Death

by tmb1112

Death is a Quirk that can only kill. A perfect Quirk for a villain, but what if the boy who manifested that power just wanted to be a hero? Enrolling in U.A. might not be enough when all your Quirk can do is kill people. Follow Zach Sazaki from his first day in Class A on a story that spans years, as he learns to be a hero, finds out more about his Quirk, and too much to summarize!

223. Chapter 223

Disclaimer: I don't own Boku no Hero Academia

Chapter 223:

14 Months Ago

Nnc nnc nnc bts-n-ktsn-bts-n-ktsn-btsn…

"I don't get why I'm out here," Kobayashi Airi hissed, her voice impossible to hear to people even a few feet away from her because of the high volume of the night club she was in. Darling had her sweatshirt tied around her waist as she could not leave it at coat-check when there was the chance she would have to rush out of there in an instant. Her t-shirt was tied up in a knot in the back too to reveal part of her midriff. The club was sweltering hot though despite it being the middle of winter, and the heaters mixed with the breathing of hundreds of people on this dance floor alone was making it too stuffy for the seventeen year old girl who got in with a fake i.d.

"I'm small too. If D can fit through the vents then so can I," Darling smiled and looked drunk as a couple guys checked her out. She disappeared into the crowd and continued in frustration, "These teams are so messed up."

"No one's happy about it," La Brava grumbled back, while crawling through the air vent stuck staring at Death's butt. "Gentle, how are things out there?"

"I am enjoying myself," Gentle replied.

"Really?" Zach wondered, while he continued crawling through the vents slow enough to ensure he did not make much noise. The vents went through the walls of outer hallways and over them at times. It was a twisting and winding system that he had a map of that he held in his right hand. He stopped again and panted for a few seconds, before glancing back down at the map that Rebel had procured for them and then starting his crawl again. "I wouldn't, have figured this, as your kind of scene."

"Is it hard to breathe in there?" Darling asked concernedly.

"He's exhausted," La Brava growled back at the girl who every time she spoke, filled her headset with the blasting music in the background that Rebel did not isolate well enough in the moment. Zach turned his head to the side and looked behind him at the short figure who snapped, "Keep moving."

"Shh, my dear," Gentle eased La Brava's mind. He could hear the claustrophobic atmosphere of the vent getting to his partner, and he replied to Zach's question in a tone more cordial while the vent team continued moving. "And this may not be 'my kind' of scene, but I am savoring the taste of a rather expensive brandy. Listening to quite a strange rendition of The Dancer Man that seems to have replaced the chorus' original tune with one played on, a flute. Hm."

"Brandy?" Rebel wondered, snacking on a bag of chips while watching the security cameras with Cherasaw sitting behind him on his right. He chomped into another potato chip and spoke with his mouth full, "Would have thought you a scotch man."

"Well as much as I'd like to continue this conversation," Gentle did not respond to Rebel. Zach grit his teeth and shimmied faster through the vents while keeping as silent as he could, though he was also listening to the muffled flute and bass making it even into their vent though at a decreased volume. Gentle continued and reaffirmed to Zach with more than just his tone that he needed to speed up, "Someone's watching me. It seems the fake bouncers at the 'VIP' entrance are not the only club employees in here."

"What does that mean?" Cherasaw leaned forward and Rebel scooted his chair forward with his eyes darting around the screens. His fingers started typing fast, and images on the nightclub's cameras zoomed in one after another quickly. Faces were zoomed in on and identified, facial recognition picking up dozens as Rebel just started.

"Have you been made?" Darling wondered. As she asked it, she noticed someone too far away checking her out when there were far too many people between for that person to suddenly gain interest in her. "Probably because we're talking to ourselves," Darling said, and then she continued moving her mouth as if singing the words to the song, which unfortunately stopped having lyrics a second later so she could not continue with that ruse.

"We're almost at the point in the vent system map that doesn't match up with the building's blueprints," Zach replied. "I need you to make a distraction. If eyes are on you then use it. You can't just slip away or it will be obvious that you were involved."

Gentle put his drink down on a table after quickly sipping the last of it from his plastic cup. He walked down a couple steps with an odd rhythmic walking pattern he never used before. Tobita hit the bottom step and slid forward away from it, then he rose his hands and shimmied forward onto the dance floor. "The eyes on me shifted away. I may have looked suspicious, but it does not seem that she is on to me."

"My guy might just think I'm too young, but he's starting to follow me around," Darling added.

"I see you. Coming up on your right," Gentle informed her.

"I'm going to break loose," Darling said, smirking while faced away from the guy who was about to be surprised by how wild she was going to get. Her right hand started moving as she was turning, and then she felt a firm grasp around her wrist and she turned to see a taller and older man standing at her side. Her eyebrows rose up at the look on his face that was intrigued by her. "What?" She asked the white-haired man who had changed his facial hair's usual pattern for this with some argument. His white goatee wrapped around his mouth, and he had on a pair of plastic glasses with lines through the middle of the empty lenses. Darling had on tinted orange sunglasses that were stylistic while her blonde hair was tied back in a ponytail. The two of them were dressed like the other people in the club, though Gentle's outfit was intended to make him look younger while Darling's made her look a few years older.

"Not everything must be so violent," Gentle told the girl he grabbed by the wrist. "Follow my lead, if you could?"

"Listen to him, Darling," Zach ordered.

"Wait a second," La Brava muttered, pausing her crawling for a second.

"Rrrgg," Darling could not hold back the growl in the back of her throat as Gentle's left hand went down to the small of her back while he took her hand in his right. "It should be Zach dancing with me," Darling said to the man in front of her.

"Oh sorry, did you not want that on the open line?" Rebel wondered after already transmitting it. He was not actually sorry, which was obvious from his tone and from the big grin across his face that Cherasaw could see.

"Popcorn?" Cherasaw wondered, and Rebel spun his head and smirked with a quick nod. Cherasaw laughed and headed over to their pantry of snacks to grab some popcorn for them.

"This isn't the time for games," Death started.

"Why is Gentle dancing with Darling?!" La Brava hissed. She and Zach were wearing armor, but all she could think about now was being in a cute outfit out there dancing to a slow song with Gentle. "You better not be grinding."

"Ew-" Darling started to reply.

"Focus," Zach growled. He saw the vent grate up ahead at his destination. "Here we go."

"We are not grinding by the way," Gentle mentioned. "And this is not making my time here more enjoyable. It is however letting us blend in a little better, which will make it easier in just a minute depending on what the conclusion is."

"Still going to need that distraction," Zach whispered. He leaned his head over the grate and looked down into a dimly lit room that was not on the blueprints. The prints for the building showed that it was thinner than it was in reality, eighteen meters smaller exactly from the real back wall to where the back wall was recorded to be. Zach glared down into a room that had shelves around the walls, a desk in the middle of the room, but no one around inside it. He stared down through green night vision into the dark room and Rebel rose his eyebrows in confusion from command as he shared the HUD that Zach was looking at. The head's-up-display Rebel was looking at was under his control though, and he zoomed in on things that Zach stared at and confirmed them into the younger man's ear.

"Where are they?" La Brava whispered. "You'd figure someone would be down there."

"Could just be a storage room, that's sometimes used as an office," Zach muttered. "A lot of contraband in here."

"Confirmed then?" Darling wondered.

Gentle looked to Darling's free hand that he had not been able to grab as they danced with the fronts of their bodies up close to one another. Darling took the hint and took her drink to her lips and quickly slurped the rest up. It was the first drink of the night that she had been pretending to drink most times she had sipped it so far other than when she thought someone might be watching. Gentle smiled at her and asked with a laugh, "Could you go make us our distraction, young lady?"

