Birds of a Feather

She has been.

カラス
          Karasu landed on a building and took a breath. She hadn't so much as interacted with her mother since she and Hawks had spoken with her a few days ago- but she couldn't really think about that at the moment. "I'm on the roof, Hawks," she said into her comm quietly. "Ready on your signal."
"Me as well," Tokoyami said over the comm line.
"And me." Shinso grunted.
"Man, UA has you three trained so well. You three get in position so quickly every time." Hawks responded. "Everyone stay silent, but get inside quickly."
"Roger roger." Karasu responded and swooped around to the side of the building, spotting a broken window. She crawled inside it carefully, dropping onto the ground. She opened her staff and looked around carefully- the room was small, making it well lit from the single window, and she could clearly see she was the only person in the room. She walked forward carefully and took a deep breath before peering into the hallway. The coast was clear.
That wasn't surprising at this point- that was a bad sign.
They probably knew they were there- just like  they had every other time. Karasu held her staff to her chest to keep it ready but concealed as she stepped around the edge of the door. All clear, still. It made her feathers stand on edge, but it was still good. It gave her a chance to prepare herself. She triple checked both ways and walked down the long straight hall in front of her- it was wide enough that she could effectively use her wings for cover or for a getaway if necessary. She checked each room as she passed them.
Clear.
Clear.
Clear.
Clear.
As she reached the fifth room in the hall a feathered arm reached out and grabbed her by the collar, dragging her into the room and throwing her to the floor.
"Dad." She glared at him.
"I heard you figured Tomie out. She let me know the mission was a fail. I'm not surprised, I warned that Dabi guy not to use her- she's completely useless." Her father growled at her. "I have a different mission, though. Take one or both of you out of commission permanently."
"We figured that out." Karasu gritted her teeth and brought her staff up to hit him across the face before he had a chance to strike her.
He brought his arm up to block it, grunting from the force of her swing. "At least one of you has a little strength to you. Your brother is barely good for a hand to hand fight."
"I think you'll find that untrue if you're threatening my sister." Hawks said from the door.
"Ah! Keigo. Making my job easy, for once. Only fitting I end both your worthless lives after you stopped me from getting the hell out of Kyushu." He shoved her staff back down towards her and kicked her in the chest before taking a few steps back.
Karasu let out a pained breath as she glared at her father. "Hope you don't think that'll do much to keep my from fighting you," she said to him through gritted teeth.
"Raven." Hawks walked to stand just in front of her. "Close your staff. Focus on keeping him pinned- I'll use a few of my feathers to restrain him."
Karasu nodded and stood up, closing her staff and letting it snap back to her wrist. She stood up and stepped in front of her older brother. "Got it." She lunged forward and swooped back at the last moment, kicking her father in the shoulder to throw him into the wall.
Her father jumped up and struck out at her with his left arm, his feathers slicing across her left temple. Blood trickled down from the cuts he had left as Karasu flicked open her staff and struck at him again. He grabbed the wrist of her right hand and twisted it back, she flipped with it to avoid him breaking her arm and splayed her wings out to throw him back.
Hawks sweapt forward and shoved their father into the wall again furiously before kneeling to check on his sister. "How deep did he cut you?"
"Not too deep, I think." She shook her head and touched the wounds. "They're only bleeding this much because they're facial wounds."
Hawks nodded and they both stood up quickly.
"Step back, I'll make an opening for you to restrain him." She said quietly to her brother as she closed her staff and spread her wings out to give herself a fighting stance.
Hawks nodded and stepped back about half the room away from them, watching his little sister carefully.
As their father moved to get up, Karasu struck him across the head with the centre of her staff. She adjusted her grip and pushed herself into the air to keep him pinned under her staff as he tried to duck around it. "God, you're a jackass!" She landed on her feet and closed her staff before grabbing the collar of his shirt and throwing him face first into the ground in front of Hawks. A swirl of red feathers bound his hands, letting Karasu release his collar and stand up.
"I doubt we'll see you ever again, Dad." Hawks said as he flipped the criminal over to face them.
The siblings stood beside each other, glaring down at their father for a moment.
It was odd, in a way, for Karasu to see the physical traits they had inherited from him. The feathers were obvious- but being stared at by their own golden eyes was a strange experience. Those were the singular traits Kido Takami had passed on to his children- maybe a smidge of an attitude problem, but both Karasu and Hawks would call that debatable.
Hawks' feathers dragged their father out the window and immediately he turned to his sister, concern returning to his face as he looked at Karasu's scratch. "How deep is your wound?"
"If it was deep, we'd see my skull." Karasu responded with an amused tone. "We should keep going- just because we apprehended our father doesn't mean we can leave everyone else high and dry."
Hawks nodded but pulled her into a tight hug, closing his eyes.
