#staring vacantly at the table in exhaustion or perhaps horror or perhaps both

[wilde-foxgloves]

far from grand art but I haven't made anything I wanted to put here for a bit and I thought this kind of slapped for a second or so's sketch that I did for a bit so here's this. kind of the mood

[the-last-kenobi]

If you’re still taking prompts: 22. “When you’re feeling better, I swear, we’ll talk this out.” Qui-Gon& Obi-Wan. You’re writing is so lovely btw!!

Yay, more prompts! And I do love this one. Thank you for choosing it!

CW: this one got rather dark. there are heavy implications of and references to attempted assault of a minor, child death, and other horrors of war.

From this various prompts list.

Requests are currently closed.

_

They were three days out from Coruscant when the fever made a turn for the worse.

The Jinn/Kenobi team had been deployed to Calzec III to investigate the disappearance of an ambassador, an assignment that had led them down very dark paths into the minds and heart of a planetary society.

A mere two days into their investigation, Obi-Wan had vanished — kidnapped, it was quickly discovered, by the party responsible for the disappearance and murder of the ambassador.

Qui-Gon had assumed that the six days between Obi-Wan’s abduction and his recovery would be the worst of it.

That the growing dread inside him that had gnawed away at his concentration and serenity, the likelihood that he would not reach his apprentice in time, his fears that Obi-Wan was being hurt, would be the most difficult things to handle.

Or even the mingled relief and panic when he had finally found his sixteen-year-old Padawan bound and unconscious in a cellar with a floor half-flooded in dirty water — that after that, they had survived the worst.

He was mistaken.

Obi-Wan was ill when he was pulled out of that cellar. There was no one to trust and nowhere to flee except off-planet, and the the distance between Calzec III and the nearest medically advanced planet was no shorter than simply returning to Coruscant.

So he set a course for Coruscant and settled Obi-Wan in his bunk, stripping off the soiled clothing he had been wearing since his kidnapping and replacing them with a clean set of tunics.

The boy was exhausted, unfocused; his skin was clammy to the touch and he had brief periods where he seemed fully awake and mostly functional.

After the first day of hyperspace travel, they had settled into a routine. Qui-Gon kept to the cockpit, while Obi-Wan kept to his bunk and the fresher, trying to rest and to contain his illness. Qui-Gon knocked periodically on his door, reassuring himself that his apprentice was all right.

And that he was there, because working alone on a hostile planet without knowing anything of his Padawan’s wellbeing aside from being sure that he was in danger had been more of a trial than he was willing to admit, even to himself.

And then, on the third day, he knocked lightly on the door and received no reply.

“Obi-Wan?” he called.

He thought he heard an indistinct mumble. Qui-Gon chuckled, imagining the boy emerging from his blankets like an irritated loth-cat, rumpled and annoyed.

Then Obi-Wan screamed.

Qui-Gon’s mind conjured — for a split second — a new version of the image he had pictured in his mind for over a week — his Padawan, attacked in his sleep — drugged — dragged from his bed —

Then he blinked and the image vanished. Qui-Gon inhaled sharply and pressed on the entry pad, opening the door. He stepped inside the cramped cabin and was relieved to see the boy securely in his bed, the room completely absent of any impossible intruders. But Obi-Wan’s face was flushed with fever, and he was struggling beneath his blankets, thrashing as if he were actually being attacked.

“Obi-Wan,” Qui-Gon said firmly, shaking his shoulder. “Obi-Wan, wake up.”

The Padawan didn’t seem to register Qui-Gon’s presence at all. He struggled with his bedsheets, small whimpers escaping his lips as he fought.

“Obi-Wan!” Qui-Gon said more sharply. “Wake up now!”

Obi-Wan rolled onto his side and dry heaved, his eyes flying open. His Master dropped to his knees beside the bed, running a hand soothingly up and down the boy’s arm. “It’s all right,” he said. “You were dreaming.”

“C-C—” Obi-Wan choked.

“Shh,” Qui-Gon said again.

“Cerasi—”

Qui-Gon’s heart plummeted. Obi-Wan was not coherent, that was obvious.

