Izuku wasn't sure what exactly he'd expected upon agreeing to let his friends and fellow classmates know what he and Todoroki and Iida already knew about Ichigo. Shock- was basically a sure thing. Horror? Definitely. But the strange mixture of empathy, shock, begrudging respect and awe that he was currently seeing from them all...

Not so much.

"T-That poor girl..." Momo said, feeling badly for her bad behavior towards her the previous night. Besides her Jiro and several other boys looked slightly uncomfortable. They didn't know what to think about what Izuku had just told them about the girl.

They had expected to hear something horrible about her. But nothing like this.

The sheer level of abuse and dehumanization that the girl had suffered from the time she was a small child had to have fucked her up in ways that even Izuku wasn't yet aware of. And to be perfectly honest, she undoubtedly needed more help than any of them could offer her.

Which begged the question... Now that they knew about her past- what did they do now? Sure, they weren't likely to stay away from her. No matter how much common sense told them all that they should. They simply couldn't. Not when their sensei had taken her in and was attempting to help her pick up the pieces of her shattered life.

"I knew that she'd been through some shit," Katsuki finally said before pausing to heave a angry sounding sigh and scrub his face with his hands- Izuku looked at the blond curiously as he waited for the inevitable display of temper that usually accompanied his every conscious thought. But it never came. "But even I don't know what to think of what you've just told us. I mean, what the actual fuck? How did she even survive that shit?"

"From what we understood of what she told us and showed us- she was conditioned from the time she was very young to basically be the ultimate soldier." Todoroki said as he laid a comforting hand on Izuku's shoulder. The boy had hesitated to say anything once Katsuki had spoken, which was understandable to a degree.

His nerves were already terribly frazzled and Todoroki wouldn't swear to it, but he kept looking as if he wanted to cry, scream, or pull his hair out or something. And he really needed to calm the fuck down before Aizawa wound up with two kids torn to pieces.

After all, if he didn't calm down- he might accidentally use his quirk on himself without meaning to. And that would suck considering how dangerous it was for him to use it as it was.

"The ultimate soldier?" Katsuki said in disbelief as he mulled over what he'd learned about the girl earlier before then blurting out, "Fucking hell- She's basically All Might with boobs!"

Izuku made a choking sound as soon as the words left the blond's mouth while Todoroki and everyone else simply started at Kaa-chan in aghast speechlessness. Really that was the same conclusion that many of them had already come too.

It was just...horrifying to hear Kaa-chan phrase what they were already thinking, like that.

"Okay...so, she's All Might with boobs/the ultimate soldier- and right now- she's hurt. And being hurt makes her vulnerable. What do we do about that?" Kyoka asked.

"That's simple," Izuku and Katsuki said in unison. "We protect her."


Toshinori was making good time on the road.

He'd left within thirty minutes of receiving Shouta's phone call and the distraught man's report on what had happened with Ichigo. Whom had somehow gotten hurt by someone else, again.

To say that he was angry would be a gross understatement.

He was so pissed that he actually managed to carry the car out of the city and into the mountains in his muscle form in under an hour. And now, here he was closing in on the camp while fretting about whether or not he and Shouta would have to lock the damned girl up in a 'tower' or something just to keep her out of trouble.

Believe it or not, he had an actual tower back in the city that Shouta could use. Just in case locking her away like Rapunzel became a realistically viable option.

And with as upset as his friend was this time, he honestly believed that the man would jump at the offer to use it. Not that he could really blame him any.

The girl seemed to by a trouble magnet. Which was something that neither he nor Shouta had seriously thought much of when his friend had first decided to take her in. He was betting that he was kicking himself for that right about now. But it wasn't as if he could just up and abandon the girl when she was already attached to him and vice versa.

It would fuck up any progress that the man had made with her so far.

Sighing as he tried to focus on anything else but how this latest incident had even happened, and turned on the radio in an effort to distract himself from having a nervous breakdown of some kind. After all, if he had a breakdown, then who the hell would help Shouta keep Ichigo alive?


