Chapter 31: Unicorn Child
"There you are, Eri," the man in the bird-like plague mask said. "You shouldn't be bothering the nice heroes."
Something about the man immediately caused Izuku's hackles to rise, despite how polite and pleasant he seemed. There was an undeniable phoniness he detected right off the bat; it reminded him of the attitude some of his former teachers at Aldera would take on when they'd speak to his mother during parent-teacher meetings, except this time he got the sense that there was something dangerous behind the friendly sounding words, not just disingenuous.
"Oh, it's no bother, sir," Izuku said at once, trying to remain pleasant himself despite his unease.
"Agreed," Ms. Zee said. "As heroes, assisting lost children is something we always have time for."
"Regardless, I must apologize for her taking up your valuable time," the man said.
"It's quite fine. Is your daughter all right, sir?" Izuku asked, casting a glance at the bandages that were wrapped around the child's limbs. He noted that the appearance of her alleged father hadn't quelled her terror in the least. If anything, it had only increased her fear; she was still shaking in his arms. "If she got hurt while you were separated, we'd have no problem taking her to get some medical attention."
Of course, he didn't believe for a moment that the little girl could've gotten lost, hurt herself, and bandaged herself, but it seemed unwise to outright accuse the man of abuse right away.
The masked man's right hand briefly clenched before relaxing, and Izuku noted the gloves he wore. Does he have a touched-based Quirk? Five finger activation requirement, maybe, like Uraraka? He wondered, knowing that such Quirks were fairly common.
"That won't be necessary," the man said, his voice taking on just a hint of a hard edge, like steel hidden beneath silk. "Eri's merely an exuberant child. She gets hurt while playing, as many children do."
Izuku remembered having scabby knees all the time as a little boy, but he'd certainly never been beaten up enough to require those kinds of bandages.
At least, not until he'd been diagnosed as Quirkless and had increasingly become the target of Kacchan's aggression, with half the rest of the school joining in. Those injuries hadn't come from playtime, however. Not playtime for him, anyway.
"She seems scared," he noted, trying to keep his tone as neutral as possible.
"She knows she's in for a stern talking to," the man replied smoothly. "She gave me quite a fright, running off like that."
Izuku's eyes narrowed. That felt like the sort of lie that wasn't even meant to fool people, but merely be accepted by those who had no other choice.
Ms. Zee's gaze flicked from Eri, who was clutching at Izuku's costume in a death grip, back to the man in the bird mask. "I apologize, Mister…?"
"…Chisaki," he answered with obvious reluctance.
"Mr. Chisaki, then," she said. "I apologize for the inconvenience, but there's been a spate of kidnappings in the area recently. Given the circumstances, I'm going to have to insist that you and your daughter accompany us to the nearest police station or hero agency so we can confirm your identity."
Izuku had no idea if there actually had been kidnappings, or if the pro hero was merely saying that to bolster her case, but he wasn't about to ask.
"Come now, is that really necessary, heroes?" Chisaki asked.
"Unless you want to tell us why this child seems so frightened at the prospect of going with you," Ms. Zee replied, smiling pleasantly.
Chisaki sighed heavily. "Very well," he said. "But would you mind coming this way? I'd rather not discuss this in a place quite so public. I'm afraid it's rather embarrassing."
"Of course," Ms. Zee said. "We've no wish to needlessly destroy anyone's reputation, after all. Come along, GL." She added.
Izuku noted how she didn't use his full hero name at once, nodding as he scooped Eri into his arms and followed Chisaki into the alleyway along the sidewalk.
The hero student felt like the whole situation was a powder keg; the possibility of violence seemed to lurk just beneath the exchange's pleasant exterior. The tension made Izuku feel like a coiled spring, and the only thing preventing him from acting were the potentially dire consequences of doing the wrong thing.
"I've been so concerned about Eri lately," he remarked, walking deeper into the shadows. "Children can be so…difficult." He added, as he began to remove one of his gloves.
Eri gasped softly.
Izuku reacted immediately, his conscious mind lagging his instincts by a split second. His willpower surged into the ring, and a massive pair of green hands reached out, moving at the speed of thought, and wrapped around the man like he was a child's doll, halting his attempt to reach for Ms. Zee in midmotion. Chisaki released a strangled yell as the emerald hands lifted him off his feet and pinned him against the wall of the alleyway.
Not giving him a second to gather his wits, Izuku rang up another construct, creating a pair of heavy cuffs around his wrists. Each one included a large dome that surrounded his hands but were too far out for him to actually touch them.
Chisaki released a wordless yell, all civility and pleasantness abandoned. "You miserable, diseased wretches masquerading as heroes!" he shouted. "Mark my words, you will die for this!"
"Well," Ms. Zee said, picking up and donning her top hat, which had fallen off when Chisaki had attempted to lash out at her and Izuku's subsequent counterattack. "I know this isn't what Majestic had in mind when he gave you permission to use your Quirk, but those were some good reflexes." She paused. "I suppose I can't say I never randomly ran into a villain while out on patrol anymore."
Izuku nodded, but his main focus was on the little girl, who was looking at him with a mixture of shock and undisguised awe. Clearly, the idea of someone being able to so casually overpower and incapacitate Chisaki was unthinkable to her.
"It's going to be all right," he promised her. "He won't be able to hurt you ever again."
If anything, the child seemed only more dumbstruck than ever, like the notion of that man being unable to hurt her simply didn't compute in her mind.
Just when Izuku was starting to think she'd simply gape at him until he said or did something else, he saw her eyes grow glassy, and she abruptly wrapped her arms around him, squeezing for all she was worth and softly sobbing out words of thanks.
"Green Lantern, can you hold that creep there until a police officer with Quirk-suppressing cuffs arrives?" Ms. Zee asked, already taking a phone from her pocket.
He nodded. "Yeah."
"Good," she said. "Do that, and try to keep Eri as calm as possible."
Momo took a breath as she stood outside the temporary agency of pro hero Kamui Woods.
She knew intellectually that she really shouldn't be intimidated by a week of work studies under a pro hero, considering what she and the rest of the Class 1-A had already been through. It was almost a given that this week would be quieter and less perilous than their first week at UA.
Despite all that, this still felt different. This was her first time deliberately stepping out into the real world of professional heroics, and she was doing it with one of the fastest rising young heroes operating today.
She hoped she could live up to whatever reputation she'd established for herself, between the USJ and the Sports Festival.
Deciding she had dithered enough, the raven-haired young woman strode through the front doors.
Almost everything in the lobby was swathed in cardboard, bubble wrap, and tape, like the whole operation was being packed up to move. About the only thing that didn't appear ready to be put onto a truck was a cheap desk that a young man in his late teens sat behind.
"Ah, Ms. Yaoyorozu," he greeted her immediately. "Welcome!"
