#when he does actually confront his feelings about Dabi’s call out post he has a breakdown

[linkspooky]

Dabi the Villain, Touya the Victim

That no.1 title you’ve always wanted is a lot of pressure, huh? Has your heart been purified with all the praise you’ve received from the public? Does your newfound vigor as a father figure to your children, make you feel like you’re developing a ‘familial bond’ with them? You seriously thought if you could keep your eyes towards the future the past would forget itself would you? It’s time for someone to give you a life lesson - (RHA SCANS). 

The past doesn’t forget. Dabi doesn’t forget. Scars may fade with time but Dabi’s won’t, they’ll only get worse and worse as he continues to burn himself using his quirk. Dabi arrives at literally the single worst time possible, to throw salt in old wounds, and stick his fingers in them for good measure. It’s clear, Dabi’s revenge is just going to make things worse for everyone, including his family, including Shoto.

However that begs the question, if not now, then when? This was always going to happen. I don’t mean ‘abusive families have to air their dirty laundry in live television’ I mean, there was always going to be some consequence to what Endeavor did to his family. Dabi is a monster, yes, but in-story he’s a monster of Endeavor’s creation. Dabi wouldn’t even exist without Endeavor’s direct actions. He’s a reflection of every bad thing Endeavor has done up until this point and everything he needs to face. The number one hero created the number one worst villain. 

1. The Shadow

Dabi is more than just a murderer, he’s also a jungian archetype. The shadow is a jungian idea that states on the whole we are not as good as we think we are. In fact, we actually might be much worse. 

The shadow is either an unconscious aspect of the personality that the conscious ego does not identify in itself; or the entirety of the unconscious, i.e., everything of which a person is not fully conscious. In short, the shadow is the unknown side.

To put it into simple terms how we perceive ourselves, what we are aware of the light, is the conscious mind. 

Everything else, everything we’re unaware of, what we’re ignoring, how we might come off to others, the unintended consequences of our actions is the shadow we cast. This isn’t something I”m making up it’s directly referenced in story. 

The approach of the villains have multiple times been compared to shadows stretching and growing deeper, this is Jungian symbolism. 

The emperor of Fallen Light, the villain that Dabi himself sent after Endeavor said word for word “His shining Light beckons the dark.” This is a story idea that’s been set up for awhile, Endeavor’s light is a false light. He is a good hero, the best there is currently, but calling him a hero requires ignoring everything he has done to his family. Most of the people who call Endeavor a hero have no idea what he did to his family, and even most of his family is just trying to forget and move on with their lives. 

Endeavor’s redemption so far has been a false one, it hinges on everybody else wanting to just move on with their lives, and everyone else being forgiving towards his actions. I’m not saying that Endeavor’s wish to atone isn’t genuine, I’m saying the story has been setting up an arc of false light. We are shown the light of his actions, his desire to redeem himself, his desire to be a hero that Shoto can look up to, and we ignore the shadow. 

There’s a duality to Endeavor. Technically there’s a duality to everyone. There’s the light, and the dark. To put it in less abstract terms, even within good intentions there can be hidden bad intentions. A person who gives to charity might just be doing it to make themselves feel like they’re a good person. There’s even an episode of friends about this, Phoebe gets in an argument with somebody that even “charitable” deeds like giving awaay money can be a little selfish because helping others makes you feel good about yourself, so she tries the whole episode to find a truly selfless action. 

There’s a duality to Endeavor, there are two Endeavors, Endeavor the hero, and Endeavor the bad dad. They are both Endeavor in the end, he is all of his good actions and bad actions. Focusing only on his bad actions, or only on his good actions would be an incorrect reading of his character. 

What I’m saying is, this idea has been building up in the story for a long time. This duality in Endeavro’s character. He is a hero capable of villainous things. However, the public, Endeavor’s own family, and characters like Midoriya and All Might only really ever see the good side to Endeavor’s actions. They all look at the light, at Endeavor the hero. 

For the most part Endeavor has not been confronted by consequences for his actions. Yes, Endeavor tries to listen when Natsuo expresses his hurt feelins. Yes, Endeavor realizes his family might want to live without him in the house. However, as opposed to Dabi who has been hated as a villain by all of society for the crimes he has committed, Endeavor is still getting the hero treatment. The worst Endeavor has to come against is his own children’s hurt feelings at his actions. Even then, Natsuo has somebody like Fuyumi constantly pushing him to try to reconcile with his father. He has Endeavor violating his boundaries, and hugging him. Rather than criticizing Endeavor for what he did, most of the criticism falls on Natsuo for not moving on. Like, what Endeavor did is just something that happened in the past that they all have to move on from. He still has the respect of his peers, he still has his position in society, he still has the title of Number One Hero. 

This happens because everybody looks at Endeavor, and they’re all blinded by the light, they only see his good deeds and not his bad ones. This isn’t a post debating whether or not Endeavor earned or deserves his punishment, or whether require punishment, it’s just an argument that there are consequences to your actions. That’s Dabi. He’s consequences. Everyone around Endeavor has been repressing their feelings. The Todorokis are asked to repress their personal hurt over the past for the sake of moving forward. 

 Dabi is the shadow that Endeavor casts. There is a villain in Endeavor’s actions. As long as Endeavor ignores that, as long as he keeps seeing himself in only a heroic life, that villain is only going to manifest elsewhere. In a story, repression does not work, simply ignoring your problems does not work. If a character ignores their shadow that shadow manifests and takes on a life of it’s own. 

Dabi is a response to those repressed feelings. Not only is he a repsonse to them, he’s an inevitable result of them. No child abuse doesn’t usually turn abuse victims into murderers. That’s also, not the point. The point is this is a story, Endeavor tried to just bury the past, and Dabi, rose from the grave and said “No, I don’t think the past is better off buried. I think we should talk about it.” 

2. The Monster

“People like to think their actions are free from guilt but they’re not-” This is once again more Jungian symbolism. People want to believe they are on the whole good and well-intentioned people. People want to believe they are better than they are. 

Dabi has been hurt. Burned even. While Endeavor only looks at the best of himself, his heroic intentions, his ambition to become number one, Dabi sees not only the worst in himself, but the worst in his father, the worst in everyone. 

The reason people identify with Dabi is not because they think murderers are sexy (but let’s admit it they are) it’s because Dabi as a character is made up of hurt feelings. He has been burned. He doesn’t forgive the people who burned him. He represents a darker, rawer side to human emotion. Sometimes abuse doesn’t make people poor innocent victims, it’s just pain, sometimes nothing constructive or good comes out of it. Sometimes it’s just damage, to you, and everybody around you. 

Putting aside the fact that he’s a murderer (hey I acknowledged it, look at me acknowledging it), Dabi is also written as a character to embody the worst parts of abuse. The negative emotions that Dabi feels are real. Dabi’s hurt feelings are just as real, as the good intentions and desire to forgive that family members like Fuyumi and Shoto have. Neither is more valid, more real than the other. 

However, everyone looks at the light, and the shadow is ignored. Dabi’s hurt feelings haven’t even been acknowledged. Not only that, but the feelings of all people hurt tend to get swept under the rug for the sake of “everyone else.” 

When Shigaraki says Heroes have turned a blind-eye to the suffering of others, he doesn’t mean that heroes don’t try their hardest to save people, or that heroes never save people. He’s saying that the characters in the story are repressing their issues instead of confronting them, and repression makes people ignorant instead of being able to truly address the problem. Now, connect that back to Dabi, who is the shadow of his father’s actions. 

Toya himself is someone in the story who has been “forgotten.” We see Fuyumi praying at his shrine, as well as Endeavor, Natsuo can’t bring himself to forgive Endeavor because of his feelings over Toya. Yes, yes, yes. However. One, the number one hero had his son die and nobody even investigated into those situation. Two, nobody even talks about it nowadays. Shoto brings up his older brother’s death at the dinner table like it’s just an awkward subject he’s uncomfortable talking about... not you know, a tragedy. 

And I’m not saying that Shoto is in the wrong here. I don’t mean to demonize his response. I’m suggesting he’s repressed. He’s repressing his hurt feelings about the brother he never got a chance to meet, his two other siblings, his mother, all of that to continue to work with his father because he wants to move forward with his dream, and probably because if he tried facing all of that it would hurt a lot. 

However, it’s still the tendency of all the characters on the heroic side to repress things, and look at that from Dabi’s point of view. His own family members don’t even recognize him because of a few scars on his face. 

It’s lonely. At the very least it’s lonely and serves to isolate Dabi in his grief further. Push him to believing that he really did die alone and was going to get forgotten, that his survival is just a hindrance that prevents everything in his family from moving forward. Dabi is made up of hurt feelings, and Dabi without prejudgice takes out those feelings on other people. However, Dabi is still a person. The same way Endeavor is both hero and villain, Dabi is both villain and victim at the same time. Dabi was a ten year old who didn’t really do anything wrong who died, after being ignored by his father his whole life. Dabi is, a zombie that’s barely alive, and constantly killing himself with his own quirk. Dabi’s pain is impossible to ignore, and yet he feels ignored. 

The difference between Dabi and Endeavor is that Dabi is living as a villain, he acknowledges that he is a villain. He’s the only one in the league to show genuine remorse for killing people, crying a tear of blood and trying to dissociate his own feelings of guilt and the past from himself to the point where he remarks he’s going ‘crazy’ thinking about it. (That doesn’t make it okay, but since when is anything ever okay with the Todorokis?) You have a character who knows exactly what he did wrong, confronting a character who for the most part still sees hismelf as a hero. 

Endeavor still sees himself as a hero in this situation. Dabi lives confronting the worst parts of himself (well he’s barely alive but still), he’s stich together scar tissue, and is covered in wounds. He is everything bad that has happened to him. But still, Dabi is at least AWARE. 

Beyond all the other plot details, what he’s doing right now is confrontation of something that Endeavor was previously ignorant of. It’s the crux of Dabi’s speech to Endeavor. What he’s saying is pointing out the dark side of each of Endeavor’s good actions. 

Endeavor becomes the number one hero, which means he finally gets all the praise, acclaim and honor he always thought he was entitled to. This doesn’t mean that Endeavor’s wish to become strong to serve as a supporting pillar for the nation was a lie, but what Dabi says also isn’t a lie either. It’s the hidden dark side of Endeavor’s actions which Endeavor does not acknowledge. 

Endeavor wants to move on and act like a father to his children like twenty years after the fact, and coincidentally this also happens right after being handed everything he wanted on a silver platter. Dabi is pointing out, the negative sides of Endeavor’s actions. Aren’t you just being nice because you’ve gotten everything you’ve wanted now? Don’t you just think you deserve to have your children love you too? 

Dabi is confronting Endeavor with the dark sides of actions so he can no longer remain blind, and he is literally in story an agent of the cosnequences of Endeavor’s actions. Dabi became a villain because Endeavor had a son for the sake of his own selfish desire to get stronger, cast him aside, and then even let Toya die. Even if Endeavor wants to move past that, Toya doesn’t. Because for Toya that defines his whole life. Toya was burned by either Endeavor’s flames, or the fire of his own quirk that Endeavor trained him to use. The reason Toya doesn’t move on is because for him, he can’t move on. Toya is dead. Toya died. Toya is some kind of zombie. And if not a zombie, Toya is dying. All because of what his father did to him. And he gets to see his father move on with his life. Everybody else gets to “Get over” his death with Toya, who is left behind. 

Toya is a frankenstein’s monster, created by Endeavor, abandoned by Endeavor, let loose by Endeavor on the world. In the real world this would be a far more complicated question, but in a story, especially one that references frankenstein directly, Dabi is quite literally “Endeavor’s Monster” running amok. Dabi would not even exist if not for Endeavor’s actions. 

Dabi doesn’t even know why he existed, or why he was brought into this world, because for him, all there’s been is pain. Pain enough to turn his hair white, and burn half of his skin off. 

The same way Endeavor only sees the best of himself, Dabi only sees the worst of himself, the shadow. However, the difference between them is Dabi has grown up mostly in the dark. 

Dabi is a reaction to circumstances. You can say it’s a bad reaction. You can say it’s not justified. You can call him a monster. You’re probably right, but still Dabi did not create those circumstances, Endeavor did, Dabi can only react to them. Dabi is a consequence to everything Endeavor did to his own family. It might be entirely Dabi’s choice how he reacts, and true Dabi did not have to choose to be a murderer, but Dabi also never deserved to be put into this situation in the first place. 

If Dabi is responsible for his reaction, then Endeavor is equally responsible for creating him. It’s something Endavor has to confront, because this ignorance, this represion, it hurts people. Think of Endeavor’s actions a few chapters ago. 

Shigaraki is another victim of an abusive father, just like Dabi. Shigaraki is also lashing out, and trying to bring down the hero society, just like Dabi. Endeavor right up until Dabi arrived, and revealed himself thought he was completely justified in wanting to kill Shigaraki for the sake of everyone. Up until five minutes ago, Endeavor only saw himself as the hero, the light, meant to vanquish the king of evil. 

Endeavor was perfectly willing to kill Shigaraki up until five minutes ago, because he only saw him as a villain. 

And now suddenly Dabi showed up and it got all complicated and shit. However, it was always complicated and shit. The villains were never objectively bad. The heroes were never objectively good. The world wasn’t as black and white as Endeavor saw it. 

Now Endeavor’s good action (saving all of hero society as number one hero), requires something most people would consider to be objectively bad (putting down his own son). 

The personal investment that Enji has in both Toya being his own son, and also his guilt over what he’s done to his family in the past, now make it impossible for Dabi to be just another villain. 

Except Dabi is Shigaraki. Dabi is Shigaraki, Himiko, Twice, Shuichi (not compress tho he’s just in it for the drama of it all). The villains in this story are trying to draw the attention of the heroes to problems within society, problems that have negatively affected them, so they can be fixed. You can’t fix something if you’re blind to it. You can’t deal with something by ignoring it. Dabi’s confrontation isn’t only inevitable, it’s necessary for moving forward. 

The shadow isn’t destroyed or ignored, it’s accepted, because in the end it’s a part of you. You are both everything good about you, and all of your flaws at the same time. Living as a fully rounded person means acknowledging that. 

Enji’s development is about putting his selfish sense of entitlement aside and learning how his actions have impacted others. Here is Dabi, dancing around going “Hey, Dad, this is how your actions have impacted me. Look at my burns.” 

Confrontation is good. The hurt feelings that have been repressed should be expressed. 

 If Enji had continued on being ignorant, he would have unknowingly torched his own son, and just seen him as another one of the villains. Isn’t that the worst possible result? Beyond hero and villain, isn’t a father killing his own son tragic? 

Dabi’s personal revenge is wrong. His decision to lash out is wrong. His obvious desire to kill himself, and then his own father isn’t just wrong, it’s unhealthy. Trying to burn yourself alive and be a martyr to a cause because you think there’s no good reason for you to be alive, and you’re going to die anyway no matter what you do - is in fact a bad coping mechanism. 

Dabi is wrong, however, ignoring what happened to him is also wrong. It’s all wrong. Trying to repress those hurt feelings is just as unhealthy a coping mechanism, as lashing out with them. 

Dabi is all hurt feelings, yes, he can’t forgive and he can’t forget, but maybe some things like the past shouldn’t be forgotten. Rather than ignoring the past you can acknowledge it, learn from it,  reincorporate it into who you are now, because the past is just as much of a part of the present as Dabi’s burnt skin and scars are a part of who he is now. 

#todoroki touya #dabi #bnha spoilers #bnha 290 #mha spoilers #mha 290 #i love that i can use that tag now #touya todoroki #todoroki toya #toya todoroki #league of villains #mha meta #my hero academia theory #dabi is a todoroki #todoroki family drama

[shadowed-dancer]

My Thoughts on the New MHA Opening and Ending

I have thoughts, and I will share them because oh boy if I don’t get this out I’m gonna explode

Vague Spoilers for the manga (up to chapter 258 and vigilantes) because I discuss the upcoming arcs, but I don’t discuss any major plot points in detail. Still, proceed with caution if you’re anime only

Keep in mind, this OP and ED will cover the Endeavour Agency Arc and the MVA Arc, so I will be judging them accordingly.

