Author's Note: I am so grateful for all my followers and readers. Thank you for the support and I hope you enjoy these next few chapters. I welcome suggestions on short stories although I have a number of them started. I'm sorry for the delays as real life has kicked my behind with some medical stuff.
Disclaimer: This story is rated for sensitive subject matter and content both mentioned and written. Includes but is not limited to child abuse, drugs, assault, rape, violence, and more.
Chapter 73 - My Children
Soji ran into the hospital, barely pausing to ask the receptionist where his wife was. They gave him a ward the next floor up and room number and Soji rushed to the double doors, phone in hand. He had messaged Keigo, receiving the information that both himself and Dabi were looking for Mila. They were going to use the GPS on Mila's choker and Soji had informed Keigo about the man outside the law offices. Police were picking up the assailant, but Keigo didn't want them looking for Mila because of the attention it would draw from the Commission. When the silver haired lawyer got to the trauma ward, Sion and Jin were sitting out in the hallway, both standing when they saw him.
"Uncle Thoji! Are you ok?" Soji shook his head, eyes on the closed door. "How is she?" Sion motioned to the door as she spoke. "She's still unconscious, as she has been since they brought her in. The doctors just finished a CT and said to give her some time before we go in." Soji frowned and went to try the door, peaking in a little. Azumi was laying still, her face angled away from the door so he couldn't really see her face. The heart monitor and pulse monitor was beeping steadily and Soji closed the door again before rubbing his hands over his face. "This can't be happening. There shouldn't be a relapse." Sion put a comforting hand on his back as a doctor stepped up to them all.
A clipboard in hand and what looked like extra fingers on each hand, the young doctor cleared his throat. "I'm sorry to interrupt. Are you Mr. Nakamura?" Soji nodded and looked at the young doctor. "Yes. Sion says you did a CT?" The doctor nodded and offered a hand. "I'm Doctor Kisha, I attended Azumi when she came in through the Emergency room. I understand your wife had a frontal craniectomy to relieve pressure on the brain some years back?" Shaking hands, Soji glanced at the closed door. "Yes. She's recovered fully with no real lasting trauma. But she was with my daughter who is now missing and I don't believe this was a relapse." The young doctor nodded seriously as he motioned for them all to sit on the waiting benches outside of the room.
"I agree. According to the witness reports, her vitals and the CT, it's as if pressure was applied to her brain to make her pass out. It doesn't seem to have caused lasting damage, but her continued lack of consciousness concerns me. Most patients recover immediately when such pressure is alleviated. There is nothing keeping her asleep that we can tell unless the brain just hasn't triggered a response. Now that can cause shock to the system or rush of adrenaline to her as she is in different surroundings. It's very important that when she wakes up, everything be as quiet and calm as possible. She may not remember what happened or realize where she is right away. That's why we have a mild muscle relaxer in her saline to keep her from injuring herself and moving around too fast." Soji nodded as Sion and Jin looked at each other.
"Can I sit with my wife at least? I'll remain quiet and will call a nurse as soon as soon as she awakens." The doctor smiled gently and made a note on his paperwork as he nodded. "That shouldn't be an iss-" Alarms went off as a code blue was called and a nurse ran into Azumi's door calling out. "Doctor!" All calm disappeared as the young doctor darted into the patient room ready to act, with Soji standing and taking steps to see what was going on. "Somebody call security and get aids outside at once!" The doctor called as Soji looked in the room where his wife had been sleeping before. The bed was empty, so was whatever bag and IV line had been hanging next to her. The monitor pads were buzzing in a flatline alarm from being removed and hanging off the bed. The window was open with the screen missing and a nurse was taking a quick inventory.
"I don't understand. The sedative bag, the line and IV and some of our hypodermics are gone. Where could she go with the sedative in her system? The monitors went flatline seconds before I got in here!" Soji pushed to the window and saw they weren't too far from a roof overhang to an AC unit to the ground. He knew Azumi could have easily scaled that down, and he wasn't waiting for the hospital staff or security to corner and scare her. His eyes darted around the room noticing a bag with some of her personal effects. He took off out of the room for the lobby, Sion and Jin running after him. "Soji! What happened?" Sion called as Soji hit the auto open for the doors. "Azumi ran off with enough sedative to kill someone! I need to find her!"
/
Dabi and Hawks tag teamed their search for Mila in the slums. Since Hawks had the tracker, he kept to the air, Dabi glancing up at his boyfriend occasionally to make sure he was in the right direction to find Mila as they moved through the back streets of Fukuoka. This was a part of town Dabi wouldn't want Mila to be running around in, but it seemed perfect for a halfway house type deal for the Takamis. Dabi couldn't wait to give them a piece of his mind when they got to them. Hawks may be a hero, but even he wasn't feeling very hero like at the moment as he landed on a rooftop and furrowed his brow at the gps. Mila was moving? Hawks glanced down to see Dabi taking the pause to catch his breath and look up as Hawks yelled down.
