He turned off his phone as it lit up from another call and stuffed it away blocks away from his target. Between speaking to Koumori to finding the warehouse only gave him a few hours, and he spent most of it making half-assed getaway plans.
It stood at the edge of the city just before the landfills and the smell of them. Plastered with red brick, on the wall facing the main road was a faded company name of some old textile industry. Men played cards on the front steps of the entrance, feigning casualness for guarding against trespassers. They sat bored, but with a hidden intensity, one tapping his foot wildly. Izuku watched this all from a distance.
Walking through the front door was a no go. Checking the back ended in the same result as men stood bored while others wandered the perimeter of the building, side-eyeing any passersby and jokingly trying to hit the lowest bar of the fire escape as they passed by.
The fire escape. The ladder wasn't down, not that it would bother Izuku. He waited for the patrol to pass before sneaking close enough to warp to the lowest level of the fire escape then quickly scaling to the top. Being broad daylight, it would be obvious to see Izuku climbing, but at the same time the lull of the warming day and security that no one was stupid enough to try to breach the place during the day came to be an advantage. Maybe this League wasn't really much of anything, if this is their standards.
The roof was empty though cigarette buds and cans of cheap beer littered its ground. The door leading into the building stood propped open.
It was so easy, Izuku would not believe this to be the League that left Koumori shaking. The boy no older than twenty-one warned Izuku of just what he faced. Anyone with trigger was dangerous, but organized crime?
" They're a calculated ticking time-bomb with an antsy kid holding the button."
Surely they were more careful than this?
But in the past year? It had been deadly silent, a prolonged suspense building like air in a balloon. The silence stretched longer like the rubber of the balloon and any agonizing second it could pop in your face.
Though unused to the newest Quirk, Izuku let his ears grow to accommodate the Quirk. At first it was like placing his ear to a conch shell, the swirl of hallways and empty rooms humming their own white noise tune. He'd practiced on the beach, and the thunderous waves forced him to turn it off. It was loud, but manageable in small quantities. He couldn't imagine such a Quirk being used twenty-four/seven. He heard his own breath, the thrumming of his pulse and the moment his eyelash brushed each other with every eye close.
Then he heard the laughter and cheering and muffled banter like beacons.
Today would be the day someone took a needle to that balloon.
The door led to a series of what had once been offices that now stood empty except for rubble and blotches of mildew. The cacophony of noise from further down the hall had echoed from its distance.
At the end of the hall had been once metal bars maintaining the balcony. Now only a bar or two protruded up, the rest lost. And he could hear the change in pressure, as the room widened and the muffling turned to clear, echoed voices, dozens of them. He peered over the edge of the balcony and Izuku held his breath looking down.
Dozens. There were dozens of them of varying shapes, colors, and sizes, some drinking and others making a circle around two fighting each other. Others fiddled with devices and costumes, one seeming to tune a box with antennas that stood straight up.
Izuku had never seen so many villains in a single place.
"Comrades!"
Izuku ducked falling to his stomach as the chatter halted and heads turned in his direction staring up.
"We gathered here for a purpose and one purpose only!"
It came from just below, perhaps the lower level's own balcony. He couldn't lean over to look in fear someone would spot him.
"What is that?"
The crowd roared, "KILL ALL MIGHT!"
Izuku's heart seized.
"Ready yourselves, the game is about to begin!"
Their roars became cheers, and clanks of metal and sharpening tools and static and teeth grinding that could tear through skin like paper—
They want to kill All Might-
They're going to kill All Might.
He lent over as men and women gathered their weapons and shuffled excitedly. Though three or four stories up, Izuku noticed fish like villains gathering together just as tall, muscular Quirked men did the same. With his ears morphed to those of a bat, he choked back a sob.
"It's about time someone taught the bastard a lesson."
"Symbol of peace, my ass!"
"Fucking twerps won't see what's coming!"