For just a split second, Momo wondered if the young man was an associate of one of her family's businesses or had attended the same sort of high society events where she'd frequently put in appearances over the years, before realizing that he'd probably seen her during the Sports Festival.
The notion that she was somewhat famous was one that had yet to fully sink in for her, apparently.
"Ah, thank you, Mister…?"
"Suzuki. Just a lowly intern," he added with a jovial smile. "I'll let the big boss know you're here."
He took out his phone and sent a text, and almost immediately, Kamui Woods emerged.
"Hello, sir, thank you for offering to take me for a work study," Momo said, giving the pro hero a bow.
"Just Nishiya is fine, Yaoyorozu, or Kamui Woods when we're out in the field," he said. "Please excuse the appearance of this place. As I'm sure you know already, this isn't my agency's regular headquarters. The HPSC and some local authorities have requested that several heroes assist with the hunt for the Hero Killer's murderer, and so I've temporarily set up shop here in Hosu."
She nodded, having indeed learned about that yesterday. "It's no trouble, but how will it affect my work study?"
If there was anything she was concerned about so far as her work study went, it was that. She was fairly confident that a hero who'd managed such a meteoric rise since his debut would have his act together and have prepared to handle a student while helping with the investigation (or at least, his agency would on his behalf), but it was impossible to be sure.
"Not as much as you might think," Nishiya replied, and though his Quirk mutation made it impossible to be sure, Momo suspected he was smiling. "I have a great deal of flexibility when it comes to when and how I contribute to this effort."
"That's good to know, thank you," she replied.
He nodded. "Now, let me show you around this place, such as it is, and introduce you to your fellow student."
She blinked, not having known another hero student would be here. "Thank you."
The tour was brief, which was wasn't exactly surprising, but the basics of a pro hero agency all seemed to be there, at least so far as Momo could judge.
"And wrapping up, we have the training room here," Nishiya said, opening the door to the largest room they'd seen so far, and the only one where everything was fully unpacked and in place.
It was also one of the few rooms that was occupied.
"Shiozaki?" Momo spoke.
The Class 1-B student was using her vines to lift several kettle bells. Upon hearing her voice, she gently set them down on the floor and turned. "Yaoyorozu? I didn't know you were doing a work study here as well."
"I was able to take two students for work studies," Nishiya noted.
Momo nodded. "I'm glad to see your hair has all grown back."
Shiozaki nodded. "Thank you. As I said, it was just a matter of sunlight and time."
Nishiya cleared his throat to regain their attention. "Both of you gave an impressive performance at the festival, but you're also both first year students, which means you've got plenty of room to grow and improve. Especially where the utilization of your Quirks is concerned," he said. "So, let's begin."
"So, you really just ran into this guy? While patrolling out on the street?" Majestic asked Izuku and Ms. Zee after they'd all returned to his agency. He seemed caught somewhere between incredulousness and being ready to start laughing.
"Yes, Kannagi," Ms. Zee answered. "I'm guessing he really is someone of some importance, then, instead of just some run of the mill child abuser in an ugly mask?"
"You could say that," Majestic said, tone dry. "Apparently he's a yakuza boss, leader of the Shie Hassaikai, to be specific. He also possesses an extremely powerful touch-based Quirk, known as Overhaul. It would make him a threat to even a lot of top ranked heroes, but it just so happens that our work study student has the perfect Quirk to neutralize him."
Ms. Zee chuckled. "Good job, kiddo."
Izuku blinked. "What's his Quirk do?"
"It allows him to completely remake any matter, living or dead, so long as he's able to touch it with his bare hands," Majestic explained.
Izuku gasped. "That's an incredibly versatile and powerful Quirk! And he uses it for villainy?!" he added with a mixture of shock and disgust.
"Yup, looks that way," Majestic answered. "Anyway, the Nighteye Agency has been investigating their operations for months, and they've been blowing up our phones since they learned you two brought him in. I haven't spoken to Sir Nighteye himself, since apparently he's out of the country right now, but from the way his number two Centipeder tells it, the guy's about ready to have an aneurysm over this."
"Sir Nighteye was investigating a yakuza group?" Izuku asked skeptically, unable to hold his tongue. "All Might's former sidekick?"
Maybe it was just his fanboy biases of everything All Might-related, but he had a hard time believing that the number one hero's only former sidekick operating in Japan would be spending his time on such a thing. It was common knowledge that the once formidable yakuza groups had been withering and dying out in the age of heroes, unable to compete with modern villains.
"The Shie Hassaikai aren't just any yakuza group," Majestic said. "They've undergone something of a resurgence of late, though authorities aren't sure why. I'm sure the Nighteye Agency was investigating that."
"And let me guess, they're afraid that us throwing their boss in jail will cause the organization to go to ground, mess up that investigation, and render all that hard work for nothing?" Ms. Zee asked knowingly.
"That, and they're afraid the authorities won't be able to make any significant charges stick yet and thus won't be able to hold onto Chisaki for very long," Majestic added.
He sounded surprisingly nonchalant about it, but Izuku still felt his insides twist. "Are you saying we should have let him go?" he asked, simultaneously indignant at the notion and afraid he'd messed up.
Majestic scoffed. "Of course not," he said. "You had no idea who he really was, and even if you had, I could never condone leaving a defenseless child in an abusive situation for the sake of an investigation. Frankly, I've always thought that ol' Nighteye tends to let the perfect be the enemy of the good in these sorts of situations," he said. "And anyway, the Nighteye Agency's fears that Chisaki will be released are just so much paranoia. It may well be that there's not enough evidence to prosecute him for the yakuza's criminal activities yet, and he might be able to wriggle out of child abuse charges, if his lawyers can cast enough doubt on whether he's responsible for the injuries on that child. But he completely shot himself in the foot by threatening you and Ms. Zee after you restrained him. Threatening pro heroes is a serious offense by itself, and now he can't plausibly claim he wasn't about to attack you before you acted."
Izuku released a breath he hadn't realized he was holding. "So…what happens now?"
Majestic gave him a sloppy smile. "Now you get an unplanned crash course in inter-agency relations and how to smooth other heroes' ruffled feathers, plus a lesson in the procedures and paperwork that follows the sort of incident you and Ms. Zee had today."
That hardly sounded exciting, but Izuku knew that it was still important to learn, so he nodded without protest. "What's going to happen to Eri?" he asked instead.
"I'm sure we can prevent Chisaki getting custody of her back, even if he manages to get out on bail somehow. The scarring all over her arms is no joke and well beyond the sorts of injuries a rambunctious kid might get from playing," Majestic said with a scowl. Then his expression eased. "In the long term, she'll be placed with a foster family. For right now, she's a guest of my agency. She's currently in the infirmary. I asked the medical staff to give her a checkup and—"
The piercing scream of a child suddenly interrupted their conversation, and the three of them exchanged a wide eyed looks for a split second before the two heroes and one hero student rushed out of the room.
