Chapter 19: Inbound

Here it is! Another chapter in the last {X} months of quarantine! The climax nears as the plot thickens

The Kasshiku District – 11:26 PM

Police sirens started to wale through the streets and some single heroes patrol in the streets. Their boots clamp and stamp on the cement as they kept watchful eyes around for anything, heeding Harumi Sakatoshi's word.

However, to their unmindful bliss, did not seem to think that there were people sneaking in the sewers.

Ryusake Tahashi, Ikari and Connor Smith-Sanders, with KouRan in the lead. They trudge on through the murky waters of the sewer. To Ikari's plight, this is disgusting.

"PEEYEW~! This stinks!" She whines as she holds her breath from the smells of the water.

'Says the cat that went through sleeping in the trash.'

Ryusake Tahashi's thought of retort makes Ikari steam, pouting and glaring a dagger at Ryu. Though he is his friend, his edge pissed her off.

"I second that. KouRan? How much further?" Connor Smith-Sanders asks ahead, and he looked back at him.

"Should be getting close now." KouRan says as he hops through the water, sucking it up just to fulfill his clan's prophecy. A few minutes later, they take a left and are met with a wall.

"uhhhh what now?" Ikari spurts out, staring blankly at the dead end.

He clutches onto the necklace and he hears whispers from it.

"Wha-What?" KouRan asks down to it, and it chimes up to KouRan in response.

Ryusake peeps at KouRan's whispering, and Ikari follows suit. Due to the sewer's echoing, Ryusake could not understand what he's saying. Ikari, however, can hear them both just fine.

'I actually do not know where to go.'

"WHAT?!" Ikari and KouRan exclaim at the same time, eliciting staggers and jumping heads from Ryusake and Connor.

Ryu flashes his golden irises at Ikari and Connor looks at KouRan, both completely perplexed by the happenings before them.

Ikari bolts over to KouRan, making him stumble from her suddenness. She snatches the medallion from his hands.

"C'mon! We need to get to that somewhere!" She shouts, breathing down at it as she jimmied and shook the necklace in a squeal.

'Spare me your whines and slide. Certainly, you're not the savior prophesied.' The medallion's rhyming retort makes Ikari snap, pissed off. She grabs the medallion by the strings and throws it to the wall, but retracts and looks at her hand to see that its cartoonish gloved hands clutching onto her hand. She squeals at it, shaking it off but to no avail.

"Stop that!" KouRan says and tries to grab hold of it. But Ikari's fast shaking makes the medallion fly off her hand. It stumbles in front of Ryusake's feet, leading him to glare downward at it. The medallion starts to glow a soft green light at its center, and Ryu is piqued by its glow.

Then, the green glow bursts into neon and shines and stings Ryu's eyes, blinding him. He sneers at the light, and stumbles backwards. He rubs his eyes of the blinding light, and can't make out what he just saw, but it was there, in the light. He comes to looking at Ikari's worried face.

"S-Saki? You okay?" Ikari looks at Ryu, holding his hand as slumps to the wall, still clutching his hands to the medallion. Ryu heaves his breathing as his hands start to burn and a voice starts to boom inside his head. His eyes drift for a moment and his breath leaves him as time has begun to slow down, his vision growing delirious as the darkness sets in.

… The figure stood before him, glaring down at him. The whit flame burns marvelously a great size, turning the figure into a silhouette, seeing nothing but his glaring eyes seething through Ryusake Tahashi.

I shall say it again, boy. His voice booms down to Ryu, taking his attention You will be damned lest you change. You crave power and thy shall not grasp true power.

Upon his word, as if by call, the ethereal fire flares skyward greatly. Ryu averts his eyes to the sky, to where the flames trickle and churn and burn, forming to a sun of white flame. His gaze returns to the figure before him and his eyes are agape at the sight.

The mysterious figure that's haunted his dreams. The one that's bullied Ryu to such great lengths for his Quirk was himself. The white flame's light reaching down to him, making him visible to his eye. Ryusake Tahashi was staring at himself, controlling a ball of ethereal fire with but the whim of his wrist.

