Kugutsu was far from being considered sentimental. Before she met Shigaraki, the most she really felt was some extreme depression and unbridled rage after All Might had the audacity to save her life and make her keep living after her family died. So the whole concept of caring about someone other than her family was still relatively new to her.

It might have been cute that she was so worried about Shigaraki, but it was her feelings for him that got her into this situation. Breaking bones, slowly bleeding to death. All because she just had to go back into that hero-infested building to get his games for him. Not that she knew the heroes were in there when she ran in, but it was still a really stupid idea for her to go alone.

Circling back to being sentimental, though. Since Kugutsu never really felt connected to anyone, she never really dreamed about other people. Her dreams were usually a swirling torrent of darkness and the occasional fond flashback of when she had turned a bar into a messy, gory crime scene for Giran. Excitingly enough, Kugutsu's first ever pain-induced nightmare was about Shigaraki.

Courtesy of her excessive blood loss and broken wrist and ankle, the girl villain had horrific nightmares about her love touching her with all five fingers and causing her untimely demise. She watched her own body crumble away beneath his touch over and over again on a loop, each time seeing his face change from mild irritation to confusion and despair. It was absolutely heart-breaking.

When the nightmare finally ended, Kugutsu's eyes opened and she grimaced in pain. She was lying on the hard floor in a dusty, unfamiliar room, with a little bit of cushioning under her head. From the corner of her eye, she saw Spinner sitting next to her against the wall, but he was asleep.

Looking down at her body, Kugutsu bit back a hiss of disgust. Someone, she assumed it was Spinner, had made a splint for her right wrist and it was messy. Kind of bloody and uneven. Haphazardly tied in place. There was a similar one on her left ankle, which was wrapped to just under her knee. Her knee had been wrapped, too, but with a separate bandage.

Breathing still hurt a little, but the pain was nowhere near as bad as it had been. Kugutsu felt at least a tiny bit closer to her normal self; she was no longer shivering and she felt warm enough. Ugh. No, it's too warm. Why am I so thirsty? I need water.

She turned her head toward her friend to ask and her cat-yellow eyes narrowed. As soon as she saw that the scarf from his ridiculous Stain cosplay was missing, she knew what the cushioning under her head was. "Damn it."

Kugutsu heard a rustle off to her other side and bit back a yelp when she was pulled into a hug by someone that was sobbing hysterically. She was lifted enough that she was able to see across the otherwise empty room to a dark, open doorway. "Ngh! Let go before I-!"

"You're awake! It's post-mortem twitching! It's over!"

"Jin-san?!" She pushed away a little and stared up at the masked villain. So they must have gotten him to make a double. Where's everyone else? Her feline ears perked forward as she caught the sound of footsteps approaching the doorway across the room.

"You've been asleep for two days!" Twice continued freaking out, shaking her a little bit like he thought that was going to somehow help.

Kugutsu's ears flattened. "Seriously? What-?"

"Don't ask what happened. You'll trigger him and he'll start crying again," Dabi taunted as he stepped into the room.

"The joke's on you, Dabi! I never stopped crying! Hey! These are happy tears!" Twice heard Kugutsu cough and carefully leaned her against the wall next to where Spinner was still asleep.

At least I'm not coughing up blood anymore. She smirked and ruffled her dark hair, not bothering to look at Dabi. "Hey, Jin-san. What's that smell? It's like someone found some raw meat in their fridge that they couldn't remember buying, but they didn't want to throw it out so they thought overcooking it would make it okay, but it's still rancid so it just smells like someone's burning rotten meat. You smell that, right? It smells like it's coming from across the room."

It took him a second before the villain burst into laughter and pointed at Dabi, holding his stomach with his free hand. "She called you rotten meat! Wow! That's super gross, Yami!"

"I kept you alive…and that's how you thank me?" Dabi crouched down in front of her, smirking and reaching out a hand to rest on the top of her head. "What're you gonna do? Are you gonna bite me? Come on. Show me your fangs, if you're so pissed off. Oh, right. You don't have those."

Kugutsu's anger was quickly escalating and she moved without giving any thought toward what might happen next. She tore away from his touch and snapped forward, her teeth sinking deep into his hand. It was only for a few seconds, but it was hard enough that she drew blood and it smudged on her lips.

"Back. The. Fuck. Up. You demented children's anime villain reject!"

It was finally at this point that Spinner jolted awake and quickly noticed what was going on right next to him. "Yami, you're okay! How do you feel?!" He saw the blood on her lips and his eyes widened, darting from her to Dabi. "What just happened?"

"Doesn't matter." She wiped her mouth on the back of her right hand, on reflex, and winced when she nudged her splint. "Has anyone talked to Shigaraki?"

Shift P.O.V

Boredom and a really irritating loneliness were all that he knew for the past two days. He had mobile games on his phone, of course, and Kurogiri managed to get a phone charger so he could play the games. It was just annoying to have to play the games by himself.

Even more irritating was when Shigaraki thought about playing the games alone. He remembered when Kugutsu would sit next to him, so close that her knee touched his, and she would play the game with him. It really pissed him off sometimes because he was sure she had to be cheating to be able to beat him, but he had started to like the company.

Of course, Kurogiri was hanging around the room. Standing there, waiting for Shigaraki to ask for something. He was still refusing to open a warp gate to get Kugutsu's corpse and by this point, he even said that her body had probably been taken by the heroes or it was starting to rot. More than likely, the heroes would have taken it for a burial.

Stupid. That's wasteful. Why should she rot in the ground when she could still be with me? He scratched at his neck, harder than usual. Chewing his lower lip, he lifted his phone a bit closer and grumbled to himself.

