Chapter Text
Hawks hasn’t been to Japan in a decade or so. As much as he enjoyed wandering through Europe and traveling across the Middle East, it’s nice to be back. Nothing quite beats Japanese chicken skewers and a good platter of fresh sushi. Japan is the closest thing to motherland that he has, even though it’s laughable to say that someone like him could have such a thing in the first place.
“Where are we going?” The child behind him asks. They’ve been walking through the outskirts of Musutafu for a while now.
“I told you, we’re meeting up with an old friend of mine,” Hawks reminds him. He frowns when he sees that his charge is wandering off the beaten path. “Tsukuyomi, do I need to be carrying you?”
In spectacularly stubborn six-year-old fashion, Tsukuyomi shakes his head and harrumphs. “No.”
“Alright, then pay attention and follow me.” Hawks slows down for Tsukuyomi’s benefit, wondering just when exactly he became a babysitter. Well, he doesn’t need to wonder. It’s been exactly one year and three months and sixteen days since he was saddled with the kid, after all.
Not that Hawks dislikes children or Tsukuyomi; he just has no damn idea what to do with the kid, is all.
They reach the foot of a hill when Hawks’s feathers pick up on the presence of somebody else. He doesn’t need to even guess who it is; he could recognize that odd mix of gunpowder and shampoo anywhere.
“Lady Nagant!” Hawks calls, waving an arm at the figure leaning against a tree. “Long time no see.”
“Hawks,” Nagant greets him. Then she glances down at Tsukuyomi, amusement flashing through her eyes and then hidden behind a facade of calm once more. “And this is your new partner?”
“Yeah. Long story short, he’s too strong.” Hawks watches Tsukuyomi hide behind his legs and peek curiously at Nagant. It’s kinda cute. “They wanted someone qualified to keep an eye on him, and my old partner just retired, so.”
“I see.” Nagant kneels down and offers Tsukuyomi a smile. She’s always had a soft spot for kids. “Hello, you can call me Lady Nagant. What should I call you?”
The kid blinks and inches forward. “Tsukuyomi.”
“Nice to meet you, Tsukuyomi.” Nagant says, patting the kid’s feathers, and a shadowy head pokes itself out of Tzukuyomi’s chest. “Oh, and who’s this?”
“I’m Pan!” The shadow says. “I want pats, too!”
Nagant chuckles. “Of course.”
She pats Pan, who purrs and nuzzles his head against her hand, and Nagant shoots Hawks a mildly impressed look. She can probably sense how much power Pan is packing under that childish, silly exterior.
“Speaking of partners,” Hawks says, taking a quick look around to confirm that nobody else is there. “Where’s yours?”
Nagant sighs and stands back up. “Overhaul’s gone missing.”
“Missing?” Hawks parrots. “You lost him?”
“I know where he is,” Nagant says irritably. “In a general sense. He’s not leaving this city any time soon, so I’m letting him have his fun. I’ll hunt him down later.”
Hawks thinks letting Overhaul wander the city unsupervised is a bad idea, but it’s not his place to tell Lady Nagant that she should be keeping her partner on a leash. “Alright, then. It was good to see you. We’ll probably stick around here for a few more days, so we can meet up again soon.”
“Stay out of trouble,” Nagant says with a small smirk, and she walks off.
With a snort, Hawks turns back to catch Tsukuyomi staring intensely up the hill. “What, is something there?”
“I don’t think so,” Tsukuyomi says. “Not anymore.”
That’s a very cryptic statement, but children are prone to making those, sometimes. Hawks is getting used to it. “Okay, well, if nothing’s there, let’s get going. It’s getting late and we—”
A tingle starts up the base of Hawks’s spine and sparks upwards, stretching all the way through his wings like an electric shock. He flexes his wings on instinct as he feels a magnetic pull, a siren call of somebody who needs him right now.
“Shit,” Hawks breathes, because he hasn’t felt this in ages and intended to never experience it again, but he can’t ignore the heartfelt plea that’s tugging at his very existence. “Tsukuyomi, I gotta go. It’s not far from here, but take this.”
He tucks a feather under Tsukuyomi’s leather bracelet and deems it satisfactory. He can track the kid down later if Tsukuyomi fails to catch up.
“You can find me, right? Don’t get into trouble,” Hawks says, trying to speak calmly even though his instincts are screaming at him to go.
Tsukuyomi doesn’t even look at him. “It’s fine, go. I’ll find you.”
With his partner’s approval, Hawks finally stops resisting the call and finds himself summoned to a different location. Indoors, still in Musutafu, he thinks. Traditional Japanese interior. And most importantly, a sobbing boy hunched over under his duvet.