His glare turns to a grinding jaw as he bellows a mighty roar, making Ryu stagger in fear of his counterpart. The fiery maelstrom above started to flare up again. Then, Ryusake feels a pull inside his chest, it feels like it could burst him open.

His insides begin to churn and broil as Ryu's lungs begin to heave breath. He stares at the fireball above and it grows in size, growing closer and closer. His eyes widen and balls at the sight, the pain increasing as he had trembled at the sight.

His trembling turned to a stagger until his arms sway to the side as he opens himself up to the fireball. Inside his chest, it begins to boil smoke.

"rgr – ngh!" Ryusake grunts as he feels his entire body rendered useless in front of the flaming maelstrom above him. Its proximity feeling closer as he feels like he is taken away but he wasn't moving.

"gGGRAHHH!" He bellows a pained roar through a fit of rage, forcing himself to stick together against the feeling of powerlessness. However,

Tch! His counterpart hisses and scoffs at Ryusake's attempt. He zooms to Ryu's staggering self and looms over him before Ryu's counterpart, with his blood-stained claws, pierces through his abdomen. The claws were peeking through Ryu's back and begins to damage his organs within.

As if in unnatural phenomenon, instead of blood spurting out, comes out a flaring white flame from Ryu's back like a flashflare, brightening up the darkness like a flashbang. It dances and beams out of him as the fire rushes out of his holes.

Ryu's counterpart backs away from the original Ryu's stomach, retracting his claws and letting his knees crash to the ground as fire starts to seep through his wounds.

Thou shall know feeling of smite lest you change now.

Hearing what this entity has said, Ryu musters a glare up to it and continues to growl. No words, the counterpart stares at him. Still holding onto the fireball with his left hand, it opens a palm on its right and faces it toward Ryusake.

The pull returns to him and makes Ryu's body jerk and stagger. His skin began to trickle as he presented his holed wounds to his counterpart. "GRAAHHHH!" He bellows a yawping scream as he feels his wounds ripping wider and wider. Ryu looks down to see his chest along with his blood spurting like a geyser until it stops.

Paralyzed at the sight, Ryusake looks on as his counterpart flaunts his fingers and claws at him. Ryu's chest suddenly feels his chest swirling as blood spurts from his holes ripping open even more. The flesh rimming them melt away as light trickles through.

Suddenly, with a flick of a wrist, Ryu's chest flares up with his own white fire. The fire begins to grow in size as Ryu feels his paralyzed body stagger and fall to his knees as the fire rises and swirls inside him.

Ryu's counterpart forms a palm on his right and holds it onto Ryu's fire. The white fire booms and dances before it is pulled from Ryu and, following his counterpart's wish, beams to the fireball above. Ryu loses all feeling in his chest outward to his fingers as the fire turns from wild burning to seeping weak and to a dripping incense of smoke.

Ryusake heaves his lungs for breath from his mouth until the fire completely leaves him. His scaled skin turns pale as weakness had instilled in his heart. His vision began to blur to darkness, the fireball illuminating the counterpart stepping over to him in a huff. Suddenly, he grips Ryu's neck and jerks him closer to the counterpart.

Thine destiny now intertwine with mine. He growls his breath at Ryu before he feels a sudden push that sends him flying. Time slows down as Ryu flails in the air, his final blurred vision catching glimpse of the fireball his fire shot off to. What was even happening, he thought.

Ryusake felt like he was floating in air and from there, his life glimpsed before him. From his mother telling him stories about knights and heroes – to the last four years of dealing with the yakuza. As his vision blurred away from him, he stares into the abyssal deep in contemplation as he heard the voices past and the mocking shadow looming over him.

He felt as if he was beyond all hope. As if he was this craven vigilante playing ihimself like a child.

