8th Sighting

The hospital room is cold.

Cold in the impersonal way that stone is cold. Not cold like winter, billowing winds and icy frost clawing through layers and layers of cold to violate you.

It was cold like a wall.

Detached and unfocused.

A cold that bleed in from the atmosphere and settled in his very bones.

Doctors had been in and out of the room since he was admitted, a myriad of tests, blood samples, examinations and reexaminations. All for one purpose.

To verify the initial test result, and what he had feared.

That he had become.

Quirkless.

Mirio shuffles in the bed, stretching and flexing his fingers as he closes his eyes.

But he has to move past that.

Past loosing ********.

Past losing Permeation.

Past the-

He freezes, the scene replaying in his eyes.

Rabbit in the dark, and Sir Nighteye rushing through, eyes whirling as his Quirk bursts into action.

And he had been taken out.

Put out of combat by wound and importance of rescuing Eri. And Nighteyes and that villain had…

He lets out a tense breath, fluttering his eyes as he opens them back open to stare at the ceiling tiles.

The door slides open, but the visitor doesn't announce himself, doesn't broach conversation, or an apology or anything like that.

"Rabbit." He guesses, unwilling to verify his assumption as he closes his eyes again.

Four broken ribs.

Some organ damage from the spike in his stomach, repaired- mending.

One pair of shattered ulna and radius.

Femoral artery damaged.

Fractured left tibia.

He wasn't in fighting shape.

"I see you're on the mend." Rabbit's voice is accented by a hum of appreciation, and the warmth in the words surprise him.

Mirio cracks an eye open. "What do you want?"

Rabbit flexes his hand instead, black leather gloves squeaking softly before he releases, splaying his fingers. "It was just a theory you know." He said, turning those devious emerald eyes to his own frame. "That ********* was inheritable."

Mirio grits his teeth, moving to sit up in the bed, but Rabbit steps forward, pressing him down gently.

And he winches as his fingers touch, and Mirio realizes he's not the only one on the mend.

Despite the looks, despite his posturing, his stance, Rabbit is injured too. It was a bloody fight for everyone involved.

He takes a step back, and that's when Mirio realizes that he hasn't moved his left arm at all, and that the arm is tucked tightly against the man's chest.

"Blackwhip. Float." Rabbit says suddenly, and in response, Mirio flinches.

There's a silence where a reply should have gone, but Mirio doesn't know what he should fill it with. Instead he mumbles.

"You stole it."

"You lost it." Rabbit counters, rolling his eyes. "And the sample I took from you, happened to have been before that erasing." His fingers coil around his arm, flicking back and forth through the skin. "And as annoying as your quirk is, it looks like I got that too."

He flinches away from those words.

His Quirk.

In the hands of some villain that would rather use it to gather information and funnel weapons into the wrong hands than use it to save innocent people.

"I thought you deserved a thank you." Rabbit states, cracking his neck.

And that makes Mirio peel his gaze off the window and back to the villain.

"What for?" He snarls it.

Rabbit scoffs at the reaction, rolling his eyes again. "Because you did save Eri." He replies. "And that was… my objective."

Mirio hesitates, narrows his eyes as he examines the man. "What do you mean?"

And again it seems that Mirio is caught off guard when the man smiles.

"What makes you think you heroes found Overhaul by yourself?" He asks, and as if to answer before he could question it, the man elaborates. "I've been funneling information one way or the other for a while now. Chisaki might have been good, but I'm good at what I do."

"And what makes you think that we needed your information?"

"Because I needed you to save Eri." Rabbit growls back, suddenly annoyed. "And I couldn't let that monster hurt her."

And.

Mirio wasn't expecting that.

For him to get…

Anger

For the sake of a child.

For the sake of Eri.

For the sake of someone he didn't know.

"Why did she matter?" Mirio mutters, breathless.

Rabbit takes a seat in the chair beside the bed. "Why wouldn't she?" He argues back, reclining in the chair casually.

Like an old friend visiting.

Not like a villain.

Not like someone that stole his quirk.

Quirks.

"She's just a child." Rabbit continues, eyes glazed over as he examines the far wall. "A kid wrapped up in something she can barely understand, and forced to do… horrible things…" And his voice drops to a whisper "all for some sick man's delusion."

That really peeks Mirio's interest.

But he's digging for information, for who Rabbit is, not what his motivations are.

"Did you know her?"

Rabbit snorts. "Why are you Heroes always assuming that I have to know someone to help them?" He rolls his eyes, looking over at him. "Check my history. I started out helping patrol cops get through the night. Then I played both sides. I controlled traffic routes, got the officers out of harmsway when harm was coming. I got shipments through because both sides knew if I was telling them something, then it was because if they got involved, it would get messy."

"What changed?" Mirio asks.

"Nothing."

And Mirio narrows his eyes. Not because of the response, but because of the tone. A half moment of pause, an intake of breath, and moment where those green eyes hesitated, unfocused and refocused on the present.

"I'm still doing the same thing I have been doing." He replies. "Helping both sides. To keep the innocents safe." He stands, legs shaking despite the determined look on his face. "I'm sorry about Sir Nighteye." He adds suddenly.

Like he genuinely wants to apologize.

And Mirio doesn't know how to take that.

Likely never will.

Because if he himself had been stronger.

Faster.

Braver.

Better.

Then Sir Nighteye would have never had to go into battle with a villain.

With someone he didn't know if he could trust.

And that just might have saved his life.

"I'll see you around. Lemillion." And Rabbit flashes him a ghost of a smile and the-

Drops through the floor.

All at once.

Smooth and fluid like he'd done it dozens of times before. An easy transition from standing to falling. Without hesitation, without fear, just a freefall through the floor and he was gone.

Mirio sucked in a breath, swallowing it as something in his chest burned and ached.

He lost his quirk.

He lost ***************.

What catches his attention isn't the object itself, but the fact that when he looks back to the window, and then to the door again, it's stayed the same.

Hung motionless in the air surrounded by a green tint.

He freezes, feels his blood run cold as he stares at it for just a moment.

Float.

And then the paper falls, drifts to the ground and skims along the tile until it's resting by the chair.

Out of arm's reach, but easily in range of his eyes.

It was a sketch.

A wide action shot.

Of him.

In the middle of the fight with Overhaul, sometime after he lost his Quirk based on the heavy stain on his costume.

His fists were clenched in the sketch, eyes blaze with some kind of righteous fury as he fought. He had Overhaul on the ropes, had him scrambling back, reaching for the ground as his next fist cocked back to deliever a blow.

A short note at the bottom. Neat script. Clearly left to be read.

'Still look like a Hero to me Lemillion.'

He doesn't feel the sob until it slides out of his throat, hot and sudden as he leans away, back out to look at the window.

He lost his quirk.

He lost***************.

But what did it matter? He could still be a Hero. Always would be. And this right here. This was just a set back. A place he could step forward from. To be better. Stronger. Faster.

[Has someone tampered with this report? Text has been redacted, and I can't clear it. Do we know what it was?]

(Nothing you're ready for. And nothing you need to worry about- Rabbit)

[…Do you just wait for us to enter these report? Cause I literally just watched that come across my screen.]

(I program in reports when specific files are opened. I'm good. But I'm not that good.)

[Just curious. Do you sleep?]

(Not if I can help it. Hey. Tell Patrol 7 to keep away from the railway yard tonight. Heard there was a bad group of yakuza hanging around there. Either reroute, or have Mt. Lady accompany them.)

[Roger. I'll send it out on the radio. Anything else you'd like to tell me?]

[… Rabbit?]

[…You there?]

[Guess he's gone.]