"Dabi! She's on the move pretty quickly! If you head left, you should be able to intercept her! I'll swing around from behind to see if she's being chased." Dabi nodded and started down the side street, keeping his temper in check. He didn't want to be burning hot to the touch if he had to pick MIla up. Cursing at the dim light as he tripped over some boxes and trash which caused him to stagger, heavy soled boots clunking on the pavement. Getting his act together, he cut left and then right because of the way the street was going, eyes darting into every alley or doorway to make sure it wasn't a place for someone to jump out.
There was the sound of yelling clearly heard ahead of him and he tried to call out for Hawks before someone slammed into his side causing Dabi to tumble over some plastic trash bins into a wall. When Dabi turned around there was a man in all black with a strange set of sunglasses with glowing rims. His head was bald which mde the black clothing and glowing rimmed sunglasses weirder as the man reached out to grab Dabi. The flame user let himself erupt into blue flames, pointing his left hand out to direct them at the man with a full blast. The man grinned a row of crooked teeth before he stepped back, obviously with trained reflexes, and turned to show why he had only rammed Dabi into a wall and not attacked. Mila was squirming and kicking from where he had an arm around her neck, pulling her up so that she was struggling to breathe let alone make a noise. Upon seeing Mila, Dabi snuffed out his flames instantly to not hurt her, but was too distracted to see Obi Takami sidle up behind him and grab him around the upper arms. The feathers in Obi's hair were shivering and shaking, a slight vibration seemed to come off of them and disorient Dabi as soon as the thief grabbed him, Obi calling out. "Moro, I got him!"
"Fucker let go!" Dabi growled as he tried to bang his head back into Obi's, stopping only when the man in front of them suddenly grabbed Dabi around the throat. The man was holding mostly scar tissue, but his grip was like ice and rock solid, sending a brief panic to Dabi's brain from the many times his father had grabbed him like this around his siblings, around his mother. He tried to struggle out of Obi's grip despite the disorienting buzz that was overtaking his senses, and kicked at the man holding his throat. OUtnumbered and restrained, Dabi felt his energy was suddenly not there, his entire body going numb from the icy touch and his movements becoming sluggish. He could hear Mila screaming as if underwater. Calling for him in a panic as she cried and Dabi's breathing stopped as his body wasn't able to get in a solid breath. Going into panic mode, he tried again to struggle, go dead weight, anything other than remain in their grasp as he saw a red haired female come up behind the man in sunglasses.
Sara was standing behind Moro watching him drain Dabi, quickly grabbing Mila from his grasp as she screamed and whistled for her Nii sama. Even outnumbered, Dabi refused to stop struggling, the icey buzzing drained feeling felt like it was going on for hours, and Dabi knew it was really happening rather fast since Hawks was around and there hadn't been a sign of him yet. As if summoned by that thought, a flurry of red feathers swept through the alley, slicing at Obi and Moro to let go of Dabi. More feathers swirled around Sara and were pushing her away from Mila, the small girl scooped up by a bunch and swept to the left where Hawks was standing, a long feather sword in one hand, smaller wings curled defensively around him as he glared his golden predatory eyes at the three villains. Moro didn't hesitate to utilize the new power he had and blue flames suddenly erupted from both of his hands to engulf the area around the alley. Dabi's mind swore as he tumbled to the ground and felt the searing heat of his own fire flash around barely an inch above where he fell on the ground. Obi yelped in pain from the feathers and then fire, stumbling back and into a corner of a dumpster and wall. Sara tried to back up from where she had been and screamed as the blue flames covered her skin and began to burn the cells of her body, beginning with her hair and skin. Hawks was unable to stop the wince of pain as almost every feather he had over there was incinerated from the force of the blast that erupted from Moro. With Mila in his arms, he curled himself around her protectively and turned with his wings wrapped around them both to offer his back to any incoming flames.
It happened so fast that when the blue flames flickered out, the alley was scorched and smoking with a thick haze. The smell of burnt feathers, hair and garbage took over as Sara continued to scream and roll around from the pain. Obi saw his wife and everything else seemed to be forgotten as he crawled forward quickly over the hot pavement to her. "Sara? Oh shit, Moro! You idiot, you hit my wife!" Dabi groaned and tried to roll over and get up despite the numb weakness he was feeling, but Moro planted a booted foot onto his chest, one hand hovering over Dabi had blue flames in it, the other was holding a half burnt feather of Keigo's "Oh no you don't Blue Flame. I'm not done with your quirk yet." Moro glared at Hawks who was pointing his feather sword at Moro with one hand while the other held Mila close, eyes subtly moving from the target in front of him, to Dabi on the ground, over to the Takami's where Obi was trying to give his wife some sort of comfort. "Hawks, one of the top ten heroes, such an honor. You give me that girl or I'll start with incinerating your partner here." Mila whined and clung to her brother as Keigo tightened his hold on her. Dabi tried speaking with what air he could get in. "Giran will destroy you." Moro scoffed, not pulling his eyes away from Hawks, seeing as the hero still had at least half of his wings and the target of his retrieval mission. "Risks of the job, Dabi. You know how things go on the streets."