Darling held back from grinding her teeth at the smirk he gave her when acting so smug in knowledge that she could not snap off right now while they were acting. Gentle turned and headed off to get her a drink, as he had been pretending to offer to get her another drink when he asked what he really did. Darling waited for him to turn around before making her disgusted look and then glanced around as if looking for a way to slip away from the older guy she had been dancing with who she had already shown hesitation towards. The awkward teenage girl in a club full of older people grinding on each other and getting blackout drunk vanished into the crowd, into a hallway, up a stairwell, and onto the first level of the club only down the stairs from the front door rather than farther below on the somehow wider second level down that had been built too far that it exceeded building codes it once got permits for.

Zach slid the vent grate aside and then slipped out of the vent himself. He did a flip and landed on the desk that was not as far down so his landing would make less of a noise. He held up his hands, and La Brava grimaced but dropped down without a complaint into Zach's arms. She gasped as her fall jolted short with barely any give on Zach's arms that did not need to lower in order to catch her. The muscular boy who caught her lowered her down softly and placed her on the desk next to him. Then he turned his head and stared around the room before dropping down onto the floor and pausing again to see if any security measures would go off.

"They're not that good," La Brava whispered while dropping down next to him less lightly. She walked up to a shelf on the wall and smirked in her helmet at all that was left out so sloppily. "These buffoons got away with too much that they shouldn't have."

"Not everyone is as amazing as the Gentle Criminal," Danjuro Tobita said, while looking towards the double doors to a hallway that should not exist and were guarded by bouncers. One of them was a dark-skinned man with two horns sticking out of his nose, a longer one at the point and a slightly smaller one above that on the bridge. He had a clipboard in hand with a list on it. The other man was lighter skinned and did not have a mutant-type Quirk, though he was bigger than his colleague by a few inches tall and a few more inches broad. "Hold on," Gentle said.

"What?" Darling snapped, as she froze and then kept walking right past the fire alarm instead of pulling it.

"Someone's walking into the 'VIP' section. I don't recognize the target, but the guards are each looking more focused and respectful. Trying to prove something it seems," Gentle commented while staring carefully towards them, making sure not to make it obvious that he was looking as he stood at one of the bars behind a line of people too thick for him to easily get in for a new drink. "Must be someone of importance."

"If the alarm goes off alone the heroes won't bust in," Zach said while looking at La Brava who stared to the only door in their small office space in an anxious way.

"What are we doing?" La Brava asked him, keeping her voice calm but failing at hiding the urgency in it. "We need to be careful here. If our presence is-"

"I know," Zach assured her. "Alright. Do it."

"They'll be-"

"If he's important, then the two guards keeping you from those doors will stay with him in a sudden emergency. We did not hit a speed bump, but an opportunity. Darling, now."

Darling smirked and she walked too close to the wall. She looked wobbly on her feet but no more so than the others in there. She moved slowly and only reached the fire alarm when the hall was too packed at that moment of people walking both directions that she was shifted too close to the wall. Her back went up against the wall, and out of the top of her dress where the curve of the fabric went down, the slouched girl's upper back opened up and the bone at the top of her spine pierced through the glass while also pulling in half and curving. Darling slid down more, wincing at the feeling in her spine though she was sure not to leave blood as her skin had become thin like paper before being pierced.

BoooOOOOOP BoooOOOOOP…

The music cut off and everyone looked around in confusion. "Don't pop smoke Darling," Zach reminded the girl upstairs. "Do what you can to keep calm, not panic," he told her.

Gentle rolled his eyes while looking around like everyone else in apparent confusion. His eyes shifted back to those double doors but the glass windows on each of them were tinted so he could not see the reaction of the man who had just walked through. The doors opened back up though and he had to hum in an impressed way as the two men there listened to whatever the guy in the white suit just shouted at them. The two rushed forward and started calling at everyone to stay calm and make sure they evacuate calmly. Last thing we need is a stampede in the middle of a club of over a thousand people.

"He's heading back your way quickly," Gentle said suddenly. "Alone." Although the important figure had sent his goons out to keep the club's reputation from taking a dive in case of an injury because of the fire, he was heading back in looking worried all of a sudden. "Might suspect something is up."

"Everyone's staying calm. They're more annoyed than anything. Lot of drunk people complaining, but they're getting ushered out," Darling said. "Looks like I'll have to go too," she added, her final words as someone came towards her telling her how she needed to go. Damn it. Waited too long. The crowd had thinned out too much that she could not slip away without making it obvious to this employee watching her that she was no average girl.

"That is fine," Gentle assured her. "You watch the front door. Perhaps pop a smoke into a grate outside when things begin to get dicy in here."

"You don't give-"

"He's right Darling," Zach countered her quickly, while prying open another locked drawer of the desk and looking through the files inside. "The crowd will have thinned already, but you need to watch the front door and with too many people around you won't be able to keep anyone from escaping. Gentle, you have the doors-"

"I'm watching them."

"Sir, you need to go," the bartender behind him mentioned. The man younger than Gentle by a couple years had come around the side of the bar and was grabbing some tips that he had not gathered up yet.

Gentle calmly turned his head to the man wearing his uniformed black vest over a tank top, and he grinned at the man in a menacing way. He pulled out a carton of cigarettes while leaning back on the stool he took a seat at once people had left the area in a hurry. The alarm continued going off above them and instead of strobe lights, there was now just a red blinking light coming from a few different places on the floor. "I believe someone was just smoking inside and set the alarm off by accident. I am sure everyone will return shortly, when the misunderstanding is cleared up." He spoke the language with a thick accident that got thicker as he tried to hide it less and less through his statement.

He lit up his cigarette and turned to the bartender who started getting an annoyed look on his face at the attitude of this guy he was about to get banned from the club. Gentle pulled in a thick drag and then blew it out at the bartender's face, "Or perhaps I will go into the back and wait with the other VIPs until everything has cleared? Make sure they know how kind Alfonso was to me."

The bartender gulped and then started coughing on the cigarette smoke as he breathed in too quickly to apologize. "You should find your way out," Gentle suggested to the coughing man who started nodding his head and hurrying away at how ominous this figure was in front of him that he had no doubt would be one of the "VIP"s that he always saw heading into the back. Gentle lifted the left corner of his lips feeling satisfied as he watched this bartender head away, Clearly not involved. Or perhaps a good actor, who knows that I am not truly involved here but knows who I might be. "Hm," Gentle took another drag of his cigarette then leaned back against the counter and put his elbows down on either side of him. "Ugh, sticky."

The rest of the staff had rushed out of the room. A few bouncers who were getting everyone to leave looked over though, including the two men who had been at the doors before and just searched the rest of the floor thoroughly to make sure everyone had left. They got back in and watched as the bartenders from different bars on the floor all headed away together, one of them murmuring to the others who all sped up away. Two other bouncers from upstairs as well as three people dressed in club attire all looked towards the man leaning back on a bar with his elbows to his sides and a cigarette in his mouth that he took another puff of before spitting it out.

The cigarette flipped and flipped as it arced from the bar across the standing gap between the bar and a railing, then dropped down onto the dance floor where it bounced with embers flicking off of it. Gentle released a puff of smoke in front of his face and calmly leaned forward in his seat to put his hands together underneath his chin while staring ahead at these men and women all looking back at him confusedly. None of them said a word to him about leaving with all the other patrons, as it was clear that he was no normal man...

