AN: So here we are, with a surprise update just before Christmas, and it's a long one too! Not much to say right now, other than that I hope you all have a safe and Merry Christmas and a Happy New Year.
Please leave a review if you fancy, I love to hear from people, and if you have any question feel free to PM me. I am part of a discord group with some other writers, so if you want to chat the details are on my bio.
Also if you have the time and the inclination, then please do check out the variety of other stories I have on my profile, who knows you might find one that is just about readable.
Disclaimer: I do not own My Hero Academia, but I am looking forward to the next season of the anime.
( - )
(Last Time)
Thirteen seeing this, quickly moved to intercept. "No! Students move away!"
"I think not," the villain rumbled in response to Thirteen. "For you see my duty here, is… to scatter and torture you all to death."
With that said the fog exploded outward and was suddenly covering everything and everyone, drawing them into a twisting void that threw off all sense of balance and turned the space around them into a black abyss.
Feeling this, Izuku did the only thing he could think of.
He went full Titan!
( - )
Chapter 11
( - )
(With Izuku)
After falling through the dark purple void, Izuku experienced a few odd moments of disorientation, before without warning he suddenly felt himself falling through the air and rapidly descending towards a large pool of water far below him. Within which, he could already see a half dozen or so poorly, and unfamiliarly, dressed villains waiting for him.
All of this, Izuku was able to take in within moments of falling through the portal, which was fortunate, because even as he fell he felt warmth and heat suddenly explode up from within him, his flesh already beginning to steam as he went full Titan.
Already he could feel several tonnes of flesh and muscle rapidly materialising and taking shape around him, even as an entire, colossal, skeletal structure formed at the same time beneath him.
Just where the biological mass and material needed to form the flesh, muscle and bone came from, he honestly had no idea. Then again nor did the researchers at Asphodel.
It was a mystery. Probably in the same way that other Quirks were, such as Iida's and the metal exhausts that seemed to naturally grow and form out of his calves, or Sero and the blocky tape dispensers he had for elbows, or even Tokoyami and his somehow sentient shadow monster thing.
Quirks, for all people pretended to know about them, were still a complete mystery.
In fact to him, Quirks were bullshit. They made no sense at all, and seemed to develop or take the form of anything and everything, and sometimes for no known reason at all.
He, Izuku, was a prime example of this. His dearly departed mother, he knew, had had a weak telekinetic Quirk that allowed her to summon and repel small objects. His bastard father meanwhile, may he rot in hell, had had the power to breathe fire.
Neither of the two were compatible from a genetic standpoint, unless they maybe came together to form a Quirk that allowed him to telekinetically control fire.
Either way, conventionally this should have meant that he would have either inherited one, or both, of his parent's Quirks, or some variation, or mix, of either the Quirks. That or he should have been Quirkless due to the weakness and incompatibility of both Quirks creating a genetic and evolutionary deadend.
According to Doctor Nakamura, one of these three things is what should have happened.
None of them did though.
What shouldn't have happened, but what actually did end up doing so, is him developing a completely alien Quirk to his genetic line, a 'mutation'. One that could have formed due to the stars suddenly aligning, and the dormant genes of his forebears coming together in a unique and almost impossibly rare way.
Maybe his great grandmother had a Gigantification Quirk, and his mother's second cousin twice removed had a regenerative healing Quirk, whilst his great uncle on his father's side had a hardening Quirk of some kind. All of which came together in him, in some kind of perfect genetic slurry, to form his Titan Quirk.
That, or it was completely random, which again would not be without precedent.
Once again, the scientists and researchers had many ideas, but had been unable to reach any overall consensus about just how his Quirk had formed, or even how it worked really. They just had theories, hyperthesis, and the undeniable fact that most Quirks were bullshit.
Letting loose a sudden roar, Izuku hit the water below, a massive wave of water and steam exploding out from him at his point of impact, the force of which forced both the anchored boat on the lake, and the aquatic villains waiting for him away.
Clenching his suddenly much larger hand into a fist, Izuku, now firmly merged into the neck of his Titan, allowed his consciousness to spread throughout his Titan form. With his nervous system becoming one with the Titan's, even as his senses linked up with the Titans' currently more muted senses.
Snapping his eyes open the moment the connection was made, Izuku let out another roar, another explosion of water and bubbles occuring, as this time he released the trapped air in his now colossal lungs.
"W-what the hell!" He heard one of the nearby villains shout, his voice already shaking and quavering, even as Izuku found his feet on the metallic bottom of the fake lake, and stood up to his full height. The water slewed off him easily as first his head emerged, his dark green locks lank, dripping wet and partially concealing his face, then his glowing green eyes, and then finally his oversized jaw.
"It's the T-T-Titan!" Another one of the villains shrieked, the voice sounding louder to Izuku now that the sound wasn't muted by the water.
Continuing to rise from the water, Izuku rolled his shoulders and clenched his hands into fists, his mouth shifting, cracking and moving as he loosened his joints and made sure his neural connection to his Titan form was solid.
When he had first started out in the labs he had had a few unfortunate instances where the connection had failed and he had found himself a very pissed off, fifty foot tall parapalegic. Which considering his Titan form heightens and amplifies his emotions, meant that he was less than cooperative when the scientists had surged in to try and help him.
Even now years later, Doctor Nakamura enjoyed teasing him about the time he threw the 'monster' of all hissy fits, and caused a localised earthquake.
Pulling his mind back to the present. It had probably been less than a minute since he had fallen through the portal, and, after rolling his neck one final time, Izuku finally brought his attention to the villains, all of whom he could see were squirming or shaking under his gaze.
"W-we surrender…" A villain with shark-like features, which was probably due to a fish mutant type Quirk thing, suddenly whimpered. The sharkman's cold, dead black eyes locked with his own glowing, murderous green eyes for a moment, before with another whimper he suddenly started treading water with just his legs, even as he raised his hands in the universal sign of surrender.
