Disclaimer: This is purely a fan work and I own nothing
Warning: This is beginning to go into manga spoiler territory. Just...you know, heads up.
"Shinsou!" Midoriya shouted as he ran into class 1-A Monday morning, making all his classmates jump.
Shinsou looked incredibly nervous for this confrontation, and he'd never admit he was preparing for this since making Midoriya sleep the night before. "Look man, about yesterday – "
"I need you to do that again tonight when I get back from work." Midoriya requested, not even letting the nervous boy finish.
"I…okay?" Shinsou blinked. "You're not…mad?"
"I was, but then I saw…well, it doesn't matter. I can explain later," Midoriya realized the entire class was watching the conversation. "But…thank you. I needed to rest."
Shinsou let the tension in his shoulders drop, clearly relaxing now that the danger had passed. "Yeah, no problem."
As Aizawa walked into the room, Midoriya shifted focus. One for All could wait for tonight; he was already prepping for work tonight, and hopefully finding out more about where Hatsume was.
"And the clone just disintegrated?!" He cried in dismay to Centipeder.
"Yup," the older hero sighed, "banged her head against the cell bars until she broke down."
"Did the detectives get anything out of her at least?" Gran Torino grunted, arm still in a sling but otherwise looked to be back up to snuff.
"Not a thing, she just laughed and said Izuku would be hers," Bubble Girl frowned. "You've got a fan, kid."
"Not what I had in mind," Deku grumbled, putting his head in his hands.
"Definitely not, any time Toga claims she loves some poor sap, they end up dead so she can have them forever," Gran Torino grunted. "You're the first Pro Hero she's ever targeted though so this is outside of her normal modus operandi."
"Do we have any leads?" Bubble Girl asked.
"One arrived at reception this morning, actually." Centipeder answered, holding a DVD. It read, "play me, Izuku ;)," in red marker.
"Oh boy," Midoriya sighed. "Let's see what she wants from me now."
The hero group piled into the conference room to play the disc. The screen fizzled on…
"Hey there Izuku!" Toga greeted to the camera, blowing a kiss to it obnoxiously. "I hope you're feeling better after I sent you that fodder to beat up." She lowered her tone in an attempted sultry voice, "I know I certainly liked watching you pound me to a pulp over and over." She went back to her usual cheery tone. "And now I know what to expect from you! You know, I usually like guys who play with knives, but what you do with the explosions AND your fists? Mmmm."
Toga laughed and shook her head. "I'm getting off track! I know you're dying to see me again, aren't you? And you're probably wondering about your little whore, right? Don't worry, she's right back here!" She tilted the camera to show the broom closet door behind her. "Here, I'll show you."
She flipped the camcorder around and slid open the slot on the door.
Hatsume looked up from the floor, with her back to the door, goggles pulled down over her eyes. She seemed to be adjusting them every few seconds.
"Hey you little bitch," Toga hissed. "Got anything to say to my man?"
"Just that he's going to kick your ass," Hatsume shrugged. "Also, hey, make sure Yukio doesn't touch any of my stuff. And..."
Hatsume looked to the ground. "I miss you, Deku Scrub." She adjusted her goggles one more time, making a little red-light blink.
"Yeah, well no one cares, ugly!" Toga laughed, slamming the slot on the closet door shut. "Now, Zuzu, you may not know this about me, but I am a big fan of Stain! But wouldn't you know it...someone caught him in an old abandoned theater. Which is where you're going to go or else I might..." Toga pulled a knife from behind her back and waved it in front of the camera with giggle, "pluck out those pretty yellow eyes of your girlfriends and take them for myself!"
"Alright kid, don't freak out - wait, why are you smiling?"
"The light on her goggles," Deku smiled. "She did something to send us a signal. I bet it's to my helmet, hold on!"
He pulled his helmet out of his backpack and began to sync it up, hooking it to the internal. There was a blinking red light over some coordinates. Grabbing a piece of paper, he scratched them down carefully, and removed the helmet from his head. "Here!" He slid the paper over to Gran Torino, "these are the coordinates she sent me!"
"Wow, you two really are a couple of nerds, huh?" Gran Torino laughed. "Bubble Girl, look these up."
"On it, sir."
"We have to consider this as a trap," Centipeder interjected. "They clearly want Midoriya to go to this theater alone, for an ambush."
"Can't we cut them off at this location?" Deku asked.
"We should, but, if they're aware of what your girlfriend pulled, we don't want to risk coming up empty handed, and then have Toga take it out on Hatsume because we didn't go along with their request." Centipeder explained. "Toga's not still on the loose for dumb luck. She's smarter than she lets on. Unfortunately."
Midoriya frowned. "You're right…so what do we do?"
Bubble Girl returned from the computer. "This is pretty nondescript building on the outskirts of town. Perfect place for a hideout. Centipeder and I will take this location."