"You seeing this?" La Brava whispered next to her, lifting her helmet for a second before looking back down at the ledger that Zach had opened with pages and pages of illegal transactions keeping their money flow and laundering processes recorded.

Just inside a locked room in a locked drawer, Zach frowned. But also in a part of a building that isn't supposed to exist. It wasn't too hard for us though. Is this actually easy, or are we just getting too good at this?

"Let's get ready," Zach said, lifting the ledger and sliding it into a black bag on his back that he had to pull open at the top before tightening again once he had secured the evidence he needed not to leave anywhere it could be destroyed. The two of them looked to the door where they suspected their enemy was coming to check on what they had just seen, as it was clearly the most damning thing in-

Creaak

Zach and La Brava turned their heads the other way. They stared at a shelf covered in bricks of cocaine that just started sliding backwards and to the side to go behind another part of the wall. Over the whole body. No touch! Zach's closed eyes snapped open red, and he covered his hands in Death that spread up his arms and wrapped around his whole body quickly. Getting more and more natural each time, he moved into a corner it would be hardest to see him from the secret passage that just opened up.

La Brava just crouched and moved to the side of the desk that it was easy for her to hide her small body completely behind. "Hey, you hear that?" She heard a woman's voice wonder.

At least two people, Zach thought.

They can't hear the alarm from in there? Wait a second, the building doesn't go any farther back than this- it can't! The basement of a warehouse across the street goes this deep. It can't go any farther- it goes deeper down! La Brava realized.

If they were hiding this stuff in plain sight, Zach started to himself. Or is this just a fake room, in case they're caught for some illegal activity?! Shit! I wouldn't have even thought twice about it, and I would have missed so much! That guy coming back here would have revealed it. I could have made him. Maybe… if I knew what to ask.

"We can't have them on both sides of us," La Brava whispered.

Zach shot out of the shadows and slammed his right hand into the side of the woman's face as she stepped one foot through the secret passage in the wall. The man behind her was the only other person coming up the torch-lit stairwell that spiraled down steeply under the wall. He was mid reply and the rest of the air in his lungs shot out of his chest in shock at the sight of the figure in front of him. "Death," he gasped, right before Zach's right heel swung up and nailed him in the side of the skull, sending his head slamming into the wall on his side. He crumpled to the ground while Zach released the woman he grabbed, then he shot back to the single real door in the room as he heard a keypad beeping on the other side of it.

The door opened inwards and the man who rushed in reached for the light switches, though his eyes were dragging over towards a section of the wall to his right that seemed like it was opened already for some reason. His jaw dropped at the flash of black rushing towards him, and he tried to pull away while opening his mouth more to scream. Zach's hands lost the darkness on them as he punched them out of his own veil, thickening the veil up his arms as he pulled the Death up them.

Zach slammed his left hand onto the man's face and covered his mouth with it. He squeezed hard so the guy would not be able to bite through his glove which had happened before and left a nasty scar on his left hand between his thumb and forefinger. Zach grabbed him by the suit jacket with his right hand and pulled into the room, then the door slammed back shut behind as La Brava kicked it closed. She rushed back over to the opening to the spiral staircase down, and she started dragging the two bodies out of clear sight into a dark corner of this tiny room.

The fire alarm stopped at that exact moment. "What's going on?" Darling wondered as she no longer heard the alarm coming from the open door in front of her that many club staff were still standing around with various people moving in and out of the building. She glanced around and still did not see any sign of fire trucks approaching or hear their sirens. There was even still a crowd there as some of the bouncers and a club representative were telling people they could get back inside soon, and she bit down with a tsk as they announced that someone had pulled the fire alarm. The cold club-goers started shouting angrily about going back inside if it was all a prank since they were not allowed to stop and get their coats first when they were rushed out.

Shouldn't have put this back on. I wanted the hood though, but that's even worse, Darling started slinking away from the building more. She was partly safe in that she was not the only one out there in warm clothing, as some people were still on line outside to get into the club, and some had had their coats or sweatshirts tied around their waists like she did. "They're getting ready to let people back inside."

"Alpha and Beta," Zach said, and Rebel spun to his left as too much was going on and he was not ready for this. He patched Zach in quickly to the squads he started talking to, and Zach continued after giving a couple seconds as they were still getting used to Rebel controlling all comms to erase the need to touch their own helmets and earpieces each time they needed to do something. "Move to positions. There's a deeper underground below the main club. They know something is going on now. They don't know what it is, but if they're planning on keeping the party going it's to use the civilians we tried clearing out. Darling, deal with that. Beta, make your perimeter around the back of the building and stay on the lookout for reinforcements."

"Alpha. Move in."

"Firing zip-line."

"Hook up."

Zzzzuuuuuu- ch. Cluster disconnected the metal ring on his belt and spun, catching Missappear as she was about to crash into him.

"Checking out below. First level clear," Fillian said with a look behind him.

"Down you go," Scatterbox said as he landed, and the group dropped down one floor with great accuracy as he was not sending them very far. They were still slightly scattered about the hall with the full-scale teleport of a team of seven all at once.

"Got no heat signatures in this part of the building. What the- Gentle?"

"Just move on with your orders," Gentle replied to Fillian, getting the other man to refocus and tell his teammates they were clear.

"Gentle?" Zach asked, his voice coming through on all the comms. Zach grimaced and wondered, "What did you do? Sitrep."

Rebel cursed under his breath and shook his head around. Cherasaw had put down the popcorn he made and he glanced at Rebel in a confused way as to his reaction there. "Sitrep" was code for I fucked up, wasn't it? Rebel had brushed by it when Zach was trying to get him serious about his job which Rebel had claimed he would be perfect at, but apparently Death had wanted a sudden switch to a private link between only him and Gentle. How am I supposed to know that you wanted- I said I'd know. Not like the others won't figure out what you're doing. You never use "sitrep" in a sentence normally.

No one else picked up on anything weird, though they did wonder about it as Gentle was not replying. Zach shook his head again as Rebel compensated by giving them the private link. We need more formal training with this method, Zach thought. "Alright. Do what you think is best," he replied aloud though, as Gentle had given him his response to how he had beaten everyone who likely would have gone into the back trying to figure out what was going on. He even prevented any of them from calling for help or announcing his presence to anyone else, as the group who had finally called out to him and approached him at the bar had been easier to take down than he thought they would be.

Slipspace brought her squadmates down the rest of the way to the same level that Death was on. They reached the doorway with a pinpad on it, but when Access ran forward with his hands lifting up his mouth dropped into a frown of disappointment as La Brava opened up the door for them.

Scatterbox stacked up against a ledge on the club's roof close to the front of the building. He glanced to the right and up at the taller roof of another building where their zip-lines had just retracted back to, and he nodded towards Tama who nodded back before lifting up her binoculars and glancing down the streets she had a vantage point over. Much higher than the two of them, the sky started to rumble and a low crack of thunder could be heard in the distance.

"Looks like you were right on the money, Death," Rebel said, while Cherasaw's rolling chair shot back towards his own computer set-up. Cherasaw yelled over to Rampart who jumped out of his bed and ran to his chair, shaking his head around to wake himself up as his screens were turning on and showing the images that Rebel made pop up on them. Rebel continued to the entire operation, "I've got some funky activity caught by multiple traffic cams. A convoy of incognito vehicles sped through some red lights, looks like they're heading in your direction."

"The minivan too?" Rampart wondered in a semi-annoyed voice that he was woken up for villains who would drive in a minivan.

"If the reinforcements roll up on the back of the building," Zach started. "Wait until every vehicle is inside the kill box. Then take them down. Make some noise. We're going downstairs."