First, the OP

This is a good OP... in theory (that’s going to become my catchphrase for this post). It’s nice to look at and flows pretty well, but my biggest problem is that it doesn’t do it’s job. An OP is supposed to be a sort of... summary (?) of the Cour it plays for. That means any cool plot points, emotional beats, and important characters should be featured in some way, shape, or form. We’ll talk about that more later, but first let’s discuss the music.

The song is really good. I have a feeling it will continue to grow on me as I listen to it more often, but yeah my first impression is that the song sounds great. My only complaint about the music itself is that it ends kind of abruptly (I noticed this is the JT opening too). The previous openings used to have a bit of instrumental to “play us out” and lead us to the end card, but this one feels like it ends very suddenly and unnaturally.

As for the visuals...

Yeah alright I’ll admit, the visuals are stunning... in theory. I appreciate the variety in backgrounds and colours, it makes the OP really interesting to look at. This was actually one of my biggest problems with the JT Opening, it all took place on the training grounds, so there was no variety (everything was metal tubes with a blue sky, with only 3 shots set somewhere different). I appreciate the style of this OP.

But like I said, that’s only in theory, as in, through screenshots these are all pleasing to look at. The pacing of this OP is wild, and I truly don’t know who to blame for this.

That sunset shot above? It lasts approximately 12 seconds, zooming in every few to make it seem like something is happening (when in reality it’s still the same poses, angles, etc). While there’s nothing wrong with a nice, drawn out shot, it becomes irritating when compared to the pacing of the rest of this op.

At the 41 second mark, we are given the shot above. It has flowed directly from the previous sunset scene. We still have not moved away from the image of the trio (aside from the opening shot and the title card) yet we’re approaching the halfway mark of the OP.

The next shot is the MLA, which lasts about 5 seconds. Ok, perfect. Not too long, but also not short enough to be confusing. It cuts away a little fast once the dude on the far left appears, but does anyone actually know who that is? No, seriously, I’m asking. I don’t remember his name and he’s not on the wiki, so I can only assume he’s not important. Therefore, it’s not all that bad if the shot cuts away shortly after he comes into frame. The audience is able to take in the scene without having to pause...

... And then the problems start

While this shot is fine in theory, it pans up fast and  cuts away quickly. You know how hard it was for me to get this screenshot? Really hard. You want to know why I struggled so much? Because, due to the timing of the cut and the way it pans upwards, it’s almost impossible to pause on Dabi’s face. I literally had to go frame by frame to get it, because he’s in shot for so little time that naturally pausing is guaranteed to miss him.

When watching this in real time (without pausing) the cut away makes you feel as if you missed something because “something was there, I just couldn’t register what because now it’s gone”. Unlike Compress, who wears a very colourful coat you can recognize the entire time, Dabi’s pants are more blended into the background.

It also doesn’t help that this shot is literally composed to draw your attention away from Dabi until the last possible second. Due to framing, your eye is naturally drawn to the brightly coloured Toga in the foreground, making it super easy to miss Dabi in the back (until, of course, his bright face appears and contrasts against the background, drawing your eye just in time for the scene to change, leaving you to wonder who or what you missed).

I know this sounds like nitpicking, but this shot is the only group shot we get of the League, and is also the start of a seriously weird trend for the villains in this OP getting the short end of the stick.

Anyways, then we get what I’ll call “The Carousel Shot” in which every Class 1A kid shows up and poses dramatically, as if they were on a carousel. It’s a lovely sequence and I really enjoy watching it but... why is it in this OP?

Seriously, this is a genuine question. Class 1A barely shows up in the Endeavour Agency Arc, and NONE of the students are in MVA. This sequence (not counting the three boys at the end) lasts 8 seconds. Why is this much time dedicated to characters who are barely in the arc? (Unless Studio Bones extends their work studies into fuller plot lines which oh my gosh please don’t do that, or if they do, do it quick).

We then get what I call the “Oh God I Blinked And Missed Everything” sequence, which lasts 3 seconds (not including the longer, moving shot of Shigaraki at the end) and features NINE INDIVIDUAL IMAGES, none of which are related to each other. Not only is this 3 images per second, but the fact that they are all unrelated means you can’t even use previous information to fill in the blanks.

What do I mean by that? Well, imagine if I show you 9 images of various pro heroes posing. If I play that in 3 seconds you’ll absolutely miss some of them, but as long as you catch some you’ll still get an idea of what I’m trying to show to you. Your brain is able to fill in the gaps that “I recognized 4 pro heroes, therefore the rest must have also been pros” even if you didn’t register every single frame.

That doesn’t work if every frame features a completely different subject. The shots in this sequence vary so widely that it’s impossible to find a through line. Some feature multiple characters, some feature one, some are closeups, some are super far away, some are character’s we know, others are characters we don’t. It’s impossible to get a solid read on what you’re being shown.

Now, again, there’s nothing wrong with these super quick shots... in theory. The problem comes from the fact that these shots are the only indicators for some of the major themes that will be explored during this Cour (like Twice’s growth and young Shigaraki).

That being said, let’s move away from criticism and talk about speculation, because hidden amongst this sequence are two... interesting images.

This All Might one is very reminiscent of the shot in Chapter 257, where Aizawa and All Might have a conversation while staring up at the stars. However, this is technically the start of the “War Arc” (or the “prologue”, if that’s what you want to call it), so this might indicate that we’re going to get farther into the series than a lot of us guessed.

(Many people suspected we’d get to that cliffhanger at the start of the season (if you read the manga you know the one), but after seeing the pacing for JT a lot of us assumed we’d be lucky to even finish Endeavour Agency. It seems we’re back to the cliffhanger now though lol). 

This is another really interesting shot because it’s indicative of Shirakumo, meaning we might get to see Aizawa and Mic confront him some time this Cour (this also makes sense, since this confrontation technically happens before that All Might scene I mentioned in the previous paragraph).

But the cat specifically is a really strange addition. That cat is named Sushi and, correct me if I’m wrong, but I don’t think Sushi is ever mentioned in the main series. I think he’s only in Vigilantes.

This might just be a little Easter Egg for Vigilante readers, but I’m personally hoping that they’ll add at least a few Vigilante shots in there to really tug at the heart strings. I’d say I want a whole Vigilante episode but I don’t think they have the time (unless they really cram MVA, which I do NOT want).

I don’t have much to say about the last bit of the OP. The action shot between the 3 boys was nice, and it follows the sort of narrative through line they established from the early shot of them sitting at the sunset. I also like the shot of Endeavour fading in to replace All Might, even if it’s very simple.

But I want to talk about an overarching problem I touched upon earlier in that villain shot: the way the villains are handled in this OP.

This is a good OP... in theory. The problem is, it doesn’t represent half the arcs in the cour! Every shot of the League is so rushed that you can barely register that they were on screen before they’re gone.

I have no idea how many Episodes Endeavour Agency will take, but I’d assume 3 (4 if you count the Christmas episode). 12 episodes for this Cour minus 3 for Endeavour Agency = 9 episodes left. If we truly do get the prologue for the War Arc (and if we assume it’s only 1 episode) that leaves us with 8 villains episodes.

8/12 episodes (aka two thirds of the Cour) will likely be about the villains. And yet they’re pushed to the background so hard in this OP.

I want to dream, and I want to believe that this OP is going to magically change when MVA starts. The song fits super well, and I can imagine like an inversion of the OP but from the Villain side! Wouldn’t that be neat? Imagine right after the “it’s alright” part Shigaraki just freaking decays the title card... oh man that would be so cool. But, alas, I highly doubt they’d do that.

Side rant, but you know what was so fun about MVA in the manga? It’s that, for 21 chapters, we leave the kids behind and the villains become our protagonists. Suddenly Shigaraki is the one we’re rooting for, suddenly we’re learning backstories for everyone, and suddenly we find ourselves just as attached to the villains as we are to the kids. It’s an inversion that’s SO RARE to find, and I think many people (myself included) were hoping it would be reflected in the OP.

A big part of being the protagonist means featuring heavily in the OP, and a lot of us just wanted the villains to get that honour, even if only once. As is, the OP still treats them as the antagonists when... really they aren’t. Not right now, at least.

So yeah, final thoughts on the OP are that it’s good, it’s just not very representative of the arcs it’s supposed to cover. If this was just for Endeavour Agency, I’d say it’s actually really cool, but if we assume that this is what will play for the Villain Arc, then it simply doesn’t do it’s job. And it makes me sad to say that because, again, this OP is really well done.

If I had to rate it? Hmmm

If Studio Bones actually grants my wish and creates a different visual for the Villain Arc (while using the same song) and then this version only plays for the Endeavour Agency Arc and the War Prologue? I’d give it an 8/10. It’s really good, but it could use a few more elements that are clearly derived from the Agency Arc (ahem, Todoroki siblings).

But if this is the OP that will play for the entire Cour? a 6.5/10. It’s nice, but it’s not representative of one of the arcs it’s going to cover. And, unlike other arcs like Pro Hero or Summer Exams, the villain Arc is so important and takes up so much time that it honestly feels like a bit of a disservice.

Now for the Ending

I want to say that I appreciate how soft this ending starts. This cour will likely feature a lot of episodes that end on... heavier themes, and I think the sight of peaceful, falling raindrops is the perfect way to let the audience process their emotions before starting the ending in earnest.

The song itself is very nice, and I like that it’s a bit slower than the more recent endings.

(Side note, but the FUNNIEST moment in the entire series is when Sir Nighteye dies because it’s so emotional and everyone is standing around his bed in his heartwrentching silence, only for the ending to come BLARING IN out of no where. If you forgot how jarringly hilarious it was, go listen to the Eri ending and tell me that’s not the funniest thing this series ever did. Anyways yeah I’m glad that’s not gonna happen this Cour).

This ending is a bit all over the place in terms of it’s visuals, but honestly I think it works. Most endings usually have a theme tying them together (all the Class 1A girls, a fantasy AU, old photographs, planning a party, etc) but this ending’s theme is a bit harder to identify.

That being said, I think it’s just supposed to show everyone going about their day. It’s calm, it’s peaceful, and it’s just very sweet to think about

I like this shot. Actually, scratch that, I like this whole sequence. I enjoy anything that allows Class 1A to chill and have fun.

Hawks is featured quite heavily in this ending which, fair. He’s pretty important in this arc.

I really love the shot where Endeavour immediately switches to Hawks, I thought that was a lot of fun, and very good symbolism on how Hawks wants to be like Endeavour. I also love all the shots of Baby Hawks, because it’s adorable.

Something about this shot is just so cute. It’s the little domestic things like waiting for a bus that make this ending feel... idk the word, real? It shows a side of the characters that we’ll never see in the episodes, but we know have to exist.

Like yes, of course the kids have to wait for the bus. We never see it, but of course there are those moments of quiet. Agh, I love it.

The villains also make an appearance and I’m very happy about that (I’d love to see more of the villains just chilling around, I think they deserve it). I kind of wish they weren’t sitting in a dark room for the sake of being edgy, since I think it would be nice to see the villains just... sort of existing, but honestly it’s still a nice shot. I also like how this shot sort of mirrors the first one with Class 1A (someone coming in while everyone else is sitting and waiting for them).

That being said, as much as I love looking at Dabi and his stupid face (affectionate)... why is Dabi the one getting the closeup?

Mind you, endings don’t need to be connected to their Cours (they can be, like the Eri one, but they don’t have to be). But this ending does seem to be connected to the arcs it intends to cover, given all the Hawks appearances, the boys wearing their work study scarves, etc.

So, I ask again, why Dabi? Out of the six League members, we learn the backstory for four of them in this arc (Shigaraki, Toga, Twice, and we very briefly learn about Spinner). The only two left out are Dabi and Compress.

I can only assume they chose Dabi because he’s constantly in contact with Hawks, and therefore that makes him important? If the OP told us anything, it’s that Bones values the Endeavour Agency Arc over the Villain Arc lol...

... Oh my gosh please tell me that’s not actually the reason Dabi is focused on here BONES WAI-

Anyways, the ending comes to a close with Hawks watching over the kids and Endeavour. The relaxing time is done, it’s time for work studies.

Overall impression? It’s great. It’s hard to screw up an ending, so as long as you have something pretty on screen, it’s wonderful.

I’ll give this a 9/10

#bnha #bnha season 5 #dabi #keigo takami #bnha season five #katsuki bakugo #shoto todoroki #mha season 5 #mha season five #bnha op #bnha opinions #izuku midoriya #bnha hawks #ok to reblog #actually yes please do reblog if you found this interesting #I worked hard on it

[stillness-in-green]

Part 2 of the response to this ask:

Part 1 was about where I think Geten’s story is going, and if I think it’s likely that Dabi will kill him; it dealt mainly with how those characters are set up in canon. Part 2 is far more about the fandom, and the assumptions people make that lead them to theories like the one above--specifically, the assumption that the League was always planning on bailing on the PLF. Hit the jump below with me and I'll go over why I think the common arguments for that are misguided at best, and willfully misreading the text at worst.

WARNING: Contains some generalizations about parts of the fandom that I have mostly taken steps to avoid seeing on my dash, so some of my characterizations may be out of date. I’ve tried to desalinate this post as much as possible, but as an unapologetic fan of the MLA and of Spinner (who I do not bring up incidentally), this is a topic I feel particularly strongly about. Apologies, but I Have Seen Things.

DISCLAIMER: I like Geten better than Dabi. I don't think he's better developed; I don't think he's a better character--I just like him better. This is largely down to the fact that I find the MLA fascinating from a worldbuilding perspective and its members compelling personally, whereas I’m less interested in Dabi personally than I am the Todoroki Drama on the whole, and have been tired of Fanon Dabi for approximately 83 years. I’ll also be the first to admit that my take on Dabi is pretty mercenary--hardly the irredeemable psychopath the Hero Stans on Twitter see, but nothing close to Secretly Soft Big Brother Touya, either. If that’s not your bag, you may want to skip this one.

So, here's a bullet point list of the reasons I have personally seen on why the League was always planning to turn on the MLA:

Dabi and Toga mention "getting started early," and Shigaraki mentions a plan, suggesting that the League had a plan in place independent of the one they arranged as the PLF.

Shigaraki says he won't forgive the Liberation Army for messing with peoples' feelings, so he would never really mean it when he forges an alliance with them.

The MLA is quirk supremacist, like Endeavor, so Dabi would never work with them.

Dabi is just using Skeptic against Skeptic's will; it’s not a willing partnership.

Mr. Compress rejects the PLF moniker for Shigaraki, ergo Mr. Compress didn’t genuinely associate Shigaraki and the League with the PLF.

Toga hated Curious, so she wouldn't want to work with the MLA either.

Twice would never forgive them for what they did to Giran.

[Error: argument about Spinner's opinion on the PLF not found.]

So, let's go over those, shall we? Note that a lot of what I'm going to lay out below isn't conclusive. What I want to establish is simply that the canonical evidence isn't conclusive, certainly not as much so as the people who support this view espouse.

|| Dabi and Toga mention "getting started early," and Shigaraki mentions a plan, suggesting that the League had a plan in place independent of the one they arranged as the PLF.

In responses to my recent Overhaul post, I defended Viz’s official translation as an accurate rendering of the dialogue in question. In general, I feel like Caleb Cook is pretty reliable in his translations, if sometimes kind of stiff or dry in localization. However, there are times he makes assumptions about lines--as indeed a translator for a currently-running series will sometimes have to--and sometimes, those assumptions don’t pan out. This is one of those times.

Dabi's line, "Shall we get started early?" is based on an assumption Cook made about a line that doesn't have an actual subject. In the original dialogue--Hayame ni hajimaru ka--there is no “we,” not even in the form of some implicit collective in Dabi’s grammatical inflection, nor is there a question of "should." All Dabi’s doing is musing that the start (again, there’s no subject, and so no indication of the start of what, or the start as initiated by who) is happening early.