Karasu hugged him back, half smiling. She knew that dealing with their parents made him feel guilty about their fight even if he didn't need to be anymore. "I'm so glad you're my brother, Keigo."
"And I'm happy you're my sister and that I've gotten to raise you, Kara." He responded as he tugged her closer. After a long moment he stepped away from his sister and nodded. "We'll deal with Mom when we get back to my agency. Whatever you want to do- we'll do it."
"I'm still not sure." Karasu admitted. "I'll figure it out once we're done with this mission."
Hawks nodded and walked ahead of her out of the room, saying "Kido Takami is apprehended" into his comm.
Karasu followed after him quickly, opening her staff as she stepped into the hall.
          "It looks like the PLF abandoned Takami and his cohorts." Jeanist responded over the comms. "We've apprehended four others, no one else is here. They were surprised about that."
"Once they figured out our parents couldn't be used to destroy Hawks and I, they cut them loose," Karasu said with a sigh. "I guarantee this was bankrolled by Dabi from All For One to try and finish his mission of driving us apart."
"And he failed on every front." Hawks said decidedly.
Karasu smiled slightly as she walked behind him. It was actually sweet to see how much Hawks was trying to make sure she knew he wasn't going to push her away again. She knew, though, that she was going to get to be his sister for the rest of their lives. She looked over the railing as they walked to the main living room of the abandoned house.
Below them, Todoroki looked up as he finished locking the cuffs on a villain and stood up, a small smile spreading across his lips when their eyes met with Karasu returning it.
"Oh, you two are just so cute." Hawks said to her teasingly. "N-"
"Not on missions, we know. We just smiled at each other, Hawks. It's nothing." She gave him a look, blushing slightly.
"Mhm." As much as Hawks teased her, he was glad they had each other.
"What happened to your forehead?" Todoroki walked over to them once they reached the main level, looking at the wound her father had managed to give her.
Karasu explained it gently, promising she was fine and it'd be healed as soon as they got back to UA the next morning.
Hawks liked to see how attentive they were to each other. He'd never had the chance to be completely in love like this, but one of the goals he'd had for his little sister when he brought her to live with him was that her life would be different from his. As odd as it could be to watch her growing up in a way that was almost foreign to him, he was overjoyed that it could happen. It was almost a measure of his success in keeping her safe from the commission- even though they had managed to get a few of their hooks in, it was still majorly his own success.
Sending her to UA hadn't actually been his first choice, he had wanted a smaller high school with a more low key hero program but the second he had told the HPSC about that idea, on their request, they had told him they had already arranged for her to go through a modified version of the training that he had experienced. That they'd let her have his private tutors for middle school, and now it was time to actually bring her into the fold.
UA had been an offer they couldn't refuse for her- their concept was to bring her into the fold during her second year, but which is why he'd resisted taking her on in the internship and work study. He didn't want her to be another creature of the commission the way he had been. Every step he had taken with her was to keep her further out of the commission's reach- the commission didn't like their personal heroes to be in a relationship, so her relationship with Todoroki being supported by the public was a strike against them. Her work study with Nighteye had actually ended up being helpful as well, even though hawks himself had opposed it, as it turned out that for Karasu staying away from the top heroes effectively formed her her own separate identity in the public eye, which was also bad for the commission as they just wanted her as a second Hawks. Even by having her tutored through middle school, it hurt the chances the commission had of making her think that the way of living under their thumb was anything close to normalcy. Private tutors in your brother's agency couldn't exactly be called anything close to truly normal either, but it allowed him to show her to the public and for her to interact with other kids her age at pro gatherings.
Karasu falling in love with Shoto Todoroki hadn't been in Hawks' plans- but it had been the perfect thing for her. She knew that he loved her by choice, she never had any reason to fear that someone had forced him to choose her. He had actively made it clear that she was his choice.
Hawks knew that Todoroki had been his sister's safety net when he'd attempted to cut ties with her. If he hadn't known she'd have someone to fall back onto he couldn't have done it. When he had become Karasu's guardian, he had seen what their mother abandoning her had done to her. Having him there had been the only thing to keep her afloat. He also knew that without Todoroki, there would have been no way for them to make up later. Karasu probably wouldn't have ever spoken to Hawks again. Todoroki had kept her heart from hardening the same as she had softened his.
          "We should get back to my agency." Hawks said as they all stepped away from the officers outside and handed the villains over to them.
"Jeanist and I will go to make the official report at the station." Endeavor said. "I assume you and your sidekicks can handle the students?"
"Of course! Not like most of them are even high strung enough to be a problem." Hawks gave him a small salute before they walked to the cars as they began to pull up.
Pro drivers were really good about being right on time.
"I'm gonna ride back with Hawks, okay?" Karasu said as she gently pushed her boyfriend's hair out of his face.
Todoroki nodded and kissed her quickly. "Okay. I'll see you when we get there."
