Mirio Togata: Are we playing anything this evening?
Akatani Mikumo: probably
Mirio Togata: what game?
Akatani Mikumo: you choose
Mirio Togata: what happened?
Akatani Mikumo: reading me like an open book, huh?
Mirio Togata: it's not exactly closed rn
Akatani Mikumo: I fucked up.
Mirio Togata: if you need to talk about it, I'm here
Mirio Togata: just know that I'm going to tell the heroes if it's in any way useful stuff
Akatani Mikumo: no longer useful and that's the problem
Akatani Mikumo: Mustard left the League and it's my fault
Mirio Togata: What happened?
Akatani Mikumo: Some of the League members are in to make the world know how it hurt them
Akatani Mikumo: others are in because they have a goal, and they agreed to help me with mine (the Symbol of Evil thing) in exchange for me fulfilling theirs along the way
Akatani Mikumo: Think Zealot and stopping Purity (he might have died, but he was a part of the family and I'll fulfill his wish despite his death)
Akatani Mikumo: Mustard had one too. And I fucked it up.
Mirio Togata: how exactly?
Akatani Mikumo: His motivation was kinda dumb tbh
Akatani Mikumo: He wanted to spite a neglectful parent seen by the world as a someone to look up to by becoming a villain and making said parent see it, to make them realize how much they fucked up with Mustard
Akatani Mikumo: took me too much time
Akatani Mikumo: Mustard's parent passed away
Akatani Mikumo: His anger and spite passed away with them
Akatani Mikumo: I had a perfect occasion to do that a while ago but I didn't
Akatani Mikumo: And now I lost a close friend and pretty much an adopted cousin
Akatani Mikumo: it hurts
Mirio Togata: well that's certainly tough moment
Mirio Togata: but
Mirio Togata: you do realize I can't exactly say I'm sad that the League was weakened, right?
Mirio Togata: and that technically speaking I should inquire more about Mustard? He is still a living chemical weapon, who is now at large
Akatani Mikumo: yeah yeah I know
Akatani Mikumo: don't bother looking for him
Akatani Mikumo: He is now in a different country, under a different name, different backstory, with a different face and probably something to obfuscate DNA tests. If not a different quirk altogether
Akatani Mikumo: you'll never find him
Mirio Togata: different quirk?
Akatani Mikumo: As I said 'if not'. Whether I did it or not is yours to guess
Akatani Mikumo: I had/have a small quirk to make yourself less noticeable when you want, whether I gave it to Mustard for him to not be quirkless but to be able to not be tracked by his quirk is anyone's guess
Akatani Mikumo: I still fucked up
Mirio Togata: I'm not going to deny that. You had a goal, you didn't make it in time. It's a failure.
Mirio Togata: but don't be TOO hard on yourself, k?
Mirio Togata: you did your best, but we can't always succeed
Mirio Togata: leave always succeeding to heroes
Akatani Mikumo: LOL
Akatani Mikumo: heh
Akatani Mikumo: been a bit of a mood whiplash, I was quite happy with Himiko and something else that I can't talk about, then this
Akatani Mikumo: hit me harder than it would do on its own and even that would be bad enough
Akatani Mikumo: can you believe that me, an SSS-Rank supervillain, has hidden himself in his office to cry?
Akatani Mikumo: jesus this is pathetic
Mirio Togata: if you did it, it means you needed it
Akatani Mikumo: I literally said that to someone like two days ago stop being so influenced by me
Mirio Togata: ok
Mirio Togata: do you want to talk about the League?
Akatani Mikumo: are you trying to take advantage of my weakened state?
Mirio Togata: did you expect me to do anything else?