But no! His jaw clenches and locks as his vision returns, his body regains sensation before he clenches all of his willpower into his fists. He had decided long ago that none will stand in his way, come what may! Not even himself will stop him from doing what is done.

He locks his feet firm to the ground before the holes in his chest start to mend themselves, but not without his power returns to him. The white flames burst from his chest and protruded from his jaw as it slicks down his chin. Then, something new he's never seen himself do.

His white fire started bursting from his hands, engulfing them in white flame. As it lit up the dark and flat landscape, his eyes focused on them, feeling something different about them; his hands started dripping down his arm and to his elbow, as if it came from a molten smithy's pot.

It burned brightly into the dark world until his vision is blurred from his eyelids lapping down.

He drifted into short sleep until

"RYU!"

A shriek into his ear wakes him up, back to the sewers as he looks around. He notices Ikari and the others were illuminated in white light, probably from his fire. Their shocked, fishpale expressions staring at him. His eyes lazily drifted down to his hands, his eyes wince from the light becoming brighter. Ryu now sees that his hands are bursting in flame, molten bits of lava drips down to the floor in a hissing sound upon the cement, melting through.

He can't see, but he can sense himself; he looked like an animal, rabid with this newfound sense of determination. Was this what he made himself to be? A beast filled with rage to finish? That question never reached him as he felt the medallion dangling around his neck as the fires died down to his wrists.

He clutches the medallion and it speaks to him.

'You have changed, Ryusake. Surely, you know what is to be done.' The medallion's sentence rung in his head as he glares to the path ahead.

"… Let's go." He weakly bellows to his companions, clutching onto the medallion as he trudged ahead, leaving them to the dust. The group just had their mouths agape at what just happened.

"… wh-what just-." Connor stammers incompletely, with KouRan catching it just beside him.

"I can't even answer that." KouRan mumbles to Connor.

Just as they were about to walk past a confused Ikari, Connor twists an arm around hers and pulls her to walk forward. The brunet looks at Ikari, only staggering shockly at the sight of a worried face. He can feel her arm tensely tingling around his. "Wh-something wrong?" Connor recollects himself quickly before Ikari were to break to tears, catching her attention.

"…" She said nothing. After seeing the state that dear Ryusake was just in, her concern for him had grown like never before. Her senses around him began to focus on him and only him along with her Quirk. In his head, Ryu's thoughts were loud and angry, they were shouts. As if he was mad at everyone. Or maybe at himself.

His thoughts of rage continued to churn now that she checked again, seeming blood-curdling now. But it was becoming clearer than just ranting and became chanting. The thought looped in his head over and over, saying only one thing.

'I MUST PUT AN END TO THIS!'

In the Corleone Estate

The entire room stayed quiet, stricken with fear. Sokudo Satoshi, feeling the weight that can see the madness aspiring before him as he kneels at the sight still held down by Kabe's Quirk. Shigaraki smiles a wide devilish grin at Peter's grand plan. Essentially, it was for the League to go hand-in-hand with Peter's crew in destruction.

He grinds his teeth, struggling to even move a finger. Beside Sokudo, his partner, Alice Smith, was only spectating his struggling and squirming. The feeling of just watching from the sidelines made her sickened inside. She had to do something too.

Quietly, she turns on her Quirk to manifest along her wrist. Slowly, the yellow diamond slicks along and up her arm, forming a panel around her right and creeping over to her shoulder. Eventually, she gains back feeling in her fingers and palm. Staring right at Peter, she balls her hand to a fist, readying herself for the moment as her arm returns to her.

"… So, you want the Nomu? You got it."

"Shigaraki –"

Toga Himiko eerily chirps under her breath before Shigaraki cuts her off with a finger. "But only" Shigaraki suddenly boomed as he closed up on Peter, and the room's tension gets tighter and tighter. "if you cough up All for One."

"Ah. Alright." Peter says before he pulls out a canister from his coat pocket. The canister whirrs and glows before Peter throws it away from them. Shigaraki just stares until the canister's glow went about the room. It shone like a lamp as it grew bigger and wider. The entire room can hear it cracking and reverberating as a space was beginning to form in the middle.