"We'll burn U.A. to the ground!"
"With the League behind us, no one is ever gonna mess with us again!"
Izuku tasted bile.
"Shigaraki, there is no going back." The voice was soft and deep, melodic like a reverbated purr in the dark. "Once we start we cannot stop."
The other, Shigaraki, hummed to this. Then he spoke with his voice like a shrill and aches as if parched, "This is a raid I intend to win, do not doubt me, Kurogiri." His voice grew lower as steps echoed away from the balcony. "Open the gate while I grab the Nomu."
He had to get out of here. He had to warn All Might, warn U.A., someone, anyone—
A black mass of smoke plumed at the center of the warehouse's ground floor, between the villains who cheered their bloodthirst.
Scum.
Two others came into view, a man of black mist— was the black mass at the center of the room his Quirk?— and a fair man covered in—
It was like insects burrowed into his skin, leaving him itchy and wanting them off, wanting them out.
—severed hands. Pale and discolored.
One covered his face.
The black mist left the side of his companion, meeting with the man Izuku had seen before fiddling with the box.
"Is the scrambler ready?"
The man grinned at the mist with a thumbs up. "Yep, we'll have a full hour uninterrupted."
Like an EMP? That would explain why they were so confident. They'd scramble any communicators blocking radio channels and cells phones.
"How big is this kitty pool?" one of the fish-like Quirked men asked another. The group had huddled together discussing positions.
"The U.S.J. is a full fledged simulator right? So probably a football field worth, maybe Olympic. Plus, it's hero course students, the school doesn't hold back in training."
"Just remember not to drown them. Shigaraki wants hostages in case All Might tries to pull a fast one."
The mist, Kurogiri appeared on the ground floor and stood beside the villain carrying the scrambler. "Turn it on now. We will depart in just a moment."
The antenna began to glow a faint blue and its screen a faint orange, the villain pressing a button and—
He almost yelped covering his ear and letting go of the hearing Quirk. The piercing, sonorous ringing stopped. His stomach and chest felt funny for only a moment as his balance waiverred. It hadn't been high pitch and screeching, but deep and guttural, so deep he couldn't hear it with natural human ears but it had hurt nonetheless.
In the time it took him to compose himself, the man covered in severed hands had moved to the center of the room and lifted his own above his head. The villains went silent, all of them.
He was the leader, Shigaraki.
"Nomu, follow."
Even with his hearing Quirk off, the footsteps thundered like a brewing storm, its screech painful enough like the EMP. The villains all paused in awe as it came into view and Izuku himself felt he could not look away.
Towering in such a way it would have had to duck to enter the offices. Skin a deep purple, almost black like bruises. It stood on hind legs but it wasn't- it didn't feel human. It's eyes were devoid of intelligence just above a beak and below an exposed pink mesh of brain matter. That Thing couldn't be human.
It followed close behind the man covered in hands, not caring that it nearly barreled over a villain standing too close. It followed until it met Shigaraki at the center of the condensed smoke and vanished, the other villains just behind them.
A teleportation Quirk.
It wouldn't set off U.A.'s perimeter defense if no one actually has to walk through the gates. And no one would know they were there if the EMP took out all the cameras and sensors.
They were going to get into U.A. and were going to kill All Might and whoever else stood in their way. There weren't enough villains to take on the whole school, not against a group of pros. Is he going after a single class? One All Might would be teaching? With so many of them, there's no way a lonely pro teacher could protect all their panicking students, even if it is All Might.
His feet moved before he could think what a bad idea it was. Jumping straight off the fourth story he warped to land on the lower balcony. Then again and again until reaching the ground floor as the last of the villains seeped through. He was running, preparing to face whatever was on the other side with little thought that there were dozens of villains willing to kill children for a shot at All Might.
He reached for the portal hand, awaiting to grasp the back of the first villain he ran into, his right pulled back in a fist—
At first it didn't register. The smoke vanished and he stumbled to the floor. He stood alone in an empty warehouse.