Hiding a smile at this display, Izuku, now head and shoulders above the now slightly bubbling water, turned to the other villains. His eyes flashing for a moment, as he then opened his mouth and let loose another half shriek, half bellow at the terrified group.
The force of his roar and the explosion of steam it released, actually causing waves to form, as it pushed all six villains back to the edge of the fake lake, with all of them practically catatonic at this point, their hands clasped firmly over their ears as they cowered at the sight of him.
They were, Izuku thought as he bent his legs and prepared to jump, actually kind of pathetic for villains.
The image of villains he had in his mind were bold, rebels and rulebreakers. People that abused their Quirks, both for personal benefit and to thumb their noses at the society that either tried to reject them, or tried to control them.
Sure it was a pretty romanticised view of villains, one that he had formed through reading books and comics, and through watching tv series and the news, after all, for all the hardship of his early life, he had actually lived a very sheltered life.
Very rarely had he been able to go beyond the boundaries of Asphodel, and when he had it had only been for tests that couldn't be done at the high tech medical facility/ juvenile reformation centre. In fact both himself, and his fellow patients/ inmates were the only real experience he had of rebellious/ nonconformist Quirk users.
That said, most of them were only nonconformists due to them either being mental unstable, or not being able to control their insanely powerful Quirks. That, or in the rare case becoming mentlly unstable, due to their insanely powerful Quirks, which caused them to be unable to control said Quirks.
Izuku honestly wasn't sure which category he fit into sometimes.
Shaking his head at this thought, Izuku instead leapt up into the air, his feet pushing off the metallic floor of the lake hard, even as the rest of him soared out of the water in a single powerful leap. His feet clearing the water by several dozen metres as he did so, before with a thunderous, and ground shaking boom he landed on the floor of the U.S.J. in what he liked to call a 'superhero landing', the concrete beneath his feet and fist shattering and cratering with the impact of his landing.
As he did this, he heard another slight 'eep' from the aquatic villains as they pressed themselves to the edge of the noticeably diminished fake lake, and looked at his colossal, and now steaming form in terror.
Grinning at this, Izuku prepared to stand up and head back to the main plaza so he could find out what was going on, and then help in any way he could. It was the kind of thing, a hero was expected to do..
Only before he could do this, he was distracted by a familiar voice calling up to him from the now half capsized boat on the lake.
"Midoriya! Ribbit!" Tsuyu Asui said, the odd frog girl that he hadn't really spoken to before. The girl's protuberant eyes fixed on him now, as she leapt up off the deck of the ship and landed in a crouched position on the ship's railing.
Turning to look at the frog girl at her call, Izuku gave her a nod.
Usually, were he in his human form, he would have tried to reply. Just what he would have said, he didn't know. Though somehow he suspected it would have been something suitably awkward, especially considering his interactions with the girl prior to this were effectively nonexistent.
Unfortunately however, or maybe fortunately in this case, whilst in his Titan form, such a thing wasn't possible. After all, he still hadn't mastered speech yet, in fact all he could do was roar and scream, and occasionally get out one syllable words like 'no' or 'yes'.
"You need to find out what happened to everyone. Ribbit." The girl said, one of her gloved hands raising and pointing in the vague direction of the plaza. "If we are here, then the others are probably spread out over the U.S.J. too, and if the villains were waiting for us here as well, then there were probably villains waiting for them too."
Izuku nodded at this.
It did make sense, the warping villain, Kurogiri, must have sent the rest of his fellow students away and all across the U.S.J.. Furthermore, Asui was most likely right when she said there had probably been villains waiting there for them too.
Just why that would be, however, was a bit of a mystery?
It could have been, he supposed, to keep them busy and distracted whilst the heavy hitters took out the teachers, after which they would then move on to the students.
That or it could have been so the weaker villains could defeat and incapacitate the students, and then use them as hostages or for ransom later on. In fact it was possible that that was one of the main aims of the attack, and not the asinine reason Kurogiri had stated about taking out All Might.
Izuku refused to believe that any halfway decent villain would break into a hero school to attack the Number One Hero, especially when said hero, if he had even been here, would have had the backup of fellow Pro Hero teachers, and a whole group of aspiring hero students. Surely no one was that stupid.
In fact, just off the top of his head, Izuku could think of a better plan to isolate All Might by just using normal civilian hostages and the simple threat that if anyone other than All Might tried to interfere the hostages would be killed.
No, there had to be more to this carefully planned and orchestrated attack then a shoddy attempted assassination of the Number One Hero.
With that thought in mind, Izuku stood up, towering over all those below him.
Instead of running off to the plaza however, Izuku instead turned back to the lake, and looked down at the suddenly nervous Asui for a moment, his gaze also taking in the quivering Aoyama at her side. The thin, armour clad, blonde boy was hiding behind one of the rails of the partially sunk ship, a scared expression on his usually smug and smirking face as he gripped onto the railing like his life depended on it.
The boy was either scared of the water, or there was something else bothering him, Izuku mused to himself as he looked down at the normally over theatrical and overly flamboyant hero in training for a moment.
The other teen unfortunately refused to meet his gaze, as he instead slammed his eyes shut and continued to shake and quiver.
"What are you doing Midoriya? Ribbit." Asui managed to get out, her face paling and her eyes bulging as she looked up at his towering, fifty foot form, even as he took a step closer so he was now at the edge of the lake.
The frog girl looked scared, Izuku noticed with a sinking feeling, and it didn't look like she was scared of the far more terrified looking villains.
Pushing that unsettling thought to the side for a moment, Izuku instead leant down and scooped up three of the villains from the water, in one of his giant hands. His fingers easily closing around their almost catatonic forms, even as several of their number either fainted or desperately tried to get away.
"Midoriya, what are you doing?! Don't hurt them!" Asui suddenly shouted, her eyes, if possible, widening even more.
Raising his other hand, Izuku raised a single finger in her direction to quiet her for a moment. By her silence he assumed it worked. After which he then looked at the frozen villains in his hands.