Shigaraki steps toward it to get a good look. It looked as if the darkness swirled as he gazes into it. Then, he sees a foot step through. Then a leg and another, then a torso. Eventually, the figure stepped into the room, buttoning up his suit as his lifeless face stares down to his suitor.

Shigaraki could not believe it. All for One, in the flesh once again. In their locked gaze, he did not notice that he was walking towards him. All for One places a hand on Shigaraki's shoulder as if a father to his own son. Shigaraki can't notice the feeling of trembling in his knees as he stares at his master, finally in front of him.

"I am back, Tenko."

Akihiro Tachibana. He was driving up and down the roads with anxiety through the roof at such a late hour into the night. There weren't any cars in sight. Only he and Stella were in the van, circling the streets like a madman. The tires skid upon the cement, their screeching echoed through these empty streets of night.

He had his feet down the pedal and immediately booked it for the nearest police station. Looking at the time, and given where they were, it was the opportune moment for them to move in on the villains. They got the buyers and the settlers all in one place.

But there was one thing missing. Ryu. That one scaly guy Mr. Satoshi called his godson. Weird, but okay.

Oh shoOT!

His brain cursed before suddenly veers the wheel back on the road, evading the incoming car. The tires skid back to the road before he takes a left. Akihiro pants before recollecting his thoughts. Where was he again? Oh yeah.

Ryu was not with them when he proved vital for Sokudo's plan. Where even was he?

That could not matter for right now, he geared himself for the police station. He turned another left and saw the police station.

"Keh!" Akihiro's hand's strain on the wheel as he turns, his feet stomp the brakes and the van skids in a drift against the cement. Its halting screech filled in the streets of night. After seeing officers rush out to see, Akihiro quickly rolls down the car window and peeks his head out.

"Villains! League of Villains sighted!"

After a moment, police officers rushed outside along with a pro hero or two. Away from Akihiro's attention, comes Detective Tsukauchi.

From the detective's perspective from the entire afternoon, he'd been racking his mind on what is happening in this city. After reports of Quirk-stealing experiments and yakuza sightings, it almost feels like the city was being taken. If that were the case, then who and why?

He feels like this case isn't even a case anymore. It was turning into a cyclone that he couldn't understand anymore. All the answers that he is looking for is at the address that a speedster's given him.

Up until this moment, he's only hoped for some piece that will help him find those criminals. But now, upon seeing someone screaming villains, Tsukauchi had to intervene. Musutafu City depended on it.

Rushing to the scene, Tsukauchi cuts through the bands of disbanding officers scurrying off for their cars and pro heroes going to the Corleone Estate, Tsukauchi heaves his breath as he crashed to the van's windows, claiming Akihiro's attention.

Akihiro, with his Quirk Stella, squeaks in surprise in his seat from Tsukauchi's sudden presence. He glares through the dark, scanning for the boy.

"Take me. Take me there, kid."

As Alice stared at the momentous event ensuing before her, Alice Smith was doing handiwork of her own. She regains full feeling of her entire right arm and conceals it by her side and looks onto Sokudo Satoshi. But there was something wrong.

"Psst!" Alice whispers over to Sokudo, not even getting a response. "We have to do something, Alan." She whispers at him, keeping her moving right arm by her side. However, she finds it odd that she hasn't been getting a response from Sokudo. Alice just sees him looking onward to the villainy.

"… wait." Sokudo murmurs to Alice, and she sends a glaring jaw to him.

"what?!" Alice peaks under a whisper, frustrated to Sokudo just watching.

"we have to wait for our moment. There's a pattern on how Peter does things."

The last line made Alice's fingers and shoulder perk up slightly in surprise, unshowing on her face. It's odd. Why would he say that? Sokudo Satoshi, the one who's always excited to take down the bad guys.