The boy had not mentioned that name in over two years.

“Padawan, you must focus,” he said softly. “This is not Melida/Daan. We are on a ship, heading home.”

“Cerasi is…”

…dead…

“…gonna… kill you.” Obi-Wan’s words, and the sheer venom in them, shocked the Jedi Master. Obi-Wan was still struggling, but more slowly now, almost as if he didn’t realize he was doing so. His eyes flickered feverishly to the middle distance, seeing things that weren’t there.

“Padawan…” Qui-Gon said slowly.

“Let them go!” Obi-Wan shrieked suddenly. One arm came loose from the blankets and missed striking his Master by inches. “Let them go, they’re too young! Let them go let them go let them go!”

“Obi-Wan!” Qui-Gon seized his Padawan by the shoulders.

Bloodshot blue eyes suddenly snapped directly onto Qui-Gon’s face, but instead of calming, Obi-Wan’s panic only increased. “Get off me!” He screamed, twisting, kicking, squirming away. “Don’t… don’t you touch me! Stop, stop, stop!” he was wailing now, utter despair twisting his face beyond recognition. “Please don’t!”

Qui-Gon released his Padawan as if burned. He pulled away sharply, horror rising in him, tasting bile.

I wasn’t — I wouldn’t —

It’s a fever dream —

A memory?

Qui-Gon tasted bile. “No,” he heard himself say aloud. “No.”

Obi-Wan had squirmed away, pressing himself flat against the wall the bed rested against, his body curling inwards — the last defense of the helpless, the frightened. The abused.

“I won’t,” he was saying frantically. “I won’t. Get out. Get out. They’re flying in the morning, they’re flying — Nield said — we tried to take the tank but — we lost too many — no. I tried! I did!”

Obi-Wan fell abruptly silent again, staring vaguely, his breaths coming in uneven little puffs. Sweat glistened on his brow, in his hair.

Qui-Gon wanted desperately to reach out and touch his shoulder, wipe his brow, but he couldn’t bring himself to do it, terrified of causing another panicked outburst, of hearing —

I don’t know what happened on Melida/Daan.

“Trevor, Meola, Hanta, Chassi, come with me,” Obi-Wan said, still gazing vacantly. His voice, however, was firm. “We need to clear the streets. Gather up the bodies. Any pieces large enough to carry. Leave anything too small.”

I never asked him. I just assumed. He told me about the end of the war and Cerasi’s murder and I never thought to ask for more.

“Hanta?” Obi-Wan said. He coughed. Kept trying to talk even though he could barely breathe. “Hanta? Dammit… she’s gone. Infection. Infection. We’re out of medicine. We’re out. They can’t. I won’t go. They can’t they can’t. Get out.”

Obi-Wan dissolved into jumbled sentences, his eyes fluttering open and shut and open again, his cheeks blazing with fever.

“Obi-Wan,” Qui-Gon whispered.

“Cerasi?”

“Obi-Wan.”

“I can ask,” Obi-Wan said, and he sounded very small, so uncertain, nothing like the slowly-more-confident but quiet Padawan who had accompanied him last week. “I could. But he’s not. He’s not. He left, he doesn’t — he doesn’t want me.”

Another chill swept through Qui-Gon. He held his breath, waiting for more, not wanting to hear it but needing to know.

“He left me, I’m not meant — he said I wasn’t meant to be — I’m not good enough for it, Cerasi,” Obi-Wan murmured. His eyes fell closed again. He almost seemed to be sleeping. “He was right about… right about me. I’m not. Not. I can ask. He might not… come back. For you. For you he might. He’s good. Not me. Not me.”

Qui-Gon dropped his head onto the bedsheets, his breath sharp and painful in his chest.

I never asked.

“Nield. I will ask. I’ll ask the Jedi I will, I will. I’m not one of them. For you. I’ll ask for you.”

We never talked about it.

“The little ones, Cerasi. I can watch them. I’ll watch them today. My fingers. The man, he broke my fingers in the alleyway. I’ll watch the little ones, little ones. It’s story time, Jilo. Shhh.”

