Chapter Text
Sir Nighteye had contacted him again.
Hawks breathed in slowly as he entered the man’s office once told to enter. Sir Nighteye had been the reason Kaina had gotten out alive and, hopefully, well. Hawks hadn’t seen her for a long while, now, kept from contacting her by the fact that she’d needed to make a clean break to remain safe from the Commission and their backlash.
She’d run away and been helped by people who’d been able to keep her safe.
All he really knew, right now, was that he was being contacted by Sir Nighteye again. Something about working together, a good mission for the scrutiny of the public in the words of the President of the Commission.
He remembered the letter he’d been handed to give to Kaina. He remembered how she had clung to it, her knuckles white as she read through it. He remembered the way she’d looked wild-eyed after. The way she had slipped away into the night with a kiss to his forehead and a whisper of good luck. With her upcoming reassignment, he figured, she had been the easiest one to slip out and away. Her letter had been for her, but she had read a piece of it to him.
They will shift the blame to you.
He’d believed it the moment she’d read it to him. Knew it was about the HPSC without even having to confirm it.
His hairline still ached where they’d removed the tracts his feathers had grown in. He had been eighteen when Sir Nighteye had slipped him the letter for Kaina. Nineteen when they had surgically removed pieces of him to make him look palatable to the public. Twenty, now, heading into Sir Nighteye’s office again.
“Hawks,” Sir Nighteye stood from his desk, bowing his head. “I hope you are well.”
“Better and better,” Hawks grinned for him, for show, for anyone watching. Smile, boy, be the face we expect you to be. Charm them.
Make them suspect nothing.
“Do you remember the letter I gave to you?” Sir Nighteye’s voice dropped lower, his palms pressed against his desk. Next to them was a small stack of papers and a pluggable device – it looked like one of the ones issued by Ishii Raiden, though it had an H written on it. When Hawks nodded, Sir Nighteye breathed out a sigh of relief. “Good. There is a video for you to watch. There has been a fair amount of them, recorded by the writer of the letter. Important information, the kind you need to know. I do not know what your video says,” he gestured down at the little drive, his hand drifting past the papers. “Your video has an extension that was stored differently than the rest,” Sir Nighteye was still speaking but Hawks wasn’t fully listening anymore.
On the man’s desk was an envelope labeled with the name, ‘Takami Keigo’.
“Yeah?” he managed to tune back in at just the right moment. “How so?” His hands itched to pick up the letter that was for him, it was his, and he needed to know what was written in it. He’d heard rumors about something strange, something to do with time and anomalies and some odd Quirk that the Commission had never been able to track down. Some Pro Hero that had shown up and then disappeared. Just…Vanished. The young woman had gotten away – he was glad she had. They wouldn’t have treated her well.
“The labeling asked me to leave you to watch it alone,” Sir Nighteye held out a pluggable device, meeting Hawks’ eyes. “I would have done so anyway, unless you wanted me to stay, but the other videos were stored on the same drive. Your main video is on there, but something was separated and a letter I was left told me to leave you alone to watch it. I would have given you your privacy to watch this anyway,” he nodded as Hawks took the device. “But it specifically mentioned you being alone.”
Hawks looked at the thing in his hand, then at the computer in front of him. “I’m going to watch this now,” he looked at Sir Nighteye.
Watching as Sir Nighteye inclined his head and walked away, Hawks waited until the door was closed behind him. He sent a feather to the doorway, listening for the vibrations that would tell him someone was still outside, still listening in. He heard and felt Sir Nighteye walking away. He’d already looked around – if there were cameras, he couldn’t see them. He couldn’t even hear the micro noises that hidden ones made. With a gasp of a sound, pain and confusion welling up in his chest, Hawks snatched the letter off the desk and put it in his lap. With that done, he pressed play on the video Sir Nighteye had left him to watch.
A young woman with blue hair was standing in front of a desk, staring at the camera.
She looked exhausted. He’d had days where he could barely keep himself upright let alone fly and he knew exhaustion when he saw it. The circles under her eyes were almost black, and her hands clenching tightly around her elbows. Her arms were held close to herself, her head shaking. “Pro Hero Chronometer, this is a recording…” Her gaze dropped to the floor, her entire body shaking as she took a deep breath. “There was an attack, two days ago. Half of Japan is terrified and falling apart. A third of Jaku is – Well,” she shuddered, gasping quietly. Her eyes closed. “I’m leaving this recording session. Your future self needs to talk to you, Hawks.”