Rukia hit the ground on the balls of her feet next to Kisuke and Yoruichi, and took a moment to look around. "You feel that?" Yoruichi asked as she tilted her head back a little bit as if she were smelling something interesting.

"Ichigo." Rukia said her friend's name in a breathless tone, earning a strange look from Kisuke and Yoruichi before the two exchanged a knowing look.

Rukia started to take a step in the direction that she could feel their friend in- and was halted by Kisuke when he suddenly snagged her wrist in his hand and said, "I know that you miss the kid and all, bit don't go running off just yet."

"But-"

"No, Rukia. You can run off and see her later. For now, I can sense Chad is close to her. Let him take care of her for you. We need to find Renji and meet up with Kenpachi and Ikkaku."

Rukia felt the nearly overwhelming urge to kick the man and run off anyways. But she knew that he had a point. They had things to do at the moment. Like meeting up with the others and planning their next move.

Chad was close to Ichigo at the moment and he would see to it that nothing happened to their friend. And for the moment that would have to be enough. Sighing because she didn't want to be away from her friend for another moment longer, she hung her head for a moment and felt Yoruichi's hand settle on her head and ruffle her hair.

"It's okay to be upset Rukia. But we really do need to focus on protecting her."

"I know." Rukia said after a moment or so. Her fists were tightly clenched at her sides as frustration bled from her very being. "I know." She said again as she turned in the direction she could sense Kenpachi and Ikkaku and started walking. Loathing every step that took her away from Ichigo's side.

Ichigo...please be safe.


Chad was up in a tree on the outskirt of the camp, observing everyone. So far he'd gotten pretty lucky with not being found out by anyone. But who knew how long that would last.

Jesus, there were kids everywhere! He thought in irritation as he eyed some of the kids sitting together in front of the two story log building through slightly narrowed eyes as he tried to figure out the best way to approach the place.

He didn't want to come across as threatening- but he was pressed for time at the moment, and coming across as threatening might be totally unavoidable. Still...he didn't want to scare the kids or anything.

If Renji had made contact with Ichigo then he could just sit himself down somewhere and wait for her to show up.

But even he knew that something was off here. After all, if Ichigo had sensed him- which was very possible by now considering how sharp her senses were- then she should have already come out to meet him. But she hadn't. And that worried him. Immensely.

Something must have happened. He thought to himself as he gnashed his teeth and mentally cursed Renji and his bumbling, oafishness. He was going to have a few choice words for the man if he fucked things up.

Which it was looking more and more as if he had.

Closing his eyes he took a moment to focus on Ichigo's presence. Trying to discern whether or not there was actually something wrong with her. He could feel the chaos in her power immediately and his breath left him in an angry snake-like hiss as his eyes snapped back open and he quickly leapt down from the tree limb. Intending to go to her and use his own power to stabilize her since he knew that she would react to his presence immediately.

He landed lightly on the balls of his feet and started forward when all of a sudden one of the many, many, many kids hanging around noticed him and let out a blood-curdling scream.

"Villain!"

Chad froze up for a second and turned his head around this way and that, his eyes going to the tree line in every direction looking for the 'villain' that the kid was screaming about. When all of a sudden he was fucking full body tackled to the ground by four boys.

He hit the ground hard and went as still as humanly possible as he was quickly- and suspiciously, efficiently- pinned down by one kid, a sort of pleasant looking boy with freckles and green eyes- sitting on his chest. And the three others using their bodies to trap his arms and one of his legs to the ground.

"What the-" He muttered as the boy on his chest glared down at him for a moment before raring back his fist and saying almost gleefully,

"Sorry man, lights out." Before his fist connected with his face.

It was on the tip of Chad's tongue to try telling the boy that he couldn't possibly hit him hard enough to put his lights out. Not with one hit and certainly not with his hand remaining intact. But the moment that his fist connected, his vision went totally black and he mused to himself, Well, I'll be damned.