I let everything that happened afterwards consume it. Consume me.

“Qui-Gon doesn’t want me,” Obi-Wan said, so, so softly, his tone perfectly reasonable. Calm. “My fault. I’m not. It’s okay. I’ll talk to them. It’s okay. I want to… I want to go home. He doesn’t want me. He doesn’t,” Obi-Wan’s voice cracked. “I want to go home.”

My Padawan.

With utmost care, Qui-Gon rose to his feet, feeling the floor sway beneath him as if he were at sea and not flying through hyperspace.

He went to the fresher and poured a glass of water and dampened a rag, carrying them both back to the beside. He set the glass on a table, and seated himself cautiously on the side of the bed, radiating as much calm as he could, trying to make his presence known through their training bond.

It must have worked, because Obi-Wan did not panic or flinch away from the person sitting beside him. Or perhaps he was simply too tired, delirious to the point of vacancy.

Qui-Gon reached out with one hand and gently pressed the boy back against his pillows, resting the cool cloth against his forehead once he had settled. He kept his hand there for awhile, and gently stroked the sweat-soaked hair with his thumb, watching the boy’s eyelids flicker as he began to doze, to dream.

With his other hand, Qui-Gon gently took one of Obi-Wan’s, holding it gently as if it were fragile, a treasure beyond price.

“Oh, my boy,” he whispered, and was not shocked to taste salt on his lips as he spoke. “Sleep now. When you wake, we will talk, I swear it. We’ll talk about everything. Anything you want.”

Obi-Wan continued to dream.

As he fell deeper into sleep, his fingers curled gently around Qui-Gon’s, and he did not let go.

fin.

[inexchangeforyoursoul]

*chucks this to the starving lions* Can I get, uhhh… you interested in some dabihawks intimacy over burns? (2k+ words) ( AO3 )

Hawks lacks his trademark energy. His movements, be them his quirky little leg bounce or a mundane lift of a hand, have become sluggish- that is, if he even bothers moving. Everything about him screams exhaustion, even after almost two weeks of being off duty. Forcing himself to get outside makes Dabi think the hero crazy for two entirely new reasons.

First, he’s everything but suited to walk the streets like this, with restricted mobility that’s just begging for some nosy assholes to tail him. Especially nowadays. He also could have become easy prey to petty villains in the first shady alley, as there’s no way in hell that he can use his left wing for anything but sending out some warped or puny feathers. Considering the cotton pads lining his neck and that his upper body is still covered in bandages under the tee, two sizes too big, this is also not subject to change for a while. There’s one additional pad on his left cheek, likely hiding the spot of a particularly nasty blister. And this mess here had the nerve to ask for a meetup and sneak out to this infection-ridden hole, but let's not even go there.

No, there's a bigger issue. The other reason Hawks is a madman… the thing that ties an unswallowable knot in Dabi’s stomach, and makes him reconsider coming for the umpteenth time, and legitimately uncomfortable�� is that the gauze on the other's body is hiding second, if not third degree burns that he himself had inflicted, under circumstances he’d rather not even think of.

Once it becomes obvious that he won't be the one to initiate, Hawks’ familiar voice rings with forced bravado. “What’s with the long face? You look even deader than usual,” he chides the villain. It almost sounds like there wasn't a rotting elephant carcass in the room. Almost.

There's no answer he can muster. He’s just staring vacantly at the left side of the other’s face. A silent thought notes how the hero's hair grows about as fast as his feathers do after being shaved. Or burned. He made all those passive-aggressive jokes in the beginning, about what high quality kindling Hawks would make if set ablaze. And he really does burn so fast… so easily.

He should have ignored the message altogether.

Hawks sighs; his scowl softens and the tired smile disappears without a trace. No point in waltzing around the metaphorical bush, is there. “See… this is why I wanted to come. Because I figured your punk ass would wax emo over it. She's safe and sound, isn't she? And I'll just have to deal with it. It’s for doing the same damn heroic thing you keep chewing me out on, after all. Can’t help not make dumb decisions? Then let them bite you in the ass! So it did, you were right! Congrats. Not that it’s a big deal, though. This shit’s always been part of my job description.”

