"DIE!"

By the time Shoto and Momo had caught up to Katsuki, he was already in the heat of battle with several rebels, right in the middle of the street. There were office buildings on either side, neat concrete with large tinted windows, no alleyways to hide in. Lampposts and trees dotted the sides at even intervals, but several of them were already damaged from the fight.

Shoto had seen some of the rebels before— Riot, the electric boy, and the girl with sonic attacks— but a few new ones had entered the mix. A girl with pink skin, a black-haired boy with knobby elbows, and a muscular boy with thick lips.

Shoto's first move with such a complex battlefield would normally be to freeze everything, but with Katsuki in the midst of it, he would have to re-think. He preferred to stay away from close combat, but Katsuki had already chosen it as the mode of battle, at least for now. However, it seemed he was having trouble taking on all six opponents at once. Every time they struck him, he growled louder, made larger explosions, but they'd learned his pattern.

"Grenade!" Momo shouted. "Fall back!

"Don't tell me what to do!" A few of the rebels screamed as he blew them back with an explosion.

Momo sighed in frustration. "We can't do anything large-scale unless he listens…Is he really that mad about that argument we had?"

Shoto shrugged. He couldn't blame Katsuki for being mad. After all, it was hard to accept that their lives had been carefully built on a series of lies, one on top of the other. On the other hand, reacting like a child in a serious situation was completely unprofessional.

"If we do something non-lethal, it doesn't matter that he's in the fray," Shoto pointed out.

"We don't know the abilities of some of the rebels," Momo protested. "It could put him in more danger if we capture them all at once. If he's not going to listen, we'll have to follow his lead."

"Fine."

Shoto charged in first, going for the girl with the sonic attacks. If he took her out, she wouldn't be able to shatter his ice. He zeroed in on the cables connecting her headset to her boots, where she seemed to have speakers.

He sent ice in her direction as a distraction, and as expected, it shattered a few moments later with a frequency he couldn't hear. Meanwhile, he heated his left, planning to melt the cables until they didn't work anymore.

She backed away when he approached, but it seemed close combat wasn't her specialty. With a well-placed kick, she collapsed to her knees, and Shoto grabbed one of the cables in his left hand. She screamed in pain, the smell of burning flesh filling the air.

Were the cables...part of her?

"Don't you touch her, you freak!"

Shoto gasped as electricity coursed through his body, making his muscles go rigid, and he hit the concrete, his heart pounding frantically in his ears. He'd gotten distracted.

"Forte?" Through pain-distorted vision, Shoto could see the electric boy trying to comfort her in the middle of the battlefield.

"B-Bolt?"

Shoto still couldn't move, but he sent ice towards the girl— Forte. It slammed into her and she flew through a window, shattering the glass.

"KYOUKA!" Electricity crackled in Bolt's hands, concentrating into the device on his wrist. "Oh, now you're gonna get it!"

Shoto froze himself as the electricity made contact. Ice was a poor conductor, so it insulated him from the shock. He could feel that he'd regained control of his muscles, jumping up as soon as Bolt was done, covered in a suit of ice. His vision was still wobbling, but he could feel the strength returning to his body.

The boy's eyes widened; he apparently lacked an understanding of basic physics. "What the—?!"

BOOM.

An explosion sent them both flying into a concrete wall. The ice around Shoto's body protected him from the worst of the impact so that all he would receive was minor bruising, but Bolt seemed to be out cold. The ice had cracked from the blow and crumbled off when he stood.

"Grenade!" Shoto snapped.

"SHUT UP!" He loosed another explosion so powerful that Shoto had to protect himself with a thick wall of ice, his ears ringing. A split second later, the muscular rebel was thrown against the ice so hard that it cracked. He didn't seem fazed, however, simply running back into the fray. A bead of sweat rolled down the side of Shoto's face, a scoff escaping his lips. What was Katsuki thinking? Shoto had half a mind to freeze his own teammate.