Akatani Mikumo: HA
Akatani Mikumo: That's a low blow though
Mirio Togata: I just want to understand you better
Mirio Togata: you and your motivations
Mirio Togata: you and your message to the world
Akatani Mikumo: I'm not going to tell you any details that could potentially help you catch someone
Akatani Mikumo: but I believe that we can talk about motivations
(***)
"I'd like to officially congratulate Best Jeanist and Miruko for their successful operation against the PLF." Nedzu started the meeting on a high note. "You have managed to dismantle their operations in Kyoto, eliminating fifty-six enemies, while sustaining no casualties yourself. "
They are all (well, almost all) back in the meeting room in the UA. Even the tables and chairs are placed identically. Legion is absent, and so is Crust who is busy with the Northern Battle Group stuff.
"Too bad they all managed to commit suicide to avoid capture." Miruko is clearly pissed off. "Fucking brainwashing jerk." Best Jeanist is much more scarce with his expressions, but he clearly agrees with the rabbit woman.
"Sir Nighteye is already analyzing the recovered computers." Nedzu replies. "Trying to take the PLF members alive is clearly a waste of time and effort, at least unless we manage to find the brainwasher and find out if his quirk can be undone."
Eraserhead doesn't say a thing, but it's nice to see the alliance actually achieving something. Their team-up brought some results - namely, the information shared between the vigilantes and the underground heroes managed to give Nedzu enough of a lead to latch onto and find several places owned by the PLF.
Not much, but a good start.
"So, why are we here?" Knuckleduster comes straight to the point. "I see that the League representative is missing, and you called for this meeting ahead of schedule."
"We got some new evidence." Nedzu replies. "Legion has managed to obtain a spy within the Creature Rejection Clan's command structure. High enough to give us enough intel to completely annihilate the entire organization once and for all." Miruko and Gang Orca perk up, but they merely react the strongest of them all. Even Knuckleduster cracks a smile.
"Unfortunately, the situation is grim and the time is limited." Nedzu continues. "Aerial reconnaissance confirmed the presence of Noumus within the High Cathedral grounds. Legion's spy claims that we have no more than four days before the negotiations are concluded and the CRC will join the Paranormal Liberation Front."
Oh well that's not good at all, Eraserhead decides. He isn't alone in that belief.
"Fucking hypocrites." Miruko is livid. Not a rare thing, but this time it's pretty bad. "Mutants are bad but bioengineered monstrosities are suddenly alright?!"
"I wouldn't expect consistency from groups like that." Nedzu replies calmly. "The spy in question decided to betray the organization precisely due to not being able to reconcile looking down on complex mutants and employing noumus in CRC's order of battle."
"Well, at least that one quirkist ass is somewhat consistent in being an ass." Miruko sneers mockingly. "Alright, what's the plan?"
"We have locations of seventeen facilities of various sizes." Nedzu replies. "We managed to confirm the presence of the CRC forces in all of them, but we had only five days for our own investigation. We're going to go through the data given to us by Legion together during this meeting, but before it happens, I have to say that the raid will be rushed. Legion has also asked us to leave the High Cathedral assault to him due to personal reasons, but to maintain the ruse of League not working with us, we'll have to send an attack party there. It'll be mysteriously late to the battle, though."
"We're going that far for him?" Ms. Joke is the one to ask, which is a surprise to Eraserhead. He thought that Knuckleduster would be the one to say that.
"I'll be frank with you." Nedzu replies. "As of now, we can't afford to lose Legion. The Paranormal Liberation Front and the League of Villains are two opposing superpowers of the underworld, and the former is massively more powerful. If we destroy the League now, we'll push all the undecided and currently League-allied villain groups straight into the Front's arms. If that happens, then the member groups of this alliance will fail to stop Overhaul and the combined force of the Japanese villains. Especially with the Hero Commission being busy with keeping the Meta-Liberation Army in check."
Eraserhead read something more about the Second World War after Lemillion's simile. This whole deal reeks of what the Allies did with the Soviets. Alliance with a lesser evil to stop the greater one.
He also read about the Cold War that ensued. He isn't looking particularly optimistic at the future, but he simply doesn't see an alternative.