"WHY!?" Izuku roared, a cloud of scolding steam almost enveloping the villains, only for it to miss them as Izuku shifted them away for a moment, before bringing them back to face him, his other hand now gesturing around at the suddenly silent U.S.J..
Prior to his words, there had been the constant noise of fighting in the background. Now, for just a few moments, there was nothing.
"W-w-why?" The shark man, their apparent spokesperson tremoured out. Before his eyes suddenly bulged. "W-why are we here, why did we come?" He shakily asked, his flesh now ghostly white as opposed to the grey it had been previously.
Izuku nodded in response.
"T-t-to kill All Might. Or that is what the big boss said. We don't care a-about that t-though." The shark man quickly said, his fellow villains quickly nodding along. "W-we're just here b-because we're b-being paid!"
"I'm n-not M-mister T-titan. I-I'm here b-because he threatened me and m-my family." One of the shark man's fellow villains tagged in.
"Y-yeah that too." Shark man nodded, the other two villains in his fist nodding along frantically now too.
Narrowing his eyes at this, much to the trio's terror, Izuku then gave a curt nod and dropped them back into the lake.
They didn't seem to know anything. That or they were very good actors.
Growling to himself at this, Izuku then looked back down at the still scared Asui and Aoyama, and then pointed at the villains.
"W-we'll handle them. We will make sure they don't escape." Asui nodded, a hint of relief in her voice now.
Izuku nodded at that, and then thumped his chest with one of his hands and then gestured in the direction of the plaza.
From where he was standing he could fortunately still see several small figures fighting, clear evidence that Aizawa and Snipe were still standing and hadn't been taken down yet.
"Ok," Asui said, her voice now much calmer. "Good luck."
Izuku nodded at that, and then turned away, his gaze instead on the plaza.
He would have to trust his fellow students to handle themselves. It was a bitter pill to swallow, but the fact was that he couldn't spare the time to try and track them all down. Not when they were all probably scattered across the U.S.J., to do so would take too much time.
Furthemore it would also give the many villains clustered on the plaza the time they might need to defeat and kill Aizawa and Snipe. That or it might allow the ring leaders to escape.
Pushing back his discomfort, Izuku nodded as he decided on his course of action. Everyone on the hero course had earned their place here at U.A., they had training, and hopefully they would be together in groups and so would be able to help each other out.
In the end they needed to stand on their own two feet.
That said, Izuku mused as he started off walking, and then upped his speed to that of a run. If he arrived at the plaza, and Aizawa, Thirteen or Snipe told him to go out and find his fellow students, then that was what he should do. He would leave the decision up to the more experienced and more highly trained teachers.
( - )
(Previously with Aizawa)
Aizawa was struggling. His eyes were dry and were starting to ache, and his limbs were shaking from exertion. Between the two of them, both he and Snipe had managed to deal with most of the cannon fodder. The weak, low ranked villains, those that were more thugs than trained and dangerous threats.
They were the kind of mooks that were a dime a dozen, every city had them. They were the dregs of society, those that didn't want to settle down and get a real job, but who also weren't strong enough, brave enough, or skilled enough to make something of themselves in the criminal underworld.
Basically they were the ideal henchmen. The type of people that could do grunt work, and the jobs that any self respecting villain wouldn't want to do themselves. Furthermore, they were also career criminals, who were basically in and out of prison on a yearly, and sometimes monthly basis.
They were the type of criminals that never did anything bad enough to get any real hard time in prison. Instead, mostly they got sent down for petty theft, anti-social behaviour, breaking and entering, and occasionally bodily harm.
None of them were dangerous enough to be put into maximum, and nor were they risky enough to justify keeping them in the already overcrowded prison system for more than the minimum time the judge at their trial decided on.
Their very existence was a clear sign that the superhero society in which they lived was failing. That the personal responsibility that was preached, and the Quirk control laws that were enforced, were all ineffective. They were a sign, or at least in his opinion, that system and the laws that governed it were outdated and ineffectual.
Gritting his teeth at that thought, Aizawa's blistered hands clenched tightly around his specially made and reinforced wrappings, even as he swung another faceless, identity-less mook into another. His swift, practiced move sending both of them crashing to the floor, not that he bothered to give them more than a cursory glance to make sure they were down, as instead he locked his gaze on another incoming villain, erased his Quirk, and then punched him in the throat.
With a gasp and a choking sound, he collapsed to the floor, his hands already scrabbling at his throat.
Ignoring this, Aizawa instead landed a kick in the side of his head to take him out, even as he danced back and avoided a female villain with grasping, serrated metal fibres for hair, his eyes once again flashing as he erased her Quirk and made her hair go limp, only for him to dash in again and land a knee to her sternum, and at the same time slam his elbow into her nose.
He could feel the cartilage of her nose breaking beneath his elbow. More than that he could also hear her anguished cry, and the crunch of her nose.
It was sickening.
But still, with practiced ease he ignored his discomfort and instead hit the ground and rolled, his wrapping once more shooting out to ensnare three more villains. These three he merely held in place long enough for his partner, Snipe, to gun them down. The twin revolvers in his hand barking out several bullets. With the knees and elbows of the captured villains exploding into a fine bloody mist in response.
It was harsh, and would probably require several months of recovery. But they were nonlethal all the same. Snipe's aim, due to both his skill and his Quirk, were just that good. Furthermore it was also necessary, they couldn't just zip tie every criminal, as for one they didn't have enough zip ties, and for another they didn't have the time.
"Two more on your six, partner." Snipe drawled moments later, his guns once again spitting out bullets as he kneecapped another two villains that tried to rush their position.
"We can't keep this up." Aizawa replied, leaping back now, his back hitting the ground as he rolled and avoided a villain with bone claws. Only for him to then stop himself mid roll and lunge back at the startled clawed man, his feet making contact with the man's knees in a distinctly gritty and unpleasant way. Once again he had to wince at the man's howl of pain, and at the shattering, snapping sound that came from his kneecaps.