Toga's line communicates much the same, save that she does specify that the schedule/plan/arrangement is happening earlier than expected--which is totally true, since her line is in response to Dabi observing that Machia moving must mean Shigaraki's awake, and Shigaraki was supposed to be down for another month.

Shigaraki's line, like Dabi's, lacks a subject to describe what exactly is supposed to start as soon as Shigaraki wakes. He's saying something that would, in a more stilted way, be, "I wake up and then it's the start, right?"

None of these lines suggest that the characters are necessarily talking about any plan other than the one the PLF laid out. Yes, it looks somewhat damning that Shigaraki's first action (after getting himself a cape, anyway) is to have Machia bring him the League, but heck, maybe that was always the plan. Just because Shigaraki wants to rejoin his comrades doesn't mean the rest of the PLF didn't already have machinations that they were supposed to set into motion the moment Machia left. After all, the plan as Hawks understood it did involve simultaneous attacks on major cities--maybe the League was going to be spearheading one of those attacks. Further, Shigaraki knew something was wrong from the moment he regained consciousness, and we don’t know how that knowledge affected the call he made. Hell, maybe the original plan was for the League to be brought to meet him somewhere in a chartered limo; we don’t know.

It's telling that this idea that the League had a Secret Plan to screw over the MLA rarely seems to account for Mr. Compress and Spinner being confused over the suddenness of events. The response to questions about this seems to be that the "villain trio" knew about it, so the ignorance of the rest of the League can just be handwaved--the important members knew, and that's enough. This is ungenerous towards both Twice and Mr. Compress, but I have got particularly little time for Spinner, the narrator of MVA and guy who decided to devote his all to Shigaraki, being disrespected in this fashion. More on that later.

|| Shigaraki says he won't forgive the Liberation Army for messing with peoples' feelings, so he would never really mean it when he forges an alliance with them.

Shigaraki does say he won't forgive the MLA, but consider what he did to the MLA and its leader. He destroyed most of their stronghold, killed scores of them, is directly responsible for Re-Destro losing his legs, and saw that vaunted descendant of Destro about six inches shy of full forehead-on-the-ground dogeza. The League Shigaraki commands killed a great many more of them, including one of their inner circle. He commandeered the Liberation Army, its resources, and its grand cause. I think it’s safe to say he’s more than responded in kind!

I'm not saying Shigaraki feels for the MLA the same way he does about the League, far from it, but I do think he's practical enough after two hundred chapters of character development not to throw them away out of spite. In Chapter 246, he tells Ujiko explicitly, "When someone offers me something, I take it," and, "I'm done taking the heroes lightly. I'll use everything I've got to obliterate the dregs All Might left behind." From a purely practical standpoint, if he intends to throw everything he has at the heroes, he has no reason to throw the MLA under the bus, and 116,000 reasons to keep them around. I'm altogether sure that, so long as they stood to be useful to his plans, he would have kept them around.

|| The MLA is quirk supremacist, like Endeavor, so Dabi would never work with them. + || Dabi is just using Skeptic against Skeptic's will; it’s not a willing partnership.

I hadn’t seen the second point in the wild, but I suppose it must be how the “The League will betray the MLA” theorists are getting around Dabi and Skeptic’s clear collaboration and how that collaboration totally scuttles the first point, huh? Hilarious.

Anyway, setting aside the fact that Dabi showed up to the one planning session we were shown when even Geten didn’t, there’s evidence in the canon that Dabi was working with Skeptic since even before the raid. Consider that Dabi’s video was filmed at the villa (the wall paneling and the style of the couch both match) and ask yourself where the camera he used came from. Once the filming was complete, where was the video stored such that Skeptic could access it from his laptop? If Dabi’d had it on an SD card and Skeptic was seeing it for the first time, why didn’t Spinner, Compress and Toga watch it alongside him? Surely Skeptic would need to watch it through at least once to know when to splice in the footage of Jin’s death for maximum dramatic impact? On that note, by far the most telling piece of evidence is this: if Dabi wasn't already working with Skeptic, then why was he wearing one of Skeptic's body cameras during his confrontation with Hawks?

Further, Skeptic's protest when he’s pulled onto Machia isn't that he doesn’t want to be with the League; it’s that he doesn’t want to leave Re-Destro behind. Once he's resigned that it's going to happen, though, he's cocky about his talents and complimentary of Dabi's big reveal, even if he is exasperated about the League's antics. It's ambiguous, I admit, but given that Dabi's wearing his cameras, he had to have known Dabi had a reason for them--and given that he is both abrasive and mouthy, I can’t imagine he wouldn’t have demanded to know what that reason was.

Hell, Dabi even thanks Skeptic for his editing work, which is more direct positive approval than he's ever shown anyone in the League (give or take the high-five with Twice, which, genuine or not, he would have known he was doing on camera). That much-vaunted panel of Spinner telling Toga to come back to the League? Dabi's grinning, which in isolation you could read as a certain rueful affection, but with the full context of the chapter, it becomes apparent that Dabi is grinning at Skeptic's laptop, seconds after telling Skeptic to "hurry up." Skeptic is, at that moment, probably gearing up the video to project nationwide, and Dabi’s more focused on that than he is Toga’s crisis, even when Compress directly appeals to him for aid. He tells Compress he doesn’t care, the same way he told Hawks he doesn't give a damn about the League.

Let me be clear here: I'm inclined to take Dabi at his word. I think Dabi hangs around the League because, for all that he says one man's conviction can shake the world, he also knows his own limits, and the League offers safety in numbers and an avenue to pursue his revenge. Maybe he finds them acceptable enough company, maybe he even does like them a bit despite himself, but I think any affection he might have for them is entirely incidental to his views on their usefulness. In the same way, while he's willing to bail on the MLA when the heroes attack, I don't think it was his plan to do so, especially not given his apparent immediate regard for Skeptic, as seen in the deleted scene here. Sure, he dislikes Geten, but ultimately, Geten is a stupid kid too tied up in his care for Re-Destro--who's now worshipping the ground Shigaraki walks on--to really be getting in Dabi's way.

Maybe if the MLA really were as quirk supremacist as Geten makes them out to be, Dabi would be actively looking for a way to see ‘em burn, but as I’ve said countless times before, Geten is not a reliable narrator vis a vis the MLA's doctrine. Now, obviously I don't expect Dabi to give them an unearned benefit of the doubt,(1) not after what he heard Geten say, but if Dabi has been working with Skeptic, it doesn't take a genius to realize that while Anthropomorph is a perfectly good quirk, it is categorically not what primarily defines Skeptic’s "worth" in the MLA societal microcosm.

Nothing that Skeptic does reflects the way Geten talks about "elevating one's ability" or "sheer strength" in the way that HeroAca fandom tends to understand as referring to flashy and offensive quirks. And yet, Skeptic is a ranked advisor warranting an introductory panel with RD's inner circle and Geten is not. Perhaps, just perhaps, this might have led Dabi to reevaluating his initial assessment just slightly?

|| Mr. Compress rejects the PLF moniker for Shigaraki, ergo Mr. Compress didn’t genuinely associate Shigaraki and the League with the PLF.

So, this one's pretty wild, because, in the same chapter that had people crowing about Mr. Compress's dialogue, Mr. Compress's actions show the exact opposite of the conclusion this theory would demand. Specifically, if it was always the League's plan to ditch the MLA, Mr. Compress would have darted right past Skeptic, ignoring the man's cries for help. He doesn't--he picks Skeptic up on the way past and (at least in the volume corrections) deposits him safe with Dabi in Spinner's scarf. Of course, Skeptic still stands to be useful, but if one acknowledges that Skeptic's usefulness is reason enough not to abandon him, then what exactly is the argument for leaving 116,000 perfectly useful warm bodies behind?

But let's set aside Compress rescuing Skeptic and focus on the actual point, because that point in itself is still flawed. Mr. Compress's thoughts on the PLF in the specific talk bubble in question are somewhat ambiguous. It's another case of the Viz translation making a couple of assumptions that are just that--assumptions.

Compress's words in the Japanese are as follows:

Chōjō Kaihō Sensen.… Viran rengo no Shigaraki Tomura ga…

Viz then renders the line like so:

The Paranormal Liberation Front's… No, the League of Villain's Shigaraki…

Note that in the Japanese, the possessive no is only included once, to indicate Shigaraki's association with the League. Further, the original doesn't indicate any negation in Compress's thoughts. Yes, he could be rejecting the PLF association for Shigaraki, but he could as easily be narrowing his scope to Shigaraki as the figure he represents to the League, rather than the figure he represents to the PLF--not rejecting wholesale, but rather becoming more specific. Compress might also be thinking first of the PLF as a general organization, then narrowing down to Shigaraki specifically.

Rather than reading this line as an indication that Compress regards the PLF as temporary, I was heartened by the fact that Compress thought about the PLF at all! If the League really had been planning to discard them this entire time, then there's no reason for Compress to have ever taken the Front seriously enough to have thought about them in that moment of crisis. You can carry this back further, too. In Chapter 258, when Twice is asking Hawks for help, he says that Spinner and Compress have been in meetings for days. Coupled with Compress's first thought about the entity that will carry out Harima's desired reformation being the Liberation Front (or possibly "the Liberation Front's Shigaraki"), this indicates to me that Compress was taking it seriously, not just gorging himself on sushi on the MLA's dime.

Indeed, back in Ujiko's lab, when it was just Shigaraki talking about his backstory and his dreams of destruction, Compress looks the opposite of impressed; we know from his narration in 294 that he liked the League because they didn't place any importance on one another’s pasts. Yet, at some point, his view shifted to believing that fulfilling his ancestor's ambition, his bloodline’s duty, really might be back on the table. We as readers don't quite know when that shift happened, but given, again, his initial mental invocation of the PLF, I think we can assume that it's tied to that alliance, those resources. And sure, when the moment of crisis happens and he's really defining who and what Shigaraki is to him, and where his values and priorities lie, it's with the League and Shigaraki as the leader of the League. But that doesn't mean he never had his hopes for the PLF at all, or was partaking in plans to ditch them.

Also too, this is a man who was lamenting the loss of their partnership with Overhaul, a man who personally maimed him, on top of killing a comrade. You're telling me the guy who shrugged off his animosity towards Overhaul would willingly allow the League to plot sabotage against even wealthier collaborators against whom he has even less reason to hold a grudge? Come on, guys.

|| Toga hated Curious, so she wouldn't want to work with the MLA either.

This one's easy: Toga pretty explicitly hated Curious, but she's even more explicit that she likes the MLA because she thinks the world they want to create is wonderful. She says this verbatim at the end of 225, after Curious has spent the entire chapter hounding her with explosions and intrusive questions. What turns her animosity on Curious is not some reveal that the MLA's world would be terrible after all, but Curious calling Toga's "normal" miserable and tragic. Essentially, she doesn't object to the world the MLA wants to bring about; she objects to being turned into a martyr for that world, especially when that martyrdom requires that the things that make Toga happy be characterized as horrific misfortunes.

Toga doesn't like Curious; she kills Curious. And then she comes into a position of leadership, and we don't know a lot about how that position takes her, but she seems delighted to be walking out onto the stage to be announced as such, and she makes active contributions to the discussion of the PLF's plans in Chapter 245. We are, again, given no indication that her lethal response to Curious means that she's planning to ditch the MLA on the whole.

Incidentally, Curious asserts what she does about Toga only in the context of the world as it stands. The world's rejection of Toga's normal, and the extremes that rejection drove Toga to, are what Curious considers tragic and miserable, not Toga's fascination with blood in and of itself. She clearly believes that, in the world the MLA envisions, Toga's life would not be so miserable because she would never have been oppressed to the degree that she snapped. And frankly, Curious isn't wrong. The only reason she is a villain in that scene is that she's willing to murder Toga to project that tragedy to the world. If she'd been willing to sit down and have a civil interview with Toga to print it in a relevant magazine, she would have been fine.

|| Twice would never forgive them for what they did to Giran.

You know, this is a totally fair point. It is, however, somewhat complicated by the fact that Giran himself never left the PLF. Now, there’s almost certainly something to be said about Giran’s whole information broker shtick being terminally compromised by his capture, his maiming, his client list being hacked, etc. He had a bunch of identifying items strewn all over the country that were covered in the national news, items that people who associated with him closely certainly would have recognized. Maybe he’s laying low for a while?

I don’t know why Giran was still around by the time of the raid. I can theorize about his pragmatism or what have you, but the canon really doesn’t give us anything to go on. Still, if he really hated the MLA all that much, as he would be totally justified in doing, it’s pretty bizarre that Horikoshi showed him twice in PLF crowd scenes post-Deika looking nothing worse than kind of confused and uneasy. Heck, you’d think he would at least have merited a better seat in the crowd for the big merger announcement.

Giran aside, the fact that Twice never does hit it off with anyone in his regiment is, I think, telling. If there’s anyone in the League that intentionally kept himself at a distance from the MLA because of hard feelings, it’s likely Twice. After all, if he had befriended anyone, he presumably wouldn’t have needed to go to Hawks for tutoring almost an entire month after Deika. That said, the fact that Twice does go running to Hawks for tutoring shows that he’s at least doing his best to act in accordance with what he thinks Shigaraki and the rest want. That doesn’t preclude the League having a secret plan that he’s either in on and playing along with, or hasn’t been told about because he might not be able to stop himself from vocalizing about it. Still, while absence of evidence is not evidence of absence, obviously absence of evidence is not evidence of presence. So, lacking any sign that the rest of the League is planning treachery, I’m not inclined to assume Twice’s lack of forgiveness is indicative of anything other than his own feelings.

|| [Error: argument about Spinner's opinion on the PLF not found.]

:: INCOMING SALT WARNING :: INCOMING SALT WARNING ::

This is the one that really gets to me. I have never seen an argument that the League is planning to betray the PLF that convincingly explains the fact that Spinner, to all available evidence, threw himself wholeheartedly into trying to make the PLF succeed. To be more precise, I have seen one explanation, and that explanation is that the plan to ditch the MLA was a secret that only Shigaraki, Dabi and sometimes Toga knew about, and to reiterate, that is bullshit.

In my experience, this is an explanation proposed by people who care about Spinner only insofar as he can be a Soft Gaymer Boyfriend or score them rhetorical points, but have little to no interest in his ongoing--and, indeed, increasing--importance to the League generally and Shigaraki’s arc specifically. The dude who talked about how Twice’s home was the League, who got through to Toga while still respecting her choice when no one else could, the guy who recognized the hollowness within Shigaraki but also bonded with him over video games, the man who Mr. Compress said was Shigaraki’s most devoted follower(2)--this man did not do all of that for people in this fandom to say, “Oh, well, the others probably just kept it a secret from him because they thought he’d be bad at lying.”

Really? “Bad at lying?” And that’s an adequate justification, is it, for Shigaraki letting Spinner toil for months under false pretenses? For lying to the man who adores him the most? Of course it isn’t, but the people who theorize this don’t really care about Spinner’s adoration for Shigaraki, or the fact that Shigaraki rewarding Spinner’s feelings by allowing him to dedicate himself unstintingly to something Shigaraki was planning to discard from the beginning would be a blatant abuse of Spinner’s trust.

I have never seen anyone try to argue that Spinner was in on a plan to betray the MLA all along. That’s because it’s patently obvious that Spinner--forthright, direct Spinner, who named the merged organization with Re-Destro, spends all his time in meetings, has a direct exchange with Re-Destro about the state of their plans, and is probably the reason RD started wearing polka dots--went all-in on the PLF. But for the people who propose the “the League was always going to bail” theory, Spinner and his labors are an afterthought.

Spinner is not an afterthought. Where Mr. Compress has been captured, Toga could hypothetically be peeled away from the League via Uraraka, and Dabi almost certainly will be peeled away via the Todoroki plot, Spinner’s driving motivation at this point is Shigaraki himself. He connected to Shigaraki’s nihilism, his hatred, but also his humanity--the humanity in Shigaraki Tomura, not in Shimura Tenko. His empathy didn’t spring from contrived psychic glimpses of crying 5-year-olds, but from long months of observation, doubt, and gradually deepening wonder. He’s the only person currently with Shigaraki that I can see caring enough about Shigaraki’s welfare that he might sacrifice his own goals and desires to help Deku save him.