This was astonishing, her face is frozen as she stares onward to Peter in celebration as evident is his signature toothy grin. He'd always been jumpy when he could take the villain down. Then again, after four years of being in the ice clearly changed him.

Regardless, she drops two shard of yellow diamonds to the floor, creating a small tinkering sound. Kabe shoots a suspicious eye over to Alice. From his angle, he should not see her freed arm. And nevertheless, she sticks it by her side to conceal it.

Kabe glares at her through his black skull mask, making Alice roll a bead of sweat down her nape under his eyes' piercing gaze. Before Kabe boots forward, Peter's low chuckling averts his gaze from them to him.

Alice breathes out of relief as she moves her small dews of diamond shards and, with her hand, rolls one to Sokudo's direction. The diamond drop rolls to beneath the soles of Sokudo's feet. Immediately, Sokudo's eys shoot down to his feet squirming, to no action of his own, from Alice's diamonds squeezing under him.

Sokudo immediately understood that Alice was ready to make a move. "Wait for my signal." He whispers an order to her.

She nods at his order before her eyes lands back on Peter with a jumpy glare, on the ready with her grip on her shards underneath both their feet.

"Hehe~ reunion, yay," Peter says with a shallow tone, interrupting Shigaraki and All for One with a chuckle. ", But shall we discuss strategy, gentlemen? If you will follow me to the table…" Peter says as he motions for the two of them to walk over to the table.

Reluctantly, All for One grimaces at Peter before he and his grandson move in with a proud smirk, redy to do business with the Lone Knight.

"Right, so here's how this will go. I give to you my plan, which you will execute."

Shigaraki circles to see lines of a map of Musutafu. He squints to see that he has drawn sites, probably for the bombs and Nomu. His eyes jerk wider in surprise and shock for the bombs had been fitted with napalm that bordered the city and cornered the city hall, the police stations and all the exits of the city to the next. The N, for Nomu, were scattered everywhere but some concentration around the bombs.

Peter catches Shigaraki's staring, peering into the placements of their troops.

"Beautiful, isn't it?" Peter starts, diverting his attention back up to him. "Here's the big picture: the police and their heroes will be too busy to even stand while you," Peter points to Shigaraki. ", Will wreak your havoc. This will be your chance to-to do your stuff." Peter stammers a bit.

Upon his words, he now realized the pattern. From his previous comings, The Burning of the Arizona Plate to the City of Anarchy. Why did he not see this before?

So that's how! A dastard trick, and to think he's done it many times before for the past decades or so. This was truly bad, for the pattern is about to happen again, right in front of his eyes.

All for One's head jerks up to look at Peter. "What will you be doing, mercenary?"

"Oh, I won't be staying here. I will give you the means to take over while you will give me an opportunity to escape."

That's right. The Quirk experiments he's unleashed and the Quirks in bottles, his infamous escapades. The escape was employed with a distraction. He tricks the police and heroes with an irresistible distraction and makes off with his prizes, the Quirks.

His head starts zipping in a fit of panic. His legs started to tense, readying himself to zip through the room with his Quirk. His shoulders docked themselves together to run straight for Peter. Alice's freed diamond-encased hand tingle with intense anticipation as beads of sweat drip and roll down the sides of their heads, unsure of what will happen.

Then, she came in. "Hey, Daddy? What's taking so - ." An innocent passesby wearing a wedding gown and a grin, which immediately melted to a frown upon taking in the room. From the look of things, she was the mob boss's daughter, the bride of the celebration above. The realization that the room didn't house in her father started to seep through as reality.

In a second, her eyes started darting across the room in search of her father. She finally sees him on the floor, unconscious. "… Da.. ddy?" Her voice crumbled as she saw him, lifeless.

As she gazed with a hopeless frown, the entire room rolled their eyes and stared in shock. Sokudo and Alice most of all. Here they both were, still waiting and letting some pangs of guilt override their movement and judgement.