"True that." Snipe nodded, his arms extending to both sides as he spun, bullets exploding out of the barrels of his modified, semi-automatic revolvers, and scything down at least three more of the greatly reduced group villains, numbers.
Already Aziawa could see close to three dozen bodies littering the floor, all of them alive, even if they were bloodied, bruised, broken and in varying states of consciousness and pain.
To the casual observer, this is not what they would think hero work looked like. Instead what they were doing, it probably looked like a slaughter, something far more villainous than heroic.
Unfortunately though, this kind of thing happened all too often in a hero's line of work. They had to put the people, the vulnerable and their charges above all else. They had to make the necessary sacrifices, both self sacrifices and other kinds to ensure that the villains stayed down and out of the fight.
This was the kind of thing that the Hero Academy students didn't find out about until their Third Years, when they got more combat experience in their internships with the differing Hero Agencies.
Even those that didn't specialise in combat, like Thirteen, had to deal with blood, death and horror. It was an unavoidable, and intrinsic part of hero work. In a world where eighty percent of the population had powers, approximately eighty percent of the criminals also had powers too, and as any person knows, the villains, those desperate, or those willing to abuse their powers for their own selfish benefit, they always outnumbered both the heroes and the police.
Making it to his feet again, Aizawa leapt into the air and avoided a large globule of green acid one of the villains had spat at him, even as then twisted and dodged several bone spikes that were thrown his way.
"The students might be in danger, and I'm not sure about you, but I'm running on empty." Snipe pressed on, his hand coming round in a blur as he pistol whipped a villain that got too close, and then shot the acid spitter once in each hip, and then again in each knee.
"I am too, and the heavy hitters haven't even made a move yet." Aziawa replied, his eyes flicking over to where the pale, grey haired villain covered in pale hands, and the monstrously muscular one with dark skin, a beak and an exposed brain, were still standing, watching.
"WHY!"
A booming bellow suddenly exploded out. The sheer sound of the voice, and the visceral anger laden within that single word, caused all motion on the plaza to suddenly stop.
Only for many pairs of eyes to almost instinctively turn to where the sound originated.
Hazarding a glance over in that direction himself, Aizawa found himself unsurprised to see a giant figure with messy green hair and glowing green eyes.
Midoriya, Aizawa thought, his eyes narrowing at the sight of the wildcard, even as he both felt and heard a sudden wave of panic shifting through the still standing and conscious villains.
"Is that the Titan of Musutafu?" One of the villains asked dumbly, their eyes no longer on the two heroes in their midst, but instead on the hulking titanic figure in the distance.
"I thought they locked that monster up and threw away the key!" Another muttered nervously.
Glancing back at the ringleaders, Aizawa immediately took note of the fact that their attention- or at least the scrawny, grey haired man covered in hands, was also on Midoriya.
Seeing this, he leapt forward to take advantage of the situation.
With this being something, Snipe also did, as with barely a glance at Midoriya, the gun toting hero swung around and offloaded even more preternaturally accurate bullets at his now stationary targets.
With a chorus of screams and cries sounding out all around him, even as Aizawa closed the distance on the lead duo. His eyes wide open, as his red eyed gaze snapped from the shorter villain that was only just now bringing his attention back to the fight, and then to the much larger one with the exposed brain, that was still seemingly staring vacantly off into the distance.
"Nomu, kill." The grey haired teen managed to get out, his body lurching backwards as he attempted to fling himself back and away from Aizawa.
The bird, man, monster, thing, didn't reply, or even make a sound. Instead its eyes just rolled in its head, as it shifted its attention from the staircase behind Aizawa, to Aizawa himself.
"Shit." Aizawa cursed to himself, pushing off the floor and leaping sideways to avoid the monstrous villain's lunge, even as he thrust his wrappings out, the bindings shooting out and around the falling grey haired man's body, before with another tug and a twist of his wrists they tightened.
"I've got you, partner!" Snipe called out behind him, his guns once again raised as he looked up from the felled bodies all around him and instead at the monstrous villain.
"Nomu!" The hand covered villain shrieked as Aizawa leapt back again, yanking his wrappings this time and tugging the grey haired villain off of his feet and towards him, even as he turned his gaze away from the now incapcited grey hair and instead onto Nomu, so he could assist Snipe in taking the big one down too.
As he did so, he could feel his eyes beginning to throb now, a sure sign of over use. Not that that stopped him from erasing Nomu's Quirk, whatever it was, and just in time too as Snipe fired his guns moments later.
For just a single moment, it looked like everything was going right.
But that was only for that single moment.
In the next however, everything went to hell.
"Thirteen!" A high pitched, familiar voice, that of Mina Ashido, screamed from the top of the stairs.
At the same time as the scream sounded out, Snipe's bellow of pain and shock seemed to join it as the gun wielding pro was hit by Nomu. With the giant, dark skinned, Quirk erased brute, smashing into Snipe with the speed and force of a freight train, instead of going down under a hail of bullets like it was supposed to.
With it's massive muscular form knocking the Pro Hero off of his feet, even as it then lunged out, one of its hands lashing out to land a punishing punch to the now airborne Snipe's body. The force of the blow knocked him back with a sickening crunch and then into the staircase some dozen or so metres away, his body then flopping down the stairs, only to roll limply onto the floor some few moments later.
Snipe was down, possibly permanently.
By the sounds of it Thirteen was down too.
Though just what her situation was, he didn't know.
As for him…
"You should always keep your eyes on your opponent." The grey haired man's sibilant voice sounded out behind Aizawa, the disintegrating remains of his metallic wrappings falling down around the grey haired villain, even as he pushed himself to his feet.
Shit, Aizawa thought as he immediately leapt away, only for him to be caught mid leap by Nomu, the bird monster's face still twisted into the same creepy grin it had had ever since it arrived, even as it unleashed a brutal blow to his airborne body.
