Perched on a rooftop at one in the morning with Anshin'in, who had so graciously abandoned supervising the Flask Plan to join "Kumagawa's Boring Adventure", even though she claimed she was "nerfed" due to "it being a different manga", he was beginning to think the vigilante life wasn't all it's cracked up to be.

The sympathetic media tended to portray them as dashing anti-heroes, who have a pure heart and a just cause who just go about their jobs the less-than-legal way. The antipathetic media, on the other hand, tended to portray them as loose cannon in-over-their-heads wannabes who were one bad day away from becoming rampaging villains.

The job mostly consisted of sitting on vantage points, if he was being honest.

SLAM.

He whipped around at the sudden noise…

「What the fuck, Carmilla?! We're on patrol! Don't scare me like that!」

Toga Himiko, vigilante Carmilla. "Hehe, sorry, I was just so excited to see your… surprisingly not-imaginary friend! Micchan has a friend!"

「Yes, it's a miracle! We must revel in it! What's your vigilante name again, my not-imaginary friend-san?」

Anshin'in groaned. "Not-Equal."

Carmilla pouted. "That's two words! Boooo! Pick a better one or I'll get stabby."

Anshin'in turned to Minus and looked him in the eyes. "Will she actually try to stab me over my vigilante name?"

He averted his gaze. 「I can neither confirm nor deny that inquiry.」

"I'd rather not deal with that right now." Anshin'in turned back to Carmilla. "I'm… Undefined?"

"Better! Way cuter. Easier to say! Welcome to the team. You are spared the blade… for now." Undefined mumbled something about syllables… he couldn't exactly tell.

「Carmilla, I already told you, we're not a team, we're partners. Mother doesn't count! She's just our gear dealer, you need three… people… oh. Oh no.」 Carmilla grinned.

"Oh yes! I finally get to bust out my super cute team name list I've been working on! Prepare your ears!"

"I don't like where this is going." Undefined whispered to him.

「Just indulge her. She's relatively harmless if we indulge her.」 Minus replied.

"The Watchmen!"

「Copyright.」

"Bleeding Blade!"

「Too hostile.」

"The League of Vigilantes!"

「Bland.」

"The Phantom Thieves!"

「I know you want to fuck the entire main cast of Persona 5, you've told me on multiple occasions. We haven't even stolen anything!」

"Not with that attitude! The Wildcards!"

「Implies that we'll go villain on a whim.」

"The Minus-Carmilla-Undefined Team! MCU!"

「I am not going to fuck with the mouse. The mouse will win.」

"Nedzu?"

「Mickey.」

"The Alleycats!"

「Not… okay, that's actually kind of cute. Not exactly what I'm looking for, but it's fine. Good work, Carmilla! We just need to workshop it a bit. Any ideas?」

"It's past your bedtimes."

「Not exactly a good name, more like a finishing catchphrase. Ooh! Eraserhead-san! You should pass that off to Midnight!」

Perched on the electrical box was The Insomnia Hero: Eraserhead. Wait, that's not his title? Damn. Seems more fitting, honestly.

"Do you honestly think she doesn't pull that one already, kid?" He looked to Minus's left. "Oh for the love of… they're multiplying… so, what's your name, third reckless child?"

"My name is Undefined'); DROP TABLE active_vigilantes;—"

"Very funny. I'll write down 'Undefined'. Pronouns?"

"She/her."

"Age?"

"3,402,193,822,311."

"Can't say I didn't try. I'll write 'Looks 15.' I'm contractually obligated to inform you that you are acting outside of the law, and that we, being the Hero Public Safety Commission, will make an effort to detain, arrest, and convict you for your extralegal actions if you step outside the parameters as set by us, being the Hero Public Safety Commission. In addition, we, being the Hero Public Safety Commission, will not make an effort to interfere with your capture, as we, being the Hero Public Safety Commission, trust the Professional Heroes in our, being the Hero Public Safety Commission, employ to make the correct judgement calls on the field to deal with extralegal operators. Finally, we, being the Hero Public Safety Commission, void all legal and financial responsibility for damages incurred in an event where an extralegal operator chooses to interfere. If you fail to acknowledge these terms, we, being the Hero Public Safety Commission, will choose to interpret this failure to negotiate with the extralegal operator as a declaration of criminal intent, and will act accordingly. Do you acknowledge these terms?" Eraserhead said, as if reading off a script.