Obi glared up at Moro, realizing Sara's burns were more severe then they seemed. "You are supposed to be our partner! Helping us retrieve the brat and turning her in." Moro's grin got wide as he gripped the feather. "Sorry, my employer said whoever got the girl to him got the money. I don't feel like sharing it three ways." Hawks was about to pick up Mila and run when he suddenly felt a strange ice cold feeling on his back, painful enough to cause him to gasp as numbness started hitting his knees. "What the-" Mila held onto him tighter, realizing something was wrong. "Nii chan? What's happening?" Moro held up the feather with a grin. "My quirk allows me to drain energy from others, and that energy is converted into use of their quirk. The closer I am to touching them, the better the connection to drain. Seems these feathers of yours are good enough to get it started." Hawks swayed and dropped to his knees as his feather sword remained floating in the air, hovering as if not sure who to listen to telepathically. Hawks tried to push Mila away, gasping. "Run...Mila...run…" She shook her head and hugged him tight around the neck, her wings coming around to brush along his arms, his shoulders and his face in an attempt to help against whatever was wrong. "I'll help you!" Moro grinned wider. "Yes, use that healing quirk I've heard so much about. Makes it easier to grab you when I get over there." Obi stood, a knife pulled from his back holster as he made to go for a lethal stab into Moro's side. At that moment, Hawk's feather sword which had been hovering, shot forward and sliced right through Obi's chest, the force of it pinning him to the wall and spraying blood as Sara screamed. Hawks struggled to try and turn Mila's eyes away, too late from the scream that came from Mila when she saw her brother's largest feather pin the bad man to the wall. Dabi winced at the sound of someone run through by what he knew to be a death blow.
Hawks glared at Moro while he held Mila protectively, the little girl whimpering as she buried her face into his shoulder scared. She hadn't been able to help heal him at all, and now she was shaking and crying from what she had witnessed. Hawks tried to take in what his options were. He could try to fly away with Mila, but the man had enough control over his feathers now that he could use them to stop or attack Hawks. Dabi was down, seemingly struggling to stay conscious himself as he occasionally tried to move out from under the boot holding him down, and Hawks was about ready to collapse if he was being honest. This guy's quirk was dangerous, and it felt impossible to beat something like that. Mimicking and copying other quirks is one thing, but this guy drained his targets and took their quirks for his own. With a maintained hold on Dabi and one of his feathers in the guy's hand, there was no way he would run out of energy or time to kill them all and take Mila. Sara was burnt so badly she couldn't even stand and now Obi was slumped where Hawk's primary had skewered him to the stone wall. There were no police sirens, the timing of all of this so fast it was making Hawk's head spin. He'd messed this one up badly, and there was no other way to put it. He endangered Dabi, Mila, himself and Hawks hadn't been smart enough to access the situation before he just went straight into it. Too fast for his own good was right.
"Alright little girl. Let's get this over with. You come here and come with me and I'll let both of these gentlemen live. I'm not after them, I'm after you, so don't make me hurt or kill anymore people." Mila whined and clung to Hawks as he held her tighter whispering. "You need to run away, Mila. Please run to a police officer or another hero." The little girl looked at her big brother, her blue eyes watery and full of unshed tears, then she looked over at Dabi, who seemed to be struggling to get normal breaths in. "I'm scared, Nii chan. I don't want him to hurt you or Nii sama. I want mommy." Keigo suddenly collapsed onto his side, his feathers moving from his wings on their own and seemed to hover around as if Moro were experimenting with what he could do with them, then he dropped them to the ground like dead leaves. "Nii chan!" Mila crouched down, ignoring Hawk's attempts to push her away and get her to run.
"Mila Run!" Hawks gasped out as the numbness crawled all over his body, putting him in the same position as Dabi. "Mila shook her head no, clinging to his arms as she started crying. "No! I want my mommy! Mommy!" Moro rolled his eyes and took his foot off of Dabi's chest, starting to walk closer. "I hate crying brats. You come here or I'll burn both of them!" The blue flames in his left hand flared up to match his threat, despite Dabi trying with everything he had just to roll over and try to get up. Mila sniffed as her tears started falling and she shook her head. "Please don't hurt my Nii chan and Nii sama!" Moro got close enough that Hawks tried to crawl between him and Mila, and got a kick to the face causing Mila to jump and take a step back still crying. He glared down at her, his patience thin and running out as he made to grab for her again. As Mila cringed back, the sound of feet running on concrete suddenly filled the alley and Moro barely had time to turn behind him with confusion as Azumi brought her fist down into his collarbone area.
The hypodermic she was holding empty as she had thumbed the plunger down the instant she got the needle into him, her purple eyes angry as her breath came in fast ragged breaths from running. Moro tried to lift an arm to attack, but she had emptied the entire sedative right into him and the man's eyes rolled up as he collapsed. Dabi and Hawks blinking, surprise on their faces as the numb feeling already began to wear off. Mila threw herself at her mommy crying as Dabi gasped in a deep breath and sat up. Azumi had her phone in one hand, the GPS app open, and let the phone clatter to the ground as she dropped to her knees to hug Mila, looking between Dabi and Keigo relieved to see them alive whispering.
"I'm here now. I'm here baby. No one harms my children. Not anymore."