"Grenade!" Momo shouted from across the street, where she was keeping pace with the pink-skinned girl, who had some sort of mucus-like liquid dripping from her palms. "Be more careful!"

Katsuki ignored her, focusing his attention on Riot, the muscular boy, and the boy with knobby elbows. He was regressing to how he'd been when they'd first met, not watching out for his teammates...

"Oo...you're angrier than usual today…" Riot mused, grinning at his opponent. His clothes were ripped and he was bleeding from a cut on his forehead, but he didn't seem to care.

"He gets angrier?" The knobby-elbowed boy's jaw dropped.

"DON'T MOCK ME!" Katsuki growled.

Shoto glanced one last time at Bolt to make sure he was down before running to help Katsuki.

"DIDN'T I TELL YOU TO STAY OUT OF MY WAY?!"
Shoto refused to meet his glare. "You're acting like a child—!"

"I DON'T NEED A DAMN LIAR!"

Shoto's heart skipped a beat. He hesitated at Katsuki's words, his eyes flicking towards Katsuki for a split second. That was all the rebels needed. Someone's fist connected with Shoto's gut, knocking all the air out of him and blackening his vision. He set himself on fire as a last-minute defense, but a fist grabbed his hair and threw him anyway, up at least two stories.

Ice!

He extended his right hand and made a slide for himself, even though the best landing he could accomplish was a tumble. He rolled onto his hands and knees and coughed, trying to get the air back into his lungs.

"You burn...Sugar's hand…" A deep voice growled.

He looked up and met eyes with the muscular rebel, who had somehow become even more muscular over the course of the battle. Then again, perhaps it was Shoto's imagination.

The rebel clenched his burned fist. "Sugar...mad…"

Shoto made more ice as a shield and jumped back, trying to ignore the cramping in his stomach. A second later, the ice exploded into a shimmering cloud of shrapnel. Sugar charged through the mist, screaming at the top of his lungs with his fists raised above his head.

Shoto jumped out of the way at the last minute, but a jolt of surprise shook his body when he saw that Sugar's blow had actually broken up the asphalt. He tried freezing the strongman, but Sugar simply broke through the ice, yelling incoherently. Fire might fare better. They were trying not to kill any rebels, but it didn't seem Sugar would have much information. Whatever experiments he'd had done had ruined his mind.

Sugar smashed more ice, but seemed confused by all the dust and water droplets filling the air. Shoto took the opportunity to burn him alive.

He didn't stay until he charred the other boy, though, simply setting his clothes on fire and then running to help the others. It was possible Sugar would be able to put the fire out on his own, especially considering the moisture that was now in the air, but he probably wouldn't be able to rejoin the fight.

Quickly, Shoto reassessed the battlefield. On his left, Momo had taken care of the pink girl, but was now fighting Forte, blood streaming from her ears. She seemed to have a few burns on her arms and legs, but nothing serious. On his right, Katsuki had three opponents again— Riot, Bolt, and the knobby-elbowed boy. His nose was bleeding, and he had small cuts and scratches all over his body, his clothes ripped. He needed help even if he refused to admit it. This time, Shoto would just have to do a better job of ignoring him.

Katsuki saw him step forward and shouted. "STAY THE HELL AWAY, JANUS!"

Shoto's mouth tightened, but he forced all his emotions away, sending ice speeding towards the rebels anyway. Not even a second had passed before it exploded, reduced to dust by Katsuki's hand.

For a moment, no one moved, the world reduced to two heroes, facing each other in a cloud of icy mist. Shoto's heart was pounding furiously in his ears, his eyes wide, but Katsuki simply glared, no trace of regret on his face.

The rebels were the first to take advantage of the shock. The knobby-elbowed boy slung some sticky tape around Katsuki, swinging him into a nearby building. Riot jumped towards Shoto, but he didn't notice until Riot was already on him. Riot had hardened his hands to the sharpness of a knife, cutting Shoto across the chest. He set himself on fire as defense.

