Who Is Dabi?

“Who is Dabi?”

Realistically, Hawks knows he’s been trained for this. With a library of documents easy enough for even him to break into unmonitored, it was only a matter of time until Touya stumbled upon his own records. As with any other scenario, Hawks knows what to say.

Deny, divert, distract.

And yet, Touya’s wide eyes, trusting, searching, betrays something in the years of routines meant to lock Hawks’ sentimentality away.

‘Looks like sentiment tripped you up after all, Hero.’

Still, tongue thick and thumbs digging into the soft of his palms, Hawks makes his way forward to Touya. Touya follows his movements with his eyes, and scoots to the side to give Hawks some room to sit next to him. He’s leaned forward to give his wings space to spread behind him, though they’re folded awkwardly to be as un-intimidating as possible.

“Dabi was a colleague of mine, a long time ago. We used to spend a lot of time together, working things out between our sides.”

“But Dabi is a villain,” Touya challenges softly. And Hawks can hear it in his voice, the dehumanization of Threats and Others that had been ingrained into himself for decades. Seeing the same conditioning take effect in Touya was… unsettling.

“Yes,” Hawks agreed, “he was a villain. But most villains you meet are also victims of some kind, whatever the circumstance. Someone can be both a villain and a good person, ok? Denying them the capacity to be both is dehumanizing a person. When you start seeing some people as lesser than others, it devalues the lives you work to save. Does that make sense?”

Touya stares at him for a moment, chews his lip, and looks back down at the file. “So Dabi was a good person?”

And fuck if that wasn’t a hard question. To agree was in invalidate the dozens of victims Dabi had made of them people he killed remorselessly and the families they’d left behind. A good person wasn’t capable of such a thing. But to deny was to defund Touya’s past for him, maybe influence him unnaturally to change against who Hawks defined Dabi as for him.

“Dabi was hurting,” he says instead. “It wasn’t an excuse, but it’s hard to put such a finite label on a complex person. Your job is to apprehend and rehabilitate, if given the chance. Everyone deserves a second chance, no matter who they used to be.”

“What if they screw that up too?”

“Then whoever was helping them did something wrong. If you take on the chance to guide someone to a brighter future, you have to be willing to stick through with it until they’re clean. If it goes wrong again, then that caretaker is just as responsible.”

Tearing his eyes away from the file, the `DESEASED' stamp red and ugly glaring at them from the bottom, Touya looks back up to Hawks. “Would you have given Dabi a second chance if you had saved him?”

“In a heartbeat. And you know what? I think he would’ve come out of it a better person.”

—

Snippet I wrote in pairing with This Post by my dear friend @seraphicghost !! We’ve been explaining a dabihawks AU where Touya forgot who he used to be, and hawks is in charge of overseeing his new hero training. Fun stuff fun stuff

we’re gonna be ok btw

thank you for all the birthday wishes!!! i don't want to spam anyones dash but ur all so sweet <3 thank you so much!!!!

grips them and shakes them

ook so i'm probably gonna start the sticker club on my patreon next month, maybe like $15? a month? thats how much i see other ppl doing it for but i dont know if i should do original designs or fandom ones based on votes :? or both? but its gonna be 2-3 stickers a month!

what do u think....

Request time: Can you draw Nepeta x Karkat? :] p.s. love your art!

<333 they were my first ship i love them so much