Zach loosened his grip on the man's face he had been gripping tightly for thirty seconds now. In that time, this small office had become filled with soldiers in dark uniforms fully strapped with weapons. Gentle stepped into the office behind the group, a few of whom spun and tensed up. Gentle just looked expectantly at Access for a moment, then the man in his squad as he was technically Alpha leader for the mission flinched as he remembered what he had on his back. He reached over his shoulder and grabbed the helmet that he tossed forward to Gentle who put it on his head, before catching the pistol that Access tossed him too.

The villain leader in the white suit was looking back and forth in panic, but Zach lowered his hand down from the man's mouth and stared into his eyes from through his visor. The man's eyes darted back and forth over that dark visor in a panicked way, his mouth too dry to make out a sound as this dark force of soldiers with no faces surrounded him. "How many await us downstairs?" Zach's voice was modulated deeply and into a scary tone. His hands glowed black and wisps came off of them as he still held them close to this figure's face.

"Y-You don't under-understand. Not that you don't know but- I mean- a lot!"

"Shhhh," Gentle's voice came out of his helmet and made the villain's blood run cold. It scared him too much actually, into a panic as Zach could see him about to try using his Quirk.

"I'll let you go if you just answer my question truthfully," Zach assured. His voice got calmer and his hands moved back, and the criminal in front of him suddenly realized there was a much better way out of this than trying to fight the scary group of international terrorists who had been the only thing on his mind for the past three months. "How many people are downstairs?

"They're letting people back into the club. I'm popping tear gas." A whispered voice filled their helmets.

"Ei-Eighty, ninety maybe. Please, don't tell them it was me…"

Zach dropped the unconscious villain on the ground and took in a deep breath. More than I accounted for. No time to call in everyone else.

"Tear gas? On civilians?"

"I fired it into the front door," Darling defended herself. She was running away along with everyone else, and no one was suspicious since they were all looking at the club already when she crouched and fired through the gaps between several people's legs to make the canister she shot from her arm into the building. Her stomach growled but she spoke in a victorious tone, "Won't have to worry about any civilians now."

"There's a fire!"

"My eyes burn!"

"What's going on?!"

"Ack cohg ugh uck- agh-"

What's- ach ack- I can't brea-ack kah!"

Darling glanced back around and her victorious smile dropped immediately. The cloud of tear gas had spread out the front door quite a bit. She turned her head and looked down the street where a car was driving this way, and she looked back and saw a couple people stumble out into the road with their eyes squinted shut while they coughed desperately trying to get the gas out of their throats. The brunette with dyed blonde hair sprinted backwards and found her eyes watering up as the gas seeping out of the club and around the adjacent sidewalk got in her eyes. "Move people! Get away from here, but stay out of the road damn it!"

La Brava rolled her eyes yet she let out a small sigh of relief at the same time. Any relief they could get was great news right now after hearing how many people they were about to charge in on. She glanced up to her side at Gentle who she knew she was going to have to use her Quirk on in a second, and he looked back down at her through the helmet before putting a hand down on top of her head in a comforting way.

"Do you think they know we're coming?"

"If we wait any longer they will for sure. It's only been a couple minutes and all of those who've come into direct contact with us are out cold." Zach darted for the secret door and growled as he ran down the stairs, "They're confused and disoriented, unsure as to what's going on above. They could be packing everything up now or just calling for assistance to clear up the confusion. Move before they organize. Take them down swiftly and don't let them ever realize what's going on."

Zach sped up three times as fast as he heard someone call upstairs, "You find out what's- OH SHI-"

---

Present

"…there's an entire department in the Ministry of Health dedicated solely to outbreaks like these," Rin Hiryu was speaking to his classmates and the Class A students after they got out of their vehicles that had arrived in Fundong. They were facing a huge white tent with a pointed top and eight equal-sized fabric sections breaking off the point out twenty meters before dropping straight down metal poles where they touched down on the floor. Behind the command tent that was sealed fully so even the entrance in front of them was zipped shut, there were two much longer white tents to its right and left that stretched over two hundred meters each down the length of Deng Park.

"Although it's been over fifty years since the last one, my grandparents told me about a bad plague that hit hard during the same time heroes were really gaining ground here in China. They were just kids, but I remember they told me that villain activity really dropped when the Ungala Plague happened." Zach looked to his side at Rin and was nodding along, his attention focused fully on his fellow student who tried not to look surprised by how attentive Zach seemed.

Never heard about this, Zach thought, finding himself interested in what Rin's grandparents had told him. Ungala Plague. Was that well-recorded? I must just not know about it. I should have done more research into the command structure of these incidents here. I didn't know there was an Outbreak Department of the MoH here. If they're already in charge, what role does Yue Fei hold?

"…Apparently some people tried to blame those with Quirks, but so many people had Quirks already and everyone was getting it. It killed tens of thousands I think, but admittedly it probably helped everyone realize that there was nothing that different between Quirkless people and those with Quirks."

"They had to work together to get through it," Yaoyorozu suggested with a nod, thinking about how something like that could unite people.

"Only tens of thousands died?" Todoroki wondered, bringing the tone back down from the somewhat optimistic one of the others looking on the brighter side of that event.

"It wasn't the first time we had faced a deadly virus outbreak. Even in all that chaos, people here knew what they were doing and how best to respond…"

As Rin continued on about other pandemics that had hit China hard before, Zach's gaze shifted past Mt. Lady who was pretending like she was not engrossed with the student she was listening to from behind the other Class B's she had ridden with on the way here. He looked beyond the woman in a purple and orange leotard with a new design that only had white on the lines that separated the orange and purple parts now. A good variety of European heroes. Francois seems nervous about looking my way. It's the way he walks. His confidence is shaken too just seeing me here.

King of Paris: Francois. Quirk, Teeth. Named Mr. Europe 4 years in a row. Zach saw as Francois looked his way for a second. He kept the same expression he would have as if seeing the man for the very first time, but Francois still quickly averted his gaze. I know his uglier side. Even though he insisted he was deep undercover with the Fundonte when I found him. There was no record of it or evidence to prove what he claimed, so I held onto my evidence of his corruption and told Francois I'd be watching him. Seems he still remembers.

There's Miss Moda, Zach's eyes shifted onto the Italian group which seemed to have brought the most amount of heroes of all their European counterparts. As well as Pasta Donna and Le Tenebre. Midoriya remembers them. He's heading over now. I wonder if he's been in contact with Metallore? Zach saw the young hero who could merge with and control metal glance his way but then refocus on Midoriya. My involvement with the mafia is well-known in the hero community now. Just as I planned for months ago.

There's La Davida too. Zach focused on a young woman with short black and brown hair that alternated in vertical stripes around her head. She had a muscular physique and an attractive face with smooth skin that was naturally tan. The native Sicilian was also in a secret relationship with the former top hero of Italy, which Zach knew most people knew nothing about. I'm one of the few who knows it for sure, considering one of the times I stopped a hit on Michelangelo that King put out, the two were… together, at the time. I think some others must have noticed though.

Michelangelo said it's kept a secret because he doesn't want his enemies targeting her, but I think that's just a hold-up he needs to get over. She's a hero too and he should accept that she's taking the risks. She is pretty young. That might just be his official reason, and the age gap is what really keeps them from going public. None of my business though. Zach kept looking around the heroes and briefly made eye contact with a few since many of them were looking his way after arriving.