Spinner is not an afterthought, and I refuse to build or entertain theories that treat him that way. So as to his opinions on the MLA? Despite having his own reasons to be leery of them based on how shabbily Trumpet treated him, he was obviously trying to make the Paranormal Liberation Front succeed, which means he must have believed that Shigaraki wanted it to succeed. Therefore, unless you’re prepared to assert that Shigaraki (and everyone else who was in on it!) was cruel enough to lie to Spinner about something he was devoting so much time and energy to, the inescapable conclusion is that Shigaraki also wanted the Front to succeed.

(Note: After letting a friend pre-read this, I have been informed that there is, in fact, one explanation offered for Spinner knowing the League was going to abandon the PLF but working his ass off on the venture anyway, and that explanation is, “Something something wants to prove himself because low self-esteem.” This is so ridiculous I can’t even bring myself to edit this post accordingly. Low self-esteem! Because nothing would alleviate Spinner's low self-esteem like toiling for months over something that holds no worth to the people he actually cares about, right? Right?? Bah. Humbug!)

And but so, to wrap all that up: I fundamentally disagree that the League viewed the Paranormal Liberation Front as a temporary arrangement, at least to the extent that they were actively planning to betray their newfound--new won--allies. The fact that I don't think the League intended to discard the MLA out of hand does, thus, influence my opinion that, whatever Geten's fate will be, I'm pretty sure it's not going to be, "He gets murdered in a way that resembles nothing so much as a sick revenge fantasy dozens of chapters after the last point when such a death would have been remotely tonally appropriate."

Thanks for the ask, anon! Sorry about-- *waves at all of this*

-------------------------------

(1) Not that Mr. “Burns Random Delinquents Alive For Not Measuring Up To His Standards For Villainy” has any moral standing to criticize others for how they determine the value of peoples’ lives, mind.

(2) Other translations for the verb in Mr. Compress’s Japanese line of, “You are the one who ____s Shigaraki the most,” include yearn for, long for, pine for, miss, love dearly, adore, idolize, and revere. “Most devoted follower” is accurate enough, but considerably less homo than some of the things we could have gotten there.

#bnha #stillness answers #paranormal liberation front #league of villains #stillness has salt #spinner defense squad

[that-good-trash]

Burn Away With Me 3

Shoto Todoroki x reader / Dabi x reader

Warnings: Mentions of death and blood, profanity, kidnap, murder, Angst

Word count: 10K

Part 1 Part 2

Summary: Kidnap and murder usually go hand in hand but not like this. The world thinks your dead and you have to watch them mourn you like a princess locked away in a tower. Except princes don’t look for dead girls. You might just have to rely on the villain who took you.   

Comment: Holy Shit, I am so sorry this took so long and that I haven’t been posting anything new. School just started again and I am a full time student and employee. I have a few other fics in progress and there will be a part four to this fic, which will be the conclusion. Thank you all for sticking around still and just bear with me. This chapter is long and I hope there aren’t to many errors with grammar or spelling. I hope you enjoy and please look forward to my next fics which I hope to post this week. 

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Endeavor was a clever man with years of getting what he wanted tucked under his belt. He wasn’t intimidated by his son. He thought of his son as a tool not a human being with feelings and emotions that mattered. He had tried to be that guy and failed. His wife wanted nothing to do with him and neither did his oldest son. He showed them that he could change and yet they didn’t forgive him so what was the point of changing. He reverted back to the piece of shit he was so good at being. If he couldn’t be Number 1 and a ‘good’ dad then fine. A hero it is, despite the fact that he wasn’t a good hero either. Just a narcissistic asshole who beats people down with no remorse and would do anything to get what he wanted. Even kill you, even kill his own son. You and Dabi had ‘murdered by Endeavor’ on your personal resumes.

Now Shoto was standing his ground against the man who continues to take the things he loves. His flames dance around his body waiting to be released like hell hounds against his father. The ice cracks when Endeavor lifts his foot. He seems amused, like this is all a game. He wants Shoto to fall apart because it’s easier to control him when he isn’t all there. Shoto won’t let that happen, not when he needed to get revenge, if not for you then himself.

“TALK YOU BASTARD!” Shoto Todoroki was anything but a loud man. He wasn’t overly confrontational so this was a big change in his personality. Endeavor quirked a brow before his booming laugh pushed against the walls of his office. He steps forward knowing that his son will respond defensively. Ice shards jut forward almost striking the flame bearded man. He laughs before grabbing the overgrown frozen stalagmites melting them in seconds. His ice was strong but fire was still fire and couldn’t be overcome by a chill. His own fire pushed against Shoto’s as he approached. Shoto stood his ground, his hair had risen slightly dancing with his flames that were now reflecting in his eyes. His father glowers down at him neither of them willing to end this in a civil manner.

“I didn’t kill her but I am glad she is gone. You will mourn and hurt for now but in time she will be nothing but a painful memory. You can’t waste your time chasing rumors, trying to kill me. If you believe ever rumor out there then you would have to believe that you killed her or that she is actually alive. See how foolish those ideas are. You are just ruining your youth and if you kill me then you will spend the rest of your life behind bars. Would it be worth it Shoto?” He knows what to say to hurt his son. How could he forget about you? He couldn’t forget even if you wanted too. You were the better half of his life. You weren’t sunshine on a stormy day; no, you took him out in the rain and made him dance with you in it. He learned to love and be loved when you came into his life. Walking away now, giving up, was not a choice. He didn’t care about prison bars or the death sentence.

“Killing you, regardless of circumstance, would be worth everything.” The flames burned against each other as Shoto lifted his hand toward his fathers’ face. The flames disappeared at the sound of knocking on the door. Both men, despite having stopped their quirks, still looked at each other with intention to kill. “Come it.”

Midoriya opened the office door flinching slightly due to how hot the knob was. He walked into the room feeling the drastic change in temperature. The hallway was cool but the closer he got to Endeavors office the warmer it was. This however was extreme; he could feel the air stick to him from the increased humidity. He gripped his shirt pulling it in and outward trying to get a cool breeze.  Shoto never looked away from his father even when he heard Midoriya clear his throat.

“Um, what’s going on in here.” The green haired boy lifted his foot, his shoes were damp from the puddles accumulating from Shoto’s ice. The walls had a heavy amount of condensation and it seemed like there were char marks on the flooring and parts of the ceiling. Midoriya knew whatever answer he was about to receive it wasn’t going to be the truth. “Pro Hero Deku, you have stumbled across a misunderstanding. My son is just emotional over his girlfriend’s de-”

“Fiancé. She wasn’t just my girlfriend, we were engaged. I was going to marry her and that’s not going to happen because you ki-”

“Because she was murdered by someone whose still out there. You should be hunting that person down instead of harassing me. Deku, if you wouldn’t mind this is over and I have other things to attend to.” Shoto was seething with hatred that scared even Midoriya who never got to see the boy like this. Endeavor turned away from the boys knowing that Shoto wouldn’t attack with Midoriya there. Shoto clenched his fist before turning and storming out of the room. He didn’t blame Midoriya for this interruption but he was upset by it. The rushed footsteps of Midoriya could be heard chasing down the revenge obsessed male.

“What the heck was that?” Midoriya had been trying to get ahold of Shoto, not for business but as a friend. He knew that Shoto was taking your death hard and everyone was worried about his reclusive distant behavior. Hell, even Bakugou was ‘worried’ about your fiancé. “Don’t worry about it, it doesn’t involve you.”

Shoto doesn’t get to take another step as Midoriya grabs him yanking his shoulder around to face him. Midoriya stared at Shoto with a look that he had seen to many times in his life. He had seen this concerned determined face all those years ago at the festival and has continued to see it every time something concerning happens that Shoto doesn’t cope well with.

“Don’t worry about it? How can I not worry when my best friend isn’t answering anyone’s calls? Doesn’t involve me! I don’t know what you were doing or talking about with your dad and maybe that doesn’t involve me but you’re my best friend.” Midoriya is breathing heavy from speaking with no break. He looks down after removing his hand from Shoto’s shoulder. His face goes from determined and concerned to downhearted. When his eyes meet Shoto’s again they both share a common emotion, hopelessness. “Also, this does involve me, I was her friend too. I care about her; everyone cares about her. We all miss her Todoroki! I know your suffering but you aren’t alone. You are isolating yourself and its not good for you. Please Shoto, talk to me.”

Shoto searches Midoriya’s eyes for any emotions other than loss and sorrow. He wants to walk away and pretend like this never happened. He thinks suffering alone is better than relying on the people around him. He hadn’t even been back to your shared home, nor had he returned to his childhood home. Instead he locked himself away in a hotel room surrounding himself with your things and any media that could drive him to kill his father. He watched videos and read articles about the disgusting man’s feats and failures. He waited for the perfect moment while clinging to your fading scent on the clothing you left behind. He was a truly broken man and even though he was a hero his intents match a certain cerulean eyed villain. There were a million things that lingered on Shoto’s tongue, words that would never get to be said. He wanted to talk, hell he wished he could have been like his classmates crying their hearts out while sharing in-depth stories but every time he picked up his phone to call or text, he saw the photo of you he had saved as his background. A picture of you smiling carefree while the sun casts rays of light that shimmer off your skin. Your hair is frozen in a windy mess behind you. Your eyes are staring at him with so much happiness and love that it hurts. It wasn’t taken on some special day or under certain circumstance, it was just a simple photo taken on a simple walk. You didn’t understand why he chose the photo yet he was overly fond of it. When the picture stared at him, he couldn’t call his friends. He just stared into your eyes wishing to see the real ones. He missed your loving gaze, he missed any look you had as long as it was toward him, even if it was anger. He wanted anything but this. Having to seek comfort in a photo was cause for heartache.

Shoto pulls his phone from his pocket, looking at the photo, before looking at Midoriya. The words still sit behind his lips, tingling, willing his to speak.

“I have nothing to say Midoriya.” Midoriya had waited with bated breath for Shoto to tell him something, anything. He could see it in his friend’s eyes, he knew there were many things that needed to be said. The response he was given punched him in the gut. He would have doubled over in pain if the punch wasn’t metaphorical. Midoriya wasn’t the type to let things go and as he watched Shoto turn around, his legs taking him god knows where. Midoriya ran after him, Shoto ignored the chase and left. He ignored the calls of his name as he exited the agency. He had to come up with a new plan. His hands found comfort in his pockets as he tried to blend in with the darkness. He heard his name echo as he turned the corner out of view. What was there to say now. If he told Midoriya what his plan was then he would try to stop him. Midoriya tried to follow but found himself in front of an alleyway of ice. He sighed pushing his hand against it. He imagined that this was the same ice that now lived in Todoroki’s heart. You were the fire that balanced it, but you were gone now.

“I wish you were here Y/n. You would know how to help him.” How ironic to need a dead person’s help when they were technically the cause of the problem. Even more ironic was while this occurred you were very much alive, asleep with your book still clutched in your hand blissfully unaware of Shoto’s unraveling mental state and morals.

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“Good morning doll.” Usually you’d snap at Dabi for his pet name but you had gotten used to it. By now you were more like roommates, he paid rent and shopped while you did everything else. You’d never admit to being used to this life but somehow another week had passed giving you no other choice. You followed every news cast and read every paper that came out hoping to read that Endeavor had died or been critically injured. It was cruel but necessary to survive and return to Shoto. Except the disappointment had to kick in after a week of nothing. No murder or injuring occurred. You started to think maybe Dabi didn’t have as strong a hold as he thought, worst case you thought Shoto didn’t care anymore. Maybe he had given up on you. A smack to your arm caught your attention as Dabi hit you before thrusting the newest paper toward you. You snatched it up faster than he could blink. He scoffed at your pathetic gesture. He had started hating watching your face fill with hope only to be disappointed by more hero news and never any good old fashion bad news. Your mood would drop and maybe a few tears would slip away. He wasn’t irritated with you, no he hated how you did this to yourself. He knew this wasn’t paradise and that playing dead was draining. He just wished that you could relax more. He had seen your smile and heard you laugh and those moments stayed with him. He watched you now waiting. You never cried, instead you crumpled the paper. You threw it on the ground before leaving the small kitchen table. You fled the room with what seemed like betrayal and anger. The bathroom door slammed shut. This was new, not the usual reaction, now he had to read the paper. It was crumpled and torn slightly in parts but he could read it, however there was really no reason to read it when the front cover was a large candid shot of pro hero Shoto smiling with his arm around some upstart, some young female sidekick. The picture must have hurt you but Dabi knew that it was faked. The smile never reached the heroes eyes. They were dead with you. The girl was all too happy to be getting a photo with Shoto. It was publicity, the media trying to make things interesting again. The article headline read Pro Hero Shoto Mending His Broken Heart With New Love Interest? Dabi actually laughed at how pathetic it was. He continued to read about this new girl and Shoto’s love for her. It mentioned her story about how she always looked up to Shoto, how he made her strive to work harder. Shoto couldn’t be bothered to comment. Dabi leaned back in his chair smirking. This was a part of someone’s plan, whether or not it was Endeavors pathetic attempt at changing the narrative or Shoto’s attempt at distracting the media while he goes after his true goal. Either way someone was pulling the strings with this little media shake up. Dabi chucked the paper onto the table not caring for its fake news. He knew what needed to be done and he didn’t like it.

A knock on the bathroom door brought you away from the storm of thoughts brewing. You had been under the, now cold, faucet for a while now. Two things were prominent in your thoughts, killing your fiancé or the girl who dared claim him. You weren’t stupid, you could put two and two together, they weren’t actually romantic interest. However, that didn’t stop you from imagining showing up at his agency with hells fury behind you. You could imagine the pure fear that people would have watching a dead girl attempt to kill her widow. If you didn’t go after him, you’d find this girl and make her regret the day she thought she could have him. You weren’t dead so watching him potentially move on made your blood boil. He got to live like a normal human while you were trapped. You were stuck enclosed in the same rooms till god knows when. You clenched your fist aware of the missing digit, another thing you lost because of this whole mess that shouldn’t have involved you. Another knock brought your attention to the door. The water stopped as your prune fingers turned the faucet off. You let your back fall against the cold tile before slipping to the tub. You refused to cry because he didn’t deserve your tears right now. No matter the truth, you were pissed at him. No tears or tight chest, just pure unadulterated anger. Dabi finally opened the door not caring if you’d yell at him. He went to pull the curtain aside but was stopped. Your fingers gripped it tightly to prevent it from moving. “What do you want Dabi.”

“I want you doll.” A scoff could be made out behind the curtain. You rolled your eyes but he only heard your sound. He leaned against the warm and slightly damp wall waiting for a witty response or reply of disgust. You remained quiet. “I want you to get off the shower floor and get some clothes on. I got a surprise waiting for you.”

With nothing left to say Dabi left you alone. You had low expectation when it came to a surprise from your kidnapper. Hell at least Belle was given a castle and had company in the form of talking dishware. A literal beast was outdoing Dabi, but that was to be expected since fairy tales were fake and Dabi wasn’t a prince. You didn’t rush to get ready which was fine by Dabi. He sat on the couch waiting with all the necessary parts of his gift. Once you dried off and had clothing on you walked into the living room. You didn’t get to far before a bag was thrown at you. Eyes wide you move quickly to catch it before it could hit you or the ground. In the bag was a strange variety of items, that separate made no sense but together made a brilliant gift. With raised brows you pull out the first item which is a wig, with hair color different then your actual hair color, that looks so real you almost check for scalp pieces. Dabi gestures for you to keep going. With the wig on the table you pull out a small case, in it a pair of contacts that were very different from your actual eye color. The gifts were staring to create more questions and concern than pleasure or happiness. The next few items were miscellaneous pieces of clothing, all dark clothed and plain enough that they would bring attention to you. A scarf and glasses also appeared from the bottom of the bag. The only theory that you could piece together made you laugh at how ridiculous it was. The more you looked at the items on the table together the more you realized that maybe it wasn’t ridiculous. You look at Dabi skeptically as you point to the confusing surprise. “What the hell is this.”