“Hey,” Hawks says softly as he kneels down, and the kid flinches and curls into a tiny little ball. “Hey, it’s okay. I won’t hurt you, I promise.”
The kid sniffles and peers up cautiously with mismatched eyes. Hawks worriedly notes the scar marred across the kid’s face. That doesn’t bode well. “Who are you?”
“Me? I’m Hawks.” Hawks smiles. Not too bright or too brash, but inviting enough to lower the kid’s guard down somewhat. “What’s your name, kid?”
“Shouto,” the kid says after a long moment, clearly torn between trusting a stranger with his name and the strange urge to put his faith in Hawks. That’s normal. Now that the kid has summoned Hawks, he’s bound to feel a connection between them. “Todoroki Shouto.”
Hawks tilts his head. The name rings oddly familiar, but he can’t quite remember why. “Shouto. That’s a nice name. Do you know why I’m here?”
Shouto shakes his head.
“Because you asked for help,” Hawks says, keeping his voice calm and soothing. “And I’m here to help you.”
“How did you know?” Shouto asks, his sniffling dying down, replaced with blooming curiosity. It’s a good sign. “I didn’t tell anybody.”
“I heard you,” Hawks says, because it’s true.
He’s about to ask Shouto what he needs when he senses incoming footsteps. Heavy ones, almost akin to stomping. Judging by the way Shouto shrinks into himself, he hears it too.
Hawks doesn’t overthink it; he scoops Shouto up into his arms, cradling the boy protectively to his chest, and tucks his wings tight against his back. Seconds later, the room’s sliding door opens up to reveal a tall man with a surly look on his face. The surliness fades in a flash though, when he realizes a stranger is in his home with Shouto in his arms.
“Who the hell do you think you are,” the man snarls, flames curling from his skin, eye-searingly bright in his rage. “Let go of my son immediately.”
Fire. Red hair. Todoroki. Oh, Hawks knows who this is, now.
“Endeavor?” Hawks asks, unimpressed. The nation’s second-place hero. He’s seen videos of him before, but wow, the man is bigger than Hawks thought. Very big, compared to the small child Shouto is. Hawks isn’t fond of that thought. “Okay, chill down and hear me out.”
“To think that you’d take a child, my child, hostage,” Endeavor growls, and the flames flare wider, enough for Hawks to feel the heat despite the fact that they’re on opposite ends of this spacious room.
Hawks raises an eyebrow. “Okay, you know what, I’m not putting up with this.”
He extends and flaps his wings hard, just once, and Extinguishes all the fire in a single gust of wind. The bewildered look on Endeavor’s face would be funny, if it weren’t hiding a slightly frantic and terrified edge to it. The face of a man who’s realizing that somebody who can overpower him is in possession of his own child.
“Okay, jeez, I’m not the bad guy here.” Hawks glances down to see Shouto staring wide-eyed at him, as if astounded by Hawks’s little trick. Repressing a smile, Hawks looks at Endeavor again. “I’m here because Shouto needed me.”
“Needed you?” Endeavor asks, incredulous.
Hawks rolls his eyes and spreads his wings. “Yeah, he was pretty desperate.”
It takes a second for Endeavor to catch on. “You’re an angel?”
“Your son’s guardian angel, now,” Hawks says agreeably. He squeezes Shouto once. “So as his guardian angel, I gotta ask…why was your son praying so hard for somebody to help him?”
Endeavor just stares, wide-eyed. He’s not playing dumb, Hawks realizes. The man genuinely doesn’t understand that his son desperately wanted somebody to rescue him, and he has no clue as to why. The man is utterly unaware of his own child’s distress, and that pisses Hawks off.
“Who even gave you your Blessing?” Hawks says, exasperated. What kind of god is neglecting their Champion to the point where he’s being this much of a terrible father?
Hawks narrows his eyes and takes a good look at Endeavor. While most angels aren’t powerful enough to discern which god a person’s Blessing comes from, Hawks can figure it out after a few seconds. “Oh, for hell’s sake. The god of perseverance? That actually explains a lot.”
Endeavor flinches. Not all people with Blessings make the identities of their gods public. Often, in fact, people tend to keep that information private nowadays. “What does that have to do with my son?”
“Oh, you really don’t get it?” Hawks asks, exasperated. “I bet you were so focused on what you were trying to achieve that your tunnel vision blinded you to the things that really matter. Like your son’s emotional state. Perseverance is good and all, but you’re a goddamn parent. You should be taking better care of your kid.”