"TL;DR?" Undefined said, knowing that she had eidetic memory and being a prick anyways.

"Be a good, compliant little criminal who pays for our massive collateral bill and we may or may not ship you off to Tartarus!" Carmilla chimed in. Minus and Carmilla had gotten this talk before. They hated it, Eraserhead hated it, he just happened to like not getting fined more.

"Ah. I accept, then. You'd need something of Minus-kun's to truly detain me, anyways, and he's long relinquished it to me. No takebacks."

「Not even if I say 'pretty please?'」 Minus chimed in with an insincere plea.

"Oh, please. Like you'd ever willingly trade that back for it. You got the better deal out of it, anyways. If you seriously came back asking for it back, I might have to knock some sense into you."

"I'm just going to write down, 'terms acknowledged', because I refuse to believe a fifteen year-old schoolgirl is the Symbol of Evil."

What was currently the make-up of what was so far just called "The Alleycats" stared at the underground hero in confusion.

"If you don't know, you don't need to know." Eraserhead shrugged. This is why he was a terrible informant, he always did this. Big believer in keeping operations away from the children, the bastard.

"Anyways, I've said my contractually-obligated spiel, and gotten my contractually-obligated information. Minus and Carmilla have already gotten the talk, but I'm morally obligated to give it again." He tossed a rectangular item at Undefined, which she caught easily. "This is a pager. If you ever feel that your life is in danger, even if the source of that danger is a professional hero, or, god forbid, you come within fifty meters of Endeavor, press the button." Undefined inspected the object, noticing the rectangular button that required a conscious amount of force to activate. "It sends out a signal to every vigilante-sympathetic hero, well, that I know of, within a two kilometer radius, with an alert, your alias, and your estimated coordinates. I assure you, these heroes will not attempt to arrest you or unmask you, unless you go villain. Stay safe out there. I have a patrol to get back to. Don't try asking Giran about the information I leaked, he'll say the same thing as me." Eraserhead started to leave, but Minus had one last question for him before he continued his patrol.

「WAIT, ERASERHEAD-SAN!」

"… yes, kid? What asinine bullshit do you have in store for me today?"

Minus grinned. 「In a battle of the rodents, who would win? Mickey Mouse or Nedzu? Round one assuming the cartoon mouse, round two assuming the company.」

"Nedzu. Both rounds." He said, far too quickly to be of any comfort. "Trust me kid, you'd live a fuller life not knowing why."

The underground hero skulked away into the shadows of the night. The Alleycats (working title) had an information broker to bother.

"Sorry kids, if you don't know, you don't need to know." Dammit, Eraserhead was right. "I've still got too much of a conscience to be luring overeager children into the Boogeyman's grasp. Check back tomorrow." He said, knowing that his opinion wouldn't change on this topic, just wanting easy money.

The chain-smoker grinned, one of his front teeth on the top missing. "Got anything else to ask me? I may or may not have new information on the drug trade, if you ask nicely enough." Ask nicely enough was code for cough up, buckaroo, in Giran-speak.

He looked at their resident non-human with pleading eyes.

Undefined scoffed. "Hey, when the economy collapses, don't blame me." She used a combination of skills to generate 500,000 yen worth in perfectly replicated notes in her pocket, and proceeded to make a show of pulling it out and putting it on the table.