"We continue to gather information about the League, however." Nedzu continues. "We're fully aware that they will become our enemies once this war ends. I believe that Detective Tsukauchi has something significant to talk about concerning this, am I right?" Detective nods from his place behind the UA table.
"Let's start from this." Miruko says loudly. "If I'm supposed to risk my head by jumping in according to the villain's intel, I at least want to know everything I can about him."
Heroes and the sole vigilante appear to agree with that. Nedzu decides to go along and leaves his place in the middle to Detective Tsukauchi.
"Legion has been very active recently." Detective announces. "Our informants connected to various small-time villain crews and remaining yakuza clans have reported numerous sightings of him and some other League members, primarily Stain. Each time they get the leaders of said groups to a negotiation table. The negotiations aren't about an alliance against the PLF, however." Detective sighs. "As of now, we estimate that no less than sixty such minor organizations have bent their knees before Legion and became the League's subsidiary groups."
"Oh dear." Nedzu says. The table of allies is probably a bit too far to hear it, but Eraserhead is very close to the rat. He understands the reaction. And why All Might and Sir Nighteye appear frozen.
Midoriya Izuku is rebuilding his father's empire. And they aren't in a position to do anything about that, because an empire of crime is a better prospect than mad scientists with armies of bioengineered monsters wanting to tear down society.
"So he is building himself a criminal empire." Knuckleduster comments. "Well, not extremely surprising. With what the PLF is doing and the noumus starting to become a public knowledge, many small-time villains look up to someone for protection. Vigilantes see my presence here as something similar."
"Not just small-time villains." Detective Tsukauchi replies. "According to gossip from the underworld, the Levellers and the Quirkless Equality Movement have become subsidiary groups as well, with Sunset and Mr. Compress becoming regular members of the League of Villains." Murmur in the room. So much about those two groups being the League's allies and equals. "We have also noticed some new members of the League, but this requires a bit more context."
"Please provide it, then." Sir Nighteye says.
"About a month ago the police noticed the disappearance of several previously active small-time villains." Detective says. "Thugs, thieves and the likes. This happened in the span of a few days, and the only common things to them all was their status as villains and relatively young age, between fifteen and twenty one years. We knew of seven such disappearances while further eleven were suspected to be a case, but we weren't sure if they were connected. This changed two days ago."
Eraserhead is almost certain this is going to be yet another headache.
"D-Rank villain known as Razorhead, who was counted among the group that disappeared, has resurfaced in a gang that swear fealty to Legion recently." Detective continues. "One of the gang's leaders is an… occasional informant of the police. He tends to sell us information about other gangs, and we aren't sure if the other leaders of it aren't aware of that. Well, according to that person, Razorhead joined his gang as an intern… from an organization known as the Villain Academy."
Eraserhead called it.
"From WHAT?!" Miruko is the loudest.
"Oh dear." Nedzu is clearly startled. Eraserhead gets painful flashbacks to the Villain Factory case.
"Informant asked Razorhead about details of it." The detective continues. "He is one of the twenty students, who are apparently a 'pilot class' of the entire initiative. The Academy teaches them how to fight with and without their quirks, in-combat quirk analysis, opening locks and disabling alarms, disguising themselves, first-aid, information gathering and analysis and a lot of other, similar things. The students are divided between three courses: Combat, Espionage and Command, with Razorhead being from the first one. The list of identified teachers includes Kurogiri, who is the Academy's principal and the homeroom teacher of the first class, Vampire, Stain and several retired villains, including a woman claiming to be Mischief. Who cooked food for the entire class which, apparently, 'tasted divine'." Detectives sighs painfully. "This is everything that we know about the Academy as of now."
"Academy." Best Jeanist is clearly on the verge of a KO. "Villains opened a school for themselves."
"That sounds like something a hero nerd like Legion would do." Oddly enough it's Lemillion who says that. "During my… stay with the League I saw first-hand that he is truly a massive fan of heroes. In a way, he respects both them and the villains, for as long as both of them fit his image of their profession. Making a school for the latter that they lack in order to improve their quality is something I can easily picture him doing."