He cannot find it in himself to give an edge to the words, or get any snarkier with Dabi right now. The incident had some really bad timing. Things… had already been changing between them, for better or worse. Dabi’s painfully aware of this, too. As for Hawks…

It's hard to forget what it looks like. The way a man's blind rage and murderous intent change to the frantic panic and horror of a child at the drop of a hat… What seeing it feels like, as your left side is set on fire in real time, feeling a thousand-degree hand print itself into your flesh in slow motion, before it’s yanked away as if it had been charred by something burning even hotter inside you. What Dabi’s voice sounds like when in distress, calling out for someone he cared for, thinking he hurt them. Then the change to a faint moment of immense relief in those haunting eyes as your body goes into shock, before giving way to some kind of indescribable emotion that’s the bastard child of those preceding it, and more.

Dabi blinks, eyes still fixated over the rose-laced, ghastly pale patchwork on Hawks’ tan skin. That's a job description he wouldn't have to worry about if he had been given a choice, the idiot. First, he was mad at him that he would intervene. But… if Hawks hadn’t been there, and jumped in between a few minutes later, he---

“It's weird and creepy to have you staring at me like this, you know? The world didn't quite end, but aren't there some news which you should be raving about…? There's chaos and distrust all over the place, people are suspicious of everything labelled hero… they even got rid of that flaming pile of garbage to save some face, didn't they? I'm having it nice with the second guesses around my alignment and inactivity, to be honest… Slipping from the top ten while also being hospitalized makes you have time for yourself! Who would have thought?” It won’t stay like this. No, no… his name is just clean enough from every available angle that both the populace and the Commission trust him and in his return. Latter will want to get him battle ready as soon as possible, right after screaming their heads off at him. He’ll get a message next week, tops. He’s almost happy to oblige, though…

“I’ve been wanting some me time for a while now, but, how should I put it... now that I got my wish… I feel like shit, and can’t do shit that I’d like to do. Karma, bitch- I’m sitting in my room all day, with no idea how to pass time, haha!” No learning to play the guitar, gardening, or how to bake brownies. He can't even take a proper shower with all the bandages and his left shoulder being as stiff as a board. There's only his body, pulsating with slowly rising, light fever, and the numb existence after taking one of those potent painkillers before the aching starts all over again. He usually cannot even remember what happens in the series he ends up watching. It’s frustrating as all hell, and killing his ADHD-plagued ass whenever he has the energy to do something. He would have gone crazy if even his right hand had been off-limits.

If not for Hawks, he would have...

The blonde’s eyes flicker to his aching side as his fake smile returns, and he lifts a hand over the bandages covering his neck. The fingers look mangled under thick layers of shedding, dead skin; the rest, still hidden from view. “The model gig is off the table, too, I guess. They are planning to patch my face up once my wings and joints are salvaged, from what I could gather. Not that it’s a priority, though.” There’s a pause. “I also caught up with my feed, and some ‘fans’ just up and left after getting a little sunburn, too… like, seriously!? That’s just mean,” he moans with thinly veiled disappointment. He exhales with closed eyes and the barely-smile, fingers lingering at the edges of the exposed burns. The expression sticks for a moment.

He would have… burned his mother.

Dabi steps closer, reaching up to Hawks’ face, then barely touches his wounded cheek. This prompts the other to open his eyes again, with light surprise, confusion, and perhaps wariness reflecting in them. “It’s high time those little snots reevaluated their tastes,” Dabi speaks up at last, brushing the back of his fingers over the sensitive skin. He never gave a flying fuck about pretty faces, but… “You never looked better.”

To anybody else, this would sound like a dig… which, it kind of is. But Hawks can read and hear the subtext, which is to say, mild disdain and genuine gratitude. It’s… something else, though. Basically being told that he’s the most beautiful he’s ever been. It’s doing funny things to him inside- it’s beyond great to feel something after the days spent as a walking vegetable. Those fingers are, ironically, also nice and cool against his aching skin, but all of this is getting a little too much to handle at once.