She glanced at the others as they chatted amongst each other and kissed him a little more, holding the side of his head. "I love you. I'll see you tonight?"
"I love you too." He smiled slightly. "See you tonight." He squeezed her hand and got into Endeavor's car before Midoriya got in next to him and Bakugo got in the front seat complaining about how he didn't get enough action on this mission.
Karasu walked back to her brother and they slid into the back of his car together.
For a few moments, both siblings were quiet.
Karasu spoke first. "I... don't know if I want Mom to keep staying in the agency," she admitted. "I'm not necessarily against staying in contact with her if she's willing to meet and follow any boundaries we set but... with everything that's happened... Having her right there is too hard. She acts like we're just suddenly supposed to have this dynamic where I listen to her like my real mom and- and she just isn't. Not anymore."
Hawks put a hand on her shoulder and squeezed it gently. "I'll have her move out tomorrow, okay? We can talk to her about potentially maintaining contact when we get home, and I'll tell her she needs to be gone tomorrow."
"Don't make her be homeless or anything, though." Karasu added quickly.
"My sidekicks and I have already looked into living arrangements for her." Hawks shook his head.
"Okay. Good... good." Karasu let out a sigh and leaned back, folding her wings down. "Thanks for always checking in with me through this, Keigo."
"Honestly I don't have much connection with her," Hawks said honestly. "So all of this was for you. I wanted to make sure you were okay with all of it."
Karasu looked over at him. She hadn't realised that- she had known it was her idea to look for their mother, but part of her had thought maybe Hawks wanted to get in touch with her as well, though. But it did make sense that he didn't really care about doing that, he'd only been seven when he went to live with the HPSC.
          The car came to a stop and Hawks slid out ahead of Karasu.
"Ready?" Hawks looked at her.
"Ready." Karasu nodded as they got inside and stepped into the elevator. "After this, we should find a night to have a cookout at your cabin."
"We can invite the Todoroki siblings," he nodded and leaned one shoulder against the wall.
"Yes, definitely-" she said almost too excitedly.
Hawks just laughed and shook his head. "I'm glad the excitement about spending time with each other hasn't worn off for you two."
Karasu smiled, she was blushing as she looked at the floor. "I really do love him."
'I wouldn't be surprised if an engagement came soon after they graduated next year, or even before it. Maybe I'll gift them the cabin as an engagement present- Kara uses it more than I do, anyway. They'll need an actual home but having somewhere for just them would be good for them.' Hawks turned to her again. "I'm glad you do. One of us has to have a successful relationship... or any relationship at all, really."
"Now that the commission is so reduced and basically uninvolved in our lives, you could start dating." Karasu pointed out to him.
The doors slid open and Hawks let out a laugh. "Ha! Right. I don't even know how to do the relationship thing anymore." He shook his head as they walked into his agency together. "Let's just save the relationship world for you."
Karasu smiled as she followed behind him briefly, and then her face dropped. "Let's go... talk to Mom now."
Hawks looked back at her for a moment and nodded. They headed towards the overnight rooms, surprised to find their mother in the kitchenette.
Tomie turned towards them and took a deep breath. "You took care of him?"
"He's back in jail, yeah." Hawks nodded. "We need to talk about you now."
Tomie nodded and set her mug of tea aside. "I've packed already."
Karasu looked away. "So you knew."
"Of course I did. With the way I had to come in here, with the way I had to ignore you... I knew at the end of it, you'd want nothing to do with me." Tomie looked at her daughter sadly. She was really seeing just how much she missed now- what she had willingly walked away from.
"I don't- I don't want nothing to do with you, Mom." Karasu said softly, looking at her again. "I need it to be on my terms, though. When I'm ready to reach out again."
Tomie looked surprised at that. "You- you do?"
"I've thought about you a lot over the years, Mom. I've missed you. That doesn't mean I'm ready to just... let you into my everyday life quite yet, though." Karasu palmed her closed staff as she looked at her mother.
Tomie nodded. "I'd like that. I want to know you again... both of you. If you're both willing."
Hawks spoke up finally. "I think I would be. Only when Kara is ready, though."
"I understand." Tomie nodded.
The moment was interrupted by the sound of Midoriya trying to make Bakugo calm down as they came down the hall with Todoroki. Karasu's face lit up as she walked over to the trio, Todoroki wrapping an arm around her and kissing her temple and whispering something to her.
"I wasn't prepared for her to have such a life," Tomie admitted softly as she watched Karasu interact with her friends and boyfriend. "In my mind, she's still the twelve year old girl she was when I... when you got guardianship of her."
Hawks glanced between them. "She's grown up a lot, especially the past year or so. I'm guessing she'll be with Shoto for the rest of her life, honestly."
Tomie let out a sigh. "I'm glad she's at least been happy."
Hawks smiled now. "She has been."