He watched as she left the room, shoulders shaking, a hand pressed over her mouth.
Sitting at the table she’d left behind, Hawks could see, was him.
A future version of him.
The Hawks on the screen watched as the young woman left as well, his hands clasped together in front of himself. He turned back to the camera, taking a deep breath. “There’s a war going on,” he said the words plainly, his voice quiet. “Her fiancée, a Pro Hero by the name of Starlight, died in the destruction of Jaku.”
Hawks looked at the man in the recording, at the way he looked into the camera, the difference in how they held themselves and he knew—
That was Keigo.
There would always be shit the Commission did to him but that, right there, was Takami Keigo. Maybe he’d dropped the family name, maybe he’d left the stained parts of his past behind. Hawks wasn’t certain but he could tell that something was different. Keigo sighed, pushing his hair back with one hand. “You’re probably looking at this right now and wondering if it’s somehow fake. You’re thinking that maybe someone got ahold of a Quirk user who can imitate faces and know names and I have to tell you – No. I already know this is going to be difficult to watch. It’s difficult to record.” Keigo stood up, coming around the desk and leaning his backside against the edge of it. He tucked his hands into his pockets. “But believe me when I say it’s real.”
Hawks picked at the edge of the letter, still watching the screen.
“By now, hopefully, you’ve gotten the letter that goes with this video. I wrote the name on the envelope, and she followed my rules about not paying attention to it,” Keigo shrugged. “She’s smart and she’s trustworthy. At least,” he grinned. “Endeavor trusts her.”
At the name of his hero, Hawks sat up a little straighter. He looked down at the letter and opened the envelope. Carefully, able to be put back together again, and neat. Sliding the contents out, Hawks stared down at the papers in his hands, glancing back up at Keigo. “The letter is pretty much just proof of what I’m telling you,” Keigo continued. “Codes and ciphers and things that only you would know.” He reached into a pocket and pulled out a photo. “This is in there as well.” Hawks found the photo quickly, staring at the details. “And yes, working with him is just as good as you imagined it to be. He’s a grumpy ass at times but,” Keigo grinned, shaking his head. “Well, you’ll see when you get there.”
The photo was of Keigo’s face, peeking out of the corner of the shot. In the background, looking somewhat frazzled, was Endeavor.
“…We couldn’t change your past,” Keigo cleared his throat. “Chronometer gave me that option and I know it is going to seem like the worst thing I could have done to you – I know, I’m sorry – but I couldn’t think of any way to change your past without altering you beyond recognition. I had Chronometer look out into the timelines. She stretched herself out way too far and she ended up hurt for it, but she confirmed what I thought. If I changed anything, you wouldn’t become a hero. You would have gone down the same road as…Well. You know him. If I’d gotten her to put your name, the name you use, on the letter, it would have found you too early. The Commission would have found out about what she’s doing. They would have stepped in and taken control of her.”
Keigo gripped the edge of the desk, setting the photo down. “We couldn’t change who you were. Not without destroying who you become.” He looked to the side, eyes bright and growing wet as he refused to meet the camera. “I can’t save myself, not from them.”
Hawks felt anger, felt it boiling in his gut. “So I’m just fucking stuck with them? For the rest of my life?” he sneered at the screen, a quiet roaring in his ears. “I’m supposed to—”
“And no, you’re not stuck with them,” Keigo seemed to cut him off, looking at his feet now. “The earliest this video is supposed to reach you is twenty. I know what happens that year. You have the billboards to look forward to. Trust me,” he looked into the camera again, eyes wide in the way Hawks knew his always went when he was trying to impress upon someone that there was an action they needed to take. “Go. Don’t hide in the corners, don’t brush it off, don’t find some mission to take or villain to fight. Go to the billboards.”
Hawks looked at the papers in his hands again, sighing. His anger slid away from his grasp, and he couldn’t reel it back in. There were photos, notes, and nothing that would be traditionally labeled as a letter. Sketches of moments in time, pieces of information that couldn’t have been from anyone but himself.
