"I attempted to contact Gremlin." Nedzu informs him through the comms. "But she called me 'Rikiya-san' and I'm not sure if she heard what I said. Any idea..."
Izuku goes pale.
"Oh fuck, keep everyone away from her." Mei chose the absolutely worst moment to have another of her episodes. And… oh god, she had Gadget with her?! "She will attack everything that moves and is remotely humanoid, and with extreme prejudice."
"I noticed the extreme prejudice part." Nedzu states flatly. "She just used what looks like white phosphorus to burn an entire squad of QLF troops to death." Izuku flinches at the image. "And now… oh dear, is that a chainsaw?"
Izuku doesn't want to know. He so much doesn't want to know.
Nedzu moved a drone above his head. Legion has a good internet connection, now. He connects to Mindscrew and sees him observe a squad of QLF soldiers from some bushes.
He wants to talk with him, but he isn't going to deconcentrate him right now. So he watches for a few seconds. Just enough to see the wonderful spectacle of one of the soldiers borrowing grenades from another, only to drop them on the ground and disappear into the woods.
Grenades explode. Izuku found his missing girlfriend. Mindscrew emerges from the woods and shoots two dazed survivors. The last one has enough time to start fleeing before running into Spinner who promptly stabs him in the chest and then shoots him in the face with a pistol.
Hitoshi really grew up recently. Spinner too. Izuku is proud of them.
"Toshi, we have a problem." He decides to speak. Mindscrew jerks a little.
"Aside from the obvious?" Hitoshi replies. "I have a list of problems. Twenty pages, and then you get to the B-letter."
"How about 'Hatsume Mei has an episode while having her entire arsenal with her'? A problem enough?" Izuku says, and Mindscrew freezes. Vampire emerges from the woods on the other side of the ambushed squad, still wearing the soldier's face, and looks at him questioningly.
"Jesus fucking Christ." Hitoshi replies after a few seconds. "How bad is it?"
"According to Nedzu it includes white phosphorus and chainsaws." He lets Hitoshi swallow the news for a few seconds before continuing. "I need you to incapacitate her with your quirk and prep her for evac. She is to your northwest, and you seem to be close to her."
"You owe me for that." Mindscrew replies coldly.
One thing off the list. Then he gets an idea. That he is tired of being lost in the forest.
"Kurogiri, I need a lift to the field hospital." He says into his mask. The warpgate opens less than a minute later.
(***)
He steps from the warpgate to see an image of chaos. Dozens of wounded people scattered around the area. It's a 'field' hospital, so it's more of a large tent than anything else. It's clearly overcrowded - nobody expected so many people with such grizzly wounds.
Recovery Girl is there, operating on a student. He sees some gen eds and a handful of subcontracted doctors and nurses doing their best. And a line of covered and unmoving people by the wall.
Most of the corpses are still scattered around the forest. The ones here are those who made it to the hospital but far too late for it to change anything. He can't help the others, but he can help those.
Some of the personnel members are eyeing him. He isn't surprised. Recovery Girl is too busy to care about being surprised.
"How many?" She asks without pausing the operation for even a second.
"Not enough." He replies truthfully. "But I'm going to do my best."
He touches the first of the dead students and activates Overhaul.
(***)
The preparations for the switch from Maximum to Minimum plans were ready. Faculty and students were still scattered, although their forces in the west amassed enough to begin to push against the PLF's main force with increasing strength.
All Might was advancing towards the main force from the north, decimating the squads that were hunting for the remaining students in the area. Lemillion has been located with Sir Nighteye and some of the third years, advancing towards the very same place, but from the south.
Right according to the plan. Save for Legion being still hidden from him, but if Overhaul knows anything about that boy, he will pop up when he understands what Minimum Plan is about.
"Deploy the High Ends." Overhaul announces. "Warper, get ready." He would have to get his hands dirty for this one, in the worst case scenario. "Artillery, fire on the field hospital."
(***)
One of Gremlin's drones has an eye on the PLF's main force surrounding the training field. It immediately reports the change. Several self-propelled guns are warped in, turning to face north.
