….
Nagant didn't lower her rifle arm, though a faint twitch pulled at her eye–
"Tsk, you can fly too? And did you forget I had to run thirty kilometers?"
Ignoring the standoff entirely, Dabi bypassed the massive desk, hopped lightly onto the chairman's swivel chair, and gave it an idle kick. The chair spun around half a circle before coming to a halt, facing the room.
He leaned back, propping his boots directly onto the desk. "Now... let's continue."
BANG!
The heavy double doors of the office slammed open.
Yokumiru Mera rushed in, his perpetual dark eye bags prominent beneath a look of panic, followed closely by a squad of armed Commission guards with assault rifles raised.
"Hold your fire! Secure the perimeter–!" Mera started, his voice cracking from sheer exhaustion.
"Gezzz..." Dabi complained, resting his head back against the cushion. "Don't tell me you didn't even take care of this nuisance out in the hall, Nagant?"
"They're all simple bureaucrats with pea-shooters." Nagant replied coldly, not taking her eye off the President. "I was prioritizing the root."
Before Mera or the guards could take another breath, a sharp gust of air howled through the shattered window.
Another unwelcome guest landed in the office, scarlet feathers flaring wide to absorb the shock.
Hawks stood, as his visor reflected the ruined office.
"Damn." Dabi muttered, not even bothering to look over his shoulder. "You really had to follow me all the way over here, birdy?"
"Are you insane, Dabi?!" Hawks shouted, gripping two feather blades tightly as his sharp eyes darted between Nagant's barrel, the trembling President, and the Dabi sitting behind the chief executive's desk. "The entire country is watching the fallout from Kamino! You can't just break into the HPSC headquarters and hold the President hostage!"
"Anyway, come in, come in." Dabi said dismissively, gesturing loosely with one hand toward the center of the room. "We need to discuss a few things, and please, let's keep the violence to a minimum. I have breakfast waiting at home, and Rumi will skin me alive if I am late."
Mera took one look at Dabi's relaxed posture, glanced at the smoking hole in the wall, and let out a long sigh.
He slowly raised a hand toward the unit. "Lower your weapons. Stand down and wait in the corridor."
"Mera! What are you doing?!" Madam President shrieked, her ash blonde hair coming loose, her pristine composure completely shattering.
She pointed a trembling finger at Dabi, looking at Hawks with desperate authority. "Hawks! Subdue them immediately! That's an order! He is trespassing, aiding an S-rank escaped felon, and attempting a coup! You are the Number Three Hero. Do your duty and eliminate them!"
Dabi didn't raise his voice or shift in his chair, merely tilting his chin downward as his turquoise eyes narrowed into slits.
"Stop fucking yapping."
The ambient temperature in the executive suite plunged into a suffocating, gravitational abyss.
It wasn't merely killing intent, but the raw, noble weight of a dragon's presence.
The air pressure thickened so violently that the walls groaned under the invisible strain, and the floor began vibrating under the crushing spiritual heat of an apex predator.
Madam President choked on her own breath, her voice dying instantly in her throat as a wave of terror pinned her to her heels.
Hawks felt the pressure harder than anyone else in the room.
His avian senses screamed in panic, every single feather on his back standing on end, his instincts screaming that a single wrong move would mean instant annihilation.
….
In the back of his mind, Dabi briefly considered blowing the lid off the entire centuries-old conspiracy.
He had the leverage to expose the full history of All For One, the legacy of One For All, and the century of fake peace that the Commission had spent fortunes protecting.
But exposing that secret wasn't his sole right.
Toshinori and Izuku were the ones whose blood, bones, and lives were tied to that generational burden.
He would have to sit down with both of them and need to plan together, and decide how much truth they can reveal to the public.
For now, his goal is to dismantle the current administration.
Dabi recalled the fragments of the original timeline.
If he remembered correctly, the ash blonde dictator got taken out, Yokumiru Mera stepped in as the stressed out acting head, and eventually, Hawks took the reins to drag the Hero Public Safety Commission into a semi functional era.
'Why wait for the middleman phase?' Dabi thought, a smirk curling his lips. 'Just skip straight to the end and dump the entire dumpster fire onto the bird right now.'