He doesn't add the fact that the League had their spy in the UA. They get to observe the best hero school for a while, and probably steal a lot of teacher's handouts while doing so. Legion was probably basing his school on the best hero schools of them all.
Last few months are a nightmare that Eraserhead can't wake up from.
"He is offering the villains who follow him his support, rather than simply demand obedience out of fear." Nedzu says. His face is unreadable. "All you need to do is swear fealty to the League, and suddenly you have access to the support items of the Villain Industries. Competent and pre-trained interns from the Villain Academy. Information gathered by Legion, who seems to be getting cozy with the information brokers and has at least two 'family members' who excel at espionage. I wouldn't be surprised if he was running an underground bank for member groups. What a brilliant, brilliant scheme."
Nedzu is probably still in pain that Izuku didn't decide to join the UA and become a hero. Eraserhead doesn't even want to imagine the result of those two teaming up. But it probably includes them laughing maniacally while drinking some high class tea, with the Hero Commission headquarters burning down in the background.
"Can we stop admiring him and start being genuinely afraid of what he can do?" Knuckleduster interrupts Nedzu's special moment. "Listen, I get that he is way less nasty than Overhaul, but from what I'm hearing now, he is just as dangerous in the long-term. If not more."
"Oh, I'm afraid of what he can do!" Nedzu replies promptly. "I assure you that we're attacking his headquarters when only it's possible to do that without losing the war against the PLF in the process… and when we actually find it. Which isn't easy. We don't know when he moved to his current headquarters. Worst of all, Legion, Gremlin and Kurogiri made it almost impossible to find. They do not enter it normally, only warp in and out. And Gremlin made it practically untraceable through the internet, even when they connect to it from the inside. Trust me, Power Loader tried. Unlike everyone else I asked, because every computer expert I tried to shove this work to took a look at the security and instantly told me to forget about it." Nedzu sighs. "Unless we capture Kurogiri and make him cough up the base GPS coordinates, we can only hope for the League to mess up somehow. Or to catch them when they are outside of it."
"I'll continue narrating the new developments concerning the League." Detective announces in the resulting silence. "I believe that it bolstered its numbers with at least some of the Villain Academy interns, probably the best of the group, although we don't know their number or identities. The only exception is the kid that we managed to catch on a camera exiting what we believe to be headquarters of some remaining yakuza clan, probably returning from the negotiations."
The hologram displays a short recording from a CCTV camera. They recognize Legion in his All Might hoodie, and Kurogiri preparing the warp. The third person looks like a young kid, with messy black hair and a brown hoodie (that he pulls up after a second). He seems nervous, looking around while Legion is turning his head towards him (probably saying something).
"We are yet to identify him, since he isn't on the list of vanished villains, but…" Detective says but Sir Nighteye interrupts him.
"Asa Naoki." The hero says. "D-Rank, villain name Rabbit." He clicks his tongue. "One of my greatest mistakes."
"Oh?" Detective looks at the hero questioningly. "Would you like to tell us some details?"
"Sure." Sir Nighteye replies promptly, but it's clear that he isn't particularly comfortable with this. "Asa Naoki is a sixteen years old child from Kamisunagawa. Claims to have an analysis quirk, but is actually quirkless. His parents knew, and had mostly distanced themselves from him as a result. He was bullied in school due to his docile nature, small build and the suspicions of quirklessness. School didn't intervene, and Asa finally snapped."
"What did he do?" Nedzu is clearly interested. Eraserhead suspects that he knows why.
"He found a part time job, bought some surveillance equipment with the money he earned, and secretly placed it around his school." Nighteye replies. "He spent months gathering incriminating evidence for the school's tolerance towards bullying and a handful of other things, such as the principal's on-going affair with an underage student. When he had enough of it, he sneaked into the school again, uploaded everything he found to the internet from the principal's computer, before using copious amounts of gasoline and homemade explosives to destroy the school and the majority of evidence which could point towards him."