He hit his fist on the cement floor.
"Dammit!"
They were in, the villains were in U.A. and people were going to die— All Might was going to—
He ran for the entrance of the warehouse and used Blink to get through the doors, startling the guards still outside the door as their playing cards scattered. He didn't stop when they called out of him realizing he wasn't supposed to be there. He didn't stop when they chased him and he didn't stop until he knew he'd have enough time, reaching a payphone and sliding whatever pocket change he kept on him and dialing.
With every ring his heart leapt higher in his throat and his stomach bottoming out. He'll think later on the fact he had the office number memorized from the times they called and asked him if there had been a typo when he registered as Quirkless for the admission exam.
A cheerful receptionist answered unknowingly. "U.A.'s business office, how can I help you?"
"U.A. is under attack! They're going to kill All Might!"
"Whoa, calm-"
"You need to tell the teachers. They're going to-"
"Kid-"
"They can teleport and they're in the school right now!"
"I don't appreciate prank calls."
"I— I'm not— just listen. They're going to attack All Might's—"
The glaring tone of an ended call sounded all too close to a hospital's heart monitor.
He choked back a sob, slamming the phone back into place before sprinting once more. He couldn't break down, not now, not when he knew what was happening. If they got to All Might or if a student was hurt as he stood stupidly trying to work a payphone, he would never forgive himself. So he ran tripping with how many times in sequence he warped. Sweat bled down his neck and seeped into his costume.
It must have been an interesting look, to see a fully costumed hero or villain— no one could be sure these days— barreling down the street and teleporting past cars before they could hit him. His mask limited his vision, leaving too many close calls until nearly losing it in one of his warps. He lost his right glove too, the thing swept somewhere under the awed pedestrians' feet.
It felt like it would never be fast enough. He needed to tell someone, scream inside U.A. for someone to take him seriously. Call the police, call Shinsou— but his phone was in the opposite direction on a lonely roof.
Yet he was across the city in record time, his palms against the concrete wall of U.A. As his chest heaved, the looming of the tower-like building casting a mocking shadow over him, daring him to execute his plan.
If he passes the barrier, Izuku would be committing a crime in broad daylight against citizens and heroes. There was no going back.
Izuku warped through U.A.'s defense wall.
In its own way it was therapeutic to step into U.A., sort of a middle finger to something he dreamed— prayed— to enter by their invitation, and now he forcefully let himself in.
Then the alarm went off.
And he had to get going once again.
U.S.J. It had to be somewhere. Was it a classroom? A name of a field? Facility? Perhaps U.S.J. was the initials of the founder. A donator! Ulysses Scott Johnson? Underground Service of Japan? Didn't he read about it from the U.A. official history book? It could be a name of one of the several mock cities. It would take hours to check all of U.A. Not only did he have to deal with acres upon acres of land, but the sub-basements hid labs for testing equipment and dangerous Quirks. U.S.J. U.S.J. He could find a teacher?—
"You there! Stop!"
When the lasso licked at his feet he knew getting them to listen wasn't going to work. Using Blink, he warped out of its reach and held his hands up until the R-rated hero Midnight paused at the other end of the courtyard he'd entered.
In any other situation, he would be fanboying his heart out, but instead he held his hands in front of him in surrender. "I—I'm not here to hurt anyone, I swear!"
She eyed him, then held her whip out in front of her. Wow her outfit was something in real life. "What class are you from?"
"Uh— 1-B?"
Blink barely pulled him out of the lasso's reach.
"Trespassing is illegal. Who are you really? Get back here!"
God, she was fast, and she was wearing heels! He had to lose her. She wasn't going to listen. He had been running at the perimeter of U.A.'s main building and he let Blink guide him pass the building's concrete wall and into a—
A classroom.