Five Noumus move north. One moves south. Then Nedzu hears the worst. Enemy artillery is shelling the field hospital. Cementoss is there, exhausted and wounded in the siege of Nedzu's fortress, and he manages to erect a cover, but he won't hold it for long.
All Might abandons moderation and storms towards the artillery position after telling the kids to retreat north. They do not listen.
(***)
"Oh shit." Legion reacts to the announcement. He has already restored nine people to life, and he is in urgent need of a nap. Or Overhaul's special trigger. Though he already used it, so trying it again would probably not help at all. "Lemillion and All Might. He is after One for All."
Only a single Noumu against Lemillion? The man who proved to have an atomic fist and has most likely grown in strength since then? He hopes that All Might will make it on his own. He should have.
"Kurogiri, warp to Lemillion's position. Now!" He shouts and disappears from the hospital. He had no one else to save there, either way. The rest was too far gone.
(***)
Noumu is a massive hulking beast, with an exposed brain and a large beak. Wearing some form of ruined trousers.
Legion emerges from the cloud of darkness ten meters away from Lemillion. He is beaten up quite badly, but his limbs are (still) intact. Izuku immediately recognizes the two other members of the UA Big Three (he is having a broken hand, she was shot in the shoulder and has it bandaged, but is clearly barely able to fight).
Sir Nighteye is there too. He is bleeding from a nasty gash on his forehead, and something has nastily mangled his right arm. He has his hyper density seals in the remaining hand.
"Legion?" Lemillion seems to be torn between being angry and happy to see him. "Here to lend us a hand?" Happy wins.
"I'm not letting my soon-to-be nemesis die not by my hand." Legion replies with a slightly tired-sounding snicker. The Noumu is advancing slowly, but carefully. Something in his movements seem odd. Is it… oh.
Overhaul expected the Legion to intervene. So he told noumu to kill him if he did, but he didn't specify the priority, so the noumu in front of them is torn between targeting Lemillion and Legion.
Mistake. He isn't sure how to exploit it, but it's a mistake nonetheless.
"Shock Absorption or Nullification." Sir Nighteye says instantly. He knows the situation is critical and doesn't want to waste time. He is a strategist and investigator, not a tactician. "Probably some form of regeneration, but I can't tell how strong. Also speed and strength boost."
Everyone but Legion had various qualities of physical attacks only. Not enough to fight their way through Shock Absorption, and certainly a lost cause if it was Nullification. Legion could disassemble it with Overhaul, but if it was some form of Hyper Regeneration, he would be exhausted with that before the noumu.
Okay, plan B. Take advantage of something that Overhaul doesn't know. After all, Izuku discovered that he had All for One after killing him. Did the Doctor tell him? How much info did they share?
"We need to restrain it for up to a minute." Izuku says. "I'm going to steal Shock Absorption, then Lemillion will punch it out." Nejire and Tamaki are clearly lost in the first half of the sentence. Sir is unreadable. Lemillion nods. Noumu decides to finish its thinking process and leaps at Mirio. "Kurogiri, now!"
Kurogiri acts fast. His warpgate envelops both fists of the Noumu, sending them elsewhere. Lemillion disappears underground, only for his hands to grab Noumu's legs and pull them partially underground, sealing its movement.
Legion leaps forward, crossing the distance and putting his hand on Noumu's head. The red electricity flashes. He locates the right quirk (it's Shock Nullification, where did that asshole doctor find it?!) and starts pulling.
Noumu is powerful, but its mind is too damaged to offer significant resistance. But it will still take a while, and Lemillion can't stay underground forever. Izuku pulls as fast as he can. The quirk is getting closer and closer, but…
Noumu frees its right hand from Kurogiri's grip. Izuku has two seconds to say goodbye to his life before a cluster of tentacles grabs the fist mid-flight. The impetus is lost, but noumu struggles onward. Sir Nighteye shows up from nowhere and grabs the hand. Nejire is there too. They buy Izuku precious few seconds, but it is enough.
He steals the quirk in time, and jumps back before the noumu's hand can catch him.
"IT'S DONE!" He shouts. Sir jumps back too, pulling Nejire back to safety. The noumu shakes off Suneater's tentacles. Lemillion doesn't know what happened, but he reaches his limit and jumps from the underground, his fist ready.