"Okay, that's actually quite awesome." Miruko really doesn't care about her words AND has a short temper for bullies. "But I assume that's not all?"
Nedzu is almost salivating at the tale. He loves well-planned operations that he personally agrees with on the moral basis. Even if they are technically villainous.
"With what remained from the school in chaos, he began to target the bullies." Sir Nighteye continues. "Not only his, but also those that he saw bullying others. His revenge methods range from uploading incriminating video-recordings, through unearthing various other publicly humiliating things, to destroying their family's prized vintage car with another makeshift bomb. All of that, I believe, he planned to do even before the mentioned destruction of school. He also attempted to destroy the home of his main bully with another bomb. Unfortunately, said bully returned home earlier and sustained some injuries." Sir Nighteye's face flinches. "Then I took the investigation over and, well, I screwed up."
Mirai Sasaki using words like that publicly is a sign of the situation being serious.
"I have managed to locate and gather evidence for Asa being the one responsible for it all." Sir continues. "However, if anything, I was impressed with the dedication AND his attempts to do the whole thing without spilling blood. My idea was to have him arrested, but provide him with a good lawyer that would picture the whole thing as a case of vigilantism caused by extreme bullying. When that would occur, I would step in, mention that him going to a juvie would only make situation worse, due to his acute insecurities and previous history and I'd call in the law allowing a hero to personally oversee the reeducation of a vigilante by placing them in the care of their hero agency. He certainly had the smarts and the talent to be a valuable member of mine. Because of that, I asked Smiley, the Rank 55 Hero who is known for being good at dealing with children, to arrest him and explain the situation. And this is where I messed up."
"What happened?" Nedzu asks, while Sir pauses for a few seconds to gather up his thoughts.
"Me and Smiley severely underestimated Asa's anxiety." Sir replies. "It's so bad that the kid is practically paranoid, and that's without mentioning at least a handful of other mental issues, such as depression and potential dissociative identity disorder. Only after the fact I got to read his notes and discovered how often he referred to himself as 'Rabbit' and began to speak of himself in third person. The point is, he didn't believe what Smiley told him at all. Worse, he had an acute panic attack on arrest, that made her search him less attentively to not worsen it further. And worst of all, he expected to be caught eventually and, due to his paranoia, was prepared for that option at any given moment. He managed to escape en route to the police station, despite being handcuffed, and in a police car with two policemen and a Rank 55 Hero."
Eraserhead stares at the hero in disbelief. He isn't the only one.
"He did WHAT?!" Mirko, as always, is the most expressive. "How did he do that?!"
"He expected to be handcuffed, so he personally sewed in lockpicks to the sleeves of his every long-sleeved piece of clothing." Sir Nighteye says. "He made it so that they weren't visible, but could be easily pulled out if you knew they were there. He used said lockpicks, and we aren't even sure how exactly, to unlock his handcuffs. When no one was looking, he pulled off two buttons from his shirt and mashed them together. They only looked to be actual buttons, and instead were made from some malleable materials that, when they were mashed together, began to produce lots of acrid smoke. He threw them in a hard to reach place in the car, forcing it to stop on a bridge. When Smiley pulled him out of it, she discovered that the high soles of his boots could be taken off. He hid a flashbang and a smoke grenade inside of them, both of them most likely homemade. He used the flashbang to escape Smiley's grip, and then escaped towards the edge of the bridge, only to detonate the smoke grenade. The pursuers thought that he was going to jump off it, but instead he used the cover to flee in a different direction, but not before throwing his shirt, which had some hidden weights inside it, off the rails. The sound of something heavy hitting the water and the smoke bought him enough time to escape off the bridge before Smiley and the policemen figured out that Asa didn't jump off." Sir sighs. "I was trying to locate him afterwards, but it appears that Kurogiri or Legion did it before me."
