Convalescence || Dabi x Reader

Chapter 16: How Convenient

Warnings: strong language,

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(y/n)'s POV

*six years previous*

I was antsy at first, but it's morning and he still hasn't returned. My feet carry me as fast as they can toward the nearest police station. When I arrive, I tear open the front doors and rush to the front desk where a single woman stands chatting with the clerk. I push past her.

"Help, please! My roommate has gone missing and I-"

"Oi, this lovely lady here hadn't finished yet. Wait your turn like a good little girl," the clerk gives me an icy stare before turning again to the woman.

"Oh it's quite alright," she says and I respond with a grateful smile, "I was just making chit-chat, and I don't want to get in the way of something important. I'll see you tomorrow for lunch, alright?"

"Alright, fine. Take care." The clerk turns his irritated gaze once again to me, "Now, what was it you were saying? Someone went missing?"

"Yes. I haven't seen my roommate in 24 hours, and he hardly ever leaves the apartment especially without letting me know about it," the words fall frantically from my lips.

"Have you considered that he didn't want to tell you where he was headed? It sure seems like you're very controlling over him, so maybe he wanted to get away from you specifically," the clerk quips.

I stare at him for a moment in disbelief.

"That's not for you to decide," I defend.

"Whatever, I'm just saying," he sighs. "Can you give me his name?"

"Touya."

"Last name?"

My body tenses as the realization takes over me.

"I don't know his last name."

"Tch, seriously? You need to know where he is every second of the day, but you don't know something as simple as a name? Do you at least know the date of birth, or even just his age?"

"January 18, 23XX. He turned seventeen at the beginning of the year." The clerk looks up at me with suspicion in their eyes.

"A child, that's who you've been living with. How old are you?"

"Eighteen."

"Who are his parents? And why hasn't he been living with them?"

I hesitate. This is the police; I shouldn't lie to them.

"They were mentally and physically abusive toward him. Plus, they think he's dead."

"How convenient."

He eyes me up and down before continuing. Question after question follows, and after an hour, I'm told to head home to wait for any updates on their search.

When I reach the door, I hear the clerk whisper something under his breath, "What a nutjob."

I was able to use my accumulated paid time off to stay home for the next few days, but I don't receive a call until three days later. That same clerk informs me that the search turned up with nothing and that with the medical condition he was in, my roommate was most likely dead.

My world shatters and fades from view. I do nothing but cry, moping around the apartment for the following week. I have no body and no money for a funeral. There are no friends or family of his that I can call, and I no longer have any of my own to console me. I'm entirely alone now.

I take a copy of Frankenstein, the first book I gave him to read, into the woods where I burn it in memory of Touya, collecting the leftover ashes. Using this as a substitute – an unworthy replacement for the real thing – I set up a soreisha (altar) in my living room; the knowledge that I have no photo of him to add to it claws at my heart.

Everything surrounding it is white: the rope that hangs above it, the paper notes, the candles, and the dishes. With every dinner, I offer a small portion of it to the memorial shrine, placing it on the frontmost dish – it feels the most right since we shared dinner every night.

Eventually, I return to work, but nothing is the same. Touya is always in the forefront of my mind, and the accompanying numbness takes hold of my very being for many months. His spirit haunts me, breathing down my neck and never leaving. I become restless. Anxious for some closure, I am driven to hack into the police records from a library, hoping to find any information they found or trace of him to prove that he existed at all.

There is nothing – more than nothing in fact. My search covers every incident filed on and after the day I went to the police, but such a file did not exist.

Anger and disbelief consume me, washing away the numbness. After that day, I start training myself and my quirk again, preparing to take matters into my own hands. 'With a strong conviction, a single person can change the world.' That's what Touya believed with all his heart. Whether it means saving people from outside the hero system or committing a few crimes, I intend to do just that.

*present time*

"The last thing you talked to me about was how terrible the hero system was, and it is. I admit it: you were right. But that idea infected my grieving mind like a weed, so here I am. I work a real job in an office, but every moment spent outside of those hours is put toward bringing down those in corrupt positions one by one; it is spent doing a hero's job, both to help the citizens themselves and discredit those heroes who were too late. I am neither hero nor villain, but I do what good I can to make up for the sins I have committed – though nothing can truly wash them away. So, what messed up part of you thought that leaving was good for you? Good for me?"

I stand before Touya – though I suppose it is Dabi now – using every ounce of hatred within me to fuel my stare as if my eyes were looking through a red dot sight. I see him conceal a swallow, but during the pause between our exchanges, he remains entirely stoic. It's likely to cover the silent calculations occurring behind his forehead, assembling the perfect response to not set me off. He's nervous, good.

"For me, I needed to follow my mission – my purpose if you will. At the time, my connection to you prevented me from reaching that end goal, so it needed to be terminated immediately. And for you, I predicted that leaving would remove the burden of looking after the weakling that I was and acting as the sole provider for us both. In a financial and mental sense, it would make things easier for you," he speaks in a calm, yet stiff tone – a tone that I refuse to reciprocate.

"Bullshit. Was it not obvious how much I cared for you? Who am I kidding? You're smart, of course you knew, even as a kid, my feelings for you. You knew how much it would make me hurt and you left anyway. You used me and my kindness to fuel your own hatred. Every action, every droplet of "care" you displayed toward me was a lie. You lied, and you lied, and you lied over and over again. And like the idiot I was, I believed every second of it."

I move forward, and he stumbles backward until we reach the edge. I seize him by the throat.

"I am not that gullible child anymore. You broke her; she died alongside the image I held of you, so I will kill you without hesitation if the situation calls for it."

I heat up the hand around his neck as a warning, but then something catches my eye in the distance.

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A/N: Thank you, Touya, for turning (y/n) into a badass vigilante, but how is she supposed to live, laugh, love in these conditions?

Word Count: 1335