"Sorry, Janus! Fire doesn't work on me!"

Failure.

Shoto gasped at the sound of Endeavor's voice in his head. Of course Endeavor had been right about the fire, all those weeks ago, but why was it coming up, now of all times—?

Something pierced through Shoto's leg, Riot's hand. He grunted as his leg gave out, in sync with another scream across the battlefield.

Riot turned. "Cellophane?! I'm coming!"

Distracted, again... Shoto reprimanded himself and froze the wound in his leg, struggling to his feet to check on his teammates again. He'd have to work harder to keep his battles long-distance. Momo was still fighting Forte, and appeared to be at a stalemate. Katsuki was growing increasingly sloppy, out-of-breath, taking too many hits, bleeding...He was outnumbered again by Riot, Cellophane, and Bolt, practically about to collapse.

But what would happen if Shoto tried to help again?

Katsuki raised an arm, aiming his gauntlet at the rebels, who all got into a ready stance. He hadn't used the gauntlet in public, yet, because of the property damage it would cause, so the rebels didn't know what it would do, but Shoto did.

Momo was twenty feet behind the rebels, still engaged with Forte, in no position to dodge such a huge explosion. Shoto's eyes widened. "KATSUKI!"

His finger tightened around the pin.

Shoto ran. Katsuki grunted as Shoto tackled him. They hit the ground.

The only thought in Shoto's mind: Ice.

A scorching light. A blast so loud it was silent.

Shoto blinked smoke out of his eyes. He couldn't remember where he was, or why. He couldn't hear anything. Chunks of concrete and broken glass were raining down around him, the smell of ash in the air. He sat up groggily, touching his head. His hand came back bloody, but for some reason it didn't alarm him.

He saw Katsuki on the floor twenty feet away, the gauntlet on his left side gone. Suddenly, he remembered, panic gripping his heart with an icy hand.

"Mo— C-Creati!" Shoto stumbled to his feet, looking around wildly. The rebels were gone, somehow, and Momo was nowhere in sight. "Creati!"

Numbly, he took out his phone with trembling hands. The screen had cracked so it was barely readable, but it still worked well enough to use. His finger was shaking so badly he could hardly dial the number.

"Hello?" Tenya's voice seemed far away. "Shoto? What is it? Is everything alright? Shoto? Shoto?"

"Yeah," he replied, realizing with a start he'd been silent. "I mean, no…"

Instantly, Tenya's tone changed, urgent. "Do you need backup?"

"I don't know…"

He tried to assess the situation, as he'd done countless times before, but he couldn't clear his mind, his heart racing in his ears, his vision blurring. A drop of blood dripped from his forehead and hit the ground, forming a small circle of gore.

"Zero and I are on the way. Please hold on!" The connection cut.

Slowly, Shoto put his phone away. Eventually, he brought himself to look around at his surroundings. Almost all of the lampposts were broken, trees on fire or splintered in half. The buildings on either side had had their windows blown out for many floors up, probably from Katsuki's grenade. Some of the concrete from the outer facades of the buildings had chipped off. Based on the direction of the damage, it seemed Shoto had managed to move the trajectory of Katsuki's explosion when he tackled him, pointing it upwards instead of at the rebels.

But where was Momo? Shoto's head was foggy, but he managed to form one thought.

Last night, I didn't have a dream...

A/N: Thanks so much for your patience the past week, guys! :D I hope the chapter was worth the wait ^^'

As always, feel free to let me know your thoughts! Critique is welcome!

Also, we hit 100+ followers on this fic in the past week, which is absolutely crazy to me O.o I never imagined that that many people could enjoy my writing! So thank you all so much for the support! It really means a lot to me! :D

I'd like to do something special in order to celebrate, but I'm not sure what, yet ^^ I'll try to think of something for next week, though!

Thanks again! :D