The force of the blow, Aizawa idly and somewhat hazily noticed as he felt his body hit the ground. It was enough to shatter his bones, and mulch his organs.
Letting out a gasp, as pain suddenly enveloped his broken body, the blood that sprayed out of his mouth, only seemed to lend credence to his initial analysis.
We need help, Aizawa thought to himself, his vision going dark as he stared up vacantly at the glass domed ceiling far overhead.
As the darkness began to take over his vision, the only thing he could do was hope that Thirteen had somehow managed to get the word out to U.A. before she fell.
( - )
(With Tomura Shigiraki)
Turning away from the crippled form of Eraserhead, Tomura Shigaraki's gaze trailed over the Pro Hero Snipe's equally unmoving form, before it then took in the fifty or so broken bodies of the cannon fodder and thugs he had brought with him today.
Things had not quite gone as planned, but he had adjusted.
For one Snipe was not supposed to be here, and instead All Might was. Still, such a thing was not a great game changer, the gun wielding Pro Hero, although formidable in some ways- the legions of felled minor villains was evidence enough of that, was in the end not much of a challenge to his Nomu.
Thinking of his pet, Tormua's gaze trailed over to the genetically enhanced, and Multi-Quirk wielding abomination.
Put quite frankly the broken creature creeped him out. It was too silent, too still. It's mind was shattered beyond all recognition, one would hardly be able to tell that it had once been human. Or at least it had been, before it had had multiple Quirks implanted into it, and massive surgeries involving genetic modification, and cybernetic enhancements.
Suffice to say, abomination was a good description for the beast.
Still, it was obedient and got the job done.
Tearing his gaze away from the motionless Nomu, Tomura instead looked to the other monstrosity heading his way.
The Titan of Musutafu.
Kurogiri, after his infiltration of U.A. had told him of the monster's presence at U.A., just as he had told him of the other students and staff he might have to deal with whilst his Nomu was killing All Might. It was why he had planned accordingly.
Have Kurogiri deal with Thirteen, and then scatter the students across the facility, preferably by dropping them from a great height so they would at least be injured or crippled enough, so that even the most useless of the henchmen he had hired or threatened into working for him could deal with them.
Just what said henchmen did with the students was immaterial; kill them, cripple them, rape them, eat them. He honestly didn't care so long as they kept them out of his way.
After that the plan was for his remaining grunts to occupy and preferably take out Eraserhead, whilst he and Nomu dealt with All Might.
As for when the Titan of Musutafu interfered, as he very much doubted that a being such as he could be dealt with by common NPCs, well he had contingency plans for that too.
He, with the help of his Sensei, had meticulously planned for this attack.
Hell, they had even planned for the possibility of All Might not being here, and by the sounds of it, with Thirteen being down, that plan would soon be in the works. That is, if it wasn't already.
Either way soon All Might would be alerted to his class being in trouble, which meant that soon enough he would be bursting into the facility gungho and ready to 'smite' the evildoers, just like Sensei said he would.
At which point Nomu, Kurogiri and himself would kill the Number One Hero.
It would be easy, especially considering the fact that his fellow Pro Heroes/ reinforcements were already down, and possibly dead. He honestly wasn't sure, then again neither did he care. That and there was the fact that All Might would also be distracted, what with so many of his students being scattered across the facility and in mortal peril.
It almost made him hard just thinking about the despair the Number One Hero would feel once he realised his situation.
"Tomura." Kurogiri said softly as he appeared next to him from one of his portals. "Thirteen, is dead, and one of the students has now escaped and is already taking word of the attack back to the school."
"Good." Tomura nodded, holding back a giggle as he looked to his aid. If there was one person he could rely on, it was his loyal supporter. After all, Kurogiri was sworn to carry his burdens.
"There is however the problem of the Titan." Kurogiri added, his glowing yellow eyes shifting to the oncoming Titan.
In the few minutes that had passed since his emergence, the seemingly not so mindless monster had already found its bearings and was heading right for them.
At the sight of the beast, a towering monolithic mass of muscle and fury, Tomura couldn't help but giggle at the irony of the Titan of Musutafu, one of the greatest calamities to have hit Japan in recent years, attending a Hero Academy. It was almost too funny.
"It's fine, we have our plan to deal with him. " Tomura replied softly, his fingers absentmindedly scratching his itchy neck. "We'll put him down quickly, so we have enough time to prepare for All Might, when that old cripple finally drags himself here to defend his 'beloved' students…"
"Remember Tomura, the Master wants him alive." Kurogiri replied, his glowing yellow eyes narrowing.
"He will be." Tomura replied, pushing down a bit of irritation he felt at Kurogiri talking back to him. He would forgive him for now, after all he was right. Sensei did want the Titan's Quirk. A smile spread across his face at that thought, even as he started to wonder just how powerful a Nomu the Titan of Musutafu would end up being once his mind had been broken and he had been implanted with several more Quirks. "Nomu, Kurogiri, deal with the Titan."
"It will be done." Kurogiri nodded, even as the Titan finally made it onto the plaza, steam billowing off its colossal form as its glow green eyes surveyed the carnage in front of it, before locking on to him.
Barely even paying attention to Kurogiri as he warped away, or to Nomu as the monster bolted past him, Tomura could only watch on gleefully as the Titan,upon seeing what he, Tomura, had wrought, threw back its head and let loose an almost deafening roar of rage.
"Time to turn on the boss music." Tomura giggled to himself. He could actually feel himself getting hard now at the boss fight he knew was about to begin. This was a floor boss, and he and his team were a raiding party. They just had to take the Titan down, and then they could deal with the final boss, All Might.
( - )
(With Izuku)
At the sight of Aizawa and Snipe's broken, bloodied bodies lying amidst the similarly battered and beaten bodies of dozens of villains, Izuku didn't know what to say or do. Instead his mind seemed to momentarily come to a halt for a moment, as he just tried to comprehend how his teachers, two well known and seasoned Pro Heroes, had been taken down.
Sure they had been outnumbered, but surely quality had to count over quantity.