“Are you saying that you came here to save my son from me?” Endeavor looks like he’s been slapped.
“Well,” Hawks starts, then pauses when a worrisome thought occurs to him. “Hold on, do you have any other kids?”
Endeavor startles, words starting to form in his mouth just as a familiar voice chirps from behind the man, “Hawks, I figured it out!”
It’s Tsukuyomi, standing behind Endeavor and looking not the least bit intimidated by the way the hero scowls down at him. “How on earth did you get in here?”
Tsukuyomi shrugs, then looks back at Hawks. “Somebody on that hill we were on, the one that looked like it was all burned out? Somebody made a deal with a demon there a year ago. A really powerful demon.”
“Huh.” That’s what Tsukuyomi must’ve sensed, then. Hawks can’t sense demons’ dealings like Tsukuyomi can. “You mean Sekoto Peak, right?”
Endeavor makes a wounded noise, his eyes huge as he says, “A year ago…?”
Tsukuyomi tilts his head to the left. “In the winter, I think? Whoever it was, they must’ve made the deal and started the fire.”
There’s silence for a long, uncomfortable moment before Endeavor says in a very small voice, “My eldest son died there last winter, on the day of the fire.”
“But whoever made the deal got out alive,” Tsukuyomi says, sounding a little confused. “I don’t think anybody died there.”
“How would you know that?” Endeavor demands, desperation cracking through his voice, and Pan pokes his face out of Tsukuyomi’s chest with a wary hiss. “Who the hell are you?”
Black wings flicker into sight on Tsukuyomi’s back, spreading and flexing with defiant intent. Even though Tsukuyomi himself is quite small, his wingspan is fairly wide, so they cast a long shadow through the hallway before they’re gone in a blink.
The manifestation lasted for only a couple seconds at most, but it’s enough for Endeavor to rear back in shock. “A demon…?”
“Tsukuyomi’s senses are pretty accurate. Demons can usually tell when there’s been a deal made nearby and in recent years,” Hawks finally says as he hesitantly, slowly puts the pieces together. “Endeavor, I think your eldest son is alive.”
-
They relocate to the living room where Endeavor can sit and process the enormity of what he’s learned in the past fifteen minutes. One son alive but most likely having made a deal with a demon, the other so desperate for help that he summoned his own guardian angel. Both proof that somehow, something went horribly wrong in his own household, and that the blame might lie with him.
“Okay, look, I get that this isn’t a great time to discuss custody issues with you right now,” Hawks says as he cards his fingers gently through Shouto’s hair. The kid is sitting on Hawks’s lap, remarkably quiet as he watches his father cautiously. Tsukuyomi is sitting beside Hawks on the tatami mat, playing with Pan as he presumably tunes the conversation out. Across from Hawks, Endeavor sits staring down at the table between them. “But I’m not leaving Shouto—or any of your other kids, actually—to be raised by you until you get your crap together.”
Endeavor rubs his face with one hand. Just looking at him makes Hawks feel vicariously tired. “Are you saying that you’re going to take my children and go live somewhere else until you think I’m a suitable parent?”
Hawks opens his mouth to say that’s exactly what he means when he realizes that he doesn’t actually have a house to raise human children in and that he knows nothing about how to take care of a kid, let alone several of them. Sure, he’s been looking after Tsukuyomi for a while now, but Tsukuyomi is far from human.
“Well, no.” Hawks recalculates the situation. “I’m saying that I’m going to live here and keep an eye on you. I’m taking your kids if I don’t see any improvement on your end, are we clear?”
“We’re living here?“ Tsukuyomi asks in a puzzled tone. Apparently he was paying attention after all.
“Yes, we are.” Hawks has a split second of self-flagellation, wondering what the hell he’s doing, making such momentous decisions on the fly, buy Shouto clings onto his sleeve, looking up at him with such relief that he can’t bring himself to regret what he just said. Hawks looks back at Endeavor. “You got a problem with that?”
Endeavor stares at him, his expression unreadable, until he lowers his head and says, “No. Stay as long as you need.”
Hawks swallows a sigh of relief. He’s glad he didn’t have to resort to an ugly argument right in front of the two kids. “Okay, good. Shouto, the adults have to talk now. I’ll be here when you wake up, so go to sleep, okay?”
The kid hesitates, then nods. Hawks presses a hand to his forehead, and within seconds, Shouto is asleep in Hawks’s arms.