All of them expected to find Chisaki or one of his underlings attacking and trying to take Eri back, but what they actually found brought them up short.
Eri was sitting on an examination table in the infirmary, still clad in the same attire they'd found her in, her whole body glowing with a bright white light. Someone that Izuku assumed to be a nurse or medical tech of some kind stood nearby holding a syringe, looking more than a little panicked.
"St-Stay away from me!" Eri exclaimed, voice shot through with terror.
Majestic turned to the nurse, who spread his hands helplessly. "I just came to draw some blood!" he tried to explain. "She freaked and her Quirk started doing…this!"
"Stay away!" Eri cried again, practically sobbing by this point. "Or my curse will make you disappear too!"
"She doesn't know how to control her Quirk," Ms. Zee breathed, too softly for Eri to hear. "Probably doesn't even know what it is. But it sounds like it could be lethal if we touch her."
Unwilling to just stand and watch Eri panic and cry, Izuku sent a tendril of green light out. It quickly took on the shape of a hand, which tentatively touched the little girl's face. When nothing happened, he summoned his protective barrier and stepped forward.
"Midoriya!" Majestic hissed.
"It's okay, sir. Uh, Kannagi," Izuku reassured him, though he increased his barrier just in case.
He scooped up Eri into his arms and was more relieved than he'd care to admit when nothing happened to him. "Hey, it's okay," he soothed the child, rocking her gently back and forth.
"Y-You're not disappearing," she hiccuped, looking at him with wet, wide eyes full of awe.
"And I never will," Izuku said. He wasn't quite sure where those words had come from, but they felt right and seemed to calm Eri, so he went with it. "I don't know what Chisaki told you, but your Quirk isn't a curse. Maybe it's dangerous, but we can help you to learn how to control it, so you don't need to ever be afraid of it again. So please don't think there's something wrong with yourself, Eri."
"R-Really?"
"Really," Izuku said solemnly. "You're okay, Eri, I promise."
He felt more than heard her exhale, and all the tension seemed to leave her body at once. The bright light she was emitting faded and died. He felt her breathing slow down and become much steadier.
"She's asleep," Ms. Zee observed quietly. "Her Quirk must've taken a lot out of her."
Majestic turned to the still flustered looking med tech. "What happened?"
"I-I came in to draw some blood so we could run some tests," he answered, holding up the empty vial he held. "The moment I told her what I was planning to do, she went into a complete panic, and her Quirk started going off almost immediately afterwards."
Izuku swallowed, looking down at the slumbering child in his arms. The implications of everything that had just occurred were unpleasant, to say the least, and that was without even considering the fact that Eri apparently had a potentially deadly Quirk she didn't know how to control.
"Well, things just got a lot more complicated," Majestic said.
Which about summed up the situation, really.
Chapter 32: Chaos in Hosu
They were badly outnumbered, Momo determined immediately as their foes swarmed toward them.
"Shiozaki, behind you!" she shouted as she unleashed an explosion at the first wave, causing them to recoil.
"Accursed things!" Shiozaki hissed as she spun about and used her vines to lash out at several of the attack drones.
Momo fired a strand of tape from each hand, which both wrapped around a metal pole sticking out of the wall, then swung upwards, at least a dozen drones flying in pursuit.
She created several small explosives that looked like miniature sticks of dynamite as she went. The pint-sized bombs were too small to do serious harm to a healthy adult human, but they were enough to mangle the more delicate parts of the drones. Several of them went tumbling to the floor, reduced to junk.
Taking a moment to glance at her fellow student, Momo quickly saw that the other girl was in danger of being overwhelmed by the swarm.
"Mobility!" she chastised her teammate.
Nodding, Shiozaki sent out several vines, which gripped the metal pegs jutting out of the walls, or just the walls themselves, and lifted herself up into the air. The drones that had been harassing her hesitated long enough for Momo to send a cascade of glue their way, causing them to crash helplessly to the ground.
With both UA students now mobile and the drones' numbers badly diminished, Momo and Shiozaki were able to smash their remaining foes in only a few minutes.
"Very good," Nishiya said as he stepped into the training room. "You're both improving quite a lot."
"Thank you," Momo smiled.
When Shiozaki didn't respond, the wooden hero gave her a look. "Is something wrong? You seem troubled by something."
"Forgive me," the vine-haired girl replied. "I just feel as though I'm not getting better nearly as quickly as Yaoyorozu. It feels as though she's taken to what you've taught her immediately, while I seem to forget to apply your lessons in the heat of these exercises, until she reminds me."
"Yaoyorozu has been using her Quirk to enhance her mobility for a while, so I've only taught her how to refine a skill she was already using," Nishiya pointed out. "For you, it's a much greater shift on how you approach using your abilities, so it's unsurprising it's taking you longer to fully incorporate it."
Shiozaki considered this for a moment before nodding. "Thank you."
"Of course," Nishiya said. "Anyway, you two have run this exercise three times in rapid succession. I think you deserve a fifteen-minute break."
Shiozaki immediately took the opportunity to excuse herself and exited the training room, presumably to use the ladies' room. For her part, Momo took a seat on a piece of training equipment and pulled a protein bar out of a pouch on her belt, eagerly unwrapping it and taking a bite.
"And how are you, Yaoyorozu?" Nishiya asked her. "I've been putting greater focus on Shiozaki, as she seems to need it more, but the last thing I want to do is neglect your training."
Momo swallowed, then gave the young pro hero a bright smile. "That's kind of you, but I'm very pleased with how things are going so far," she said. "Your suggestions with how I can improve my travelling by 'tape slinging' have been invaluable!"
"That's good to hear," the wooden hero said. "Though I think you may overestimate my contributions."
Momo was quick to disagree. "Not at all," she said. "Until now, this technique always felt theoretically very useful to me but too dangerous to actually use in the field. Even my friend Midoriya wasn't able to offer so many suggestions on ways to refine it."
"Midoriya…he's the one who won the Sports Festival, correct?" Nishiya asked.
Momo nodded. "Indeed. He's given me a tremendous amount of useful suggestions and support when it comes to developing my Quirk, but even with his help I wasn't able to get it to a place where I felt I could safely use it in the real world."
"He can outright fly, which means he doesn't face the same obstacles someone like you and me do. That probably makes it more difficult for him to fully wrap his head around the problem," Nishiya said.
Momo nodded. "That makes sense."
The pro hero suddenly looked anxious, enough that the raven-haired hero student could pick up on it despite his permanently expressionless face. "By the way, did he…say anything about me to you?" he asked carefully. "You did mention you're friends, so I assume you discussed your work studies."
Momo frowned slightly, wondering where the young pro was going with this. "He suggested that you would be a good hero for me to do my work study with, among a few other options," she answered. "I've been meaning to ask you to give me your autograph for him, in fact. He's a big pro hero fan, and I know he wants it."
"Does he?" Nishiya said, sounding surprised.