The spot in his room he’d used to hide his plush toy.
Looking over the information he held, Hawks nodded. He could believe it – could believe that this was his future, this was who he became. Someone who held himself taller and calmer. Whose past, shadowed and uncertain, wasn’t hanging over his future. He appreciated his own foresight – hindsight? – for the way everything had been arranged. He knew himself well, after all. Keigo had known that Hawks would refuse to believe something that involved him so closely unless he was given no choice but to believe it. The photos, the codes, all of it was just proof.
“I don’t know what else to say to you,” Keigo made a face, shaking his head. He was chewing on the inside of his bottom lip, Hawks knew it. “I can apologize for not changing anything until I stop breathing but it won’t make a difference. There isn’t much difference between where I am now and where you are, except for what has already been changed.”
He stuck his hands back into his pockets idly. “Except for this.” Keigo cleared his throat and looked directly into the camera. “Your wings are yours,” he paused, hesitating. “But you offer them to someone. You pledge them to someone. And it’s not the Commission.”
A shock of cold, like ice water in a hot glass, poured down Hawks’ back.
Pledging loyalty to someone was not something he did lightly. He’d done it once, as a child, when he’d been told he could be a hero too. His entire life had been bound by that decision – he’d functioned as a spy since he was sixteen years old. Giving part of himself to someone else was not something he did easily. Not something he did lightly. The Commission had been a dagger at his throat, a knife at his back, a sight on his forehead for years. Eat, breathe, drink, smile, dance, move the way they wanted, or they would ensure that he faced the consequences. The price to pay for a calmer world, he had been told. The price to pay for peace.
He had tried to run once.
Just once.
“I know,” Keigo approached the camera and Hawks watched him, watched the smoothed-out lines of a picture-perfect smile he wasn’t holding. With a shake of his head, Keigo laughed. “I know. I know that it doesn’t feel fair – it never has and it never will. Cloak and dagger bullshit to get you in the right place at the right time so they can’t intercept this message to my past self. I advised Chronometer on it, on how to make sure your letter gets to you.”
“I tried to run,” Hawks muttered. “Because I found out what they really wanted to do. Totalitarian, an act of control over anyone with Quirks because they didn’t like the idea of the world being out of their control. The Commission was started back when Quirks first started,” he narrowed his eyes at Keigo, his hands clenching around the papers he held. “I’m in danger if I even think of leaving them. So what are you doing?”
“You have to hope for a better world,” Keigo took a deep breath. “Chronometer is sure she can help our pasts find a better one to live.”
He leaned back against the desk behind him, looking at the ground. Hawks knew that expression, the quietly mutinous rage he lived with, the fury howling in his chest at being chained. “So, I’m going to believe in her. Endeavor trusts her, he’s the one who convinced me to record this video. The Commission fucked up,” his gaze snapped back up to the camera, molten gold, rage making his entire body tremble. “I tried to tell someone when I was younger, if you need more proof that you’re me and I’m you. I tried to run, and I tried to tell someone. They disappeared the hero I tried to work with, tried to tell. They got rid of her and made it seem like a mission gone wrong – they didn’t order me to make the kill happen, but they did order her dead. A price to pay, apparently. A few lives here and there, ruined and shattered and gone, not a big deal in the long run.”
Hawks stared back at Keigo, a shiver trembling his wings as he stared at his reflection – older and angry and forced to live through a few more years of being a public idol. He had only ever wanted to help people, to save them like his hero had saved him.
“They have a price to pay to us,” Keigo hissed out. “To the people they’ve ruined, the ones they twisted, the ones they bent until they broke.”
“The Commission would kill Chronometer if they knew she could do this,” Hawks whispered. “If they knew she could organize something like this across the timeline. I need,” he paused, looking at Keigo, who was taking a deep breath, eyes closed. “I need to keep her safe from them.”
“You don’t deserve to have to pay any more prices for the general good,” Keigo whispered. “And that’s something you’ll be convinced of, someday. Someone very important to you helps you learn that, one day.”
“But I need to help with this,” Hawks studied the screen. “Otherwise we’ll never get free.”