“Okay, now tell me everything.” Hawks glances at Tsukuyomi, who has progressed into playing cat’s cradle with Pan. Well, he doesn’t think it’ll be as potentially hurtful for Tsukuyomi to hear what happened to this family, so he doesn’t put his partner to sleep. Instead, he directs his gaze back to Endeavor, who looks a little lost as to where to begin. Hawks deigns to give him a nudge. “Start from how you got married.”
-
About 37 percent of the human population receives Blessings from gods, who exist in their own realm. Depending on how powerful the god is and how much they take a liking to the recipient, they can bestow anything from a minor gift to an incredibly strong superpower. One human might gain the ability to shrink in size at will; another might be able to manipulate the ages of other human beings. Two humans can receive differing Blessings from the same god, and a god can bless as many humans as they like. Generally, humans receive Blessings between the ages of four and twelve, though occasionally older humans belatedly receive Blessings as well.
And out of those people with Blessings, roughly four percent of them are crowned as Champions. The gods’ chosen ones. While most humans meet their god only once in their lifetime when they are given their Blessing, the chosen few are revisited sometime between the ages of fourteen and nineteen. When a god revisits a human to crown them as a Champion, the human grows significantly stronger, both in terms of physical strength and their Blessing’s power. Not only that, but Champions become notably healthier, becoming immune to illness and even healing near instantaneously when injured. Champions are, for lack of a better word, superhuman.
Many, many centuries ago, Champions used to fight each other in the names of their gods. That kind of thing is regarded as old-fashioned nowadays, but society has found a new way to put Champions to use.
Heroes. The government-approved, society-serving humans who fight criminals that have their own powers to prevent ordinary humans from arresting them. Heroes consist solely of those who have Blessings, with the majority of them being Champions. While humans with ordinary Blessings also are welcome to apply to become heroes, they’re rarely as prominent as the gods’ favored ones. There’s a reason the top twenty heroes in Japan are all Champions.
There’s a certain kind of reverence for Champions, given how rare and powerful they tend to be, and they’re almost as worshipped as gods themselves are. Which is ironic, given that most of the time in modern society, nobody knows which god the Champion is favored by. It could be the god of medicine, the god of friendship, the god of wisdom. It could even be the god of plagues, the god of tragedy, the god of destruction. There are thousands of gods out there, and there’s no use in saying which of them are good and which of them are evil. They are simply who they are, and their Blessings are neither meant for good or evil. They’re meant as gifts, and it’s up to the humans to wield them as they see fit.
The same goes for angels and demons. There’s no inherently good or evil nature to either of them. They live amongst humans, undetected, and only reveal themselves when they’re summoned by another human. Angels are often summoned by sheer luck and desperation, a prayer that manages to reach them bringing them to a human’s aid. Demons are summoned by humans similarly.
The difference between angels and demons is simple enough: angels will provide lifelong protection for no cost, whereas demons will grant any wish within their power as long as the human can pay the price the demon demands. Humans tend to summon angels by accident when they simply need help, whereas humans tend to summon demons when they have a specific intent or wish in mind. Either way, it doesn’t necessarily mean that angels are better than demons or vice versa. They simply have different natures.
And because of those different natures, as a way to balance each other out, each angel is partnered with a demon. It’s a buddy system of sorts, one that developed mostly out of a need for companionship; being semi-immortal on your own in a human world is lonely, after all. It couldn’t work in pairs of angels or pairs of demons, mostly because conflicts of interest could arise, and thus they’d settled on angels and demons partnering together.
So angels and demons roam the earth, protecting people or granting wishes, simply adhering to their own sets of neutral rules that have nothing to do with good and evil. After all, sometimes even the most heinous human beings summon angels simply out of desperation, and even the kindest of humans can summon demons simply because they wish to help others. There are stereotypes about angels and demons, but they have little bearing on reality.
The idea that a guardian angel kept watch over their charge every hour of every day, for example, is a stereotype. Angels—and gods as well, to be honest—are not omniscient. An angel doesn’t keep track of their human incessantly, but they can always be summoned to their human’s side in an instant if their human calls for them.
So in theory, Hawks doesn’t have to live in the Todoroki household. He could travel to the other side of the planet, if he wanted, and he’d still be able to come to Shouto’s aid in a heartbeat if the boy reached out for him.
But Hawks knows, from the small hand still gripping his sleeve even as the kid dozed in his arms, that he can’t leave. Not yet.
-
Once Hawks gets the gist of things from Endeavor, he mulls over the entire story with a critical mind. Even accounting for the fact that the entire story was told from Endeavor’s perspective and must be missing pieces here and there, he can tell that most of it is true.