"Yes, why?" Momo asked, eyes narrowing very slightly.
Kamui Woods was one of the fastest rising stars among young pro heroes in Japan, and most people expected he'd crack the top ten in the hero charts very soon. It shouldn't come as any surprise to him that someone might want his autograph.
"We encountered each other, a little over a year ago now," Nishiya answered. "He got himself involved in a villain incident, and I may have come off as…harsh to him as a result of it."
Onyx eyes narrowed further. "He told me about that villain encounter once, in passing, but he never mentioned you were one of the heroes there," she said. "This was when he believed he was Quirkless, wasn't it?" she asked.
"Indeed," Nishiya answered. "I feared for his safety when he recklessly rushed in to face a villain that even we pros were struggling with."
Indignation flared through Momo on behalf of her friend. She strongly suspected there was more to it, and that the wooden pro had been far harsher than necessary to her friend because of his Quirkless status, and wanted to mitigate any damage he'd caused now that Midoriya seemed like someone who could easily enjoy a meteoric rise to the top of the pro hero industry once he graduated UA.
Taking a deep breath, Momo forced herself to calm down, reminding herself that she didn't have all the facts; Midoriya really hadn't gone into very much detail on that villain incident, having been more focused on telling her about his power ring and lack of a Quirk at the time. Also, the green-haired young man himself obviously didn't maintain any significant hostility towards Kamui Woods. The last thing he'd want would be for her to put a crimp in the rest of her work study by lobbing accusations at the pro who'd been a very helpful teacher to her thus far.
"Midoriya's not the type to hold a grudge," she said. "In any case, given how many people probably mistreated him as a result of his apparent Quirklessness, I suspect it would just be impossible for him to have one for every person who ever slighted him."
That didn't mean she would refrain from a minor dig, though.
Nishiya couldn't wince due to his Quirk mutation, but she thought something in his body language suggested it.
"I'm glad he's found such success now," the pro hero said.
Momo decided to take him at his word there, automatically offering a polite platitude in response.
Shiozaki returned a moment later. If Nishiya was relieved to see her, he hid it well.
"All right," the pro said. "Next up for you two, I was planning—"
He got no further before a loud klaxon sounded through the building, cutting him off. Crimson lights began to flash on and off.
"What's going on?" Momo asked.
"Are we under attack?" Shiozaki added.
Nishiya reached into his pocket and withdrew his smartphone. He visibly recoiled at the message on the screen. "The city's under attack by numerous villains. It appears to be a coordinated assault," he said, almost visibly switching to on-duty mode. "Come with me."
He turned and started heading toward the door at a brisk clip. The two UA students broke into a light jog to keep up with him.
"Does this mean…?" Momo trailed off.
"Yes," Kamui Woods replied. "We're going to need all available hands to deal with this one. I'm authorizing the two of you to use your Quirks, but that's for crowd control and rescue, understand? You're not to engage any villains if you can avoid it."
"Understood," Momo nodded.
Shiozaki's face looked almost as green as her hair at the thought of being thrown into such a situation so soon, but she managed to acknowledge the pro hero's instructions in a reasonably steady voice.
Momo nearly did a double take the moment they stepped outside the front door of the temporary agency. Plumes of thick smoke rose from multiple fires scattered all around the city, and the sound of explosions and shattering glass created an erratic but nearly constant rhythm.
"Do your best to keep up," Kamui Woods said. "If you get separated from me, you can keep assisting civilians if you feel it's safe for you to do so. Otherwise, you can either hunker down somewhere safe or make your way back here."
"Right," the two students agreed crisply.
"Let's go," Kamui Woods said, extending one of his arms until it was able to grab onto the side of a building. He pulled himself forwards and went barreling into the air, while the two UA students used their respective Quirks to follow.
Meanwhile, well away from the chaos that was unfolding in Hosu, Izuku was sitting on the bed in the simple room he'd been given the Majestic's agency, using the rare downtime to do a video call with his mother. Eri was cuddled up next to him, slumbering deeply.
"Oh, Izuku, she's precious!" Inko exclaimed in a hushed tone as he tilted his phone so she could get a good look at Eri. "Who in the world could possibly abuse such a little angel?"
"They tell me he's a yakuza boss," Izuku said. "Apparently he has a very powerful Quirk, but since I was able to use my powers to stop him from touching anything, I was able to prevent him from using it at all."
"I'm so proud of you, Izuku! You've barely started at UA, and already you're saving innocent people!" Inko said.
He wiped at his suddenly moist eyes, doing his best not to disturb Eri. "Thanks, Mom," he sniffed. "That means a lot to me."
"So, what's going to happen to her?" Inko asked.
Izuku sighed, the warm and fuzzy feeling his mother's pride had given him quickly ebbing. "I don't know," he said. "At first, Majestic said they'd find a foster home for her, but it seems like she has a dangerous Quirk she can't control."
"So, what does that mean for her?" Inko asked, trepidation obvious in her features.
He sighed heavily. "If Majestic's agency can't find a foster willing and able to handle her Quirk, then she'll be put into the custody of a government agency that deals with orphaned children who have uncontrolled, overly powerful Quirks."
His mother grimaced at that, and Izuku didn't need to ask why. The agencies charged with that duty were notorious for operating facilities that were more akin to prisons than anywhere a child might be happy. The staff made sure to keep orphans in their care at arm's length, at least, treating them more like living, volatile bombs than children in need of love and affection.
Eri would be free of the abuse her yakuza "family" had subjected her to, but in many other ways it wouldn't be much of a step up for her.
"Is there no hope of her avoiding that?" Inko asked, eyes glistening at the idea of the cherubic child sleeping next to her son having to endure that.
"Unless a foster steps up, the only way would be for her to gain control of her Quirk in a hurry," Izuku said. "But Chisaki convinced her that her Quirk is a curse, so she's really reluctant to practice it. I'm the only one who can get her to even try to deliberately activate it."
Izuku looked down at the peacefully sleeping child for a long moment before he continued.
"I, um, kind of offered to take her in myself at one point, but Majestic and Ms. Zee nixed that immediately," he admitted. "They told me how the impulse was normal but it's not practical for heroes to basically adopt every civilian they rescue, and doubly so for a hero student. In any case, I'm too young for that anyway."
He felt so stupid telling his mother he'd tied to do that without even consulting her, considering how much of an impact it would've had on her and her life, too, if he'd gained responsibility for Eri.
"It's okay, Izuku, I understand," Inko smiled softly. "She's very attached to you, isn't she?"
He nodded. "Yeah, partly because I'm the one who stopped Chisaki, and partly because so far I'm the only one who can touch her when her Quirk's firing off without being affected." He sighed. "I just hate the idea of her going to one of those awful orphanages when she's already been through so much," he chuckled bitterly. "I guess there are things even one of the most powerful 'Quirks' can't fix."
His mother hesitated for a moment. "Izuku…"
"Yes?"