Jedenwurst is getting the same mixed response from the heroes around here as the people who welcomed us in Xing. I thought he'd be far more popular for that speech he gave. He is great, but the problems he caused with his speech are going to create big problems with this outbreak happening at the same time. It's why revealing corruption isn't always the best move, especially in the most trying times. Zach looked away from Jedenwurst and to the number 1 German hero who had arrived as well and stepped out of the car to his full height of eleven and a half feet tall. Deutsheld. Quirk, All-Sight. His body type has nothing to do with his Quirk, much like Mina's. It's not gigantism though.

The extremely tall, bald man was muscular but had a rather slender body type because his abnormal height made him appear lanky. He looked towards Zach Sazaki after he saw the teen glance his way even though he was not looking at the student when Zach's eyes shifted onto him. Of everyone who's job it will be to keep the quarantine measures in place, Deutsheld will be the most important. I'm sure Yue Fei will have him leading that aspect of the op.

There's the third ranked German hero, Grundwasserleiter, or Aquifer they'll probably call her here. I hadn't seen her or Deutsheld taking part in any of the politics or arrests surrounding the European weapons' labs the AoD revealed. Zach watched as the woman of five and a half feet stepped up next to the top hero more than double her height who she glanced up at before turning Lifebringer's way as well. She flipped her long blonde braid over her back from her left shoulder with a flick of her head. Zach's focus left Aquifer though and went to a sidekick she had brought with her who he also recognized, Looks like he graduated. Underground Hero: Tunnel Maker. Otto Müller, Zach saw a boy just older than him who had only been a senior at his German hero high school the year before when they had met in person, only Zach had been wearing a black helmet at the time.

"NOW! DEATH!" Zach imagined hearing that shout from the surface where Tunnel Maker was bloodied and cornered by four of the villains who had him aboveground and therefore lost their focus on the floor below their feet. They did not expect the trap laid for them, a trap Zach waited in until Otto had gotten them to confess to everything in the moment they believed they had already won. "Gundwasserleiter can't say it, but we're glad you came to help us. Good luck, Tod." Zach heard the name he was called in Germany, a word some of his comrades had had written down their backs just as he had had 'DEATH' on his own.

Didn't see Otto again until the Sky Base over Prague, Zach thought. He glanced around but did not see any of the other heroes who had helped in the joint mission with mainly Czech heroes taking down a secret sky headquarters for the Dark Angels in the Czech Republic's capital. Some amazing tech they had up there. All Quirk-based to keep them that high and cloaked and off radars. Doubt we would have ever located them without the ISS's help. Astronauts contacting heroes to tell them about the mysterious floating island over Europe. Just lucky Raylei intercepted the message, or all those heroes would have been wiped out up there.

Zach turned his head and looked towards a large group of heroes still not as big as the Japanese group, but probably third in size after them and the Chinese heroes hosting the operation. Coola and Buccaneer. She's been dealing with the Freedom Fighters. Most of the credit has gone to her recently, and she's been praised in the US as people have come to accept their guilt for Gondorhan. It's frustrating that they've apparently taken responsibility too, as I knew they might even if they weren't responsible. At least the blame hasn't been pushed to AoD, but if the Freedom Fighters are lying then a wave of misinformation and confusion is sure to come. Blitz is still hunting the rest of them down so he won't be here. Buccaneer's very popular in the US now too, more so than before.

I left so many defeated pirates for the two of them. They were on my trail at first but started just taking the credit for the villains I left behind. That ultimately is what led to Buccaneer's trouble back in the US as an internal investigation was launched into their affairs, as to if he and Coola had gone too far in Africa but blamed their actions on other villains killing each other before they arrived. Most of the time that was true anyway. They killed each other far more than I killed them… most days. Don't avoid their eye contact. Make sure it's uniform all the way through other than those I know. Anyone who shouldn't know Zach Sazaki should not receive looks like he knows them.

Is he the one who took down all the villains we were chasing? Buccaneer's eyes narrowed towards Lifebringer but the Japanese student standing amongst his classmates just kept looking around at all the other heroes arriving and grouping up to talk. They were all standing outside of the command tent that some of the Chinese heroes had walked forward to and were speaking to someone on the other side of the entrance flaps. He was always one step ahead of us. Coola hated it too, but the heroes across the east coast of North Africa were right. We couldn't give them the credit. We didn't even know for sure if it was them, most of the time. The signs were clear though.

"Is that Lifebringer?" Captain Celebrity wondered while stepping ahead of some other Americans in their group. Christopher Skyline lifted his eyebrows in surprise, "I figured he'd be taller."

Coola glanced to her right and up at the very tall, muscular, blond-haired hero in a red cape who rarely broke the top ten heroes in the nation anymore. She liked this version of the man more than his younger more arrogant self who occasionally reached the number 1 ranking in the nation though. Even his comment was made half-heartedly and she could tell in a way to lighten the mood as a lot of people were on edge about the entire situation and Lifebringer's presence there. Coola considered asking him something but kept her mouth closed and refocused on examining the entire team who had arrived at the same time. I can ask about your family when this is over. No need to remind you how much you have to lose.

Zach only looked to Captain Celebrity for a moment before his gaze shifted and lingered on someone who had followed him and stood on his side. A hero past his prime but still important and strong enough to be involved in all the important things. Makes sense to join his agency. I'll figure out how she got in later, Zach's gaze shifted again. He looked away from the lean woman with maroon-colored hair that fell straight down to her shoulder-blades. Although he had skimmed over most other sidekicks and support staff he did not recognize, his mood changed after seeing the woman in her late twenties who did not belong there. She looked his way and had a similar look to many others on her face upon seeing Lifebringer in person for the first time, and Zach thought to himself while already looking over towards the command tent where Szechuman had stepped out of, She's as good as I am.

Star-Spangled Man landed down in the middle of the arrival area and stopped all the heroes who were moving or opening their mouths to speak. Szechuman was about to settle everyone down when Star-Spangled Man dropped in on them. "Glad you're all here. Szechuman, are you ready for us?" Star-Spangled Man wasted no time, and everyone else immediately re-intensified as Star-Spangled Man lifted his mask that he had pulled down from his face for his flight there. He put a specialized visor over his eyes that was dark blue like the top half of his uniform, though the visor was not covered in white stars as Star-Spangled Man's chest was. His cape was the American flag, his boots red, his pants red, white, and blue, and his golden tool belt had a buckle in the shape of 'USA' each a different color of the flag. The man had brown hair flipped up at the front instead of bangs, and he was a few inches shorter than Captain Celebrity but also a decade younger than the man with a similar Quirk only less powerful much like Wonder Man who was also on the scene with two other Korean heroes who Zach was not formally acquainted with.

Wonder Man was actually walking over to speak with the boy who had revived him only a few weeks ago when he had come to United Korea to help with the terrorist attack. He stopped though when Szechuman replied affirmatively to Star-Spangled Man and welcomed everyone inside the sterilized command tent that he announced was cleaned every half hour to ensure the safety of the heroes inside. Szechuman added though that they had to enter the tent no more than three at a time, as there was a tiny section between the outer flaps and the inner ones that once both sides were closed, decontaminated every time. Szechuman went back into that small section now with the inner flaps closed tightly shut behind him, and even just being outside for a few moments he still decontaminated before heading back in.

Just in case the Sleepless particles are in the air here, Yaoyorozu thought, and she noticed a lot of others picking up on the same thing. A couple even fidgeted with their masks to ensure an air-tight seal, but she did not make any move to do the same. Too much fear of catching the virus will cause me to falter. Adjusting the mask too often will put me at risk. I trust the way I fitted it at first. My nose is itchy, Yaoyorozu's face scrunched up for a moment and she wiggled her nose, determined not to touch it for something so minor, as aggravating as she knew it was going to become.