Kurogiri had tried to contact Spinner to request that he go back for the body, but Spinner's phone had apparently died because Kurogiri was sent straight to voicemail. Everyone else made contact through Giran to say they were okay and hiding. It pissed him off even more.

Why'd she have to get killed and everyone else is alive? She had a stronger quirk than her fan boy. It should've been him. Every time that Shigaraki had even a tiny feeling of guilt about sending her back into the old hideout for his games, he immediately pushed the thought away and replaced it with this. I should've made him go back for the games and made her stay with me. This is his fault.

His mobile game was rudely interrupted by a message from Dabi with an attachment. Shigaraki chewed at his chapped lower lip, debating whether he should look at it or not. He had been tricked before; he would open a message from Dabi and the image would be something disgusting or lewd. The half-charred creep's way of trying to piss him off.

Against his better judgement, he decided to open the message and his blood-colored eyes went wide. The message itself read "Look what I found in the trash" and the image was of Dabi crouched down next to Kugutsu. The girl villain was either dead or unconscious. It was difficult to tell.

Her eyes were closed, head hanging limply and skin a chalky shade. Her lips were slightly parted and they were a sickly shade of grey. It really did look like Dabi was just posing with a corpse and he seemed completely comfortable with it.

"She isn't trash. Look at you. You look like a dumpster fire. Why are you touching my fan girl?" he muttered, beginning to drag his nails along his neck until his fingertips came away red and shiny with blood.

"Is something wrong, Shigaraki Tomura?"

The blue-haired villain held up his phone for the dark, misty gentleman to see the image for himself. "He found her corpse. Someone else is handling her corpse like she's some kind of doll. I can't stand it. I want-"

"I believe she may still be alive," Kurogiri interrupted.

"What are you talking about?" He glared up at the other villain, already getting annoyed. She looked dead in the picture. Plus, he was one hundred percent sure that if she was alive then she would have killed Dabi before he got this close to her. As unlikely as it was, there was an undeniable rush of excitement at the possibility that she might be alive.

"If this picture was taken today, then she would have been dead for two days. If you look closely, you can see that there is still color in her face. It might be difficult to see, but-"

"I can see it without you pointing it out." Shigaraki brought the phone screen closer and he chewed at his lip. She's still alive. Why was she in the trash? He looked at Kurogiri again, scowling. "You need to get her."

"Shigaraki Tomura, as a leader, it would have a greater impact on her and the League if you were the one to go to her. If you can acquire Dabi's coordinates, I can open a warp gate for you to collect Kugutsu."

Of course it just made him more irritated. Trying to get that information from Dabi was like a stupid game. The stapled, sentient trash villain kept teasing him about wanting to see Kugutsu and saying his kitty was safe. Then he started ignoring Shigaraki's messages so the blue-haired villain began spamming Dabi's phone with random jumbles of letters.

Finally, after two hours of wasting his time trying to get the coordinates, he was able to tell Kurogiri where they were. Of course, on some level, he was suspicious that Dabi might be sending him to some weird location. So, needless to say, he would make Kurogiri check before he went through the warp gate.

Shift P.O.V

"You look nasty," Dabi muttered, tucking his phone back into his pocket.

"You stupid…urgh! What's your problem, crispy creep?" Kugutsu glowered up at the male villain, wishing she could do more than snarl insults. It had been about an hour since she woke up and she knew that using her quirk was out of questions since she was still healing.

She had been in the middle of talking to Twice and Spinner, asking about everyone else's whereabouts since about half of the League was with her. Apparently, Dabi had aimlessly wandered around with her on his back until he found a building he thought was abandoned. It was not. Now the floor had little piles of ashes on it and the building was occupied by the villains.

He smirked and ruffled her hair a little too roughly. "What's wrong, kitty? You look like a stray someone pulled out of a dumpster."

Kugutsu released a low growl shortly followed by a shout. "Shut your whore mouth! At least I don't look like an overdone slab of meat that someone stapled together after they dropped it on the ground and it fell apart! You look like some edgy pre-teen's failed attempt at an art project! You look like a rotting decoration from a haunted house!"

Dabi's smirk stretched into a grin and he leaned down, his fingertips digging into her scalp and making her wince. "Is that…any way to say "thanks for saving me"? I carried your half-dead body here and did all the hard work."

She snarled and reached up, grabbing his wrist with her left hand and digging her nails into his skin. "Get your nasty hand off of my hair before I rip out those staples and see if it'll detach your hand! And if it does, I'll shove it-!"

"I thought you were dead. But here you are. You sound like you're having fun." The voice came from beyond Dabi, near the open doorway.

"Shigaraki?! How long have you been here?" Spinner pushed himself to stand and started toward him, but paused to look at Kugutsu. "You probably want to talk to Yami, right?"

"Awww! No fair! I want to hang out, too! Whatever! I'm over this anyway!" Twice was the first to leave the room and he was followed by Spinner, who was a little more reluctant to go.

Dabi leaned down closer, stopping with his mouth inches from her left ear. "Don't have too much fun," he taunted, snickering. He stood and turned away like the dramatic edge lord that he was, passing by Shigaraki with a smirk.

Kugutsu's ears flattened and she tried to push herself to stand up. She wanted to be able to go greet her crush properly and try to apologize for losing his games. Pain exploded in her ribs when she tried to stand and she yelped. As she pressed a hand against her side, the blue-haired villain crossed the room and fell to his knees in front of her, his arms loosely wrapping around her. "Sh-Shigaraki?"