Eraserhead and Snipe, they were supposed to be Pro Heroes, the best of the best. It was almost inconceivable to him the fact that they could be taken down by no name chumps like those that had attacked the U.S.J.. After all, the League of Villains, it was such a pretentious, presumptuous and stupid name, and one that he had never heard of before, meaning it was most likely a newly formed group.
Still, despite this they had been beaten, and by the looks of it quite convincingly too.
Mentally forcing his concerns over the current situation down, Izuku instead focussed on the three remaining villains in the plaza.
They looked strong.
In fact, he thought idly, they must be if they were the last three left standing. None of them had so much as a mark on them.
There was the one with scraggly grey hair and a costume that seemed to consist of a dark outfit, over the top of which multiple grey, dead looking hands could be seen gripping onto his arms, shoulders and face. The guy looked creepy as all hell. As for what his Quirk was, well his costume certainly didn't give anything about it away. Unless of course his Quirk was creating disembodied hands… which considering how bullshit some Quirks were, was a possibility.
Following on from him there was a hulking brute that looked to be nearly ten feet tall, with bulging muscles, a beak, shark like teeth and an exposed brain. This one, Izuku noticed, definitely looked strong. Though just what it was capable of he honestly didn't know.
The final one of the trio meanwhile was the shadowy and mysterious Kurogiri, the one he had met before, the one that had confronted Thirteen and had warped Izuku and his classmates away. He, Izuku, knew was strong. At the same time however, Izuku also knew Kurogiri's Quirk, or at least the broad strokes of it, which for the moment made him a known quantity.
Letting loose a roar of both anger and challenge, Izuku spared the rest of the plaza a single cursory glance, his gaze lingering momentarily on a slight bit of movement he could see at the edge of the plaza, over near a kiosk of some kind, before he turned back to the villains and charged.
Just what his plan was at this point, he honestly wasn't sure. All he knew was that he needed to take these three remaining villains out, or at least drive them off. After which he could focus on what really mattered; checking on his teachers and finding his classmates and making sure they were safe.
"Nomu, Kurogiri, deal with the Titan." The grey haired villain shrieked in a nasally voice, his pale hand pointing at Izuku as he charged at them, even as Kurogiri and the now named Nomu, rushed past the lead villain and towards him.
Gritting his teeth as the Nomu rushed forward to meet his charge, even as Kurogiri warped away somewhere, Izuku responded to the most immediate threat, the smaller being, in the most appropriate way he could think of.
The moment the rapidly moving Nomu got within range, Izuku lashed out with a brutal kick, his foot fully connecting with Nomu's torso, even as he followed through with his kick and punted Nomu away. With the dark skinned monster's body almost blurring, from the force with which it was hit, even as Izuku's foot began to steam as the skin and bone he had broken with the force of his kick rapidly healed.
It was almost comical in a way how easily Nomu had been dealt with, Izuku mused to himself as he pressed on, his glowing green eyes now on the grey haired villain, as he dismissed Nomu from his mind for a moment.
The massive blow Izuku received to his side moments later however, soon countered any amusement he might have been feeling, even as the sudden and vicious blow knocked him sideways and almost toppled him over.
'What!' Izuku thought to himself furiously, his head twisting as he shifted his legs to steady himself and to avoid falling to the ground.
'How is that possible?' He then thought, as he regained his balance and spotted what had hit him.
It was Nomu.
The big, beaked bastard had hit him in the side with enough force to break a couple of ribs. More than that however the monster had also managed to lodge its hands into his flesh, even as it started to rip into him with its beak, further damaging his already damaged ribs.
Holding back a snarl of anger as he felt muted pain thrum through his body, even as his wounds started to steam and rapidly heal. Izuku could feel that his amplified emotions were once again flaring up and threatening to take control.
But he wouldn't let them. Instead, mastering his anger, Izuku forcibly ripped Nomu off of him, accidentally tearing off a chunk of his own flesh as he did so, even as he then flung the beaked monstrosity to the ground, hard.
Only this time he kept eyes on the monster as he hit the ground, or rather as he was suddenly swallowed by a misty purple portal.
'Kurogiri!' Izuku snarled to himself, even as he felt another thunderous blow hit him in his back as another one of Kurogiri's portals opened up behind him and divested itself of Nomu, the Nomu that was still shooting through the air from the force of Izuku's own throw.
"GAHHH!" Izuku roared in anger, his legs buckling as the ten foot tall, however heavy, Nomu struck him once again, only this time it hit him in the small of the back.
Reaching behind him quickly, Izuku managed to get his hand around Nomu once again and rip him off his rapidly healing back. Steam once again issued forth from the wound, even as his Titan form began to heat up from the exertion. The air around him now shimmering from the sheer amount of scorching heat he was giving off.
It was enough that it should have started broiling Nomu alive, just from its proximity to Izuku's Titan form.
That wasn't the case though, as Izuku noticed once he wrapped his hand tightly around Nomu and brought him to his front, his green eyes locking on the miraculously uninjured and unbothered monster for a moment, before he lunged forward and slammed it as hard as he could into the already shattered and fractured stone plaza. Only this time he didn't throw him, or release him. After all, he didn't want the ever moving Kurogiri to pull another fast one on him.
This however, turned out to be a mistake.
As after slamming Nomu into the plaza, Izuku was soon knocked off balance by the lack of resistance he felt, as his hand and the Nomu that was clenched in it, seemed to just sink into the earth. Or rather it just sank into one of Kurogiri's portals, with the portal closing the moment his hand disappeared into it with barely a sound, even as it severed his hand cleanly from the wrist down.
Letting out another roar of anger, his head throbbing now as he continued to try and master his temper, Izuku stumbled back to his feet, the stump on his arm now steaming, even as it began to regenerate.
As for the Nomu, as he turned his head, Izuku could see that it had once again appeared behind him, dropping from Kurogiri's portal, with remnants of his hands disintegrating around it. With its feet touching the ground for all of a few moments, before it dashed right at him. Its movements were as fast as they were when the fight first just started.
