So This Is Love

Chapter 29

[Content warning: VIOLENCE!!!!!!!!!]

Stain was moving rapidly up the walls, watching Dabi expectantly. With a huff, he used a small burst of flames from the soles of his feet to assist his attempt to scale up the wall - certainly not as fluidly as Stain had, but Dabi swelled with pride when he saw Stain's approving nod.

"Good. As usual, you learn quickly," Stain praised, before he took off across the roof, leaping to the next one over. Dabi carefully accessed the distance, knowing he would have an easier time if he used his flames, but excited to discover if he could make the jump without the assist from his quirk.

'Nope,' he decided the second his feet left the roof. A small burst of flames gave him the last bit of leverage he needed to cover the distance, pitching forward toward the roof to take the brunt of the landing off his legs. Stain merely watched as he toppled over, rolling onto his back, huffing out a furl of blue in frustration, 'play it safe, stupid. Play it safe, you're not there yet.'

"Better than the last time you did it," Stain assured him, appearing in Dabi's vision, "I should get you using those legs of yours more. It will help you build up the strength you need to make these kinds of jumps without your quirk."

Dabi sighed, pressing his head back against the concrete. He raised his hand, looking at it drearily.

He remembered imagining the scars digging further into his skin, dragging up over his knuckles, making him look more disfigured - and then he remembered after he had gotten home, when he was alone with his thoughts, panting against his pillow, how he'd imagined Abiteth's softer, tattooed hand tracing over his new scars. He'd rutted himself into a stupor, thinking about her fingers tracing all over his skin, calming the fires that burned - blistering and untamed - beneath layer and layer of membrane.

If only he didn't have a parasite in his ear, burrowing into his brain, keeping him on a tight leash.

"Dabi," Stain's voice was distant, and Dabi was at least grateful that being reminded of Yumi stopped him from getting worked up over Abiteth.

First, Dabi noticed that there was a tall, lanky woman standing next to Stain when Dabi sat up. Secondly, the blueflame hadn't even heard her arrive, 'and she wasn't there when either of us jumped over.'

Hackles raised, Dabi slowly rose to his feet, looking the woman over. She wore a mask on her face, and an evening gown on her body, reminding Dabi of that orange-haired, red-dress wearing cartoon lady he'd seen in passing on the TV once when he was a child. Right before his mother turned off the TV, aghast that he had seen it.

She even had a furry shawl over her shoulders.

"Lady Masque," Stain introduced, tilting his head in a gesture for Dabi to come closer, "one of the Nightmares, led by Warframe," his eyes narrowed as Dabi inched closer warily, continuing to look Lady Masque up and down, "they could be helpful to you."

Warframe was familiar - 'that brute. The one that chased Famine off, has a wood quirk like Abi. Pretty sure he's Guardian.'

Lady Masque, too, had an odd familiarity about her. He would have to delve into that more later, find his laptop and scour it for any news of these 'Nightmares'. As engrossed as he was in analyzing what he could see of Lady Masque, trying to deduce if he had seen her before, the conversation between her, and Stain was nearly lost to him.

"- my protege-"

Dabi perked up at being referred to as Stain's protege. Something was special about that, lit up some feeling in Dabi that he hadn't expected, primarily pride, some embarrassment. It felt nice. It felt good to be acknowledged by the older man, someone who was putting in the effort to train him.