“It’s a disguise.” Your heart stopped for a second. Could this really be happening? You look at him with pleading eyes begging for this to be real and not some kind of sick joke or trick. “You’re gonna need it to leave the apartment.”

There was no way that this was real. You must have died for real. You suck in a breath, holding it in while your chest shakes with your shoulders. You are trying to prevent yourself from crying. You still refused to believe this cruel trick. The costume pieces sat staring at you, this was farfetched. Dabi was expecting more excitement, to be praised, he should have expected that you would be skeptical.  Instead of criticizing you he walks up next to before smacking your back. “Go get ready I’m not waiting all day.”

“Yes okay, I’ll be right back. You are not allowed to change your mind!” You had never moved so fast before in your life. Before being kidnapped you would have spent a good amount of time preparing to go out, especially with Shoto but right now you were throwing everything on with haste. You pulled on a pair of black leggings and over those a simple enough deep blue skirt. It was above your knees and for a moment you felt like a high schooler again. The top was long sleeve and didn’t matter because a hoodie went right over it. The hoodie wasn’t bulky and instead was light weight and thinner. The hood was most likely to hide your face if necessary. The wig was most likely the most expensive item because it was definitely not a costume one. You had to giggle since it looked like you were cosplaying. Your contact covered eyes stared back at you in the mirror, your fingers ran through the wig. You didn’t look like you and this made you feel like you were being reborn. You were still Y/n and yet the girl that stared back wasn’t her. You were dead and this girl was alive, it was almost riveting. When you walked out of the bathroom Dabi looked you over, he smirked nodding with a look that told you he was impressed. You pretended like you didn’t care but you did. A little good attention wasn’t bad to want. You were starved for it so it was no shock that you didn’t shy away from his. You walked toward the door but he was faster blocking the exit. Your heart dropped thinking he was going to laugh and tell you this was a joke. Instead he placed the fake glasses onto your face. “There are a few rules your gonna have to follow.”

Relief washed over you as your fingers brushed the cool metal that framed the fake lenses. You listen to ever word. The basic rules were to not speak to or look at anyone long enough to be recognized, you weren’t allowed to use your quirk and if any heroes tried to approach you were to act shy and hide your face. You had a lot of rules about hiding your identity and yet here was the most recognizable villain ever. He smirked knowing you felt he was being hypocritical.

“Don’t worry Doll, I got someone for this.” He motioned toward his own face where his skin was held together by staples. You nodded not knowing exactly what he would do but not really caring. You got to leave and that was the most thrilling thing ever. He opened the door and you felt the cold hallway air hit your exposed skin, which wasn’t much. A giggle escapes as Dabi holds his hand out for you to take. You grab it with vigor ready to be alive again, even if it was just for a moment.  

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You had no idea how he did it but Dabi looked like a normal person. Well normal to society. Personally, you didn’t mind how he looked. He took you another apartment in the same building. He walked in and walked out without staples or scars. The quick explanation he gave was that the persons quirk helped change how someone’s appearance looks to others. Sure, enough your fingers touched his face and you could feel the staples even though you couldn’t see them. Amazement, you were amazed at this quirk before you realized the quirk could have been used on you and you wouldn’t have needed to wear the get up. Dabi knew what you were thinking when you side glanced him.

“Don’t look at me like that doll. This was expensive, much more expensive than your get up. You can wear a costume; I can’t really cover this up.” You hadn’t even thought about him having to have paid for the quirk users help. Of course, in an underground world someone gets money any way they can. You laugh at his comment about covering up his face. You walk in front of him turning, your skirt swirls around with you as your fingers brush his cheek. Your eyes hold so much kindness. “You don’t need to cover up. I think your face is perfect.”

Dabi blinks, he doesn’t really know what to say. Mostly because he never mentioned being ashamed of his scars openly. He was though. He hated how he looked but lived with it since it was his choice, technically he was forced into something so dramatic by his abusive father. You didn’t need to compliment him; you didn’t owe him a smile. You were really a peculiar person. His arm slowly lifts before a flick is administered to your forehead. Your hand quickly moves to rub the spot while you face scrunches. “How sweet you think I’m covering up because I’m ashamed when really it’s because I’m a wanted criminal. I do appreciate it sweetheart. Better watch out, I know you’re touch starved but falling for your captor is kind of cliché. No Stockholm syndrome allowed here.”

Your face went from discomfort to embarrassed. You rush after him as he walks away with a cocky grin. You hit his shoulder before walking next to him.

“I would never fall for you.”

“I know because you have your AmaZinG Shoto you love so much.” You hear Shoto’s name and feel angry again. You grab Dabi’s hand, holding it while you both leave the apartment building. He laughs knowing that you had nothing to say because it was a touchy subject. The moment you both felt the cool fall air blow by the anger you feel dissolves replaced with excitement. You are free, this was what a caged bird feels when it gets to spread its wings. You didn’t even care that you had no idea where this was. Your legs moved you off the front steps of the neglected building and you spun around on the sidewalk. Dabi laughed while his hands pushed into his pockets. He walked onto the sidewalk after you. You stopped spinning turning to him with an appreciative smile. He didn’t deserve it but he accepted it. His hand gestures forward and you grab onto him once again. You link arms with him making him raise a brow. You don’t care about his reaction because you aren’t going to let anything take away your happiness. You let him lead the way, walking passed rundown buildings and sketchy people. You don’t want to judge but it definitely wasn’t a part of town you would have been found in prior to dying. The dirty sidewalks, seedy businesses, and rundown buildings soon enough turn to crowded sidewalks and streets, large and small businesses, and hero agencies. Oh god, you looked down as you passed an agency you didn’t recognize. Dabi laughs because most kidnapped people would go screaming the first sign of ‘help’ while you were acting like you were also a wanted criminal. You looked away from the looming agency building and around the street. People walked right by you never even questioning who you were. They didn’t care. You weren’t Y/n right now, just a stranger. Dabi didn’t understand how you felt so content with being around strangers. He didn’t understand because he didn’t like people and they didn’t tend to like him. Watching you intrigued him, you didn’t run away, you hadn’t stopped smiling, and you hadn’t mentioned Shoto.

“Da-Um Dante, can we get something to drink?” You almost said his name but stopped quickly changing it to the first thing you could think of. This fake name amused Dabi causing him to smirk, not only that but he was also smirking because you asked for a drink. He wanted so badly to tease you but for some reason couldn’t find himself doing so. “Sure, doll.”

“Let’s go to that café, I want something warm with whipped cream.” Your arm released his so you could pull him along. The café wasn’t to busy and Dabi was grateful. He watched you look over the menu mouthing the items to yourself. The cashier called you forward asking your order. You ordered a large hot chocolate with extra whipped cream. The cashier smiled at your simple order before looking at Dabi.

“And would your boyfriend like something as well.” Boyfriend? Your face scrunched up like you had just smelled a soiled diaper. Dabi couldn’t hold back the laugh that escaped. The cashier could have thought you were siblings but of course you had to be dating him. Before you could comment about him not being your boyfriend he stepped forward, his arm going around your waist to help pull you to his side. He leans closer to the counter. “I’ll have a black coffee.”

“Da-” Before you could say his real name by accident his grip tightened and he gave you a look that warned you. You pouted before pulling away. He paid as you went off to find a table. You found on in a corner against the window, which was exciting to you because you could watch the people. Dabi found you daydreaming, your head in your hand while your eyes watched some high school students taking pictures together.

“God, they look stupid, poor uninformed youth. Little do they know what the pitiful future holds.” You stared across at him as he looked at the teens with a completely opposite viewpoint. A cream packet hit Dabi prompting him to bring his attention back at you. You were displeased with his commentary. “Really? Because that’s truly how everyone’s life is destined to turn out. I’d like to believe that those kids are going to grow up and enjoy life, they might change the world or make a big difference. I know you have your reasons to not enjoy life but that doesn’t mean everyone is going down the same path. Everyone deserves a chance to be happy.”

“Hit a nerve, did I?” Dabi had almost forgotten that you both came from different worlds. While you believed in hope, he had none. Hope was for children, for fools. You however knew the cruelties of the world and still help onto the sliver of hope you had left. These kids were you. They laughed and you remembered when you were their ages, laughing with your own friends. Now you were trapped, a prisoner of your own accord. Regardless you did not find him funny or charming. “Such a prick.”

“Never said I was anything else.” He was annoying and arrogant but honest. He never pretended he was a gentleman; you chose to believe he could be one. You couldn’t argue with him. It also wasn’t worth ruining your time outside the apartment. This outing was yours not his.

“Your drinks.” You thanked the barista who dropped off your order. You held the cup a gentle smile crossing your lips. Dabi didn’t touch his drink, instead he was watching the people outside. His own thoughts bringing him to think about your future. He wasn’t planning on keeping you around forever but his plan was working slowly. You were now intertwined with his life. He thought about you every time he left the apartment. You could have escaped but you hadn’t even tried. It was like his promise to release you was good enough to calm you, to make you trust him. His eyes watched you through the window, your reflection seen from his angle. The way you licked the whipped cream from your lips caught his attention. He looked beyond your reflection and at the people passing, not wanting to get to invested in watching you. He wondered how long you’d spend running around the city till he’d have to drag you back.

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six hours had come and gone and yet to you it was minutes. You had missed the fresh air, the sunlight dancing on your skin, and the chatter of people around you. You had actually had conversations with strangers, you spoke to people and they spoke with you. It was thrilling and yet as the sun started setting you knew that it would be ending soon. Your face fell with your shoulders at the idea of going back. Dabi would have went back by now but you wanted to stay out and this was all for you. He drank the subpar coffee, walked the crowded stores, ate overpriced food, and even let you get close to people and conversate despite the risk. The streetlights turned on and it seemed even more people were out. Dabi’s phone was vibrating against his leg, his hand reached into his pocket to pick it up. You were watching one of the TV sets that was playing a news station. He hesitated before disappearing down an empty alleyway to answer the call.

“I told you not to call me today.” The irritation was clear in Dabi’s a statement.

“I’m well aware of what you told me it’s just that we have a problem.”

“What problem is to big for pro hero hawks that he has to call a villain to get help from.”

“Shoto.”

There was a brief moment of silence, tension in the air and through the phone. Dabi thought things were moving slowly so now he was sure that the pro’s need for revenge was dwindling. The sidekick in the photo came to mind. Maybe there were to many distractions, maybe he needed a push in the right direction. A reminder of his loss.

“What’s the problem.”

“He hasn’t been coming by endeavors agency and I haven’t seen much of him even in the district. He might be planning something but currently he is avoidant of his father and thus is getting in the way of the plan.”

Dabi was right, but of course he was right, brother’s intuition. This was beyond irritating news but he was already formulating a plan. That plan needed to happen, now. He could hear the phone move away from his informant, hawks, followed by whispering. The person speaking in the background had no idea that their precious hero was helping destroy the current number one. Dabi hung up the call and texted hawks a brief warning. Looked like it was time to send you home. The moment he left the alleyway he found you were gone. Of course, you were gone. He disappeared without telling you where he was going. Hell, he wouldn’t be shocked if you finally gathered the courage and common sense to run away. Before he could even begin to question your whereabouts, he saw you. You were leaning against a clothing store with your hands held in front of you. A stray tear was making its way down your cheek as you looked into the night sky above. The lights and clouds forming made it hard to see any stars. Dabi walked through the crowds of people with only you in his sights. Why were you crying? His hand reached for you but retracted immediately when he watched someone else catch your tear. His body stood frozen amongst a group of business men while his worst fear surfaced.  

“Are you okay? I saw you and couldn’t help coming over here. You look so sad, familiar and sad.” Standing in front of you, so close his breath touched your face, was red riot. He was in disguise just like you were but not as intense. He wore a hoodie to cover his hair which was down instead of spiked. A mask hid his rows of shark like teeth and his casual clothing made his build less noticeable. You knew who he was even before you looked at him. His voice laced with concern and care was more familiar than his looks to you. He wasn’t a close friend but if you were friends with Eijiro Kirishima he thought the world of you, would die or kill for you. He was ride of die and right now he was talking to a dead friend with no clue. Your throat tightened and fear pulsed through your veins. Fear of being caught? Dabi taught you that, that being caught was bad, that if this plan didn’t happen then things would end up so much worse. Fear wasn’t the only thing you felt. You wanted to lean into his hand when it caught your tears. You yearned for his attention, for physical contact from a past that seems so far away regardless of how much time it had really been. You look into his kind crimson eyes and realize that maybe he was trying to figure out who you were. He looked curious but there was a hint of confusion. He was wondering why you were familiar and the only thought he had made no sense. If you talked, he would figure it out. You were literally stuck between a rock and a hard place.

“I…” You didn’t have to speak because someone else spoke up instead. Dabi’s hand yanked you away from the wall and into his side. He turned you till your chest was pressed into his own, hiding your familiar features away from the prying heroes’ eyes. He knew that his own self was way more familiar but with this quirk hiding his distinct features he didn’t worry about getting caught.  Dabi’s piercing stare causes Kirishima to back up, his hands raised in surrender.

“Are you bothering my girlfriend.” Dabi’s voice was distinct and yet when he spoke, he sounded like someone else. He had spoken with a deep growl that fit his usual tone but something was off. Somehow, he wasn’t Dabi talking. You couldn’t be offended by his words since he was saying them to save the both of you. Yet deep down you weren’t disgusted or offended, instead hearing him growl with a twinge of overprotective jealousy made your heart skip a beat. The way he held onto you in a tight possessive manner made you almost fall for the false title as his girlfriend.

“I didn’t mean any harm. I saw her crying and she seemed sad so I wanted to make sure she was okay… She reminded me of a friend I recently lost.” Kirishima was never the type to make trouble but he did find himself stumbling upon it quite often. He sounded sincere and didn’t want Dabi to get the wrong idea. You knew Dabi didn’t actually believe you were being harassed; he was preventing you both from getting involved in something that would jeopardize everything. The part that really hit you hard was his last sentence. You reminded him of you. He approached you hoping to ease your pain but also because he wished you were the real thing. The harsh reality being that you were the real you and he wasn’t allowed to know that. He was mourning you as well and he wanted to look into your eyes and see the girl that used to go drinking with the Bakusquad. Instead he saw your glossy tear covered contacts. He saw the fake you and was reminded that people don’t just come back from the dead. You had to bite your bottom lip to prevent yourself from running to him, to prevent a slip up just because you wanted to give him reassurance. Dabi’s grip on you tightened, as if he knew what you were contemplating. “She’s fine, just got lost in the crowd. Thanks for the worry but we must get going. Sorry about your friend.”

“Hey!” As Dabi turned away from Kirishima to walk away with you, a voice called out to the red head. Your body got tense and Dabi recognized it as he jolted his head back toward the hero. Bakugou was in his own shitty disguise walking toward his best friend. Kirishima was a good boy, someone who wouldn’t harass strangers, Bakugou wasn’t the same way. If he thought you were familiar, he would interrogate you. Dabi was ready to use his quirk to escape if needed, ideally he would prefer not to. “Come on shitty hair, let’s go.”

“Sorry… I forgot we were supposed to meet up. I saw this girl and she reminded me of Y/n.” Dabi was already pulling you away again the moment he realized Bakugou hadn’t noticed the two of you. The crowd started to swallow you up but you could still make out what Kirishima had sadly spoken, you also heard Bakugou’s response. “Idiot, she’s dead. You gotta stop looking for her, you’re starting to act like Icy Hot.”