Peter looks at the frozen bride just by the door and backs away from the table. Sokudo did not need to see his waist to know that he had his hand by the hilt of his sword.

"NOW!" Sokudo shouts, understandably in a hurry. Alice flicks her freed wrists, warping both her's and Sokudo's placement, freeing their entire bodies from Kabe's hold over them.

"Ngl!" Kabe grunts, whipping his palm to the two now-moving heroes. Alice angrily whips her wrist at Kabe's hands, throwing shards at him. The diamonds pierced through Kabe's hand and arm, making Kabe grind his jaw in a squeal.

Peter immediately turns to unsheathe his sword. Without a word, Sokudo locks the heels of his feet and immediately zooms forward, meeting his arms to Peter's chest. He heard a huff of breath before he starts going faster. Sokudo's eyes lit up with the power of His Quirk, Speed, and immediately started running with it.

He zoomed to the wall with Peter in toll and did not stop there. He started running up the wall and grabbed Peter by his collars and dragged him in his run around the room. Literally. His brain goes topsy-turvy but he payed no mind to the nausea seeping into it and focused on getting faster and faster.

Sokudo's trails of white and black coloring, along with Peter's blonde hair and his trail-coat, became a blur as he sped around the room. In the midst of it, Alice started whipping out yellow shards and carelessly threw them to anyone.

"Fuckin- GAH!" Takumi Oshido whipped out a gun before he was interrupted by a shard hitting for his shoulder, deeply aimed for the bone. He falls to the floor and a blur of white zips by her vision. The white was aimed for everyone in the room. Alice was astonished by Sokudo. He's still got it, she thought to herself as she manifested her signature streamy tiara upon her head and more shards between her fingers and sets her eyes onto the rest of the villains unaffected by Sokudo's speeding around the room.

Sokudo grinds his jaw in his running only to go faster. His vision starts to blur and his run become fluid; He can't even feel his legs stepping. His eyes can only take in sights about 5 feet in front of him. Good thing he's honed his reflexes and his agility.

His body turns into a slur, like he was quickly floating into the air as time and space begin to fastly pass him by. He felt his head spinning like the room and he had to drop Peter somewhere or his insides will turn into jelly or die from whiplash. By his two- thousandth step, he knew what he should do.

Instead of running towards the wall, which he was about to hit, he managed to turn left. But he had to keep going and slow down, so he was now running on the wall going left. He continued to slow down until he will slow down back to the floor.

Alice throws her yellow shards at Toga Himiko, running at her with a knife and a blood-thirsty face hiding her confusion. The insane villainess is impacted by the shards chucked into her shoulders, and Alice, "Ngh!" punches her against the wall and Toga is chucked to the wall, pierced with shards into her shoulders with a grunt. All before Toga feels the impact of an object slowing down his speed.

Sokudo, as thanks to the baggage that slowed him down, can now slow down his step. He now feels the weight of Peter adding onto his feet pressing to the floor. But he was going faster than the average Olympic runner. He starts making roundabouts in the room.

Takumi Oshido forces a mag into his Gun Bracer and points over to Alice. She catches wind of it and forms a diamond Shield to stop the bullet. A gunshot aimed for her head, and it pierces through the field and forming a crack into it. Quickly, she forms a shard but is passed by Sokudo.

Just hearing what happened, Sokudo tripped at the sound beside Alice and, using Peter as his air bag, crashes him to Takumi. In a breathy grunt, "Gugh!", Takumi feels the impact of Sokudo's sudden stop and all of his air is forced out as he feels Peter smushed up.

Alice readied some more shards between her fingers, aiming the next shards for the villains. The bloodshot in her eyes evident as she drags her grit out with Sokudo.

Sokudo Satoshi started to gather for breath into his lungs after running so far. Ignoring the spectating bride by the door, he glares down at the villains slumping by the wall, especially Peter's staggering body. He clutches the hitman's bomb detonator from where he stands with anger plastered onto his face.

"THIS TIME! YOU LOSE! PETER!"