Intended or not, it worms an involuntary (and rather painful), real smile out of Hawks. “Wow… gross.”

He’d be amused at the answer already, but the smile is what gives Dabi whiplash, cracking the uneasiness boulder the size of a truck sitting on his chest and sending him straight to cloud nine. Which is not something that he wants right now, goddammit.

And he would backpedal on the spot, because this backfired really bad, but Hawks has already placed his marred hand over his, and is reaching up with his other one, too. The relatively undamaged right is placed over his bare arm and traces over the scarred-up skin.

“… Does it still hurt a lot?” Hawks asks then, examining the burns meticulously; the texture sends a small chill down his spine, forcing all remaining hair on his body to stand.

He lost sleep over thinking about this. It’s a little embarrassing… thinking about whether Dabi’s wounds hurt as much as his do, all of the time. Or how he took the news. Last thing he kind of remembers before waking up to numb aches is getting an ice layer cast over him by the youngest Todoroki, and all he knew after finally catching up on the news was that the villain managed to escape and was MIA. Honestly… he had just been worried and thinking about Dabi a lot.

… Okay, it’s very embarrassing. And alarming.

“Can’t feel much where it's like that,” he admits. Where gentle fingers run over dead skin, there's a ghost of a presence that the surviving nerves deep below give notice of. A hint of warmth, maybe. Nothing more. “Not now, nor when the stuff cracks and bleeds. What will hurt… are these spots,” he guides the man’s hand up to the staples over his wrist, then takes the same hand and rubs lazy circles over a healed-up spot. “Dead and live skin don’t get along well. They get pulled apart easily, especially if you are still growing… and shit swells and tears when you are not careful. But you’ve already seen that happen to me.” Having finished the vaguely educational monologue, he looks Hawks in the eyes. “It’s also bold of you to waltz into a cesspool like this one. The plague eats roast meat for breakfast, and I hear chicken’s his favourite.”

The last line revives the smile before it could fade, and he looks back at Dabi, too. “Aww, worried~?”

“Nah,” the villain replies with the corners of his mouth also creeping upwards. Hawks’ dulled senses don’t even register that he’s already in his face until it’s too late; “The plague is me.”

The kiss is tender, and lasts only a second or two; before the hero knows it, it’s already over. He blinks first, trying to decide whether he just hallucinated this under the influence of drugs, or it was a real-ass thing that just happened… then hides his mouth behind his free hand with a blushing face.

“… that was totally uncalled for,” he mumbles, trying not to sound whiny, while also trying his best to look as angry as possible. It’s entirely futile as he can’t get rid of the fully grown, shit eating grin, though. “I’m still running a fever, you know. This is not helping.”

Burning face and heart aside, a part of him feels bad about this. Even if nobody asked Dabi to do this. It’s as if he was using the situation for selfish gains.

“In that case, get your sorry ass back to the hospital or whatever, little phoenix,” Dabi purrs, giving another kiss on his temples once Hawks manages to look at him again. The villain lets go of the hand at last, but stays close, staring into the other’s eyes for a moment.

There it is again. That ‘more’ he saw in them back then. It’s stupid, yes… but Hawks would be lying if he said he didn’t enjoy basking in the glint that’s so foreign to those eyes.

He doesn’t get much time to enjoy himself, as Dabi’s lips are already curling into an impish smile; “Then, once you resurrect from those ashes… maybe we could run a fever together, hmm?”

Hawks spends the next minutes cursing softly from behind both hands as his ears start burning up, too... and Dabi just laughs, not caring for the blood leaking from his face.

***

*old HDD processing noises* not that I’m particularly happy with it, but yeah, I think this is the first kiss I’ve ever written. hell, those may be even the first vaguely suggestive lines that are meant to be taken seriously that I’ve ever written. Hide yo wives, and hide yo husbands, this is the beginning, I’m going hog wild y’all

ps admit it… the half-assed summary had your expectations fooled