The punch creates a shockwave strong enough to send Izuku flying. Noumu has much less luck. His upper half practically vanishes. The regeneration starts restoring the lost body part, but the heroes don't give it time to get anywhere. Nejire and Lemillion tear it into pieces with their attacks. The regeneration gets slower and slower until it stops.
(somewhere else an exhausted hero gets his arm disassembled while the students are forced to watch. The blood gushes from the open wound.
"See?" Overhaul hisses. "Exhausting you cost me five High Ends, but at least I did what All for One failed to do. Ah, the things you do to impress your allies."
His warper gets him out of the battlefield before anyone has time to react. He can't risk Kurogiri warping in and blocking his escape route)
"We won!" Lemillion is clearly on the verge of falling to the ground from exhaustion. "That was… something." Nejire and Tamaki agree with him, but wordlessly. Izuku has no idea how many fights he missed, but they clearly were at the thick of it.
"Oh no." Izuku says. He can feel terror replacing post-battle happiness. "All Might. Overhaul sent five noumus after him." Sir Nighteye freezes. Lemillion looks at Izuku with dawning shock. "Kurogiri!" The warpgate envelops them all.
(***)
All Might is dying.
He is kneeling on the ruined battlefield. Crushed and destroyed bodies of the High Ends are scattered around. His right arm is missing. His form is steadily deflating, as the remnants of his power - and his blood - are leaving his body.
Several terrified and (mostly) wounded students are trying to stop the bleeding. It doesn't seem to be working.
Legion, Sir Nighteye, Kurogiri and the Big Three emerge out of nowhere. Sir and Lemillion rush towards All Might.
"Recovery Girl, now." Izuku says, his brain still failing to process what's in front of him. He can't name it. The words to describe the scene fail to come through.
Kurogiri returns a few seconds later with Recovery Girl. Her outfit is stained with fresh blood. Her eyes widen when she sees All Might. Then her expression darkens.
"Nothing I can do can save him." She is crestfallen. "Not in this state."
Sir Nighteye and Mirio look at Legion. They don't say a word, but he knows.
"I… can't." He replies. "I used Overhaul too many times, I can't…"
No.
He won't let All Might die.
He is a hero. The greatest of them all. Powerful and good enough for the son of his greatest enemy to acknowledge him. He is the Symbol of Peace. He is Mirio's mentor - and without him, who is going to make sure that Lemillion will not stray from his path? Who will make sure that the second Symbol of Evil will have a worthy antithesis?
"Keep him alive for five more minutes." He says to the Recovery Girl. Something, is that hope?, flashes in her eyes. She runs towards All Might as fast as her legs allow her. "Kurogiri, my sister. Now."
"You don't mean…" The warper is shocked. It's hard to tell without the face, but Izuku knows.
"NOW!" Izuku shouts at him and Kurogiri vanishes.
The students, including Bakugou (oh, the irony) stare at him. There is a mix of hostility and hope in their eyes.
"Nedzu." Legion says to the communicator. "All Might is dying. I need Eraserhead here as fast as possible. Kurogiri will pick him up, but I need coordinates."
He gets them almost instantly. He sends them to Kurogiri, telling him to fetch Eraserhead when he returns with Eri.
Izuku takes off his mask and the hood. Kurogiri bursts out from nowhere, with a sleepy-looking Eri in her favourite All Might onesie. The warper disappears again.
"Izu-nichan?" She says sleepily. He kneels before her and grabs her little hands. "What happened?"
"I know that I told you that you'll never have to use your quirk if you don't want to." Izuku says quietly but confidently. "But I need to ask you to do it right now."
This wakes her up. She looks around, and sees the dying All Might. She recognizes the clothes. She sees him slowly deflate, and she is smart enough to understand that it was him. Her eyes widen in terror.
"Izu-nichan, that's…" She says, but he interrupts her.
"Eri." She looks back at him. "That's All Might. He is dying, and you are the only one who can save him. It was Overhaul, Eri." Her face turns pale. Izuku hates himself for having to resurrect her nightmare. "All Might fought to protect children like you and saved dozens of them, but Overhaul got him."