The Chinese heroes are heading in first. Doesn't look like The Wall has been briefed about much yet either. "Army of Death! I resign from the Task Force!" Zach recalled the ninth ranked Chinese hero's shouts in Qingxiao when he was running towards them which caused a few of his comrades to tense up to protect him during his revivals of the population. "If that is what it takes for you to trust me, then I've resigned! Now let me help you save this city and its people." I told everyone to trust The Wall, and like I thought he did not betray us. All the Chinese heroes saw us in a different light after that day. I never thought it would be something we did, but then again I never expected an earthquake to just happen nearby. I thought for so long that it had to be a trap, but sometimes natural disasters really are just that. Natural.

He's also pushed more publicly than other Chinese heroes for looking into and changing the terrorist status of the Army of Death. Not sure how I feel about that, Zach looked behind The Wall and a few other Chinese heroes slowly making their way into the command tent. There's Aladdin. He knows about Arma, even though I tried to keep the new Saudi heroes from figuring out we were the ones who really caught her. Someone had to know. I'm just grateful he worked with us to help give the new government a chance.

The Arab man Zach looked towards was a young man though he was not just out of high school. Rather, he was someone who had failed the nation's hero licensing tests multiple times and thus was spared from Mongoloid's purge that killed so many Saudi heroes. Aladdin had dark blue hair tied into a long ponytail behind his back, and he followed closely behind the Chinese heroes he felt a large debt to and could show it unlike the greater debt he was in to Lifebringer that he felt he had to keep completely secret. The Saudi Arabian provisional government had tried desperately to restart their nation and build up strength the way the Army of Death suggested to make sure they were not taken advantage of, and yet the Chinese came in anyway. They sent many heroes to assist the Saudis keep control at the same time that Aladdin was working closely with vigilantes and bounty hunters.

The new hero class was too small and too weak to control such a large country on its own. Many of his people still considered the Chinese help as a tactic to gain favor in Saudi Arabian trade deals in the future, but whatever the ulterior motives might be, Aladdin knew that the heroes who had come in had helped for nothing more than to assist him in his fight to keep villains out of their reborn country. We're all in this together, Yue Fei told me. I haven't forgotten that… Oh man, is Lifebringer looking my way? I can't even right now.

His Quirk is Thief. I need to be excessively cautious around him. Zach examined the twenty-five year old closely who was intentionally keeping his eyes away from the Japanese heroes. He hasn't been a hero long enough. I know he has the ability to rob someone of their Quirk for a certain length of time. It isn't public knowledge how long, or how he goes about stealing it, but it is unnerving having him here.

He's looking straight at me. We haven't interacted directly, I mean I saw him that day in Hatto! Did he see me down in the crowd? Should I look at him? I can't do it! Eeee! Aladdin felt embarrassed by his thoughts alone, and his eyes darted around to check if anyone was reading his mind and could hear how hard he was fanboying right now. When his eyes darted to the left he caught a piece of a look his direction in Lifebringer's peripheral vision and his eyes quickly darted to the opposite side. Oh man! I really want to go shake his hand! But what if he thinks I'm trying to steal his Quirk?!

Is that all an act so he can try and steal my Quirk? Zach tried to divert his gaze, but his eyes lingered back onto Aladdin's back as the man was stepping into the decontamination section of the tent. I don't know, but something's suspicious about him.

"Hello there Lifebringer. Deku."

Zach and Midoriya each turned around and looked at a group who had had their drivers park their cars farther back to not crowd in with everyone. The extremely nice voice that greeted them was one the two boys recognized as well and they each smiled when they turned and saw the group of men and women in red and white costumes who stepped forward to them. Team Canada had arrived and were all smiles as they came across the boys they had worked with a while back.

"How long has it been eh? Two years now, right?" Samwell wondered.

The leader of the group in his mainly red hockey jersey with padding underneath that acted more as armor shook his head and laughed when he did. Kurt called out, "Not even! That's amazing. So much has happened. You haven't met Little Isla!"

"Hahaha!" Linsey, Kurt 2, and Samwell all laughed.

Little Isla was seven and a half feet tall, but the younger woman and newest member of Team Canada still giggled in a quieter but higher-pitched tone. The other U.A. students besides Zach look at her in surprise at the sound of her voice. Zach just smiled to the tall woman and greeted her, "Nice to meet you."

Mountie Man gave Lifebringer a more discerning look than his countrymen were treating him. Zach shifted his gaze over to the other Canadian hero who had arrived with Team Canada, Last I heard about him he was outside Gondorhan with Señor Striker. Haven't seen any Mexican heroes here- yet, that is.

Analyze quicker. Don't use Death. There is no need for me to scare anyone while here. I can just be a hero. Quick, before we go in. The Twin Jaguars, Zach nodded and turned to Midoriya who was talking to Team Canada and thanking them again for coming abroad to help out with international villain incidents. His mind was not on their conversation though, Indigenous brothers from a tribe in Costa Rica. They studied in San Jose and rose to the top two heroes in the nation with their teamwork. Jago and Jagu are 1st and 2nd respectively, even though Jago was born a minute after Jagu making him the younger. It's not just them on their team but several others from Costa Rica too, all among the top twenty heroes in the nation.

Not surprising. For one, it's a small nation. Two, their teamwork results in much better and more efficient responses against villains. The Jaguars' agency consists of almost all the top twenty heroes because of that coordinated response. Costa Rica was likely the Latin American country that Bolivar had the least power in because he was never able to turn any one of the Jaguars' team members.

Outback Man turned his head as he was walking forward, leading the other Australian and Pacific Islander heroes with him. He looked to Star-Spangled Man and nodded at a friend of his who nodded back. It was a casual greeting between colleagues who worked together and may have a more friendly relationship but were focusing on the mission. Zach still stared after Outback Man for another second before looking to Star-Spangled Man again, Five of their group of seven are ADTF. Outback Man and two of the other Australians, as well as Ramu from Tuvalu and Un'su'su from Kamama-Balat. Disproportionate. Intentionally disproportionate. No one would suspect it coming from that part of the world.

I'm now certain of his ulterior motives. Not that they matter as long as I stick to Yue Fei's orders and keep to myself and my mission. Zach looked away from Star-Spangled Man and to Ectoplasm who told him and two others to head up to the tent to get ready for their decontamination and entry. Not only will I not acknowledge that I even notice your plans, I'll make you doubt yourself. No- just stay focused yourself. Enough people here distracted by trying to get me that I don't need to be distracted by trying to not let them get me. Just, I won't give them any more ammunition to use against me.

Star-Spangled Man looked away after Lifebringer broke the eye contact with him. He started looking around the others who had arrived just like so many heroes had examined all their comrades they would be working with. His eyes stopped on a girl with long earlobes that ended in jacks though. Jirou stared back and kept her eyes the same size forcefully even as the hero many considered the strongest in the world looked right at her. "Yeah. That's Zach."

The last time they had seen each other, Jirou remembered Star-Spangled Man pausing the surveillance footage in Sueguon. She remembered how she responded to him when everyone else was questioning if Underlord could really be Zach Sazaki. He took my opinion seriously. Like it really affected his own. Is he here, to help? Or is it for Zach? Her eyes shifted towards her classmate's back and then she looked away as if to pretend she had not noticed Star-Spangled Man's look in the first place. I'm staying out of it. Zach won't be allowed to keep doing what he's doing. They'll kick him out and arrest him or he'll just run away again. It's obvious. It's been obvious from the start.

