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Izuku was one large itch. From his cheek and neck to his shoulder and forearm — everywhere, really — he felt like someone had poured a nest’s worth of fire ants down his shirt while he slept. It took every ounce of his self-control not to scratch, but he knew the consequences of giving in outweighed the temporary relief scratching would bring. The one time he had given in to the temptation, he’d scratched open a blister. Dabi had lectured him on the danger of infection for what felt like hours after and still wouldn’t let him live it down.
Izuku sat up from his mattress, blanket pooling around his waist, and twisted, reaching over to the milk crate table beside him. A bottle of lotion, a curled-up tube of Benadryl cream, and an empty cup sat on top of the crate. As badly as he wanted to use the last of the cream, Izuku resigned himself to taking an antihistamine and lessening the itch with lotion while he waited for it to take effect. The cream wasn’t all that expensive, but even with Dabi bringing in money from… whatever he did… money for supplies was tight.
Scooping up the cup and getting to his feet, Izuku surveyed the room. Adjacent to Izuku’s mattress was Dabi’s, with a neatly folded blanket and flat pillow atop it. Two bins in the corner held his and Dabi’s clothing, the one for clean clothes sitting empty save for a shirt and the dirty bin on the verge of overflowing. A trip to the laundromat today would be unavoidable.
The combined living room and kitchenette was only a little bigger than the bedroom and like it, contained very little beyond necessities. Aside from a well-used couch with a suspicious brown stain that Dabi had dragged in a few weeks ago, there was no furniture. The stovetop in the kitchen worked, though the oven was broken, and they had a second-hand rice cooker and new minifridge that ate up a lot of their money to buy. A few cheap cups and bowls sat on a doorless cabinet shelf.
The antihistamines sat out on the counter, easy for Izuku to find. He shook out a single pink pill, washed it down with water, and returned to the bedroom. He glanced at the cracked digital clock on the wall, reading 9:21 AM. Dabi would be back soon, maybe by the time the medicine kicked in.
As Izuku slunk back toward his mattress, he sloughed off the loose black shirt he’d borrowed from Dabi to sleep in and tossed it onto the dirty bin, now officially overflowing. He sat back down on the mattress heavily, snatching up the lotion bottle and squeezing a bit onto his fingers to begin the tedious process of working it into the taut, itchy scar tissue.
The burns were extensive and difficult to reach in some places. His face was the easiest to reach, but hurt the most. Dabi said it was because there were so many nerve endings in it. His shoulder, where the burn had gone deep into his flesh, nearly to bone, hurt only slightly less. He often needed help to cover it completely, but Dabi would do it in return for Izuku’s help with his own.
Izuku was nearly finished when a lock clicked and the apartment door creaked open.
“Welcome back,” Izuku called from the bedroom, before standing and walking into the other room. “Did everything go okay?”
Dabi shut the door behind him without acknowledging Izuku’s greeting, then tossed the apartment key onto the counter with a loud jangle, a wad of yen following it in short order. The stench of smoke wafted in with him.
“Fine,” Dabi groused. He looked especially haggard, his shoulders slumped and unburned skin wan. He muttered something about ‘too much this early’, glanced around the kitchenette, then returned his focus to Izuku. “Did you eat?”
Izuku shook his head no. “Only got up a little while ago. Already took some medicine and I’m just about finished with my burns.”
Dabi nodded and simultaneously swung the door of their mini fridge open. “No scratching?” He grimaced at what he saw, or rather, didn’t see in the fridge. “Looks like we’re gettin’ low on stuff. Better go shopping today, Freckles. Don't forget your phone."
Izuku nodded sharply, his face hot. Dabi would never let it go, would he? As for the burner phone, Izuku knew right where it was by his bed, and he never forgot it.
“I gotta do laundry today, too,” Izuku said, watching Dabi pull out the egg carton. “We’re down to just one clean shirt right now.”
“Fine. Breakfast first,” Dabi grunted, closing the fridge door with his hip. “Get the rice down. I’ll make some tamago kake gohan.
Izuku nodded eagerly and proceeded to do just that. The meal took little time to prepare and dish out, and soon the two took their sides of the couch, eating in comfortable silence.
When they’d finished, Izuku scooped up their bowls to wash and Dabi retreated into the other room to sleep. Izuku was careful not to wake the man as he hauled the dirty clothes bin out, looking looser and far more relaxed asleep than he had awake.
Izuku took a few yen from the counter, his burner phone tucked into a pocket, and shut the door softly behind him.
-
For a Monday morning, the laundromat was surprisingly quiet. Izuku sat on a table, tub stashed beneath his feet, watching the clothes swirl in murky water. He used to enjoy the busy, impersonal quality of laundromats, where people saw each other once or twice a week and rarely chatted about anything deeper than the weather. All sorts of people used the laundromat — University students, busy salarymen and women, tourists... It was the sort of place Izuku could get lost in, where he could be present, but not seen.