"Wait-"
Students screamed and he screamed too. The teacher— is that Ectoplasm?— shouted at him to halt but Izuku weaved past the students and their desk (or those that weren't being used to barricade the doors) and warped into the hallway.
A shot at his feet made him freeze.
Snipe aimed their gun at him.
"I don't miss. Stay where you are."
"I'm not the enemy here!" He tried to explain with his hands held up once again. "There's villains here and they're going to kill All-Might!"
"On your knees and keep your hands up."
Dammit dammit dammit. No one was going to listen to him. As a kid or an intruder, he wasn't credible. He'd have to just find the villains himself.
He thought of how thick the ceiling would have to be then warped up a level. He let his ears grow and listened for the incoming footsteps as snipe searched for him and ran in the opposite direction a floor below. He'd be going towards the staircase if he realized Izuku had went up.
This is crazy! He's being chased by heroes, and not just any heroes but the literal people who could have been his teachers. In any other situation he would have been bouncing with joy.
Instead, students blocked the doors with furniture, if the scraping was anything to go by, students whispering to keep quiet as others claimed it all to be a drill. The buzzing of a fly made his ear twitch.
No not a fly. It was faint, but it was a ringing to his ears he quickly recognized. It wasn't so loud and nearly painful as it had been in that warehouse but it was here somewhere, the EMP that villain had carried into the misty warp gate. He thought he imagined it.
So it was on campus? But where? What if this is just noise from the other electric systems in the building? It was a sort of low echoing ring below the blaring alarms and the cacophony made having his morphed ears hurt.
He decided to look out the tall panes of glass for windows, waiting to see if there were any roaming teachers before warping to the other side to be outdoors once again.
That's when he landed on the speeding suit of armor. Like a literal, walking suit of armor.
The two fell onto the grass and groaned before realizing who they'd run into.
Why was Ingenium on campus of all days?
The hero looked to him, and Izuku saw the wideness of his jaw and glasses Ingenium he'd never seen worn before.
The said hero quickly stood and held his fist out ready to attack demanding answers instantly, but Izuku had to try one more time. "Please, I don't want to fight." He raised his hands for what felt the final time and he expected the same answer. "There's villains here after All Might. I'm just trying to warn you!"
"Wait you know?" Ingenium paused speaking in a voice too high for a licensed hero and that's when Izuku really looked at his face, saw the red framed glasses and the engines in his legs. Ingenium's are in his arms. This is not Ingenium. Maybe a sibling? The resemblance was too close to just be a similar Quirk.
Nonetheless, this guy was listening to him. He couldn't be a villain but he wasn't one of the hero professors. Is he a part of the class being attacked?
Then he rose his fists again. "How do I know you're not working with them?" He spoke strongly and almost robotically, each syllable the same length. "I haven't seen you before."
The best way to get him to listen was tell the truth. "I scouted the villains' hideout? And I set off the campus alarms on purpose." Maybe that's a little too blunt.
The blaring tone still rang around them, a recorded voice from the speakers still telling students to find shelter and hide.
He tried again. "Where is the U.S.J.?"
"It's on the edge of the property, but— hey wait!"
Izuku used Blink to avoid the hands that grabbed at him, ignoring the pounding in his head at the number of warps. He called over his shoulder, "Get the teachers there now! They'll listen to you!"
He didn't have time to explain. The scrambler. The Nomu. They were key items Izuku knew about and they didn't, but taking the time to explain it all would be precious seconds. And he wasn't fast enough. He wasn't Ingenium. He wasn't a hero in training or someone naturally gifted. He didn't even know what direction he was going!
But—
He knew what the whirring sound of the EMP was like, just not where. Too far to pinpoint with how the Quirk is now. Too slow to check the whole property of U.A.
But—
He felt it in the simple utility belt around his waist.
He had a trump card.
Izuku would worry about the consequences later. He knew this could happen, and instead held back every ugly thought about himself and pulled the stick of gum from its packet and chewed.