Letting out another growl, Izuku twisted around to meet its charge this time, his still healing right hand shooting forwards as he thrust his suddenly shimmering blue, hardened hand into, and then through, the oncoming Nomu, the muscle clad bones of his still regenerating fingers impaling themselves through Nomu's body like spears. With his hand still steaming, as it continued to try and heal whilst impaling Nomu. With the sheer amount of heat it released whilst doing this, no doubt scorching the still silent monster from the inside out.
Releasing a breath of scolding steam, Izuku stood once more at his full height, the Nomu now securely gripped in his hands.
Or at least that is what he tried to do, as unfortunately the moment he stood up, he then almost immediately lost his balance as one of his feet sank into one of Kurogiri's portals, with the portal then rapidly closing and cutting off one of his legs from the knee down the moment he tried to balance himself and pull it free.
Roaring in both anger and moderate pain, Izuku instinctively threw both hands out to catch himself as he fell forwards, both hands, including the one holding Nomu cratering the ground beneath him. But only for a moment, before a portal took shape beneath Nomu and sucked him, and Izuku's now fully healed right hand into it.
'Not this time.' Izuku growled to himself as he used his hardening on his right hand, his arm from the elbow down shimmering blue as it became diamond hard.
It didn't help.
Instead once again Kurogiri's portal closed on his hand, cutting cleanly through his shimmering blue wrist, even as it once more released Nomu.
Snarling, Izuku pushed himself up and onto his skeletal and still healing leg, already he could see the tendrils of muscle and tendons wrapping around it as it once again became strong enough to hold his weight, especially once he used his hardening to reinforce the newly formed muscle and bone.
'Kurogiri.' Izuku snarled as he looked around and tried to find the warping villain.
He couldn't defeat Nomu with Kurogiri around and acting as support. Already their hit and run tactics were having an effect on him. After all, everytime he used his muscles or regenerated, more the regeneration, his body burned through energy, which in turn created heat. This heat, he was normally able to release in the form of steam through his pores and his mouth, which in turn meant he could keep going without cooking himself to death inside his Titan.
Unfortunately however there was only so much heat he could vent through steam, and already Izuku was reaching that threshold, and could feel the effects taking their toll on him. He was starting to overheat and dehydrate. It was the downside of his Quirk, it wasn't well suited to battles of attrition like this, or to hit and run tactics that forced him to constantly regenerate himself.
Twisting around, Izuku once again caught Nomu charging at him from the corner of his eye, and once again he responded by kicking him away. Only this time, as the flying Nomu was swallowed by a portal, he was ready as he hardened his elbow and then twisted and rammed backwards and into Nomu, even as it hurtled from a new portal that appeared directly behind him.
Once again, he could feel the impact of his blow. It was powerful, powerful enough that it should have shattered all the bones in even an enhanced human's body, and turned their organs into a mushy soup too. Only the Nomu seemed to almost easily shrug off the blows he laid upon it.
Turning once more, Izuku kept his gaze sharp as he saw another portal form and Nomu fly out of it once more, his body still propelled by the force of his previous blow.
Letting out another roar at this, Izuku lunged forward and caught the flying Nomu once more, both of his hands, now sheathed in shimmering blue, clenching around the monster. With one hand gripping its upper body, whilst the other grabbed onto its legs.
Solidifying his grip, Izuku then twisted his hands and pulled them apart with an almost sickening crunching, squelching sound. A shower of blood falling down to the ground around him now, as he then flung the upper part of Nomu's body one way, and the lower part off in the other direction.
Killing, it was not something he wanted to do. But he could see no other way out of this predicament. After all, everytime he knocked Nomu away he came back with the same force he was thrown, and everytime he tried to trap him Kurogiri created portals and lopped off Izuku's limbs until the monster was free.
As for Kurogiri, Izuku didn't even have the time to try and catch him with Nomu constantly nipping at his heels. That said, even if he did have the time, he wasn't entirely sure he even could physically catch the teleporter.
He was in a stalemate with the two villains. But it was not a stalemate he could win, not when he was already on the verge of having to drop his Titan form before he fainted.
"Haha brutal!" The grey haired villain shrieked with glee from where he was still standing, his hands clapping together delightedly. "But also altogether ineffective, not when my Nomu can regenerate just as well as you can Titan, thanks to one of its many Quirks. Then again you never really stood a chance, this Nomu was specifically designed to take out All Might, Titan. The same All Might that defeated you so long ago. Did you really think you could actually beat it?"
The man's voice was as petulant and whiny as it was nasal. It made him want to stamp on him. Especially considering what he was saying about how this creature was designed, not born. That it was a laboratory experiment.
Unfortunately he had no time to vent his frustration on the annoying grey haired villain that was sensibly staying out of the range, instead he had a newly regenerated Nomu to deal with. The monster in question now whole once more as it barrelled across the pitted and shattered floor of the plaza towards him.
Letting out a snarl, Izuku prepared to meet its charge. Once again he could feel his rage beginning to overtake his mind, his vision going red as his gaze locked onto his annoyingly resilient foe.
Only before he could, he was stopped by a wall of ice which shot across the plaza and smashed into the Nomu. The force of the ice knocked Nomu sideways. With the Nomu, instead of disappearing into a portal like usual, instead hitting the ground hard, its entire left side coated in a thick layer of ice.
"What!" The grey haired man shrieked, even as Todoroki emerged onto the plaza, more ice exploding from his hand and foot as he continued to coat Nomu in layers and layers of ice. A difficult task indeed considering the ice cover Nomu's proximity to the almost wall of heat Izuku was releasing with his mere presence. "Kurogiri!"
Twisting his head in surprise and confusion, Izuku tried to spot the ever moving, and ever shifting warp villain, only for his eyes to widen as he eventually found him. Only he wasn't alone, instead the misty villain was surrounded by his fellow Class 1A students, Ibara, Tokoyami and Kirishima, all of whom were using their Quirks to harry the warp villain, and to stop him from concentrating and using his portals.