You let yourself be dragged down streets and away from the lit-up buildings. Your day had already faded to night and now you knew where you were headed. Dabi was obviously taking you home and surprisingly you didn’t mind. It had been fun but, after hearing your former friends talk about you as if you were a ghost, the fun dissipated into self-loathing. At some point Dabi wasn’t holding your arm anymore, instead you followed slightly behind him as he led you back. He would have told you that it was time to return but he knew that you were well aware. Your mood had soured and he wasn’t going to contribute more than he had. The apartment building was dark when you arrived outside it. You would easily enough deem it an abandoned building had you not been living here. Dabi held the front door open for you allowing you to walk through the doorway and into the hallway with the flickering yellow bulbs. Dabi walked behind you occasionally telling you where to turn, until you got to the apartment. He let you inside and went to apologize but you had already started heading to your bedroom. He planned on leaving immediately but that didn’t happen. He followed you inside, his phone discarded on the table as it attempted to interrupt him.

“Did you have a good day?” You stopped outside the bedroom door and thought about the hours outside these walls. Despite how it ended you did have fun. Hell, you had a blast just being out in the fresh air, surrounded by people and bustling buildings. It was sad that you found satisfaction in freedom but who wouldn’t after living their life locked up for an undetermined amount of time. A small smile graced your lips as you pulled off the wig. You held it in your hand as your hair settled down back against your face. You turned and looked your captor, friend? in the eyes.

“I had a good day, thank you Dabi.” You open the bedroom door before disappearing into the room leaving Dabi a little surprised by your answer. His shoulders shake when he starts laughing. He really had no idea what to think of you. He walked away from the door calling out to you that he was leaving. Without a response from you he left. You didn’t cry once you were alone. Instead you sat on the floor with your head in your hands replaying the boy’s words. Kirishima thought you were familiar, Bakugou had to remind him that you were dead and yet you were pulling a fast one on them. Had it been Shoto would he have known? Would he instantly know despite the layers of disguise? Would Midoriya have known it was you. Would he have chased you down? These words meant nothing because there was no way to test if this would happen. Had Shoto shown himself on the crowded street Dabi would have taken you home immediately. He didn’t find the others a threat, Shoto was a pawn so of course him seeing you was a threat.

Bzzt bzzt bzzt. The sound of vibrating could be heard coming from the living room. An eyebrow raised as you sat up, getting off the floor. Had Dabi not actually left? You dragged yourself down the hall finding that you were alone in the apartment. The only thing out of place was Dabi’s phone sitting on the table. The entire time you had been here Dabi hadn’t let his phone out of his sight. You wondered if this was a trap as you approached it. The screen was lit up and you saw a text waiting to be read. The missed call notification was below the text box. You read the contact name. You didn’t have to decipher the insulting nickname; You knew that the person trying to get ahold of Dabi was Hawks. You unlocked his phone, you had seen the code before when he hadn’t realized you were watching, the text popped up. You tried to ignore snooping through the previous messages and instead opted to read only the ones that had just arrived.

[I know you already have your mind set on this but maybe rethink this. I don’t think it’s going to go the way you want it to.]

[Are you ignoring my calls on purpose?]

[You can’t kill Shoto’s new sidekick. It messes up your plan against Endeavor.]

[Shoto just left the agency…]

The words reflected off your drying eyes as you read through the texts. Your heart had started racing as you read what his intensions were tonight. What had led him to this decision? Had you contributed to his idea to kill her. You didn’t want to be the reason an innocent life was taken even if you held hatred for her that very morning. This couldn’t be happening. Had Dabi had his phone would the texts change his mind. Had you known his plan prior to him leaving would you have been able to stop him. Your grip on his cell tightened as you decided what needed to done. You hadn’t taken off your disguise, it was dark outside, and you had a shit ton of adrenaline coursing through you. You held onto the phone as you ran out the door making sure it locked before you disappeared down the dully lit hallway. The outside world was much darker and colder than it had been earlier. You had no idea where to look for him but you realized that he might have mentioned a location. You checked back through the texts but found no location, instead a lot of conversations about Endeavors demise and Shoto’s involvement. You went to the internet looking for answers to where the sidekick could be. You found a tweet the showed a picture that had been taken ten minutes prior. The photo had the girl posing with a large electric building clock in the background. You knew where this was and the time gave you an idea of how long ago this was actually taken. You hoped you’d make it in time. You were suddenly hit with the fear that Dabi wouldn’t hesitate to hurt you if you tried to stop him. You let the fear settled in your stomach while your legs sent you flying down streets. People looked at you like you were crazy and the funny thing was you were thinking the same thing. You were crazy, this was all insane. The craziest part being your conflict over whether you were doing this to save an innocent girl or because you didn’t want Dabi getting caught. A groan of frustration left you as you found the building the photo was taken in front of. Your legs were throbbing from running. You were curious as to why a sidekick under Endeavor would be so far from their district. You looked around while overthinking everything. You needed to figure out where she would go and where Dabi would ambush her. An alley would be his primary choice and there were plenty of those around. You ran around asking people if they had seen her, using Dabi���s phone to show the picture. People thought you were some crazed fan before pointing you off in different directions. Eventually you felt defeated, like all this was for nothing. What if Dabi had realized his phone was missing and went back to get it. He would definitely be on his way to kill you. The alternative thought was that the girl was already dead. Your feet begged for you to stop walking. You just about gave up when the most putrid smell hit you. Your hands covered your nose and mouth. You gagged. The smell brought you closer and closer to the truth. You followed it knowing what it was. The smell of charred flesh, burning hair, boiling blood. The smell of overcooked organs and crackling bones.

“Dear god.” You found her. You found her the exact way you hoped not to. What was left of her corpse was enough to identify her. Her teeth could be seen since her lips and the skin around them was burned away. Her gums had burns as well, her tongue was nonexistent. Her eyes seemed to have boiled but you could still make out her warped irises. He didn’t burn away all of her hair; you could see slight strands sticking to what skin remained on her scalp. Her body was worse off. You couldn’t look at her any longer. You turned sobbing into the same hands that prevented the smell from invading your nose. You could prevent the smell from getting stuck in your nose. You would remember this smell for the rest of your life, her burnt corpse would live in the darkest recesses of your mind. Your legs were starting to lose their ability to remain standing. You wanted nothing more than to escape this hellscape you had searched for. You glanced back again at her before quickly looking away again. Sobs slipped out as you mourned her, a stranger who this morning you wished didn’t exist. It was ironic really. You could help but blame yourself. “I’m so sorry… I didn’t want this to happen.”

You showered yourself in blame but the reality was that Dabi needed Shoto to remember you, to remember his need for revenge, and in order to achieve that Shoto needed to be reminded what you had supposedly gone through. Except you were actually alive and this girl wasn’t. You finally snapped out of it enough to want to leave. Dabi was obviously gone which meant you were limited on time to get back before he saw you were gone. You pulled out the phone and realized there was another missed call from Hawks. You opened the voicemail and had in playing in your ear.

“Dabi! You have to get the hell out of there. She sent an emergency alert and Shoto is looking for her. He’s on his way there now.”

Fear once again crept over you as you let your arm drop down to your side. The phone light cast a shadow on the wall and revealed someone approaching. Suddenly the alleyway felt warm and yet chills engulfed your body. You turned slowly as you felt the intruder staring at you.

“Shoto…” You whispered his name, a million feelings trying to surface but all you could do was smile sadly. You never thought about the body sitting behind you and the smell no longer existed as you watched him walk closer. You were unaware of what he was thinking, what he was feeling. He was already upset that day, his anger waiting to surface and now it was bubbling out in the form of ice creeping down the alley way ground and heat burning along the walls. The light from the phone had disappeared as the screen blackened. The light was now being cast from the Shoto’s flames. The closer Shoto got the ore he could see. He was staring at a woman in a black hoodie, dark skirt, and black leggings. A woman with unfamiliar hair and eyes. He was staring at a stranger. You were a stranger standing in front of a dead body. The charred disfigured corpse of his newest sidekick. You weren’t a stranger anymore but instead a villain. This wasn’t a case of stumbling upon a dead body, No. To Shoto he had arrived late and you hadn’t left on time. You stepped to the side as if you were expecting him to walk past you. It was a mistake. He was able to see her body, your own demise came flying to the forefront of his mind. You had been a pile of ash and she was still recognizable but the two were far too similar. He looked at you and for a moment you thought he saw the real you. His hand raised and you couldn’t help smiling, imagining his hand cupping your cheek. His arms around you holding you. Instead his eyes held pain, pure unadulterated hatred. His flames danced across his body and you had no time to react as they were sent directly toward you. The alley way was blazing with fire and yet your feet were iced to the ground. There was no escape as you witnessed your fiancé look at you with the need for revenge, he wanted you dead. A sob escaped as the flames finally reached you. They dance lightly against your skin before dissipating. Red flames were now blue as a wall surrounded you. You had closed you eyes while waiting for death. You’d accepted this so easily but someone else wasn’t going to. You hadn’t realized that Dabi had come for you. When he saw Shoto he knew it wasn’t going to go the way your imagination wanted it to. He knew the broken man would try to kill you. His flames burned hotter than Shoto’s which he used to his advantage. He protected you by burning away the flames that attempted to swallow you up. His body emerged from the blue inferno. The quirk that had hid his flaws was gone. His face was back to being graphed and stapled, his eyes burned with as much hatred as Shoto’s. His hatred was conflicted, he hated Shoto for trying to hurt you and he hated himself for ever putting you in this situation. You were sobbing on your knees as you heard Shoto screaming out in frustration. Dabi laughed at his pathetic brother as he walked in front of you. His flames still wildly blazing around you, never actually touching you.

“You killed her… It was you. You killed the love of my life. That girl you’re protecting, I bet you love her. I bet you’d be destroyed of she died. I’ll take her from you. I’ll make you regret ever taking Y/n.” Shoto was fast as he rushed Dabi, but Dabi was faster to defend and retaliate. You couldn’t move as Shoto’s words echoed through you. You could feel how broken he was and all you could think about was how you were the one who did this to him. Regret burned hotter than the flames. You watched Dabi and Shoto move like a well-choreographed dance. Never hitting the other as flames and ice clashed. The wall of ice thrust in front of Dabi was shattered with a sharp punch from the raven-haired boy. Shoto moved forward while droplets of water rained down as his ice was melted. His hands finally reached Dabi as they took ahold of his throat. Dabi lifted his own hand thrusting it against the duel quirked boys face. His quirk activated causing Shoto to release him while yelling out in pain. His face wasn’t burned but it was red, irritation from the heat evident on his skin. Dabi approached him while rubbing his throat which now had hand marks on it. He stood in front of his clueless brother.

“I didn’t kill her. Endeavor killed her, just like he killed your brother. Endeavor is somewhere laughing at you as you spiral out of control. I’m having doubts that you ever loved her because if you had then he’d be dead. Had you really loved her maybe she’s be alive right now.” Dabi was letting his emotions take control as he taunted the pro hero. He wanted Shoto to hurt physically and mentally. He wanted him to suffer even after he killed endeavor and got you back. At this rate he might not even want to give you to a man that he felt didn’t deserve you. Shoto let the words settle, to dig under his skin. He wasn’t about to let Dabi get away with his statement, or any of his actions. He wasn’t going to go for the villain. He was going to go for you. His ice shot him upward giving him an advantage. Dabi was ready for the attack but it never came. Instead he became all to aware of the fact that you hadn’t fled the scene. “Dammit.”

“No hard feelings.” Shoto spoke directly to you as he dropped from his ice wall beyond the blue flames. He landed in front of you so close you could touch him. You looked up at him slowly lifting your hand toward him hoping he would take it. He slapped it away looking at you with disgust. To him you were begging for your life, looking for repentance. He had none to give you. You wanted him to looked past the contacts, through the wig. Why couldn’t he see you? You smiled sadly mouthing an I love you before closing your eyes. Tears dripped down your still burning cheeks. It was as if the next few moments happened in slow motion. Shoto moved his hand hovering above you as the fire engulfed the world around you. You felt the pain set in dragging a scream from deep within your chest. It was searing pain that didn’t fade even as the flames disappeared with the burning of Shoto’s body. The flames burned a blue so bright they were almost white. Dabi’s body burned with his quirk use. The smell of hair and skin burning once again invaded your senses and you had no idea if you were smelling yourself or one of them. Shoto was yelling out in pain while Dabi yelled with anger. The moment returned to normal speed as you heard Hawks yelling above. “SHOTO STOP!!!” Shoto looked up as well had Dabi. Immediately he knew this was his time to get the hell out of there. He ran past his brother, both men in excruciating pain. Shoto reached out to stop him but he hesitated when he heard Hawks screaming for him to back down. He could hear the sirens as he watched Dabi collect you into his arms. He was trying to put as little pressure on your new wounds as he could while carrying you. In your delirious pained state, you reached your left hand out toward him. He had to have been delirious himself because he could have sworn that the villain girl, he had just tried to kill was missing her ring finger, the same finger that was left for him.

“Y/n.” Your name slipped from his lips as you were carried away from the scene. Your eyes closed and you drifted off into a nightmare that resembled the moments that had transpired that night. Dabi brought you home cursing himself and everything around him. He punched the wall cracking it. He growled as his back hit the same wall he just punched. He didn’t understand why he wanted so badly to kill Shoto right now but he knew that it was all because of you. You were supposed to be a small pawn to get the game going, to get it closer to the climax and now you were involved deeper than he wanted. You were never supposed to get hurt, not like this. Looking at your burned skin, relieved that the burns weren’t third degree. He was able to protect you but wished he had done more. You should have been unscathed and yet you lay on the couch marked due to his own family’s mistakes.  

“I’m so sorry Y/n.” He moved to the front of the couch his hand brushing your scorched cheek. The wig had basically burned away and the contacts needed to be removed before they caused permanent damage to your eyes. A knock on the door told him that help had arrived.

--------------------

Hours had gone by and you remained in a mindscape that resembled hell. Shoto continuously killing you while you felt and watched every moment. He reminded you about how you didn’t matter to him, that he never loved you and yet his eyes said they did. It was a cruel world to be trapped in. Slowly thought that world faded and you could see a dull light behind your heavy lids. You could hear a voice gently speaking to you, apologies and promises. When you finally found the strength to open your eyes you found Dabi staring at you. His eyes looked sad but that quickly changed to shock as he realized you were awake. He smirked, or at least tried to.

“I guess true loves kiss does wake a princess.” You scoffed before attempting to slap him. You body was sore but when you saw your skin you had no burns. There were slight markings that made you think that you had been in much worse shape. Dabi was smiling at you as he sat back sighing in relief. You attempted to sit up and he was quick to move and help you. He held your back pulling you up without hurting you. You thanked him and he nodded before getting you a glass of water. He almost dropped it when he saw that you were crying. The glass was left on the coffee table as his arms reached around you. He hadn’t hugged many people in his life but he knew that it held the power to help. You clung to him sobbing into his shoulder, screaming practically. It was painful for Dabi to hear and t reminded him of his newest hatred for Shoto. His hands held you protectively, comfortingly. You held onto him crying until your throat was raw and your tear ducts dried. Eventually it was just you being gently rocked by Dabi as hiccupped sobs continued to escape.

“What do I do know Dabi. What do I do when I died for him and he tried to kill me? I used to dream of our reunion, it was beautiful and full of tears and love. Now when I close my eyes, I picture the flames, the screaming. I hear his words as he tries to kill me. I can feel the look of disgust and hatred.” You had to cover your mouth to try and stop the oncoming panic attack. You wanted to scream but couldn’t. “What do I do when all that kept me alive was the idea of being free to be me again, but the world doesn’t need me in it. He doesn’t need me. I’m a villain in his eyes and I think he might be one in mine now. What is there left for me now.”

“Stop. Please stop. I need you Y/n.” Dabi pulled you against his chest as his lips crashed into your own. A moment of pure emotion and adrenaline. He promised to himself, as his lips molded to yours, that he would make things right for you even if that meant giving up his plan.  