She hesitated for a moment, then shook her head. "Nothing," she said. "For now, you just help that little girl as best as you can."
"I will," he said solemnly.
"So, what's the rest of your day look like?" she asked, clearly looking to move the subject away from Eri's future.
"Quiet, compared to yesterday, though I guess that's not a high bar," he said with a smile, recalling how busy and chaotic the aftermath of the encounter with Eri and Chisaki had been. "Majestic had me doing some training earlier, and he let me observe most of the interactions with the Nighteye Agency regarding the yakuza case. And tomorrow he said he'd take me on patrol himself. But for the rest of today I'm on Eri watching duty. I'm supposed to try and get her to do some Quirk training if she's up to it, but right now she's obviously not."
"You should take the chance to rest, too, then," Inko suggested. "Even the greatest heroes need their rest." She added with a smile.
"Good idea," he said. "And anyway, I'm not about to move when Eri's on me like this."
Inko chuckled. "I think it's illegal in most countries to get up in your situation," she joked. "Bye, Izuku. Talk to you again soon."
"Bye, Mom."
He ended the call and was about to grab a pillow for himself when there was a soft but urgent tap on the door and it slid open a moment later, revealing Ms. Zee.
"What—?" he began.
"There's a large scale villain attack happening in Hosu," she explained before he could get any further. "Majestic wants your help transporting personnel there."
"Right!" Izuku said.
He focused his mind, and green light haloed Eri's form. The little girl was lifted gently into the air, allowing the hero student to get up and off the bed, then lowered back down, the light fading.
She stirred briefly, eyes blinking open. "Wha…?"
"I have to go and help some people," he said. "You can go back to sleep. I'll be back soon."
"Really?" she asked, and though she was obviously still half asleep, the fear in her eyes was clear.
"I promise," he said, trying very hard not to think of a future where this little girl needed to go into the care of an agency that would regard her more of a hazardous material than a child.
"Okay," she agreed, finally succumbing to sleep again.
That done, he followed Ms. Zee out of the room, softly closing the door after himself. The sidekick led him to the roof of the agency's building, where Majestic, what appeared to be all of the agency's other sidekicks, and several EMTs and other non-hero first responders were congregated.
"Midoriya, good," Majestic greeted him. "You made good time."
"There's a villain attack in Hosu?" he asked.
The pro nodded grimly. "Yes. Reports are all over the place, but it sounds like multiple creatures similar to the ones that attacked your class at the USJ are there and wreaking havoc all over the city," he said. "We're going to help with containing the villains and with rescue work. I can't transport everyone here all the way to Hosu by myself, which is why I need your help."
"Of course!" Izuku nodded.
"Now, you still have permission to use your Quirk," the hero said. "But don't engage with villains unless you can't avoid it. And stay with me or one of my sidekicks if possible. This is already more hardcore than anything I was expecting to expose you to this week."
"Right," Izuku said.
"Good man," Majestic nodded. "Now, grab everyone I don't and follow me."
Shimmering rings appeared beneath the pro hero and over half the others present, and they took off into the air. Izuku channeled his willpower into his ring, and a corona of jade light appeared around him and the remaining agency staff, who lifted off the roof and then took off after Majestic.
He tried not to think too much about how Momo was in Hosu right now.
She can take care of herself. She has an amazing Quirk and she's gotten so much stronger since we all started at UA, he tried to reassure himself.
He couldn't help but worry anyway.
"Dear Lord, protect us," Shiozaki breathed as she and Momo followed Kamui Woods into the heart of the chaos that was rapidly consuming the city.
The place looked like a war zone; in addition to the fires, there were damaged buildings and other property damage everywhere. People were rushing around in a panic, desperate to get off the streets but only increasing the danger in their haste, threatening to trample one another.
As they approached, a massive, creature with gangly limbs, chalk white skin, and multiple eyes embedded in its exposed brain swung by, grabbing a civilian.
"Nomu!" Momo gasped.
It wasn't the same creature that had attacked the USJ, but it was clearly the same kind of abomination.
Kamui Woods immediately sprang into action, swinging towards the creature, just before it hurled the hapless civilian it had grabbed through the air. The wooden hero surged forward, grabbing the man with a tendril grown from his arm before the civilian could crash into a building at high speed.
Unfortunately, he had barely gotten the chance to place the man down on the ground before the Nomu tackled him.
Momo almost rushed forwards to help him, only to be stopped when the pro threw a sharp look in her and Shiozaki's direction. "I've got this!" he barked. "Remember what I said! Don't engage any villains unless you have to!"
Hero and Nomu became a wild tangle of long limbs as they fought, crashing through the area as Kamui Woods tried to get their fight away from civilians while the beast attacked with the wild ferocity of a savage animal. In only moments, the two had rounded a corner and disappeared from view.
"You heard him," Shiozaki said, after the two students spent a second looking off in the direction the two had vanished in with stunned shock. "Let's do what we can to help!"
"Right!" Momo agreed with a nod.
There was no shortage of work for them to do, even with the restrictions placed upon them. Momo used her Quirk to spray fire retardant on some of the smaller blazes, while Shiozaki moved debris aside to free trapped civilians, and they both pulled many a fallen person up to their feet and out of danger of being trampled.
Time seemed to lose all meaning as the pair worked frantically to stem the tide of chaos. While Momo was sure that they'd only been at it for a few minutes, it felt like they'd been in the midst of this disaster area for hours.
Then an inhuman scream from above them seemed to pierce the heavens, and both students looked up to see a winged Nomu erupt from the side of a tall building, just before the top floor erupted into a fireball that briefly turned night into day.
"What kind of Quirk does that beast have?!" Shiozaki exclaimed.
Momo was already in action, having seen something that the vine-hair girl had missed, namely the people who'd leaped out of the building just before the explosion, clearly part of a desperate escape.
Moving as quickly as she dared, the Creation user swung and bounced back and forth off the walls of nearby buildings, trailing tape behind her the whole time, creating an extremely sloppy spiderweb as she went.
"Ooph!" the first civilian to land in it grunted, the tape stretching briefly but holding fast, to Momo's immense relief.
The others landed only an instant later, and she and Shiozaki moved quickly to get them out of the sticky, improvised net. The civilians each gave a quick word of thanks before taking the opportunity to flee, all of them nearly sprinting away despite the fact that the winged Nomu had already moved on.
"Come on," Momo said after the last one was on his way and she'd disposed of the mass of the net.
She fired a strand of tape from her hand, swinging up to the top of a modest building, with Shiozaki following along, and the two of them went from rooftop to rooftop, looking for another incident to assist with.
The one they found made Momo's blood run cold.
"What is it?" Shiozaki asked, seeing her fellow student freeze.
"Look," Momo said, pointing down at a nearby intersection where a familiar black creature with an exposed brain stood. Judging by the multicar pileup at the center of the intersection, it had already caused plenty of chaos and was ready to do more. "That's the same Nomu that attacked the USJ."