Him, Rumi, the others who had been tapped for the Commission’s ‘Elite Force’ of young heroes. The ones trained and raised and taken from their families. There had been talk of the oldest Todoroki son, a boy Hawks had never met but had heard plenty about. A young man who could wield fire and ice in turn – the Commission would have used him more than they had used Hawks.
“We don’t deserve the pain we’ve lived with for years,” Keigo looked up again. “And if we can help the pieces fall into place, we can help bring the Commission down.”
He stood up straight, turning so that Hawks could see his back for the first time. The open-backed bodysuit he always wore was present, showing off a scarred back, no feathers to be seen. “Because we are done letting them take things from us,” Keigo’s jaw clenched. “Endeavor almost died to a villain attack – I had to save his life.” Hawks had noticed the scarring on his face, the lines of it stretching across his cheek and eye. “The villain turned out to be his own son. If things go the way Chronometer is hoping, he won’t become the same person as he is in our timeline. I lost my wings to him, too. Endeavor’s face was burned, just the same as mine. Our scars match, now,” he lifted his head.
“This is the drive marked with an H,” it was held up, shown to the camera. “Dig through it. It holds all the files I was able to get out without risking myself. It holds the files others have collected on the Commission. Make sure that it gets out there, okay?” Keigo made eye contact with the camera once more. “It holds the secrets about the Commission that I was able to get access to. Their wrongdoings, the list of the dead that they ordered, the people they harmed to get what they wanted.”
Hawks nodded, his wings twitching, flaring. The edges of his feathers sharpened, prepared to fight a battle that hadn’t reached him yet.
An order felt different when it was from himself.
“Bring them down,” Keigo’s voice was softer, almost mournful. “And make sure they can’t pull this on anyone else. Not ever again.”
The video ended when Keigo plucked a remote off the desk and aimed it at the camera. The screen went black and Hawks took a deep breath. That had been a lot, had been almost too much. The knowledge that someone, even his future self, knew what he had gone through was almost a relief. Someone out there, in the endless span of time, knew what had been done to him. He slid the contents of the envelope back where he had found them, tucking it into the inner pocket of his coat. He wasn’t going to return it to the spot on the desk he had found it in. Standing up, Hawks moved to the door, opening it and calling down the hall for Sir Nighteye. It took a minute for the man to return, proving that he had been honest about wanting to give Hawks privacy to watch the video.
“I was told to spread the files on this drive,” Hawks spoke once they were both back in the office, the door shut. He picked it up, holding it out for Sir Nighteye’s scrutinization. He'd set it down, at some point, though he couldn't remember when.
Sir Nighteye stared at him after glancing at it, his eyebrows raised. “Of course. What they are doing is dangerous, in the long run.” He nodded, pulling open a drawer to grab something, holding it out to Hawks in a loose hand. “I do not need to know what yours contains,” his voice was even, calm, and Hawks trusted it more than he had ever trusted the head of the Commission. “But I need you to pass this on to someone named Rumi. As well, I hope the answers you were given have helped you.”
When Hawks took it, he was holding another drive suddenly. “They’ve given me something to work towards,” Hawks lifted his chin, meeting the man’s eyes. “How old is Chronometer now?”
“Eighteen,” Sir Nighteye stood up straight. “I take it your message involved seeing her?”
“Her fiancée died,” Hawks looked away. “There was an attack that collapsed parts of Japan and her fiancée was one of the casualties. I was offered information by my future self,” he tightened his grip on the drives, keeping them close and safe. “And I will act on that information. One key piece of information was that she needs to be kept safe,” he inclined his head, just for a moment. “Thank you for telling me. I will likely see her on patrol, then. I will speak with her soon.”
“If your future—” Sir Nighteye called out as Hawks moved to turn away. “You do not have to do anything your future self asked of you. If your future ordered you to do anything…”
“Nothing I wouldn’t have done anyway,” Hawks smiled, picture-perfect. He was good at that. “And I feel it’s important, so I will listen.”
He bowed to the man, then left.
It was smart.
The secrets he had been gathering in his years with the Commission, sneaking them out on a drive that was sent to the past. Couldn’t get caught for sharing them if they would never be able to trace the info leak back to him.
He could burn the Commission down.