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Taglist: @flowersgirl02​ @tiredandkindaoverworked​ @ linndragneel  @tabalugax  @pikagirl1996 @hauntedclaudio

~Let me know if you wanna be added to the taglist~

#mha #mha imagines #mha x reader #mha angst #mha dabi #mha shoto x reader #mha todoroki #bnha #bnha todoroki #bnha imagines #bnha dabi #dabi x reader #touya todoroki #shoto todoroki x reader #bnha shoto todoroki #todoroki x reader

[thumb3l1n4]

Thoughts on chapter #293 (AKA a very long post)

I made a post when chapter #292 came out and one person replied with "I love how everyone thinks that villain stans automatically agree with and condone the villains' actions". I don't think myself to be a villain stan, although I do love Horikoshi's villains, since they're all amazingly interesting characters. There are villains that I feel very compassionate to: Shigaraki, Dabi, Twice, Spinner and Toga. And I could instantly relate to Stain's philosophy, while being totally turned off by his actions. I don't think villain stans condone the violent actions of their favorite characters, I'm sorry if my previous post made people believe I do. But from the most recent releases I gathered that there is maybe a small fraction of villain stans that aren't really seeing the intricacies of the full picture. I don't mean this in a bad way: this is definitely the villains' time to shine and I know we were all waiting for the big Dabi-Endeavor showdown since theories were thrown around, so it's normal to be hyper-focused in what our favorite character is doing or what's happening with them. It's easy to forget that there are times and places where it's safe to show our compassion. I'm not gonna lie, I'm kinda annoyed that some villain stans seem to want the heroes to show compassion to Dabi right now, while they're in the middle of a battle that would decide the sorts of their society. Thanks to Dabi's speech, the civilian's faith in their "picture-perfect" system is crumbling (well, I hope so, because their society sucks on so many levels) and Best Jeanist, who was bashed for absolutely no reason all over Twitter last week, before the official translation was out, knew that that was Dabi's intention all along. Tōya could have told his own story right after Stain's video came out, if he so wanted. He chose to join the League, instead, because as we know now, he might have thought that he would have a better chance to kill Shōto, that way. I can't blame Tōya AT ALL for wanting and needing to see Endeavor, finally, rightfully, punished. However, Dabi throwing the compassion card around in the middle of a life-and-death situation (a situation where his main end-goal is to hurt people), is just peak manipulation...

... Which is awesome for a villain!

It's less awesome if you're standing on the Heroes' side and you're hearing about all the years of abuse that a colleague of yours put his family through, for the first time. I want to note that not a single Hero, till now, has said that they do not believe Dabi (not that I recall, at least). I saw one comment on Tumblr saying they didn't like that Best Jeanist used the word "dirty laundry", the chapter before, but I don't think the Hero said it in disrespect. I think it had more to do with Dabi's intentions behind revealing his truth, than Best Jeanist not believing him, or worse, dismissing him as a victim. Dabi's truth was called "dirty laundry" because Tōya didn't use it to seek justice, for himself and his family, but rather to get revenge on everyone, to create chaos and to excuse his own criminal actions. It's a truth tainted by hatred, not in the sense that fans of the manga and the Heroes should just forget about it: his past and pain are very, very real and Dabi and the rest of the villains need help. But the Heroes cannot take the time to feel sorry for their enemies, right at this moment, because if they do, that's the end. That's kinda what happened between Toga and Uraraka: she needs to stop Toga because while hurting people might come natural to the villain, that's not a healthy way to live. Toga didn't ask to be the way she is, and as a Hero, it should be Uraraka's job to give her the chance to get the treatment she didn't get as a child, that would teach Toga how to deal with her natural urges in a way that is not harmful to anyone. Mind you, Toga didn't seem to like the idea of conforming herself to anyone else's expectations, so she might not want the therapy. Uraraka would still need to give her all to stop the villain, no matter how sorry she actually feels inside for her.

If the villains win, the Heroes will not be able to rectify their society. Only after this fight ends and villains are taken into custody, it would be safe for the Heroes to show their honest reactions to Dabi's revelation. Only then we can hope to see them caring for the villains' health and their truths and possibly demand that Endeavor turns himself in (I actually want him to do so on his own, without external input). The Heroes aren't being heartless, if that's what some villain stans are thinking. They simply do no have the luxury to let Dabi's words manipulate them into feeling bad for him during a fight, because innocent people's lives are at stake here and just because Tōya had a horrible childhood, it doesn't mean that he's gonna care and let those innocent people be. Dabi wants to see the WHOLE world burn.

Onto Deku, now, the second character in two weeks accused by some, of being an abuse apologist.

He's the first character EVER to confront Endeavor on his treatment of Shōto, after seeing how his own classmate was spiralling and hurting himself, because Shōto didn't want to use HIS OWN Quirk to prevent himself from quite literally freeze to death, all because of Endeavor's abuse.

Deku has always wanted to follow All Might's steps and like All Might, he wishes to be able to save everyone in need. Toshinori, however, already told him that that's not realistic and Deku accepted the fact that he can only save the people in need that he's able to reach and as we saw with Shōto, Kota and Eri, he's ready to lay out his own life and break every single bone in his body to do so. He's so determined to save people, even against the worst of odds, that he can twist fate. I think it's exactly this determination of his that made him speak out this time, not only for Shōto, but for Endeavor, too. Do I like that Deku cares? Yes, I'm glad that people like Deku exist, people that genuinely care and wish and pray for criminals to regret what they've done so they can have a chance to right their wrongs and become a better person. Do I think Deku would stop Endeavor from turning himself in or defend Endeavor in front of the other Heroes so they don't take him away and bring him to justice? I might be wrong, Horikoshi can still make a fool out of me, but I don't think so. Deku knows the years of abuse are there and they will never go away. Deku is also the guy who told off Natsuo for trying to make Shōto feel resentful towards their father, when Shōto was somewhat past that and only wanted to heal. Deku recognized that the siblings have all different ways to deal with trauma and told Natsuo that his feelings are valid, but he can't push them onto Shōto, because Shōto's feelings on the matter are just as valid, even if they don't align with those of his big brother.

Just like villain stans can feel compassion towards Dabi because of his past, while being repulsed by his criminal actions in the present, Deku can feel repulsed by Endeavor's abuse of his own family and still see that a part of him (no matter how little it is) wishes to be a better human being. Deku didn't say that Endeavor should be automatically forgiven for his past actions, no one can deny that the abuse still has serious repercussions for every Todoroki involved (yes. EVERY). But the thing with Deku is that once he's seen this tiny, barely-even-there, light in you, he will fight to save you. I don't think that the people calling Deku an abuse apologist are giving his intuition or insight enough credit.

Dabi's not Endeavor: this means that Deku hasn't seen anything in this fight that might hint to Tōya wanting to be saved. Again, the same thing happened between Toga and Uraraka. And sadly, even Twice and Hawks (Hawks miscalculated sooo bad there). It's unfortunate that phrases like "you can only save someone if they want to be saved" and "you cannot help someone who refuses to be helped" still apply to this world, but that's the ugly truth and I'm sure that to someone like Deku that's a very hard and bitter pill to swallow. Endeavor said he wants to right his wrongs: in my opinion, he's still got a lot of work to do, since he should have really started it all off by being honest to everyone about his actions and let justice do its course. During this battle I'm forced to recognize (like Deku does) that Endeavor might actually be able to reedem himself, after actually atoning for his crimes. I cannot say the same for Dabi, because he doesn't want to atone for the bad things he has done. I didn't see Deku's speech as him excusing Endeavor's abuse to his victim or conceding the point to Tōya, that Heroes don't care about villains. I saw it as Deku telling Dabi to stop using his own abuse as an excuse to hurt other victims (Shōto, Natsuo, Fuyumi and Rei) because as harsh as it sounds, Tōya can't demand compassion for his own pain while being uncapable of showing compassion to his own little brother. Maybe Tōya doesn't actually know everything that Shōto has suffered through, maybe he thinks that his little brother got lucky with his Quirk and didn't have it as bad as he did. That's not his place to say. Dabi is making a contest out of their family's pain, trying to declare which Todoroki got it worse (clearly believing that it's him and that that allows him to do whatever he wants to, now), so I reiterate: he can't ask for compassion in the middle of the battle and the Heroes are actually doing the right thing, not letting themselves being manipulated like that and basically forfeiting the fight.

AFTER this arc ends, I truly hope to see the Heroes showing their compassion for the villains. I hope they would get rid of that obnoxious Hero Ranking and that the society would stop festering the idea that only certain Quirks and their users are strong and valuable and deserving of a voice. I hope they could change their world so that people like Tenko, Tōya, Jin, Himiko and Shuichi are able to ask for help AND BE HELPED before it is too late.

#bnha 293 #bnha dabi #toya todoroki #endeavor #bnha deku #midoriya izuku #bnha mha #this is so long #sorry lmao #you might get bored before you finish reading #sorry for any mistakes #english is not my first language

[bbq-hawks-wings]

BBQ gripes about fanon Hawks

Not even gonna put this in the character tags aside from the spoiler one I use just for the anime-onlies on my blog. I'm salty. I just wanna vent. I want to keep the general character tags fun because it was awful when I went looking for new content and found so much Not Fun material a while back; and I don’t want to become what I hate. Basic point - my blog, my vent, and unless it’s reblogged (which you are welcome to if you like) this post dies here.

Please know this isn't a callout post or me claiming that others are being fans of Hawks "wrong" because they disagree with me. I am a huge proponent that (with very few exceptions) fiction and fandom should be free to be enjoyed, reinterpreted, or otherwise indulged in however the individual fan prefers; and if I don't like it, I let them have their space and go do my thing elsewhere and leave them alone (hence why this not going in character tags). I just have been annoyed with the rampant mangling of Hawks' canon  personality/characterization - that is, confusing common fanon interpretations of him with how he’s actually written/portrayed and then getting angry (like, actually-angry-spilling-into-publicly-dragging-real-people, not just disappointed) when he acts like canon Hawks in canon. Non-canon is open season and by and large has my blessing, it’s just frustrating when it gets dragged into discussions about the manga. 

This has been going on a long time, but I just want to get it out of my system in my personal space. All this is, is my "Overthinking Tumblr blogger Shakes Fist at Cloud" moment.

#1 Hawks is a sociopath/unempathetic.

I just... I... You can't be reading the same manga I am if you genuinely come to this conclusion about who he is in canon. A man with nothing to gain by looking like this when considering the depths of the suffering inflicted on others that he bears some amount of responsibility in...

...cannot be called unempathetic.

"But he killed Twice and Best Jeanist!"

Twofold counterargument to this one, starting with BJ - we don't actually know he's dead. There's a body, there's a disappearance, and we have no idea wtf happened, but we also don't know wtf happened. It's drastically ooc for Hawks to murder someone in cold blood. For someone who places emphasis on speed specifically "because when two sides keep fighting and won’t give up, someone eventually has to die" it makes no sense for him to not have had a plan and simply ambush a man in his own home - this goes doubly since he was in contact with the HSPC and had time to "premeditate" anyway.

And as for Twice: Hawks ran out of options. He wanted to detain Twice and keep him from escaping and helping the MLA. He was able to do so when alone, but the moment Dabi cornered him Hawks had a choice to make - probably die in the fight and let Jin go or make absolute certain he can’t and still probably end up dying because he's in bad shape and still probably won't make it out of this, regardless. I don't need to harp on this - it's been said a couple different times now by several people. Even in 266 when Dabi initially ambushes Hawks, Hawks thinks to himself that he’ll carry Jin out of the building to keep himself and Jin safe before Twice retaliated and Dabi literally forces Hawks into a corner.

Jin's loss was a blow, but the chips on the table being wagered are human lives, not feelings. Up until that point, Hawks did everything he could despite the weight of his decision. Human life is human life, and Jin’s life isn’t more important than the may more who will be saved by quashing the MLA’s revolution. Simply equating “could kill someone” with “unempathetic” is fundamentally flawed, and mistaking someone who is pushed to kill despite every attempt to avoid it as unempathetic and even sociopathic has missed the point to the extreme - the mere fact he avoided lethal force for so long alone proves he possesses empathy.

#2 Hawks is a compulsive liar.

He is a good liar, but he does not like lying. He does twist the truth, but always when forced to keep a secret. Even then, his lies are predominantly spun from truth and omitted details instead of outright fabrications. He doesn’t gaslight, and he doesn’t make up stories/details if he can help it.

When Hawks told Endeavor his dreams for the future, that was the truth. When he told him he thought he was cool at the hero billboards, that was the truth.  When he tells Tokoyami to focus on his strengths instead of merely covering his weaknesses to be a better hero, that was the truth. When Tokoyami asks Hawks for his weakness and even why he took him on as an intern in the beginning just to ignore him, he tells him the truth.  When he tells Jin he "doesn't belong in a cage" and that he considers him a good person, that was the truth. When he recognizes he’s profoundly wounded Jin for deceiving him for months, he tells Jin the truth. When confronted by Dabi and he doesn’t need to lie anymore in this fight to the death, he tells him the truth despite not actually needing to in hopes to learn the truth behind Dabi and Shigaraki.

I don't have a better segue, so I'll just mention that a lot of folks who believe this also believe the next point.

#3 Hawks is unapologetically emotionally manipulative.

The context makes a huge difference and we need to look at when and why he manipulates others as well as the fact that he does.

At the hero billboards, Hawks plays the heroes on stage as well as the crowd. He's trying to shift the mindset of, "oh yeah, just another hero ranking" to "wake up, mf's, things are changing and you better be ready to change, too!" Rocking the boat is a huge no-no in Japan. Despite being part of his “persona” there is still real social risk involved with this move but one that he deems necessary to turn heads and get gears turning. This is not just an elaborate ploy to get under Endeavor’s skin, but an effort to reach a wider audience while he has them captive.

He does use the public crowd around him and Endeavor before the Hood fight as an excuse for its appearance, but the original intent was to mentally prepare Endeavor for what was potentially (and proved to be) the fight of his life without outright telling him so he could maintain his undercover status. When he realizes he’s part of the reason for Endeavor’s permanent scar and life-threatening injuries, he feels remorse.

He lies to Jin to get information out of him, but linking back to #2, when calls Jin a good person and offers him a way out, he’s telling the truth. He does feel guilt for having to manipulate an otherwise well-meaning person and betraying them, especially given his long-running history of being used and the ongoing issues he suffers from because of it.

When he meets up again with Endeavor to drop his clues about the League’s movements, he squirms when he realizes the interns don’t know him well enough to know he’s blowing smoke because he does NOT want these kids to actually buy what he’s selling. This espionage mission is hard to navigate, and he has to tread carefully lest he setup the dominoes in the wrong places.

This is all to make the point that Hawks is more than capable of emotionally manipulating people, but it’s not in his nature or something he does to any and every person he comes across just because. We haven’t had much opportunity to see him operate outside of the HSPC’s orders which is where the bulk of the instances of his manipulation comes from - those orders requiring him to operate covertly and thus, by nature, necessitate lying, manipulation, and strategically withholding information. 

If anything, when he’s making an appeal to someone else as his own person - not as a hero on a mission- we actually see a level of vulnerability and transparency we don’t otherwise catch.

Though it’s technically canon-adjacent and not necessarily canon in and of itself, in My Hero Academia: Team Up Mission where he works with Bakugo and Midoriya he operates on a level of transparency with them we’re not used to seeing; and my theory is he took it as an opportunity to operate without ulterior motives and build report instead of bucking back against “training up the next generation of heroes” like he initially did with Tokoyami.

Which now actually segues better into the next point.

#4 Hawks never lets people get close to him.

There’s a surprising amount of evidence that Hawks wants the ability to be an open book. Back at Team Up Mission, the restaurant staff note he regularly takes people he likes to their establishment - so we’re basically told outright this is a special place to him reserved for enjoying himself and only people he likes get to share it with him - so we already know what that says about how he sees those two despite their sparse interactions. We already know he’s taken Endeavor there when Endeavor made no move to input as to where he wanted to have the lunch meeting.