Todoroki Touya had never received a Blessing and he hadn’t taken it well, sinking deeper and deeper into obsession as the rest of Endeavor’s children had each received their own minor Blessings. Then, when Shouto had been bestowed with a surprisingly strong Blessing two years ago, Touya had finally tipped over the edge. He’d obsessed over finding a demon to grant him powers instead—Hawks had seen his fair share of humans make that deal—and while Endeavor and his wife had tried their best to convince him that it wasn’t necessary, he hadn’t listened.
The day the fire started at Sekoto Peak, Touya had claimed to Endeavor that this time, he’d summon a demon for sure.
Endeavor had dawdled, believing his son would come back after another failed attempt. He’d eventually gone to fetch his son, only to see that Sekoto Peak was engulfed in flames. They’d never discovered anything left of Touya except his jawbone, and until today, Endeavor had believed that Touya had summoned a demon, only to pay the price with his life.
That was another stereotype. Demons rarely ever asked for the summoner’s life in exchange for granting their wish. Still, Hawks couldn’t blame Endeavor for thinking that. Why else would have Touya never returned home?
So Endeavor had spiraled from the loss of his son, driving his family into corners until his wife had a nervous breakdown and pushing his youngest son too far until Shouto summoned a guardian angel. Endeavor hadn’t even realized how much harm he’s wrought upon his family until now.
“Well, it won’t undo the damage you’ve done,” Hawks says, picking his words with care—because he might disapprove of the man’s past, but that shouldn’t mean he should write off the man’s future, “but you can change.”
Endeavor swallows. “And you’ll make sure…my children will be safe?”
From me? Is the unspoken addendum, but Hawks hears it anyway. “I mean, I’m no pro at raising kids, but I can learn. I’m an angel. I’ll make sure they’re safe.”
“You must know the basics, if you’ve managed to take care of your partner so far.” Endeavor glances at Tsukuyomi, who’s fallen asleep, slumped against Hawks’s side. Hawks uses a wing to pull the kid in closer. “I didn’t know angels could have red wings.”
“Stereotype,” Hawks says quietly. “But yeah, you can make sure I don’t accidentally starve the kids, and I’ll make sure you don’t traumatize them.”
Endeavor nods. “I…appreciate that. Thank you.”
“Well, it’s kinda my job now.” Hawks looks down at Shouto sleeping, cuddled up against his chest. He knows Endeavor has no clue which god blessed his son, but Hawks can see it clear as day. Endeavor has no idea how lucky he is. “So…do you have any spare rooms?”
-
Shouto is elated to see Hawks the next morning, whereas Fuyumi and Natsuo are surprised and disbelieving of the fact that an angel and demon will be living under their roof. They eventually get through introductions though, and all three children look somewhat relieved to have someone else to take care of them.
“What do we call you?” Fuyumi asks over breakfast. “Is Hawks your real name?”
“Hawks is the name I use in general. We have real names, but those our supposed to be secret, since they can be used to summon us,” Hawks explains. “We don’t have human names, though, so maybe we should come up with those.”
Natsuo looks excited. “We can help!”
Hawks doesn’t mind. He glances at Tsukuyomi. “You okay with that?”
Tsukuyomi shrugs. “Yeah.”
And thus the Todoroki children, along with some input from Endeavor—“Enji,” the Champion corrects—create names for both Hawks and Tsukuyomi, and even Pan as well.
“Takami Keigo,” Hawks says aloud, scrunching his nose. “Man, it feels weird. I haven’t had a human name in a while.”
“We can call you Hawks at home,” Enji says awkwardly. “And use the name only when there are other people around.”
Fuyumi looks at Tsukuyomi. “Is Tokoyami Fumikage okay with you?”
Tsukuyomi tilts his head thoughtfully, then nods. “I like it. And Pan likes Dark Shadow, too.”
Hawks personally thinks both names are a bit on the nose, but as long as Tsukuyomi is happy, well. It’s not his place to rain on the kids’ parade. “Alright, then. Looks like it’s decided, then.”
Shouto peers at Tsukuyomi. “Can I call you Fumikage?”
Tsukuyomi, who probably doesn’t quite understand what the intimacy of first names are in Japan yet, nods. “I don’t mind, Shouto.”
Shouto lights up a little, and Hawks wonders if the kid has never had a friend before. Well, having a demon as your first friend can’t be all that bad. When Hawks glances up at Enji, the man looks rather regretful. Like he’s realizing how long it’s been since he’s seen his children smile.
“Okay, everybody,” Hawks says ruffling the feathers on Tsukuyomi’s—Fumikage, he supposes he should say—head. “Ready to start the day?”