"We need to find Kamui Woods or another pro hero, now," Shiozaki said, noting the way that the monstrosity was approaching a group of civilians who were just trying to escape the car accident and get away.
Momo shook her head. "By the time we find a pro, people will be dead," she said. "I can knock it out with Somnambulist gas. It worked at the USJ."
"We're not supposed to engage in combat with any villains!" Shiozaki hissed.
"Kamui Woods only said not to engage with villains unless we have to," Momo pointed out. "And I can't just let people die to a villain I can stop that!"
"…all right," the vine-haired girl gave in. "But I hope you're right about this."
Momo activated her Quick and pulled a gas grenade launch from her torso, already loaded with a cannister filled with Somnambulist gas. Hefting the weapon, she took careful aim at the hulking creature down on the street.
She fired, sending the gas grenade careening toward its target. It impacted the street less than half a meter from the Nomu's feet and immediately began spewing its pink vapors, the resulting cloud quickly obscuring the creature.
Momo and Shiozaki waited and watched the cloud with baited breath.
Then the Nomu stepped out of the mass of knockout gas, very much still conscious.
Momo inhaled sharply. Had the League of Villains somehow managed to endow the Nomu with an immunity to the gas since the USJ attack?
She wouldn't have believed such a thing was possible, but then again, she would have said that the Nomu itself was impossible before the USJ.
"Yaoyorozu…" an increasingly nervous Shiozaki spoke.
Then the Nomu turned to look at them. Its gaze was as empty as ever, yet somehow its malicious intent remained all too clear.
Chapter 33: Pursuit
"Move!" Momo shouted, already firing a new strand of tape from one hand.
The Nomu made a seemingly impossible leap into the air, practically flying, and crashed onto the rooftop mere seconds after she and Shiozaki had vacated it, leaving a deep crater in the top of the building upon impact.
"I thought you were confident you could neutralize it!" Shiozaki exclaimed as she and Momo frantically swung from building to building.
"I was!" Momo replied.
The Nomu jumped after them again, landing on the ledge of another building, which quickly crumbled beneath it, but the beast threw arm out and then into the side of the structure, right through the brick, using its grip to arrest its fall before it hit could tumble to the street.
The creature pursued the two hero students like this for several blocks, leaving a trail of cracked masonry and broken windows as it hopped from building to building, hot on Momo and Shiozaki's heels the whole time.
"We need to find a pro to handle this demon!" Shiozaki said.
"I'm not sure even a pro hero can take it! It's supposed to be strong enough to challenge All Might!" Momo said. "Besides, we don't know where exactly we can find a pro!"
"Then what do you propose we do?" Shiozaki demanded.
"Split up," Momo said.
"What?!"
"Split up!" Momo repeated. "It can only chase after one of us, after all! Whichever of us it doesn't pursue can go and try to find pro heroes to assist!"
"But…!" Shiozaki trailed off, clearly not liking it but not having another idea. "Fine! But be careful!"
Momo agreed, and at the next intersection they reached, she went left while Shiozaki went right.
The Nomu hesitated for only a moment at the crossroads before going left.
The raven-haired girl wasn't surprised or displeased, for that matter; she had figured it would opt to go after her. She was the one who'd helped take it down at the USJ, and she was the one who'd attacked it now, after all.
She was glad that if one of them would have to pay for her mistake in attacking the Nomu, it would be her and not her fellow student, who'd advocated the more prudent path.
It also meant she could now do her best to handle the Nomu without worrying about ensnaring Shiozaki in the crossfire.
Reaching a large parking structure, she landed briefly on a concrete barrier on the roof of it meant to stop any potential, out of control vehicles, then swung off again.
She was already firing glue at the spot where she'd been as the Nomu sailed through the air, and the beast landed in the sticky grayish puddle she'd left, instantly adhering to the solid concrete.
Stopping to perch on a ledge on a nearby building, Momo turned to watch the Nomu, allowing herself a moment to catch her breath while she watched to see how it would react.
At first, the beast simply attempted to leap at her despite the glue, but the weight immediately stopped it. Then it tried to pull its feet up, but the barrier wasn't actually attached to the parking garage, making it difficult to just rip off chunks of it. The Nomu tried to do it anyway, but it had a hard time getting leverage, and even with its enormous strength went tumbling to the ground.
Momo was about to breathe a sigh of relief when the creature released a growl and then began to thrash and struggle violently.
"No, it's not about it to…"
A terrible, wet tearing sound came from below, and blood spurted as the Nomu iripped off its own lower legs at the knees to escape her impromptu trap. Momo released a gasp of horror at the grisly sight.
However, her disgust gave way to fear as she saw new tendrils of flesh abruptly sprout from the bloody stump and rapidly begin to thicken, soon taking on the appearance of new, undamaged lower legs.
She took off again just in time to avoid capture by the Nomu as it leaped after her with its regenerated legs.
Over the next few minutes, Momo tried multiple different methods of stopping the Nomu, only to have it eventually overcome all of them. The monster's incredible regeneration ability, coupled with its complete willingness to mutilate itself to escape any trap, ensured that she couldn't stop it for very long.
Which meant that now would've been a really good time for Shiozaki to return with some pro heroes, but of course that wasn't about to happen. There had, after all, been a huge flaw in her hastily made plan, namely that Shiozaki had no way of finding her now. She had been more interested in getting her fellow student out of danger than actually somehow getting a pro hero to handle the Nomu for them.
She found herself wishing that Midoriya was here. Even if he was without his power ring for some reason, Momo felt sure he could come up with some brilliant idea on how she could use her Quirk in a way that would seem obvious in hindsight that would stop the beast pursuing her.
Unfortunately, he was in another city at the moment, but she knew that other 1-A students with in Hosu right now. Coming to a stop on a ledge, she quickly took out her phone and began to tap away, all too mindful of how little time she had before she needed to move on.
As it turned out, Izuku was not nearly as far away as Yaoyorozu believed, having arrived in Hosu some time ago along with Majestic and the other members of his agency.
So far, the hero student found himself both impressed and disappointed.
The members of the Majestic agency had sprung into action as soon as they'd arrived at the city, working like different parts of a well-oiled machine to both hunt for the villains causing all the chaos and destruction while also engaging in rescue operations. It was nothing short of inspiring, and Izuku hoped he could someday be so practiced at working to help people.
The disappointing part was that there was no place or role for him in these obviously well-rehearsed plans.
He had been quickly handed off to a junior sidekick called Kadabra, who was in charge of providing protection for an emergency medical station the EMTs were setting up.
Izuku wouldn't have minded helping out with that in the slightest; as a student without even a provisional license doing a work study, he knew better than to expect the most dangerous or exciting assignments.
Still, with destruction and death unfolding across an entire city, he dearly wanted to be able to do something, no matter how menial.