At least, that was how it had been before he was burned. Now, people saw him and kept looking. Little kids who didn’t know any better and adults who did would stare, only looking away if they noticed him staring back. It bothered him, how some people flinched when he stepped in their direction or sent him pitying looks when they thought he wasn’t watching. The pitying looks weren’t anything new, of course, but the distrust was. The fear certainly was.
Their reactions to him had nothing on their reactions to Dabi, though. At worst, Izuku looked like a truant teen who had a bad run-in with a fire quirk. Concerning, but harmless.
Izuku’s scarring was offset by his young face and bright smile, but Dabi, with his purpled scars, a permanent scowl, and a manic glint in his blue eyes, looked like a villain.
And it wasn’t even an unfair assumption, on their part. Izuku knew that whatever Dabi did to pay the bills and buy necessities couldn’t be very legal, what with the odd hours, inconsistent salary, and how he often came back to the apartment smelling of smoke and iron.
Izuku was far less conspicuous than Dabi by leaps and bounds, so it only made sense that he was in charge of running errands in public, such as laundry and groceries. He still had to be cautious, of course. Izuku was a missing teen. He looked like a truant. And both were something the police would be on the lookout for. Probably.
He wondered, with a stab of pain, if she’d reported him missing. If she was at work now, missing him.
Izuku moved the clothes from the washer to a dryer, avoiding the gaze of the tiny child a few feet away, staring intently at his scar, as his mother loaded a machine.
"Hey, kid." Izuku startled from his thoughts and looked up. Izuku’s sight in his left eye was fuzzy since the surrounding skin was burned, but he hadn’t even heard the man approaching.
The man who stood by him had a lion’s head and a scar running parallel to his eyebrow. Izuku held his tongue, restraining the urge to ask him if his jaw strength was comparable to a lion’s, because Izuku recognized him. Dabi had given many warnings on who to avoid or run from if they ever saw him, and Lion-head was one of them.
The recognition must have shown on his face, because the man smiled widely, exposing his enormous teeth. "So, you're the brat that lives with the firebug. You don't look like much. Though," the man grabs Izuku’s chin roughly, claws digging into his cheek, and turns his face to see his unburned cheek, "this half isn't so bad to look at. Bet you're a good little housewife for him, hm? You'll be needing someone else to take care of you soon."
Izuku shuddered, disgusted and alarmed by his words. Shit. Lion-head knew where the apartment was. And Dabi was probably still asleep and unaware. Izuku needed to warn him.
Izuku glanced away from the man, and around the Laundromat, an idea coming to him. Izuku stood up sharply, stopping on the man's foot to free himself and screaming, "Get off me, pervert! Don't touch me!"
Attention was on the man and Izuku in seconds. The man lunged to grab Izuku, but Izuku was already outside and several people were yelling after the man, blocking his path, and calling for the police. Now Izuku just needed to get somewhere he could hide and call Dabi.
Izuku hoped he wasn’t too late. The man had implied that Dabi wasn't hurt yet, but the threat of ‘soon’ still distressed Izuku. Izuku needed to call Dabi. He had to warn him.
Glancing behind him, Izuku was relieved not to see lion-head, but he didn't drop his guard. He needed to keep going, run long enough to make him not worth tailing, and get to one of the approved hiding places.
There was an unused dumpster at the end of a long-closed building that Dabi had shown Izuku once. It was close, and easy to get in and out of because of a rusted hole in the side of the metal, big enough for him to get through, but small enough that most adults could not.
Izuku slipped into it, panting hard. He wasn’t in any better condition than he'd been a few months ago — he’d lost a lot of weight and muscle, in fact — but he was used to running from bullies and avoiding Kacchan. His legs burned from exertion, but lingering adrenaline kept him from feeling too awful.
Dabi. He needed to warn Dabi.
He dialed the only number in the phone and set it against his ear and unburned shoulder, rubbing one thumb against the other as he waited for Dabi to pick up.
"Freckles?"
Izuku breathed out sharply. "Dabi! That one guy with the lion head showed up in the laundromat. He recognized me, and — I think he knows where the apartment is. You need to get out of there!"
Dabi audibly stood, setting down the phone with a clatter, presumably to put on his shoes. A few seconds later Dabi was back on the line. "I'm grabbing the money and meds, then I'm out. Where are you?"
"Dumpster, the one four-ish blocks away. Please hurry, it sounded like—"
A crash came over the phone. Izuku didn't dare cry out to ask if everything was okay. The line was dead.
-
Izuku thought he'd been in the dumpster for at least four hours. But it could have been just one. He was wound tense, his burns irritated and aching, but he resisted scratching. Dabi would be mad if he scratched.
-
He ended up scratching his arm, just a little. Let Dabi yell at him.
Dabi could yell at him all he wanted when he got there.
-
There were two sharp knocks on the side of the dumpster. Izuku sat up immediately and crawled over to the hole to poke his head out.
At the first whiff of smoke, Izuku teared up. He squeezed out, not caring if his clothes caught and tore on the rough edges of the hole.