"Then you and I can see what Toga has in store for you at that theater," Gran Torino stood up, grabbing his cane. "We can't run the risk of not showing, in case they have some sort of hostages or plan on hurting civilians in their methods."
Deku nodded, careful not to show his discontent. All of this made sense, but he wanted to be where Hatsume was. It's not my call though.
Hatsume tried her best not to flinch as she was backhanded by Toga, collapsing against one of the shelving units, but a grunt of pain escaped her lips.
"YOU IDIOT!" Toga screamed, furiously, kicking the Support student in the ribs. "You think I wouldn't notice your STUPID GOGGLES!"
Hatsume coughed but let out a rueful laugh. "You're the idiot who left them on me."
Giving the lovesick killer sass turned out to be one of her worse ideas as this earned Hatsume another kick in the side. "YOU!" Thud. "ARE LUCKY!" Thud. "I WANT HIM!" Thud. "TO SEE." Thud. "YOU DIE!"
Hatsume coughed as her vision blurred, she was a little alarmed to see blood trickled down to the floor from her mouth.
Toga took a deep breath. "It's fine. It just means I get to move up phase three while Zuzu is busy with phase two." She let out a bitter laugh. "With any luck, maybe I'll have him sooner."
The villainess stormed from the room and slammed the door behind her. Hatsume could hear talking to someone on a phone, and with the coast clear, she reached under the shelving unit, and pulled out the old mop handle and flashlight. She had carved a makeshift screwdriver from the wood, which she had used to modify her goggles. "Back to the drawing board..."
"I've called in some backup from nearby agencies. If anything goes down, they'll be on top of us pretty quick, so you just hold your own if things go south," Gran Torino explained as they spotted the theater a few blocks away.
Midoriya nodded and wondered if Toga knew just how much it sucked to be back here. This was the culmination of his summer break with Mei. As he hopped down to the street and began to approach, the night replayed vividly in his mind. He'd never have guessed that taking down Stain would have brought him and his partner together, but here they were.
As he pushed the rotted, burnt doors off their hinges, he walked in the theater to see a lone figure on the stage, sitting in a chair. As he got closer, he zoomed in via his helmet to find...
"Dabi..." He frowned. He had figured he'd run into him at some point.
"So, you're Deku?" The villain laughed. "I can't believe he had trouble with you."
"Stain, you mean?" Deku retorted. "You're one of his followers, right? Is that why you wanted to fight here?"
"No. Not Stain." Dabi stood from the rickety old chair, and with a flick of his fingers, turned it to ash without even turning around. "Though living through him is another thing I can't even comprehend."
"What do you want?" Deku growled. "Toga sent me here to find you. How do I get Hatsume back?"
"You think there's a scenario where either of you live through this?" The villain sneered, wreathing his arms in blue flames. "I don't give a damn how mad Toga gets, the only thing I'm bringing her back is your charred corpse!"
As a wave of fire came crashing towards Midoriya, he leaped to another section seating, the entire area he had just been was covered by flames.
Fire, and none of my temperature regulators. This is going to be tricky.
Dabi was already prepping another wave of fire to attack with, so Deku responded with an air blast, careful not to use the fingers that would trigger an explosion for his gloves.
As Dabi unleashed another wave, the air blast connected, blowing a hole in the flames. The villain had not been expecting Deku to come leaping through the whole, and club him across the face with spinning back kick.
Dabi was thrown back but stumbled to his feet and rubbed his jaw. "You're tougher than you look. No wonder he liked you."
"Who are you talking about, you psycho?!" Midoriya jumped towards Dabi again for a Detroit Smash, but the villain jumped away.
As Dabi landed in a three-point stance, he set the entire stage ablaze, causing Midoriya to spring upwards, grabbing the rafters with his spider legs to avoid the all-consuming blue fire of the villain.
"You can't be this stupid," the pyromaniac sneered, "you did build all those tools to take him down, didn't you?"
As stream of fire came for Midoriya, he threw himself towards a patch of flooring that was not engulfed. "You mean...Todoroki?"
"Finally!" Dabi laughed. "I was wondering when you'd figure it out. I bet you're wondering WHY I CARE!"
With his yelling, the villain hurled a massive fireball towards the hero, who knocked it off course with an airblast from his fingers. As good as my mask is at filtering out smoke, I need to end this quick. Fire like this will spread if I don't do something. "I have a feeling you're going to tell me."
"Well, I never got to tell him...but that's my little brother."
"WHAT?!" Midoriya yelled. He had been expecting a lot of things, but not that.
"That's right!" Dabi cackled, throwing more fire, which Deku struggled to knock off course. "I was Endeavor's first failed attempt at breeding some hell-spawn that could take down All Might!"
Running out of room on the burning floor, Midoriya jumped to the walls, using his mechanical legs to scale up the sides of the theater towards a balcony. I need to put some of this out.
