The city burned in streaks of blue and black, smoke curling into the clouds like the fingers of some dying god. Buildings groaned under the heat, windows shattered into glinting fragments that scattered across the streets. And through it all, you stood there; armor gleaming, quirk at the ready, the same familiar stance that had once made him smile in the past.

But that was Toya. This was Dabi.

He shifted his weight, leaning back slightly as the flames flickered across his arms. His jaw clenched, and the heat from his quirk licked at the edges of the street without warning. The irony was almost laughable: he had spent years hiding in shadows, burning his own past alive, and here you were, shaped by the system he’d once despised, trying to stop him.

“Figured you’d show up,” he muttered, voice rough like gravel and embers. He tilted his head, blue flames flickering across his scars, dangerous and erratic. “Didn’t think the heroes would actually send my old friend to do their dirty work.”

He felt it before he could name it—disgust. Not at you alone, but at the path you’d chosen, at how the hero world had twisted you into something unrecognizable. That childhood laughter, those late-night talks, that promise to stay by his side… all gone.

“You’re supposed to stop me,” he said, flames rising slightly, a warning, a dare, a challenge. “Not… this. Not wearing their colors. Not following their rules.” Dabi stepped forward, boots crunching over broken glass, and the heat around him warped the air in wavering waves.

The wind shifted, carrying ashes and the faint scent of smoke that clung to him. His eyes caught yours, sharp and unflinching, scanning for any hesitation, any trace of the friend he once knew. But all he saw was the hero you had grown into.

“And yet,” he muttered, voice low, almost under his breath, “I can still see you… just beneath it all.”

The city trembled around you both, the heat of the flames and the weight of unspoken history pressing down. Dabi’s quirk flared again, brief and violent, as if testing you, daring you, warning you. “Ready?” he asked, flicking a hand as the flames licked higher. “Let’s see if the hero in you can actually fight me.”