"I… I…" She stutters. Kurogiri warps back with Eraserhead. The man is visibly exhausted and has half of his head bandaged. One eye remains, and Izuku can see it darting towards the fallen All Might. And then back to an unfamiliar child.
"Do you remember what I told you about your quirk?" She remains shocked, but he has her attention. "I told you that he lied about it. I told you that it's a beautiful thing that can save hundreds of people. That can help people like you, who were wounded by people like Overhaul. You can start right now, Eri. Please, help me save him."
She comes to a decision.
"I'll do it." He was never as proud of her as he was right now. For as much as All for One and Mischief were supervillains, at least one of their children was an unquestionable hero.
She approaches All Might. Her horn grows larger.
"Everyone, move away from them!" Izuku shouts, and the crowd surrounding All Might disperses. "Eraserhead, use your quirk on her when I tell you." Eraserhead nods without a word.
Izuku walks behind his sister. Just in the right distance to grab her when she finishes, but not close enough to get hit by her quirk.
All Might is still conscious, but barely. His eyes rest on Eri, his form almost entirely deflated. He doesn't have strength left to speak or move. His breath is faltering. The blood drips out of the wound. He is still kneeling there.
Eri gets close, touches his remaining hand and activates her quirk. Then there is light, not bright enough for everyone around to get blinded by it. There is buzzing, a constant vibration upon everything in the vicinity.
The light envelops Eri. Second later All Might freezes, as similar light envelops him.
Izuku hears a gasp when All Might's other arm is suddenly reattached to his body. He has no idea who was the source of it. Perhaps Sir Nighteye, maybe Recovery Girl. Maybe it was Izuku himself.
The body blinks quickly between deflated and inflated forms. Very quickly. Eri's quirk rewinds the body in front of her for years. Several. When the blinking stops and the body remains bulky, Izuku decides that it's enough.
"Now!" Eraserhead's eye turns red. The light vanishes and the horn shrinks. Eri is about to fall to the ground when Izuku grabs her. She is unconscious, or perhaps has fallen asleep from quirk exhaustion. But she is breathing steadily.
"Kurogiri, we're leaving." The warper doesn't ask questions. They all disappear. Behind them, All Might's eyes open up and he takes a deep breath… with two of his lungs for the first time in years.
(***)
Kurogiri has recovered all members of the League. He was still trying to help them bandage their wounds when Izuku decided to put an end to it and directly ordered him to go rest a bit. He was on the verge of falling to quirk exhaustion, and it was rather obvious.
"Did we lose anyone? Izuku is lying on the couch, barely having enough strength to raise his head. He was still running on pure adrenaline when he got his sister back home and (once she woke up) explained to her to keep that night a secret from their parents.
"Zealot." Mindscrew replies. He is one of the very few members of the League that aren't to some degree wounded. He is sitting in an armchair, obviously drained. Still in his villain outfit, he was too tired to take it off before resting for a bit. "Took out like a hundred noumus, but they got him finally."
"That's one awesome death, not gonna lie." Spinner mumbles. His hand is bandaged, and the other is set in the cast. Too close to an explosion of something, apparently.
"He died saving some hero kids." Dabi adds. "He probably died happy." Another non-wounded member, but thoroughly exhausted and with his skin badly irritated by the temperature amplitude that it was exposed to. He spent a while finding a (rather awkward) position on his couch that didn't hurt THAT much, and decided to stay like that for as long as possible.
Stain would have added something, but he was still in an underground hospital. He ran into a High End Noumu, and while he succeeded in slaying it (after some rather extreme duel), he got wounded pretty nastily and almost lost his hand. He was going to spend a week or two there.
Vampire was sitting on the floor, thoroughly exhausted, but only with some nasty gashes from a noumu that ambushed Mindscrew's party. Her sitting position was right next to her boyfriend, of course.
Gremlin is incapacitated and tied to her bed. Where she PROBABLY shouldn't be able to escape from until she wakes up and they manage to confirm that her episode is over. She shouldn't be able to cause that much damage with Gadget hidden away from her even if it wasn't.
Tenko has bruised ribs from a noumu's punch. He is already playing a video game in the back, his preferred form of chilling down after excess stress.