Dabi looked awful. Where staples had once held healthy skin to scar tissue, new scars had developed. Blood was smeared along Dabi’s arm and his clothes were full of ash. His eyes were blazing and unfocused.
Izuku had only seen Dabi like this once, after a job “went real-fuckin’ sideways” as Dabi put it. Dabi’s quirk hurt him if he used it too much, so he tried to avoid it when possible. And if he really strained himself…
“Dabi. Are you gonna be okay? A-are we safe?”
Dabi shook his head. “W-where are we going to go? Is there somewhere we can go?” Izuku placed a hand on Dabi’s wrist and immediately retracted it, fingers stinging from the heat. Shit.
“Dabi, if we aren’t safe, we need to leave!” Izuku injected as much urgency he could into his voice and finally, Dabi seemed to register it.
But not quickly enough.
“Crawled off to an… alley to die, huh… you bastard,” a laughing, pained voice came from the mouth of the alley.
Izuku was beside the dumpster still, and short enough to be hidden by it, meaning that whoever was at the end of the alley probably hadn’t seen him. But Izuku also couldn’t see them. He only saw Dabi turn, whisps of smoke coming off of his hands from weak blue-tinted orange flames.
Izuku didn’t know Dabi could make orange flames.
Unsteady steps came down the alley toward him, but Dabi stood his ground.
Izuku whispered sharply, “Who?” If Dabi could tell him that, maybe Izuku would be able to distract them and Dabi could get away and they could regroup somewhere… or something, shit. Izuku didn’t know, they hadn’t planned for this!
“Not much better off yourself, blue bitch,” Dabi retorted, weaving in place.
Blue bitch. Fuck. Dabi told him her quirk was minor, but it affected him pretty badly. “Nausea” he’d called it, said anyone who looked at her would become disoriented and feel sick, like sitting in a car without windows on a twisting mountain road.
Izuku couldn’t look at her. He could close his eyes or otherwise avoid looking at her, but then he wouldn’t know where she was, and on top of her quirk, she might also be trained enough to take Izuku down before he or Dabi could escape. And Dabi would be no help here, weak as he was, and probably feeling more poorly from her quirk’s effect.
But if he could avoid seeing her until she was close, maybe he would have more of a chance. Judging from her slow gate and Dabi’s comment, she probably wasn’t in the best shape to be fighting someone off — even if that someone was him.
Izuku motioned to Dabi to back up, and then pointed to himself, miming jumping out at the woman.
Whether Dabi caught his movements from the corner of his eye, disoriented as he was, was unclear. But when the steps of the woman came closer and Dabi took a few unsteady steps back, Izuku knew he had what he needed.
“Hah… you're barely upright … this'll be easy.”
He slipped off a shoe, quickly and silently undoing the lace, though his fingers trembled terribly at the thought of what he was about to do.
Heroes weren't supposed to choke out other people with shoelaces. But Izuku had given up on ever becoming a hero when he took Dabi’s hand in an alleyway just like this one.
The steps were closer. Izuku pushed himself against the alley wall. He watched the edge of the dumpster. Watched a black boot cross behind it. Izuku looked up for just a second, just long enough to see her in full and to be hit with a wave of dizziness. But it was enough, and Izuku sprung on her.
Luck was on Izuku’s side, and the woman wasn’t expecting him, and as such didn’t move away as he crashed into her. He looped the shoelace over her head, attempting to pull it together like he'd seen in movies. But the woman elbowed back into his stomach, knocking the breath out of him. Izuku released the string and she gasped in air, giving him time to stumble away.
She turned on Izuku then, momentarily dismissing Dabi, and Izuku shut his eyes, trying to think of what he could do next.
But Izuku couldn't think. He felt like someone had shaken him like a soda after looking at her. He couldn't focus on anything but his churning stomach and unsteady feet.
Even with his eyes closed, Izuku knew the distraction had helped Dabi. Heat slammed in front of Izuku, and when he reopened his eyes, the woman was down.
Her scream and the scent of burnt hair and skin overwhelmed Izuku’s senses.
“We gotta go,” Dabi said, stepping forward and pressing a hand to her neck. Izuku watched in numb horror as the fire entered her throat, burning into it, ending her scream and her life.
Izuku knew Dabi wasn't a good man. And somehow he knew, though refused to acknowledge, that Dabi must have killed before. He swallowed back bile and didn't move.
“Freckles. Kid! Now! You wanna get caught by whoever followed her?”
Izuku shook his head violently, and staggered toward Dabi, away from the cooking corpse.
There wasn't any going back, now, Izuku thought. He'd just helped Dabi… he'd helped him… he'd helped him kill someone.
Izuku was promptly sick.
“Come on, Freckles. You can do that — later. Ugh.” Dabi called again, clearly feeling unwell himself but for a different reason.
Izuku wiped his mouth, tears pricking at his eyes. They had to go. Dabi was right, he could…he could do this later. Think about what he'd done later.
Can't go back now, he thought and ran to Dabi’s side at the mouth of the alley.