"Midoriya!" Sato suddenly shouted, his yellow clad classmate running onto the plaza too, with Kodai running alongside beside him, a metal pole in her hands, which she then passed over to Sato, and which he then threw to Izuku.
'What?' Izuku thought to himself as he saw the tiny three foot metal pole spinning through the air towards him. What was he supposed to do with that, use it as a toothpick?
It was as he thought this however, that he saw Kodai place both of her hands together, even as the three foot pole suddenly rapidly increased in size, with it going from three feet in length to closer to thirty feet.
Nodding his head at this, Izuku grabbed the suddenly massive metal stave, even as Nomu finally broke out of Todoroki's ice and rushed towards him.
Seeing this, Izuku spun around to face him, the pole now held in both of his giant hands as he let out an almost deafening roar and hit Nomu in a move reminiscent of a pro golfer hitting a golf ball. With the weight of the pole, and force of the strike proving too much as it lifted Nomu clear off its feet and sent it hurtling away, and into, and then through, the glass dome overhead.
"Fore!" Kaminari shouted gleefully as he and several of their other classmates made it onto the plaza too now. All of them looked fine, if a bit battered, bloodied and bruised.
Whether they all coincidentally arrived at the same time, or whether some of them grouped up beforehand and came as one, Izuku didn't know. Nor in fact did he care at the moment, instead he was just glad that they had come, and that he had the back up he needed.
"No, no, no!" The grey haired villain snarled, leaping back to avoid a blast of ice from Todoroki as he did so, and a wave of green vines from Ibara, even as he ran towards the exhausted looking Kurogiri. With the warping villain no longer in the form of an ominous misty cloud, as he instead hunched over in a distinctly humanoid form. His metal collar scruffed and slightly damaged, and his smart waistcoat and shirt ripped to shreds.
"Stop him!" Yaoyorozu shouted as she too arrived on the scene, a bazooka-like implement in her hand, which she used to great effect as she aimed at the fleeing, hand-covered villain and launched a metal net at him.
In response to her shout, both Sato and Kirishima rushed for the villain, even as he used his Quirk to somehow reduce the metal net to dust.
Seeing all this, Izuku did the only thing he could at the moment. He dispersed his Titan form and collapsed to the ground, his face flushed red and his body steaming and bathed in sweat, even as he started to take in deep laboured breaths.
"Izuku." Kodai's soft voice rang out, as she ran over and came to a stop next to him, her face slightly smudged and dirty as she knelt beside him and started to awkwardly pat him on the back, clearly a bit wary of the steam that was still rolling off of him. "Are you okay?"
"Fine, just tired." Izuku rasped back, his face still red as he continued to take deep breaths, even as he looked up and saw that a number of his classmates had rushed to Snipe and Aizawa's side too, both of whom at least looked to still be breathing at least. With the rest of them pursuing the grey haired villain, or at least they tried to before he reached Kurogiri, drove off the nearby students, and then both managed to get away in one of the exhausted Kurogiri's portals.
The villains had escaped.
It was a bit of a kick in the teeth after all they had done.
Still, Izuku thought tiredly as he heard the doors to U.A. slam open and saw a smiling All Might arrive on the scene, Iida and a number of other battle ready teachers pouring in behind him. It could have been worse.
Looking around, he could see that most of his classmates were now here, and although they were battered and bruised, they were all still standing and alive. As for the rest he could see more of them, including the very noticeable Mina, rushing up to All Might's side at the top of the stairs.
The main two villains had escaped, but they were all alive and well.
Or at least he hoped they were.
So all things considered, this day should probably be counted as a victory.
( - )
AN: So what did you think, I hope you enjoyed it? That said I already suspect that some parts won't go over well with some, specifically Izuku not just curb stomping Nomu, Shigaraki and Kurogiri. To which I can just say, it is what it is. As much as I would have loved to write about him kick the crap out of all three of them, it just didn't work out that either in my mind or in my words. The thing with Shigaraki is, or at least in my opinion, is that he isn't stupid. He is annoying and whiny, hypocritical and just oh so punchable, and has a chip a mile wide on his shoulder, but he isn't an idiot. More than that he has good advisors, one in specific who would give the pretty standard advice that no plan survives the first impact. Furthermore he had the most dangerous resource of all, knowledge on who would be present, i.e. he knew Izuku would be there, and thus they planned accordingly to take him out, most likely at his Sensei's behest.
Either way this is just an example of how even the most OP seeming powers are not flawless. Izuku is pretty versatile but has weaknesses at the moment, the kind of weaknesses most have when they start off, the kind that you work to cover with improvements, tactics or new equipment. That and it is a learning experience. Plus I did enjoy the imagery of him just punting Nomu around, that was fun. That and I liked bringing 1A in to save the day, and not All Might and the teachers. Not that it was All Might's fault though, after all as was said last chapter, he was miles away at the Nighteye Hero Agency for some unknown, and impossible to predict reason...
Other than that, and my rambling aside. This chapter was pretty action packed, so I hope it hit the right notes. I'll admit I actually enjoyed writing Aizawa's cynical point of view more than I would have thought. It was actually quite refreshing, a nice contrast to how happy, clappy and positive a lot of the other heroes/ U.A. students tend to be. Not that they are all that way of course, it is part of what makes My Hero Academia such a good series, most of the characters, and I say most, are not 1 dimensional caricatures, most of them go through their own growth and journeys, short though they maybe considering they tend to be just side characters/ subplots.
Still, rambling aside, I hope you enjoyed the chapter and leave a review. Feel free to PM me or chat on Discord if you fancy.
I may try to update another one of my stories before the end of the year, but that is a big 'may', as it depends and time and inclination. My two greatest weaknesses.
Hope you all have a good Christmas and a Happy New Year, and thanks for all the support you've given this story so far.
Cheers
Greed720.