Eraserhead is still having problems understanding what he just heard. This went from the level of being an escape artist to the level of being an escape Leonardo da Vinci or something like that. He can't even have problems with Smiley for letting this kid escape, because he is lucid enough to admit that there was a fair chance that it would work with him.
"So extremely intelligent escape artist, capable of planning and executing almost perfectly a weeks if not months-long revenge plan on an entire institution." Detective summarizes. "That had enough foresight to train self-unlocking police handcuffs before starting his plan. And has probably located the nearest precinct and decided that if he gets arrested at home, he can use the bridge between them to escape. Hence the weights. Oh and master of creating makeshift explosives and who knows what else." He sighs. "I think we found a Command course student of the Villain Academy. And probably the Legion's new assistant."
"Oh look." Miruko says dryly. "The VILLAIN Academy is more tolerant towards quirkless students than 99% of hero schools in this country. Oh the fucking irony." Eraserhead is certain that rabbits aren't venomous. But a certain rabbit woman certainly is.
"Please, don't start that talk." Nedzu is just slightly hurt. "The UA has already announced the much-needed corrections to its policies concerning issues like that."
"Give yourself a #1 Hero School medal and nail it to your head with a fucking jackhammer." Miruko replies, with a rising anger. "Showing basic human fucking decency after years of doing nothing is apparently a praiseworthy achievement in this piece of shit country."
"Please, can we NOT fight?" All Might finally has enough. "We're supposed to be working together. Stopping PLF, finding a way to dismantle the League before it becomes the second version of All for One's empire, saving people. Anyone still remember those goals?"
Nedzu and Miruku relent. The day is saved. For the next twenty minutes.
"Be happy that you mentioned the recruitment bit." Knuckleduster announces. "Or I'd fucking punch you in the face for arresting a kid for doing the right thing."
Twenty seconds, Eraserhead corrects himself. It was just twenty seconds.
Sir Nighteye opens his mouth for some nasty retort. One that will probably including a rebuke of the very concept of vigilantism, bad enough to make Knuckleduster tell them all to fuck off and go home.
"Just… STOP." Eraserhead finds himself speaking before that happens. "We had less arguments and got more things done when we had a villain among us. Stop acting like you need one as a voice of reason among you, and let's get some things done instead of trying to murder each other with words."
He just wants to take a nap in peace, is it THAT hard? He had a hard day at school earlier. Most of his days at school are hard, especially now that his students are having issues with what happened at the Training Camp. He didn't lose anyone, a true miracle. Even Mineta by some unbelievable stretch of logic of the universe not only didn't get killed but also decided to stay in the school.
But the atmosphere in the class changed a lot afterwards. From happiness to cold determination.
"Eraserhead is correct." Nedzu takes advantage of the moment - he probably figured out how close they were to having the entire meeting skydive into some nasty place. "We should focus on the information exchange. If you want to continue learning more about the League of Villains, I can tell you all about my new findings about their members." He sighs slightly. "It's mostly the reason why I invited you all, but not Mr. Mikumo."
"You have something new?" Sir Nighteye asks. They share most of their data, but both of them have their own secret little investigations here and there.
"Actually, quite a lot of things." Nedzu replies. "Some might be enlightening, some might be shocking, some might be… interesting. So, do we do that first or do you want to plan the CRC raid before that?"
(***)
Hate me all you want, but I don't have any personal issues with Mineta (if you exclude the fact that his name apparently means a type of oral intercourse in my native language, oh the irony). Frankly speaking, he is like a slightly touchy Midnight who has the advantage of not being a teacher.
Frankly, if he was a girl doing the same thing he does in canon, he would get loads of fans. C'mon. Any fic that has him booted out of the school for that yet Midnight is apparently a'okay despite being the teacher that downright verbally molests minors in public is just embarassing, ngl.
No, I don't have any issues with him but I also don't really like him. That's all that you hear about him in this fic. Sheesh.