Unfortunately, all his attempts and offers to help were rebuffed by either the EMTs or Kadabra, and it was obvious they all just wanted him to stay out of the way.
Izuku was trying to content himself with doing just that, but he felt about ready to explode with pent up energy and the desire to act.
Then his phone pinged.
Reaching into his pocket, the green-haired young man fished it out, frowning at the notification it was displaying.
Yaoyorozu had enabled GPS tracking of her phone for all the members of the Class 1-A group chat. She hadn't sent any messages to the group or anything, just turned on the feature so any and all of her classmates could see her location. Why would she…?
His eyes widened as it suddenly clicked, and Izuku frantically input his passcode to unlock his phone.
"Ring," he spoke in a hissing whisper, barely bothering to look and confirm that none of the Majestic agency staff present were paying attention to him. "Interface with my phone then pinpoint and track Yaoyorozu's location."
"Connecting," the ring responded into his mind. "Interface complete."
Kadabra never even noticed Izuku leaving.
As genetically modified monstrosities tore through Hosu and heroes struggled to stop them and contain the chaos, a second, more insidious part of the villains' plan went into action.
A single video appeared simultaneously on all the major social media sites, mysteriously making its way to the top of every user's feeds just as quickly as it had been posted, despite the account used to post it having no followers and no other videos.
All over Japan, bemused and curious people clicked play on the strange video.
"Good evening, Japan, my name is Shigaraki," a thin man with pale blue hair and what looked disturbingly like a severed hand clutching his face spoke to the camera. "I'm sure by now all of you have heard about the 'Hero Killer' Stain and his mission."
He paused for a moment, bowing his head slightly, as though in mourning or quiet contemplation.
"Nobody knew who he was or what he was about while he was alive," Shigaraki continued. "The public just thought of him as a serial killer who murdered pro heroes. It's only after he was killed himself that this country found out the truth."
The hand on his face obscured most of his expression, but it was still obvious how intense the young man became all of a sudden. "He wasn't killing heroes randomly. He was only striking at those who make a mockery of the name. The so-called heroes who don't care about whether they're actually helping anyone or not, so long as they're getting rich and famous. The frauds, the liars, and the cheats who oppress instead of protect!"
Shigaraki abruptly jumped to his feet and began pacing around in agitation. "The media says Stain's death is a mystery, but everyone knows it was a pro hero who did it. He probably thought that murdering him would bury the truths that Stain represented. Well, he was wrong!"
The young man sat down again, turning his burning gaze to the camera. "We, the League of Villains, will pick up where Stain left off, to remake society into one where frauds and oppressors don't get to pretend to be heroes. And for our first act, we avenge his death tonight, in Hosu City. Come out, heroes, and respond. That is, if you dare to risk our judgement."
The world took on an odd appearance at night when moving just below the speed of sound, at least when using the ring. Everything seemed to blur together into a whirl of lights in the darkness, all of it seen through the emerald haze generated by his protective barrier.
It actually looked quite a lot like traveling at faster than light speeds.
Izuku normally never would've flown so quickly inside a planetary atmosphere, much less while above a major city, but as it stood, the only thing stopping him from going even faster was the knowledge that he would leave a trail of destruction in his wake and quite possibly kill people if he stepped on the accelerator any harder.
Yaoyorozu was in danger.
He came to an abrupt halt, his perceptions of the world around him crashing back into normality above a busy street, the ring automatically halting him once he reached the desired coordinates.
"Where is she?" he wondered aloud.
As if on cue, he suddenly heard the sound of crumbling stone, followed by a woman yelping in surprise and fear. He snapped his gaze toward the sound just in time to see Yaoyorozu landing awkwardly on the street, clearly having attempted to make it to a ledge on a nearby building only to have it crumble beneath her boot.
An instant after she touched the street, a dark, hulking figure that was unmistakably a Nomu crashed onto the street nearby her, landing with such force that it created a spiderweb of cracks in the asphalt. Yaoyozoru scooted away from the figure.
Izuku's willpower surged into the ring, and the Nomu vanished beneath the massive emerald boot of a Mt. Lady construct.
"Midoriya!" Yaoyorozu called up to him.
"Hi, Yaomomo," he said, trying not to show just how relieved he was to find her alive and well. "I got your message."
Before she could respond, the Mt. Lady construct staggered as the Nomu beneath its boot gave it a mighty shove. Surprised, Izuku quickly dispelled the construct before it could crash into anything, then rang up an All Might construct, which immediately began to trade blows with the Nomu.
"Midoriya, it's the same one from the USJ!" Yaoyorozu said as he descended and drew near to her.
"You're right, it is!" he exclaimed, realizing that it was exactly the same creature they had faced on that chaotic, terrifying day, the one that the League had claimed was intended to kill All Might. "Can you…?"
"No," she answered at once. "It's immune to the gas now. I got into this mess to begin with when I tried to stop it from attacking civilians that way."
He blinked. "How is that even possible?"
"I don't know," she replied. "But it means we need another way to defeat it. Do you think you can manage it?"
His gaze flicked over to where his All Might construct and the Nomu were engaged in furious, high speed combat. Izuku poured more willpower into the construct, trying to increase its power as much as possible.
He knew he was a better ringslinger than he'd been at the USJ, but back then Mr. Aizawa had been cancelling out the beast's Quirks, or at least most of them. The Nomu seemed to be shrugging off all the blows that Green Might was throwing at it with impossible ease, barely tiring at all.
"I'm not sure. It could go either way," he admitted.
"We can't let that thing win," Yaoyorozu said grimly. "It'll kill us, then start attacking civilians."
"I have an idea," he said. "It's a little risky, but…"
"Tell me," she said.
"I need you to make something," he said, quickly explaining the plan to her.
She actually smiled when he was done, a glint in her dark eyes at the sheer insanity of the plan. "Give me two minutes," Momo said.
"No problem."
Then she turned away from him, grabbing the front of her costume as the telltale glow of Creation began to shine from her torso.
Izuku pointedly looked away while she worked, a blush on his face, and did his best to just focus on the fight between his construct and the Nomu.
There was a loud clatter as Momo finished her work. The young hero student then lugged the object to the ground between them and where the Nomu was engaging with the ring construct.
"Ready?" Izuku asked.
Yaoyorozu nodded. "Ready."
Izuku dispelled the All Might construct, abruptly leaving the Nomu without an opponent. Visibly confused, the beast whirled around, head jerking this way and that as it searched for its foe.
Yaoyorozu stuck two fingers into her mouth and whistled piercingly, immediately getting the Nomu's attention.
"Over here!" Izuku taunted. "Remember us?"
He had no idea whether it did or not, but the Nomu clearly viewed them as acceptable targets. It began to sprint in their direction, its footfalls leaving cracks in the street as it went.
Then it stepped onto the platform Yaoyorozu had put into its path.