Shihai Kuroiro, their no-longer-a-spy in the UA, is in another room. Catching up with Blueberry. There was no point in not evacuating him, as it was rather obvious that Nedzu knew about a spy. Only a matter of time. They lost a good information source, but got back a friend.
Mustard returned home already. Izuku used the last remnants of his Overhaul quirk today to fix his wounds. He of them all still had a surface life to maintain. And he suffered them right before the retreat, so Overhaul still worked on him.
The gas user spent the entire time applying hit & run tactics on the QLF soldiers, gassing a lot of people - Nedzu used him to soften the enemy before heroes rolled in and stomped on whoever was left. He was exhausted, but more or less satisfied.
"So, was it worth it?" Mindscrew asks finally, once the silence turns awkward.
"We'll find out tomorrow." Izuku replies sleepily.
He switches to Life Support quirk just in case before falling asleep. Thankfully it was just exhaustion.
(***)
"What's the end result?" Sir Nighteye asks. Nedzu is obviously the one most aware of the result of the battle.
They are both sitting in one of the room's in the fortress. The ruckus outside is still going - helicopters come and go, carrying more wounded students to the nearest hospitals. Sir Nighteye's wounds are mostly patched up, so he has time to interrogate the principal about things.
It ended half an hour ago. It was, all things considered, inconclusive. Remaining PLF's forces retreated eastward, with heroes too weak to pursue them. Overhaul's warp quirk user probably picked them up a few kilometers away from the edge of the UA owned area.
"Pretty bad." Rat replies. It was an understatement of a century, all things considered. "We lost forty-seven students, Kamui Woods, Midnight and nine other pro-heroes. Gran Torino and two of the Wild Wild Pussycats will probably end up having to retire due to injuries." He wasn't going to bet on Gran doing that, that old man would probably stay a hero even if he lost all of his limbs. Losing two wasn't going to stop him, especially as those were the upper ones.
"The press is going to gobble UA up for this." Sir Nighteye replies coldly. "Forty-seven dead students, Nedzu."
He is painfully aware of that fact. And there was also the part with how many of them received various degrees of wounds. If anything, aside from the support and gen ed students, most of the survivors were wounded.
"We'll deal with vultures." Nedzu replies. "We were attacked by forces of at least one SSS-Rank villain, most likely two although the noumu-maker lacks the official presence. Including no less than one thousand of their lackeys. I'm not saying that the fallout won't be horrible, but we'll manage."
Somehow. This wasn't going to be a PR hit the same size as what Legion did to the Hero Commission in Hosu, but it was almost as bad. It was going to be ugly. Nedzu was powerful, but not invincible.
At least he ramped up the security several times beforehand. What he did was way overboard, but did give him an option of pointing out that it didn't happen because school went too cheap on the security. Giant murderrobots, fortress, artillery battery and so many heroes? Yeah, it was the villains that were so good, not heroes that messed up.
This was a villain team-up that he had no way of foreseeing. Predicting events like that was a job of the Hero Commission. It failed horribly this time.
They had ALL MIGHT on the scene, of all people. He isn't sure how to spin this up to not make people lose their faith in the Symbol of Peace, but he'll manage. Somehow.
They aren't sure of exact numbers, but the QLF - well, PLF now - lost no less than three hundred soldiers, twenty-seven tanks and other vehicles, and at least one hundred twenty noumus. Also numerous high ranked villains. The noumu bit was probably a disaster to the enemy forces.
Probably. Nedzu doesn't want to imagine the option that they didn't get the overwhelming majority of the noumus available to the Paranormal Liberation Front.
There were many things to talk about. Many things to change. Nedzu has managed to win a battle, but narrowly. He wasn't dumb, quite the opposite. He knew that he won because Legion and the League of Villains intervened.
For now he had the PR fires to put out.
(somewhere in Japan, a deadly tired child picks up the phone, only to hear about the death of their mother. The person on the other side misunderstands the wails as born from sadness, rather than from the fact that the boy now has no one left to hate)
(***)
As promised - time for the heroes' wake up call. Overhaul certainly doesn't play around, huh?