Though he kept Tokoyami at arm’s length initially, we have at least three canon instances of him sharing personal interactions with him with other canon-adjacent indications he cares for and values his intern. We’ve readily established that while Endeavor may not consider himself close to Hawks, Hawks does hold Endeavor as near and dear to his heart. While his only mission regarding Twice was to get information out of him, he still made a genuine effort to help and save him because he wanted to and considered him a friend despite the circumstances.

We still don’t know very much of Hawk’s past, his personal relationships outside of work, etc.; but despite the HPSC’s extensive efforts to strip him of his identity he not only possesses a faceted, complicated personality but seems to want to share that with others readily when and in the ways he’s able. Getting into the truly squishy, vulnerable parts of him may take a while, but on a scale of closed to open, he seems to lean towards open.

#5 Hawks is hopelessly in love with Dabi and will abandon everything up to this point for him.

This isn't to throw general DabiHawks shippers under the bus. Most of them know VERY well at this point that canon has sunk that ship, and they're just having fun with it at this point - and you know what, power to you! They look great together! In another life, the character chemistry could have been incredible. There’s a lot of great DabiHawks shipping content I thoroughly enjoy despite not shipping it myself.

It just isn't canon. It never was and never came close. Even now, with the Endeavor reveal being very much imminent, Hawks' view of Dabi is one of a lying, malicious, callous, murderer. Though he’ll likely be crushed at the revelation of what Endeavor’s done, that doesn’t equate to him defecting (especially not immediately) and falling into Dabi’s arms.

And Dabi hates Hawks just as much.

Again, this is not anything against the ship or the shippers - just an annoyance I have with some who were so wrapped up in the ship they were genuinely mad when the ship sank and they dragged that frustration out into the real world against real people when canon didn’t align with fanon. 

Ships are some of the most stupid things to rail against creators and fans over, and the amount of harassment they receive now over shipping has me ripping my hair out when I know it’s a mere fraction of the total pool of shippers who are frothing at the mouth while the rest are super cool and happy doing their own thing and keeping to themselves.

Ship what you want, regardless of “validating evidence” and have fun. Don’t make it others’ problem when it isn’t canonically validated.

#6 Hawks is a dirty cop.

Only half upset with this one because it comes down to the nuance and lack of precise definition of this phrase I have a problem with. Lots of people hate cops for very real, legitimate reasons. Police forces - being a voluntary, government-employed force enforcing government rule - are notoriously prone to corruption of every kind.

It's implied the HPSC is itself corrupt, though to what extent we don't know. (Granted, buying a young child from his family to raise as your personal puppet is pretty high up there.) By continuing to follow orders from the HPSC and not vehemently fighting back, many see him as reinforcing a corrupt institution and at least partially liable for their continued hold on society. 

Fair enough, but... The issue I have with this is it reduces Hawks to his job.

I believe a huge chunk of this take comes from my experience as an armed service member spouse, but it's easy for me to empathize with a guy

Who was promised the moon for himself and his family in exchange for his service not realizing what was actually being asked of him

Is praised outside the organization for "being a hero" and "upholding this country's core values" while first-hand witnessing the corruption of it when inside

Is viewed as a cog valuable only in services rendered instead of being treated like a human by said organization and worked into the ground because of it

Is frustrated by the insistence to keep the status quo instead of improving procedure/infrastructure/environment because egos need to be padded over real, human problems being solved

Has his autonomy or otherwise ability to operate under his own judgement restricted in favor of maintaining organizational control at the cost of effective action

Has DEPENDENTS who rely on his continued work to provide for them and is thus unable to refuse an order, even when it's morally reprehensible and even outright illegal

Whose cries, both those calculated and desperate, to the organization (who have placed themselves as the sole resource he can turn to) for help (even for his own body/mind) fall on deaf ears until he breaks to the point of becoming unusable or dangerous - and even then minimal effort/responsibility is taken in favor of keeping him functioning in the organization as long as possible.

Hawks fights back against the HPSC constantly. He raised concerns over letting civilians suffer to get him in with the League of Villains and then still defied orders by reducing casualties to zero. Despite orders to keep his mission top secret, he's informed Endeavor of his motives/movements independently from the rest of the heroes. He had long refused to take an intern (read: fresh meat for the machine) to train until this year, and even then sought to minimize his encouragement of Tokoyami for as long as possible until he realized Tokoyami was made of the real mettle people needed in a hero and not just another youngster endangering himself on a pipe dream.

He even takes initiative to keep his personal to-do list from the HPSC to a minimum by squashing problems before they come knocking asking him to fix it for them. He knew of the League of Villains and anticipated the escalation of their movements immediately after the USJ incident as well as has a network of informants and connections with local police forces to stay in the know.

His methods for apprehension of criminals are, and continue to be, to react and detain them so quickly they can't retaliate or endanger others in the struggle, thus minimizing human loss and injury despite the insinuation the HPSC has told him that gloves are off in the current situation.

He might be "a cop" depending on the definition we go with, but he isn't a dirty cop. He doesn't plant evidence. He doesn't shoot first and ask questions later. He doesn't blindly take orders. He largely doesn't see "villains" as dirt under his shoe but as people pushed to extremes. He's a morally convicted individual trying to rebel within the system instead of tearing it down outright. He may be wrong in the assumption, but he genuinely believes he can do more on the inside of the system than outside.

#7 Hawks is a manwhore.

Ok, this one is not serious and actually just to end this all on a lighter note after ranting until I'm blue in the face. 

I'm 100% guilty of this myself. Something about that chicken makes me and many others salivate - either for themselves or to watch him with someone else. We love dressing him up slutty, portray him as flirting unashamedly, and placing him in as many overtly sexual scenarios possible.

The best part about all of it, though, is that it’s almost the exact opposite of how he dresses/conducts himself in canon. His clothes are loose fitting and high-coverage. He’s personable, but never gives any indication he’s romantically/sexually involved or interested in anyone. The asscourse is real only because we cannot confirm either way due to his baggy clothes. His overall figure/body shape has been hinted at, but only recently confirmed; and his jacket had to be literally be burned off to get a good look at the pattern of his shirt under it!

~~~~~~~

And with that, I release the frustration and move on. 

Enjoy fanon as much as you like - even I do! Just be aware of where canon and fanon diverge, and definitely don’t take the difference out on real people. Please also be aware of how others hold their favorite characters dear before flooding the general tags with negativity and creating a hostile environment for them. People latch onto their “comfort characters” for a plethora of reasons, and when they lose that character to the plot, the fandom, or otherwise, they should still be allowed to grieve and celebrate what they had in a safe environment. 

Retaliation in response to others coming against your favorite is also not acceptable behavior. It sucks, but the most mature thing to do is step away from the general fandom, stick to blogs/spaces you know are safe, and let the storm blow over. Comfort characters do not justify mistreating real people no matter how much they may mean to you.

When “canon gets it wrong” is where fanfiction and pockets of the fandom community comes into play. Leave those people alone and let them be. For those who aligned themselves with canon, they are not free game to take personal frustrations out on. Leave those people alone and let them be. Unfollow the people/tags you need to for your own sake and others’, and the fandom will be a better place all around over time. Venting belongs in controlled spaces away from the rest of the fandom and with enough warning for those who not only don’t want to endure it but who for their own safety shouldn’t.

Fandom is a community, and healthy communities do not endorse members lashing out when they don’t get their way.

#spoiler!hawks #let's talk hawks

[echodrops]

So, given Dabi's perceived incompetence, you think his scars are self inflicted? I figured that, if Dabi is indeed Touya, he must have tried to impress Endeavor and show him that he is "worth it". So he probably tried to train himself in seclusion. But with a body meant for ice, he was not able to handle the flames and ended up burning himself and running away, traumatized or something along those lines. Admittedly, it could be a stretch, since we have no details on what exactly happened.

Post is NOT spoiler free, watch out anime-only fans~!

Had a bunch of asks about Dabi in my inbox after my Dabi post but I got distracted thinking about ships… I’m back now and gonna answer a few that are all about that Dabi is a Todoroki theory~

Look man, if he’s not Touya, I will officially be the S H O O K E S T. At this point, the real plot twist would be if he wasn’t! I really think there are just so many signs at this point that I can’t make myself believe it won’t happen. I mean the fact that Horikoshi deliberately drew Endeavor’s eyesight being damaged before his confrontation with Dabi so that Endeavor wouldn’t be able to see him clearly??? COME ON.

But man we’re all going to look so stupid if he isn’t Touya…

Rest under the read more to save people’s dashes:

As for how Dabi got his scars… I don’t have any answers, of course, just my own theories and conjectures based on vague statements and panels in the manga…

I guess first I’d point out that while we don’t know really much about Touya at all, we do know a couple things:

1) He physically took after Rei way more than Natsuo or Fuyumi did. Despite being Natsuo’s confirmed older brother, Touya was a tiny kid. Given that he would have to very close to Fuyumi in age or older than her, the fact that he was shorter than his sister just makes this all the more noticeable. This kind of tininess is usually (although of course not always) a deliberate visual indicator that there was something wrong with the child’s health. Looking at the only two panels he appears in definitely gives the impression that he was a pretty fragile-looking kid who I would not be surprised to hear had health problems (bad fevers from an overpowered fire quirk, anyone?).

2) His posture in this frame is also pretty telling. They all look nervous–it’s obvious they’re being looked at by Endeavor and are uncomfortable with it–but while Natsuo looks a little shame-faced and Fuyumi a little confused, Touya is clutching his hands together in a classic “timid child” pose. It seems likely to me that he wasn’t an especially assertive kid.

3) Then there’s the whole hair issue–is his hair red like the anime or white like the manga? The only reason I could see for not coloring his hair dark in the manga is that Horikoshi specifically uses black ink for the red color of the Todoroki family’s hair–coloring Touya’s hair completely black would make it beyond obvious that he’s Dabi. But still, couldn’t he have used tone like he does for Kirishima’s hair? We know that white hair = ice quirk, so I am very interested to find out whether the anime has it right in using red, or whether the white used in the manga is plot relevant, and we’re going to find that Touya really did have a body meant for an ice quirk…

4) We also have Natsuo’s ominous comment:

To me at least, this statement seems somehow… specific? Like there was some Big Deal™ that immediately caused Touya not to be in their lives anymore, and Endeavor was directly involved in it. Natsuo definitely strikes me as the type who would blame Endeavor for a training accident, even if Touya was training of his own free will, but I can’t personally shake the feeling that Endeavor was right there whenever the Bad Thing with Touya happened and that Endeavor, Fuyumi, and Natsuo all know more about Touya’s fate than they’re willing to talk about. I think it’s important that we’ve never seen a scene of Natsuo and Fuyumi getting any close looks at Dabi either.

6) The kids’ ages are important I think. Shouto is about five years old when he sees his siblings playing soccer, and they all looked about the same age there as in this second screen cap, although I wouldn’t put Fuyumi at 12 in the screen cap above, so maybe not… In any case, we know that Shouto was already in training (~5 years old) and Touya had no major visible scars. So Touya made it to at least 12 years old without doing major damage to his body (although of course it could be under the clothes). Based on that, personally I would doubt a bit that he was training and burning himself in secret, at least not for any extended amount of time.

6) The one piece of evidence we have for figuring out what actually happened to cause the scars is the burn pattern itself, especially on Dabi’s face. One thing that people have often pointed out is that Dabi’s facial burns line up fairly well with the places fire also settles on Endeavor’s face:

Also I’m pretty sure Dabi officially qualifies as BNHA’s biggest glow up. If you compare chapter 67 to chapter 190 it’s like looking at two totally different characters lol

But, more importantly than this, I think, is the fact that we never see Dabi’s fire take this shape in the manga. Although in a couple of scenes his flames have covered parts of his face, we’ve never–not even one time–seen fire specifically come from below his eyes or around his mouth like Endeavor. This is not something that normally happens with his quirk–which could mean that he was copying Endeavor when the injuries occurred.

So what did happen?

I don’t know, but if you ask me for a personal headcanon about it:

In a desperate attempt to protect his mother from being taken away and forced into the mental institution, Touya Todoroki challenged his father to a fight he could never win and pushed his own body so far beyond its limits that he nearly died.

I mean, if sweet baby Shouto had a reaction this intense:

Just imagine the reaction of the children who would have been conscious to see their mother ripped away from their home, possibly violently, possibly forever? With Rei having snapped hard enough to attack Shouto, I can’t imagine that she would have taken well to Endeavor physically confronting and restraining her to force her away… It could have been quite a horrific scene in the house after Shouto passed out from the pain, and what better way to cover up damage to one kid then to blame Rei, who had already damaged the other? This would help lend greater credence to Rei still being in the mental institution too: if the doctors have her on the record for causing or at least provoking the injuries of not one son but two…

Obviously such a fragile-looking child as Touya, who we know was never formally trained, would have stood no chance against an absolutely enraged Endeavor, but if we know one thing about the Todoroki family, it’s that they’re stubborn beyond belief. Endeavor probably batted aside his failure of an eldest son like it was nothing… but Touya refused to stay down. I think, overwhelmed by hatred and resentment, he put everything he had into trying to fight back against his father, bursting with flames too hot for his ill-suited body, heedless of his own pain.

That break in Dabi’s bottom lip is from the unprotected skin splitting as he screamed in rage and agony while on fire. Just sayin’!!

And even after going beyond his limits in every way, to still inevitably be crushed beneath his father’s heel… I can’t imagine the degree of loathing such a miserable defeat would make a child feel for heroes and all of hero society who let down the Todoroki siblings so badly…

If Touya ran from the hospital afterward, we could even be looking at a situation in which Dabi has been raising himself all alone since he was 12 or 13. Hell, he might even have caught the tail-end of Stain’s soapbox speeches about the revival of heroics while living out on streets…

BUT, YOU KNOW, that’s just my imagination running wild. XDD

I’m sure that my headcanon is too exaggerated to be true, but I do think the scars are self-inflicted and that Touya did fight with Endeavor at some point before abruptly leaving the Todoroki household.

Or… he’s not even a Todoroki and he totally gave himself those scars just to look cool or something lolol.

It’s SYMBOLICCCCC.

Okay, being a little more serious, I think it’s mostly being used the same way as that one scene of Itachi in the rain in Naruto:

Holy shit I never thought I’d be looking at a page of the Naruto manga again…

It’s basically a scene used to humanize and show a tiny glimpse of a “villain” character’s hidden depths–is Dabi all evil, or is there some softness underneath?

The blood is definitely supposed to symbolically represent tears, which actively tells the reader “Something about the idea of families hurts Dabi.” Coupled with the fact that he’s also smiling in a way that does not suit the moment at all and talking about how thinking about what Snatch said actually drove Dabi crazy, I think we’re also supposed to be getting the feeling that Dabi is not quite as calm and collected as he seems to be on the surface. We all love to call him the “sane man” in the League of Villains’ sea of crazy, but it’s entirely possible that Dabi is experiencing or has, at some point, experienced a psychotic break and that the almost lazy, unaffected behavior we see from him most of the time is little more than a thin veneer on top of a much less stable inner-mind…

What interests me is how many people (even the BNHA wiki) seem to suggest that these symbolic blood tears indicate that Dabi feels remorse for the families of all his victims… But I wonder if that’s really the case at all.

Does he feel remorse regarding his victims’ families… or only his own? While I think it’s tempting to imply that Dabi feels bad about all the families he’s hurt in general (which would be a good redemption arc flag), I’m actually inclined to think that Dabi is a little more self-centered character than that, and it’s his own family that’s on his mind here, not guilt over strangers he’s never met and never will meet.

I lol’d. Even more than that–by saying this to Endeavor, he’s almost certainly ensured another Dabi vs. Endeavor clash in the future, so like… he basically gave his dad impenetrable plot armor for another 50-100 chapters. XDDD

Dabi, my dear heart, why are you such a dumpster fire???

#dabi #dabi is a todoroki #touya todoroki #dabi headcanons #boku no hero academia #bnha spoilers #boku no hero academia meta #dabi meta #you can pry this headcanon from my cold dead hands #my hero academia #my hero academia spoilers #I dislike when series are not named the same thing across all languages #it's a pain feeling obligated to tag with two names for the same thing