The Nomu let out a loud roar as it was abruptly flung into the air, even whatever Quirks it had unable to override the simple physics involved.
Izuku supposed the whole setup was a little like something out of a cartoon, except with a dangerously powerful hydraulic hammer replacing the classic giant spring under the platform, but there was no denying the effectiveness of it.
He'd just needed to get the Nomu into the air.
Before the beast could come back down to earth or even reorient itself, Izuku funneled willpower into the ring, and a cluster of green rockets appears on the Nomu. They immediately blazed with emerald flames, and the speed of the monstrosity's ascent immediately increased tenfold.
In seconds, the Nomu had vanished from sight entirely.
"There," Izuku said. "Those should carry it into low Earth orbit. Even if the Nomu can survive up there, there's no way it could—"
He didn't get any further before Yaoyorozu threw her arms around him, pulling him into a tight hug.
"Y-Yaomomo?" he stammered, his whole body going rigid in surprise.
"Thank you," she whispered in his ear. "I thought…I thought the Nomu was going to get me, until you showed up."
He slowly brought his arms up, woodenly returning her hug and making very sure that only his hands came into contact with her back. The excessive caution on his part might've been a bit silly considering Yaoyorozu had brought them into full flush contact, but the last thing he wanted was to take advantage of this situation in some way.
"It's okay," he said softly. "The Nomu's gone. I'm here."
She continued to hold him for a few moments longer, but he could practically feel her calming down. Eventually she released him, to his mingled relief and disappointment, a bashful expression on her face.
"Thank you," she said again. "I apologize for…going to pieces there."
"Don't mention it," he replied, giving her a nervous smile.
She laughed, though it sounded a bit shaky. "I should…get back to work, and try to find Kamui Woods and Shiozaki," she said. "I'm sure you need to get back as well."
His eyes widened. "Oh, right, I never told anyone from the Majestic agency where I was going," he said.
I am going to be in so much trouble, he thought.
Still, that was a secondary concern to him. "Are you sure you're going to be all right?" he asked.
Yaoyorozu nodded. "I'm sure I'll be fine, thank you," she said. "I…won't be provoking fights with any more Nomu, or anything equally foolish, that's for certain."
"You did it to protect innocent people," Izuku was quick to point out.
"It was still reckless on my part, though," she said, then held up a finger to silence him before he could protest. "We could debate this all night, but we both have places to be."
"I…yeah, all right," he agreed reluctantly. "I'll text you tomorrow, after this is all over."
She nodded. "Thank you again, Midoriya," she said softly. "You were my hero tonight."
Then she fired a strand of tape out from one of her hands, and an instant later she was swinging away.
Izuku tried his best not to grin like a fool for the rest of the night, knowing it was unbecoming for him while in the middle of a de facto war zone, but he flew a little higher on his way back to the medical station and his steps felt light for the rest of the long night, the memory of her saying those words replaying almost constantly in his mind the whole time.
Meanwhile, far away from the chaos unfolding in Hosu, the CEO of Detnerat was returning to his home after a hard day's work. However, he had no plans to rest immediately, despite the lateness of the hour.
No, Rikiya Yotsubashi might be done working for the day, but the events still in motion demanded the attention of Re-Destro.
I must get in touch with Curious as soon as possible to see how we can best spin these attacks to benefit our cause, he mused.
It shouldn't be too hard, in his opinion. After all, the notion that people should be allowed to use their Quirks to defend themselves in such situations wasn't the most difficult case to make. He'd still defer to the Meta Liberation Army's media expert on how best to deliver that message, though.
The businessman and would-be revolutionary was so absorbed in his thoughts that he almost didn't notice the black clad figure standing at the end of his driveway.
"Who are you?" he demanded of the man, who looked like someone cosplaying as a hero (or villain) with a costume made from black trash bags, in his humble opinion.
Definitely not something that had been made by Detnerat, that much was certain.
"I never fit in when I was young, thanks to my Quirk," the man said, looking down at the ground rather than at Yotsubashi.
"What?" he asked, frowning. He didn't relax his guard, however.
"My Quirk allows me to read the minds of the deceased, so long as their brains aren't damaged or too decomposed. Or at least, that's what the Quirk counselors said, but I always knew the truth, that I can speak to them," the man said, still not looking at Yotsubashi. "Everyone always viewed me as a deviant and a freak, for feeling more comfortable among the dead than the living. I was harassed and beaten up all the time growing up, even by my own brothers."
Yotsubashi's eyebrows rose, his mind already racing.
It would be extremely strange for some random person to just start telling the CEO of Detnerat all about the troubles he'd endured because of his Quirk, but it would make a lot more sense for him to pour out his soul like that to Re-Destro, Yotsubashi knew.
If this man knew of the MLA and his role in it, then he represented a huge breach in security. Yotsubashi would need to find out how the stranger had discovered what he apparently had as soon as possible.
At the same time, this was starting to look like a massive opportunity. With a Quirk like the one this man claimed to have, there was little information that would be inaccessible to the MLA.
Get him a job in the right morgue, arrange for important targets to have "accidents" and they could gain a wealth of intelligence that no one would ever even suspect they possessed. An asset like that could further the cause of liberation enormously.
Recruitment it was, then.
"My friend, it's absolutely appalling that you suffered such discrimination because of your amazing meta ability," he said. "You shouldn't ever have had to endure that. Your ability makes you superior to so many; you never should've been looked down on by your inferiors."
"You mean it?" the man in black asked, finally looking him in the eyes.
There was something wrong in that dark gaze that made Yotsubashi want to shudder, but he suppressed it, writing it off as merely his imagination.
"Yes," he said, giving the man the friendliest smile he could. "You should be liberated from such oppressive restrictions, free to use your meta ability proudly in a new world we can create together."
The man in black grinned at him, and Yotsubashi felt the smile fall away from his face.
"No. Death is the only true liberation."
Yotsubashi scowled, activating his meta ability, body swelling with muscle and skin blackening as his stress and negative emotions were converted to pure power.
"I'm not interested in that kind of liberation," he said.
"Too bad."
The man surged forward, moving with shocking speed. Yotsubashi threw a punch, swiping with one beefy arm, but his massive fist struck nothing but air.
Then a huge hand that seemed to be made of inky shadows materialized in the air and clamped down onto his face with an iron grip, blinding him.
He clawed at it, trying to rip it off of himself.
Then Yotsubashi felt it, and his struggles abruptly ceased, body shrinking as the effect of his meta ability suddenly ceased.
The spectral hand on his face dissipated like so much smoke, and he looked down to see his attacker's hand buried in his chest up to the wrist.
Yotsubashi felt the most profound coldness spreading out from his chest.
"I liberate you from the oppression of life," the man whispered.
The titan of industry and Grand Commander opened his mouth, trying to damn his killer with his final moments, but he couldn't get a word out. His head slumped forward as his body went limp.
Re-Destro was dead.