"And soon, we were going to go finish the job and take our dear old dad! But guess what? SOME VIGILANTE ASSHOLE KNOCKED ME OUT AND RUINED OUR HOSPITAL STAKEOUT THE DAY BEFORE!"
"I have a feeling you aren't talking about that Knuckleduster guy, are you?" Deku quipped, hoping the distraction would give him enough time to find the best vantage point. Get angry, asshole. You'll get sloppy.
"Do you know how long? How long I've been planning to off that son of a bitch?!" Dabi growled, losing control as streams of flames whipped around him, engulfing the theater, burning even his own skin. "I NEEDED THAT BRAT TO PUT OUT ENDEAVOR'S FLAMES!"
"Too weak to do it yourself?" Midoriya taunted. "I thought you were supposed to be a heavy hitter. No wonder you're only Toga's attack dog."
That was just the push Dabi needed, as he laughed in something of a mad fury, sputtering flames haphazardly across the old building.
Now.
Midoriya jumped to the highest rafter he could, unloading his mist grenades from his belt and threw in a scattered pattern across the theater, the mist and moisture dampening the flames and covered the entire theater in sickly, moist steam. He could hear Dabi cursing below, the moisture in the air stifling his powers.
Midoriya kicked off the ceiling and took a cryo grenade from his belt, using One for All to whip it down onto Dabi before he could catch his bearings. Landing next to him on the state, Deku knew the ice encasement wouldn't hold him long in the stifling room, so he shattered the ice block holding the villain himself with an explosion from his glove.
The force, threw Dabi past the rear of the stage, slamming him into the brick wall, shards of ice slicing into his skin, blood pouring down his arms and from his ribs. He coughed in pain, but Midoriya was already on top of him, using his spider legs to pin Dabi against the wall by his extremities.
Using blood-view setting in his helmet, Midoriya began reigning Full Cowl punches against every new and exposed cut, opening the wounds further, each blow stronger than the last, until finally Deku paused.
"It doesn't matter who your family is, Dabi." The hero growled. "You want to burn every hero off the earth? Fine. I'll stop you, EVERY TIME! But you leave Todoroki out of it. Now..." He leaned closer. "Where. Is. Mei?"
Dabi coughed and smirked. "Get bent, hero."
Still pinning the villain down, Midoriya sprung up and hit him with a Full Cowl dropkick to the chest, driving Dabi through the wall brick wall, and the villain collapsed in the back alley, unconscious. Gran Torino was back there, waiting. He beamed at the younger Hero as he climbed from the burning building after the villain.
"Good going!" Gran Torino chuckled. "I was almost worried you'd need that backup, but you seemed to have that well in hand."
Deku looked back at the burning building and wondered just how bad that would have needed to get before Gran Torino would consider things, "out of hand."
He was on pins and needles as the police and fire marshals showed up, and he gave his statement on what happened. Finally, when that was done, he and Gran Torino went towards the train station. "Give them a call, see if you can get ahold of Bubble Girl," the older hero advised as they got onto the rail car.
Midoriya called, putting the phone on speaker so his boss could hear. But when the call was answered, he nearly dropped the phone.
"Hey Zuzu!"
Gran Torino snatched the device from Deku's hand. It was a good decision; the teen almost crushed it on instinctive rage, his fist clenched, white knuckle, over where the phone had been.
"Toga Himiko. Where are you?" The elder hero barked.
"Ew, is it just that gross old fart?" Came the disappointed villainess' voice through the receiver. "I guess Dabi didn't deliver, huh? Well, that's okay! I always have a backup plan for every backup plan! Tell my darling Izuku I left him a surprise at the bar you sent your ugly crones to!"
The phone clicked, and the two heroes exchanged uneasy looks. Midoriya tried calling back Bubble Girl, and Centipeder after that, both all his attempts were left unanswered.
On the train, he checked local newsfeed for anything in the area he had sent his coworkers too, but nothing had been posted.
As they finally arrived at the next town over, there was a noticeable urgency in their steps as they reached the coordinates that Mei had sent to Deku earlier in the day. As the building came into focus, they noticed sirens and police tape.
"What happened here?" Gran Torino barked at a nearby officer.
"Crime scene," the cop answered, just as gruffly. "What business do you have here?"
In any other situation, watching Gran Torino squabble with the cop would have been incredibly amusing. But as the elderly hero fumbled around in his pockets for licenses and agency paperwork, Midoriya could only stare at the building and wonder what waited for them inside. Finally, with clearances in order, the two heroes were allowed to enter the building.
As they walked down to the basement, they opened the door to the bar, and were immediately hit with a foul odor and a gruesome sight.
On the floor, Centipeder and Bubble Girl lay, dead, as police were photographing and bagging evidence. Between the two heroes, a heart had been drawn with their blood, containing a message.
"Next time, no cheating Zuzu."