries in and Quirk discrimination was as rampant as ever. But the law was a cruel mistress – he knew from repeated meetings with her. She gave no tears for men fresh out of food and fortune. Neither would he.
The man made that nasty upchucking sound again. Hawks exhaled and flapped. The glob missed him by a mile. The man shot again. He darted once more. Left and right, shifting down. Hawks watched and waited.
The man clenched his stomach, the last bits of strength gone.
He moved.
Wind spun and surged as his wings flashed open. A flurry of feathers was discharged, falling like blossoms in spring. The hero raced forwards, blade in hand. The villain hacked and raised his quivering spider legs. His freed feathers shot towards them. The man’s legs swung and batted with wild abandon.
The feathers swirled, darting, slicing through his legs. Blood spilled in the flurry of limbs. Cut upon cut, digging into the appendages. One last cut on each severed the legs. The man yowled in pain. His appendages crashed on the road, twitching their last. His creams were gargled and agonizing but short.
Hawks rushed, fast as sound. His foot found the villain’s chest. The villain went flying. A hard crash with a metallic echo rang. The man was out cold, his head knocked on a streetlamp.
“Really hoping I don’t have bug guts on my feathers.” Hawks muttered on landing. “That’ll be a good three showers.”
“SOMEONE HELP!”
The day’s duty never ended, Hawks thought, as he turned to the nearest building. A young boy no older than five was grasping for dear life teary-eyed on a windowsill at a nearby apartment. A stray web glob from the fight had struck the building. His hand gripped the stone by a few fingers, their strength fading fast. It summoned an image of another boy paralyzed by the heights.
Hawks blinked away the thought. The feathers he released still swayed in midair, awaiting orders. He ordered them to the windowsill just as the boy’s hand strength faded. The boy fell screaming. He’d only dropped a couple of feet before bouncing on a bed of floating feathers. They gently hovered down until the boy’s feet could securely touch the sidewalk.
“Hawks!” The boy cheered, running up to the hero. “That was so cool! You saved me!”
“Part of the job, kiddo.” The man grinned ruffling the kid’s hair. “Next time if you wanna catch me at work, get some better seats. Or TV, that works too.”
All at once the crowd of onlookers rushed up to him, all starry-eyed and adrenaline fueled. This was the fun part of the job, dealing with the star-struck fans. Sign a few autographs, pose for selfies, throw a few winks that sent girls into cardiac arrest. Just playing the part of the model hero, smiling and saying all the right things. Happy citizens were a key part in the pie chart that made up a stable society – he knew, having been to the meetings.
“Hawks saved the day!”
“A bank robbery, a villain fight, and saving a kid in a few minutes!”
“He is the fastest hero!”
All around him came the clicks and flashes of cameras. He reached for his pocket and retrieved a pen, twirling it in his fingers. Sure enough, hands popped out with merchandise of his, from backpacks to t-shirts to dolls. He gave a wave to a group of high school girls in uniform with a cheery smile. On cue they went red in the face, squealed, and turned away.
“Alrighty folks, it’s been a pleasure being your hero today but this bird’s gotta fly.” Hawks smiled as he lifted into the air above the fans. “As usual, stay safe, follow the rules, all that jazz. Now-“
“Kenji!”
Hawks blinked at the shout. He turned to an older boy emerging from the waves of people, easily high school age though not from any hero school based on the lackluster brown uniform. He was running to the kid that Hawks had saved from falling. The high schooler embraced the kid like a lifeline.
“Hey, big bro!” The kid spoke smiling. “I didn’t know you were in town!”
“I got permission from my teachers. Don’t try and change the subject though.” He scolded the boy, shaking his shoulders. “I saw you leaning out the window! What have I told you about getting too close to hero fights?”
Ah. So the kid had wanted to get up close to the action. It sounded like a regular thing too.
“You’re a real worrywart. Didn’t you see Hawks save me?”
“That doesn’t make it okay!” The older boy had gone puce faced. “Hawks isn’t your personal trampoline. What if you get in trouble again and he’s not around to save you?”
“No way rhat’d happen.” The younger smiled as if danger itself was fantasy. “He’s real fast, he’ll come!”
“Kenji, I’m serious!”
“So am I! Hawks always comes! He’ll catch me, promise!”
A bold promise for a random kid to make, but it was a promise he’d made long ago to someone else. The words once again set ripples in his memories, stirring images between the waves. He’d be lying if he’d said it didn’t trigger old feelings from long ago, lost in time’s tide after years with the Commission. It surprised the hero as he’d long since thought the word ‘family’ had lost all proper meaning to him.
But the face of a boy with vibrant green curls with feathers soon to match appeared, and it was hard to deny the sudden warmth in his chest. He’d been called the man who moved too fast, it seemed even to the point feelings were left in the dust. No, he thought – an entire identity was left behind.
The people were giving strange looks. Hawks cursed internally. The dangerous thing about slowing down was that it gave people time to look between the cracks.
He turned and flapped away before anyone could start asking questions. Once back in the air, miles above the streets, he let his mind wander. The other boy’s face was now a firm fixture in his head. The one part of family that he’d considered good. A smile appeared on his face, and for the first time in so long, it was genuine.
“Promise… right…”