"That's better." Dabi drawled, leaning forward and resting his elbows on the desk, his boots still planted disrespectfully beside the gold-plated nameplate–
"Now, let's establish some ground rules. The old regime is dead. The black ops hit lists, the child grooming in the basement, and the fabricated crime rates. All of it ends today."
Dabi's gaze flicked coldly toward the trembling Madam President, who was still paralyzed under his draconic aura.
"As for you... the era of hiding in the dark is over."
He said, devoid of theatrics. Then he looked down at Madam President with cold detachment–
"The battle just now simply showed a glimpse to the country what happens when decades of fake peace collapse all at once. If you resign quietly on medical grounds, this institution survives the transition. If you wanna fight it, Kaina will empty a round into your chest, the public learns what you've been doing in the basements, and the government dissolves the entire Commission by nightfall.
"You don't have a third option."
Madam President's lips trembled, but the weight of the truth, and Nagant's unwavering barrel, kept her silent.
She lowered her head, broken
Dabi turned to the rest of the room, his eyes settling firmly on the winged hero.
"Hawks, you take the presidency."
"Wait!!! What?! Me?!" Hawks blinked behind his yellow visor, his feathers stiffening in disbelief. "Are you out of your mind? I'm an active field operative, Dabi. I can't just take over the entire government commission–!"
"You don't need to know the paperwork yet." Dabi countered. "All Might is gone, and public faith in Heroes is bleeding out. However, people trust you. You're young, you're visible, and more importantly, you grew up trapped inside this machine.
"You know exactly how it exploits people. You've always talked about wanting a world where heroes have time on their hands. You will never get that world by patrolling the streets while corrupt officials keep creating villains in the shadows."
He concluded. "Anyway, you're the President now, birdy. Deal with it."
Dabi then shifted his gaze toward the exhausted official standing near the door.
"As you say, our birdy is clueless in administration." He then jerked his thumb toward Mera. "I believe that's your domain, Mera."
Mera exhaled slowly, the exhaustion in his posture giving way to an unexpected stillness. For years, he had been cleaning up state-sponsored atrocities, and this is going to be another nightmare, but at least his hands would finally be clean this time.
"It will be an impossible workload." He murmured tiredly. "...but it is lawful work."
"And finally, Kaina." Dabi said, looking toward the sniper. "You know every blind spot, secret facility, and covert channel this agency ever operated. You can see where this is going right? You will get your freedom once again, and all you need to do is simply help them out."
Lady Nagant stared at him for a long beat. Then she said, a smirk touching her lips–
"I can live with that."
Clap–!
"Done."
Dabi immediately clapped his hands, and pushed himself up from the executive chair, brushing a few specks of broken glass off his pants.
He had successfully dumped an entire nation's worth of institutional reform, political restructuring, and mountain sized paperwork directly onto their laps in less than five minutes.
"Perfect. The class is adjourned."
Dabi said, turning his back on the new leadership and walking straight toward the massive hole in the wall. He paused at edge, glancing over his shoulder with eyes that burned with finality.
"If any of you leeches ever try to put a leash on my life, manipulate the media against U.A., or touch my family again... I won't bother using a window next time. I will just erase the foundation."
Then, his eyes locked directly onto Hawks.
The casual indifference dropped for a fraction of a second, replaced by a dark, protective glare that made the winged hero's feathers stand on end.
"And one more thing, birdy." Dabi muttered, narrowing his eyes into sharp slits. "...You fucker. You're still somehow the number one hero to my daughter Eri. So you better do a proper freaking job running this circus... and don't you dare disappoint her."
Hawks blinked, completely caught off guard.
The tension that had locked his muscles melted into a startled stare.
Out of all the national threats, political upheavals, and system corruption at stake, the terrifying monster who had just shattered the sky was ultimately most concerned about his little girl's favorite hero keeping his act together.
A wry smile touched Hawks' lips, though he kept his hands raised in surrender. "Right. No pressure at all, then..."
Dabi clicked his tongue. "See ya."
With a burst of flame beneath his boots, Dabi dropped backward off the ledge.
The heat wave of his takeoff spread through the top floor, leaving behind a streak of smoke across the bright morning sky as he finally headed home to his family.
.
….
[To be continued…]
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