So go for it here for all I care. Just leave me out of it.

The Japanese heroes are too close to this, Star-Spangled Man thought. He turned to his own closest colleagues as a few other American heroes came his way and questioned him about his time in China so far as they had only just arrived. I can't trust them. Due to their close proximity to Zach Sazaki, they would wind up revealing our motives during the operation. I can't have anyone figure out that this is an ADTF operation as well. Only a few know.

I don't feel right about this, Captain Celebrity had told Star-Spangled Man that he wanted to help him when Star-Spangled Man requested his help and that he join the Task Force that was growing much larger since the top American hero took charge. The entire layout of the ADTF was changing and the amount of resources and time going into it had expanded drastically since Endeavor's resignation. Captain Celebrity saw the way Star-Spangled Man looked at him for a second though and he had to keep himself from looking at Coola who the Task Force's commander had explicitly told him to keep their mission from.

As Zach was about to reach the front of the line with Midoriya and Todoroki, the three of them looked to their left and at the short old woman who had come with them and who had several Chinese heroes leaning away from her as her voice got louder. Ectoplasm and Kamui Woods each considered mentioning something to her about waiting until they had gone through the initial briefing, but Recovery Girl's voice rose louder still and shut the two men up before they even got started.

"I'm telling you to get several more of these facilities ready. Don't just tell me that you're in the 'process' of choosing a new location for one! This is clearly not enough to handle to numbers of patients who will be arriving here."

"We have over 1,000 beds already-"

"Get more." Recovery Girl's voice was shrill but demanding. She turned to her right as Sheshou came out of one of the long tents to see what was causing a commotion. "You!" Sheshou pointed at herself with a confused look. Her head started turning with her eyes growing wider as she spotted someone else looking her way she recognized through his clear mask, but her head snapped back forward and she stood up straight as Recovery Girl started yelling at her.

Yaoyorozu was following after her friends towards the command tent. She looked at the side of Zach's face as he stared over towards their school nurse. Has he finished checking them all out? She wondered to herself. Yaoyorozu could see Star-Spangled Man in the corner of her vision, and she continued internally, I wonder what his relationships with all of them are. I am certain Zach knows more about the heroes here working with us than anyone. It will be strange to see how those heroes are going to treat him based on the fact that many suspect that he's Death and yet they can't openly act like he is.

"Creati!" Yaoyorozu spun, and Recovery Girl snapped at the taller child about to head into the command tent. "I told you to stay by my side! Get over here and come with me. I am going to find the resource acquisition manager here- you don't have one?!" Recovery Girl exclaimed at the Chinese heroes on her left who each gained similar looks like none of them wanted to tell Recovery Girl that. They sweatdropped as the woman yelled at them to bring her to their most experienced doctors then, which the heroes were able to do, and they led her into one of the much longer tents.

Yaoyorozu glanced back over her shoulder as she started racing after Recovery Girl. Zach nodded towards her and said, "I'll fill you in after."

Creati nodded back then rushed after Recovery Girl to assist however their experienced nurse wanted her to. And a second after she went into one of the long tents that were connected far back by a middle section sterilized except for connector tubes of thin plastic sheets, Zach walked forward into the command tent's entryway that Todoroki closed behind them. Zach was in the front of it and he held his arms out at his sides. Midoriya looked at him oddly for a second then rose his own up just as Todoroki did behind him. A feminine robotic voice spoke up a second later, "Please lift your arms and close your eyes."

Neither Midoriya nor Todoroki could see but Zach's eyes were already closed too. Did he hear her already? Midoriya wondered, as his classmate had been ahead of him and closer to the tent so he may have been able to hear that voice when the last group went through.

Todoroki felt a cool spray that felt like a mist and yet it did not feel like he was getting wet either. Has he been in one of these before? I can't see why he would have been.

The spray stopped. Zach opened his eyes and rose his right hand that he wiped across his safety glasses. Guess I can take these off now, he stepped forward and opened the inner flaps that he walked through while taking off his glasses with his other hand. Others inside had already taken theirs off as well as pulled their masks down. No point in taking my mask off. If it's going to be uncomfortable I may as well not get used to taking it off periodically. It will be a better example to others around too. I shouldn't have removed my glasses either. Zach wiped around his eyes then looked at his glove as if in surprise that no liquid was anywhere he felt himself get sprayed. He put his glasses back on afterwards, Who am I being an example for? Do I really think all of the people who see me are going to have this kind of equipment to wear themselves? If anything they'll just be angry that I get it while they don't. Guess I could give away my gear to the first person who sees me and doesn't have any- and then leave a bad role model for everyone else who sees Lifebringer not wearing any PPE.

It's not like I'm going to get sick though. If those particles enter my body I'm fairly certain I could kill them all. If they could even puncture my individual cells at all. My body is strong. Zach walked towards the middle of the room and stepped up to one side of a large round device in the center that had a strange grid pattern on top of it. The green grid of black squares was glowing, and Zach's eyes rose over it to the air above that was tinted blue by a circle of light coming up from the edge of the circular machine. This is pretty amazing tech. I don't think they even need Quirk-enhanced materials for it. Straight hologram technology. I never invested any time into it because I didn't think it was necessary to have holograms, but it does make everything feel more advanced, which could help with morale when it comes to questioning how advanced our medical knowledge might be…

What is Sazaki thinking about?

Lifebringer just walked right up to the middle of the room like he's a top hero meant to be there! Cocky kid's still in school.

Death doesn't look as intimidating when he appears bemused by a hologram machine…

What are his plans here? I know he's conspiring about something.

It's a good thing Recovery Girl got Momo away from here. She always sees right through me, Zach could see Captain Celebrity in his peripheral vision and glanced towards that hero again before refocusing ahead on where Yue Fei was going to give his briefing from.

"This location is designated as the Front-Line Incident Command Center. Or FLICC, for short," Szechuman announced in English to the tent full of heroes from all over the world. "The FLICC is going to be this team's main operational headquarters. All reports you have can come here, and I will relay them to the Central Command in Xing. This is not the only FLICC, so be sure to label each of your reports under Fundong FLICC leadership. This is not so I can take credit, it is just so we can maintain organization and smooth integration of all response teams to the Sleepless Outbreak."

"I'll take it from here, Szechuman," everyone in the room looked to the hologram of Yue Fei that appeared as detailed as if he was standing in front of them. The only difference was that he was somewhat tinted blue, and they could only see the upper half of his body from about his bellybutton up.

"I thank you all for coming on such short notice. I briefly informed you about the Sleepless virus on your drive in, but the outbreak is rapidly developing. There is more I needed to tell you and yet also new developments that have changed the way we need to respond right now." Yue Fei wasted no time, and no one else wasted any time by interrupting him either. "The coastal city of Beiju has only an hour ago admitted its first patient that had symptoms resembling Sleepless. It could have been anything, but over the last hour, thirty five other patients exhibiting the same symptoms have been admitted to three hospitals in the same vicinity."

"Dozens in an hour?" Metallore asked in surprise. Others darted their gazes around only to snap them back to the hologram as they saw the majority of people in the room fully focused on Yue Fei and unwavering even after that announcement.

"Beiju is the largest city in the region and lays on the coast. I have just ordered the ports closed and all flights out of Beiju are being grounded, while flights into the city are being rerouted as we speak. We discovered that all the people reporting sick in Beiju so far had traveled through the same intersection when local heroes and myself worked through each of their paths over the past twelve hours. Every one of them crossed it between eight and six hours ago. It was the largest intersection in Beiju."

