phoenix ✦ k.takami (hawks)

One

She dipped her wings in ink to cover up her scars and wrote her story in the sky, her words lit up like stars.

~ Christy Ann Martine

Track 2: Notice Me by Tobi Lou & Mia Gladstone

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The steady showers that fell from the sky patterned onto the sidewalk, puddles leftover from the endless downpour. It had been raining for the past three days, the sun hidden behind the rolling black clouds. The horizon rumbled in the distance; the arrival of a spring storm.

Yet the storm had not reached a small province on the outskirts of Musutafu where a silver car passed under a grainy streetlight, splashing a puddle onto the sidewalk in front of a small, local bar. Above a set of glass doors was a neon blue sign that displayed the outline of a phoenix.

It was warm inside, the atmosphere welcoming to anybody looking to get out of the humid rainstorm with a background of soft music playing off of the jukebox in the corner by the mixing bar. The walls were covered in newspaper clippings on heroes and paintings created by an unknown artist. The array of stiff drinks and warm food were a bonus to the comfortable joint.

Many of the locals would stop by after work to drink a beer and decompress, and you recognized most of them as regulars who had been loyal since your mother had first opened. Yet there were always the nights where a strange face would pop in now and again.

In front of you sat an underground hero. He wasn't popular by any means, tending to lurk around for night patrols and avoid the media like they were a plague. During the day he was a teacher at U.A.: the high school you had graduated from. He'd been there for a little over six years, known to be one of the toughest instructors at the top hero school in the country. He'd expelled a whole class a year ago, and that threat lingered over the heads of his current students; like a guillotine held by a thin string.

Aizawa Shota had always been one of the most pessimistic, brash people you knew in the world. He worked hard to get where he was though he never took the hardships he faced in becoming a hero for granted.

That's how he ended up sitting at one of his top prodigy's businesses, nursing his second glass of sake as the night passed on. It was early morning now, the sun would be rising within the next few hours. Seeing the hour, it was common for few people to still linger around inside. At the moment you only had three patrons: Eraserhead, a regular who lived across the street and another who had just finished his shift at work.

Aizawa stopped by a few nights a week to wind down after his shift of night patrol was over, though he'd been on rest for awhile besides teaching his students. He was still covered head to toe in bandages, though his arms were almost fully healed by now thankfully. You hated seeing him in such a condition but he wasn't the type of man to let you fret over him; it would just piss him off.

"How are your new students, Zawa?" You inquired, leaning over the granite bar top and propping yourself up with a hand.

"Loud, obnoxious, idiotic children." He took a sip of his drink through a straw and sighed. "Especially one of them. He has an impeccable quirk yet his personality says otherwise."

"Is his attitude as bad as mine?" You questioned with a chuckle.

"No. He's by far worse than you. While you were only aiming for the top to fill your fathers boots, he's looking to surpass All Might just because he's number one." He replied bluntly.

"I still think that's an admirable goal, trying to be number one." You mused, waving off the man who lived across the street as he set off the door chime.