Giran thumbed through the notes. "You know what, I'm not even gonna ask what that one's 'bout." Apparently satisfied, he grinned. "Alright, so, trigger trade. Ever since the Villain Factory went kaboom, there's been a huge power vacuum, right? Allegedly, a yakuza group is making plays the spot. The Shie Hassaikai. Recent coup d'etat, you know? Internal overthrow. New boss is an upstart villain named Overhaul. Wears a plague doctor mask. Whatever you do, do not let him touch you. His quirk is an insta-gib. Game over, man. God, I need to stop hanging around that bar… Well, that's all I know. Check back tomorrow, and I might have more for you."

Satisfied, the Alleycats (working title), retired for the night.

「Remind me again why we can't just have you transfer to Aldera?」 The joint apartment of one Kumagawa Misogi, one Toga Himiko, and now, one Ajimu Najimi, was quite lively for the current time. It helped that one was an insomniac, one was nocturnal, and one didn't require sleep.

"Because I'm wanted for attempted murder, Micchan!" Himi explained to him. Ah, right, that.

"Excuse me?" Oh right. Anshin'in was somewhat depowered here, for reasons that truly only made sense to her. She couldn't just… know things instantly anymore, if he had to describe it. Other things were different, too, but that's not important right now.

「Don't worry, Anshin'in! If anything, her parents should be arrested, they practically starved her to quirk-driven insanity. But they're rich, so there's not much we can do about it!」 He said, trying to move away from the topic. He hated unearthing Himi's trauma, especially accidentally.

He peeked into the alleyway off the unfamiliar street in the unfamiliar Japan, cacophonous sobbing echoing out.

A girl his age in a sailor uniform, covered in blood, with unkempt blond buns and fangs driving into the bottom of her lips, piercing the skin, huddled over herself in tears clutching a bloodied box cutter like it was the last reminder she had of her own sanity.

"Saito… I'm sorry… I'm sorry… I'm so sorry…"

"I was just… so hungry… forgive me…"

"Fucking pieces of shit bastards deserve to rot in Tartarus, die in Tartarus, and suffer for all eternity in Tartarus."

Anshin'in looked at him funny, so did Himi.

Ah, he said that part out loud. Also dropped his brackets. And mask of insincerity. A hateful sneer had overtaken his face.

He took a deep breath. And it was all back to normal.

「Sorry. They really hurt Himi, and Himi's like… a sister to me, at this point. I don't know if I could compose myself if I saw them in person. I might go full GER death loop on them, you know? Manually.」

"No problem." She said, ignoring his barely masked bloodlust. "So, when are you bringing over Answer-kun?"

「Sorry, he's busy over break.」 He wasn't, but he looked too much like Saito. Misogi couldn't do that to Himi. She'd collapse in on herself if she wasn't prepared. 「You'll have to see him when you transfer in! You're going with Alibi Block as your quirk, right? Did you remember to put yourself in the system?」

"Like I needed more than a stray thought to do that. Of course I did. Who do you think I am?"

「Just checking. You know, I'm jealous! You can pass off your twelve quadrillion skills as any quirk you want! Meanwhile, I've only got two, so I had to pass myself as quirkless for plausible deniability!」

"Am I supposed to believe you couldn't plausibly separate All Fiction and your screws? No matter how much you pathetically beg me, I refuse to give you Book Maker back. You're just a smidge more interesting when you have All Fiction on you. Still within the margin of error, but a bit less predictable." She confessed.

"Are you two talking about Abnormalities? Sorry, I know about Micchan's Minus, but it's still hard to follow! We just have quirks around here, not the weird conceptual stuff. I mean, we do have the weird conceptual stuff! But it's really rare!" Himi complained.

"She's already briefed on Abnormalities? Good, that makes this next part infinitely easier. Toga-"

"Call me Himi-chan or I'll get stabby!"

"Himiko" Anshin'in said, sparing her dignity as Himi pouted. "has a latent Minus."

A/N: Two chapter drop! Used to be one chapter, but it got a bit long. Here, we introduce Himiko, now vigilante Carmilla.