"Edamazi Plaza," Szechuman growled, his fists balling at his sides with rage splaying over his face.

"Are the Sleepless particles still in the air?"

"Is there a-"

"The city has been completely shut down. Stay-in-place orders are being blasted over the city. The release is believed to have happened early this morning before work for most people. Everyone at work is to stay at work until the air quality is tested. Everyone at home is to stay home. Parents are separated from their children at school. People are scared. The orders will be ignored. Anyone who moves around right after the release of these Sleepless particles risks moving the virus with them. How long it can survive outside a human host, on one's hands, trapped in a cooled container, it's all unknown. We need to keep the quarantine strict and enforce it now before things get out of hand."

"That is why," Yue Fei continued. "I am splitting this first response team in half to create another FLICC in Beiju. Szechuman will stay in Fundong…" Szechuman's mouth opened to argue immediately as Beiju was his home city. Yue Fei continued though and it made the second ranked hero in the country close his mouth, "…Under the command of former 1st ranked Chinese hero, Warrior Hero: Mulan."

Zach rose his eyebrows up. She's missing an arm and a leg. Half her face was burned off too. I was stunned we managed to save her.

"She is still undergoing physical therapy and getting used to new prosthetics from a surgery she went through recently…"

Virtucorp's been busy. Don't smirk, Zach scolded himself as he was close to letting it show how pleased he was to hear about that.

Yue Fei went on while looking straight at Szechuman who he could see perfectly from Xing where he had a 360 camera view from his hologram position of the FLICC tent in Fundong. "I am sure you can accept that."

Szechuman hesitated for another second before nodding his head in reluctant acceptance. Mulan was no longer ranked after her long absence, but she was still widely and highly respected by the heroes. The fact that she had come back into the fray early to take charge during this epidemic impressed them even more, as most of the world did not think she would survive at all when she was attacked just over a year ago to that day.

"Fundong is the fifth largest city in the Gangwe region, smaller than Xing or Beiju, but still a very densely populated city with over 11 million people. The rate of infections seen in Fundong show a more likely scenario that the villains we are facing released the Sleepless particles sporadically and in different areas with lower populations. As if they were testing out all they could do. In Beiju, we see that they hit somewhere that would experience a high volume of exposure to Sleepless." Yue Fei paused and his eyes got much darker, "I am not the only one who can see that the villains are getting more confident and smarter in how to spread the virus most dangerously. If this continues much longer, China may be cut off from the rest of the world as other nations fear the spread of Sleepless into their borders."

"Even though those showing symptoms have all traveled through where we believe the point of infection was within the last eight hours, they also reported it quicker than most because of the news of the disease. Now that the Ground Zero of the Sleepless infection in Beiju is known, tens of thousands of calls are coming in from scared civilians who think they may have been exposed. Thousands of others yet to show symptoms will need medical assistance. The phone lines at every hospital and police station will be going off nonstop and calls will be missed to save lives. Take this all into account when you get to Beiju. The situation may be far worse than in Fundong where it is currently under control."

"What is the top priority?" Star-Spangled Man asked.

"It has to be identifying when the air is clean enough to send everyone home. The longer they're kept in place the less control they'll feel we have over the situation," Yue Fei responded. "However, Star-Spangled Man, your team will be split as well."

Star-Spangled Man did not ask what his team was. He just waited, and Yue Fei was glad he did as he continued quickly anyway, "Coola, you will be assisting Mulan as the lead of International Response Team A-2. I just split your group which you can see here. A-2, head back out to your vehicles now."

"Hold on."

Everyone was getting ready to move. A list appeared next to Yue Fei's holographic image as if a computer was generating it into view. Everyone on Team A-2 could see their hero names and wanted to rush to their vehicles as quickly as possible after hearing what was going on in Beiju that clearly needed a massive immediate response. They all turned to Coola though who stood right in front of the hologram of Yue Fei and stared into the top Chinese hero's eyes.

"Before we begin, I would have you tell us all one thing." Her eyes narrowed and she glared into Yue Fei's so intensely that the room silenced and no one questioned her like a few were considering as they thought she was wasting time. Coola's voice was low as she questioned Yue Fei, "What about the connection to Gondorhan?"

I don't believe the press. They make their own assumptions, same as the higher-ups, Coola's glare was unwavering and locked firmly on Yue Fei's eyes. The Chinese hero's face did not flinch as Coola looked for the slightest twitch in his expression that she was searching for. I know it wasn't the villains who took credit when I accused them of wiping out Gondorhan. None of the FF could give me a suitable explanation for how they managed to kill everyone, and somehow take down or make Rhino Chick disappear. My friend…

Also Pharaoh is gone. Though he was stationed in NYC which doesn't make any sense as to why he would have been with her in Gondorhan. Which begs the question as to whether Twin Rivers, Atmos, or The Spear's disappearances were related as well. I wasn't close enough to Pharaoh to know his connections to any of them. Rhino Chick, Gondorhan, vanishing heroes and now this. The Freedom Fighters aren't capable of this.

She's right to be angry, Zach's gaze was focused on the list of people going to be leaving this room. The Freedom Fighters taking responsibility messes everything up. I knew they might get the blame even if they weren't the ones who did it, but if Coola doesn't buy it either even after facing them head-on, then how could they have anything to do with it? At least more of the super observant are leaving now, and luckily Captain Celebrity is staying right here.

The virus was released in Beiju, and in its busiest area, Midoriya's eyes were locked on the list of people heading to Beiju. He kept his mouth shut even though he did not see his name up there as he wished it was. His breath sucked in sharply through the filters of his mask, The cases there are going to come in so rapidly it'll overwhelm hospitals. Did they release it during the rush of morning commute? It sounds like it might have been too early, since it doesn't linger in the air too long I thought. The police and heroes out on the streets right now will get sick first, along with doctors treating the first sick people who might have still had it on their clothes. All international airports are going to stop passengers on flights arriving from Beiju now. Anyone who arrives from China. If video of chaos in Beiju gets out- which is why we all need to make sure that everything looks under control! And make sure it is under control too! Panic will be the end of us!

Midoriya's trying not to panic. At least that shows he knows how bad this is, Zach looked away from the list that did not have his own name on it either. It was just released there. It doesn't kill quick enough to warrant sending me there yet. Not when people are dying in those tents to my left at this very moment. Every second I spend in here… Doesn't mean a thing if I don't have a time limit anymore. I need a limit. Something, anything to show me that I'm not-

"That information is classified at the moment. You will have to contact me directly and go through a direct channel with my superiors to have that released to you." Yue Fei continued louder when Coola opened her mouth, "It is not that I don't trust all of you. Panic is a dangerous thing even among heroes. Do not forget that, Coola." Yue Fei's words came out harshly, and Coola grit her teeth while glaring even harsher back into Yue Fei's eyes. She could not confirm or deny any of her theories or get anything on Gondorhan right now with that kind of answer. And yet he was right in regards to the panic, considering things were bad enough as they were without bringing the horror of the Gondorhan Incident into the fray.

These aren't just kids. They can handle it… "Tsk, fine. When this is done though, and I throw those terrorists at your feet, you'll tell me exactly what I want to know." Coola turned and marched off for the front of the tent. "Let's go!" She yelled out without looking back.

"Everyone on A-2 get going. Three at a time out too," Yue Fei reminded. "Though there's no need to decontaminate your person on the way out, we cannot have both the inner and outer flap opened at the same time. After each group leaves the space will be cleaned before the next group can go."

"We're wasting precious minutes," La Davida countered to the hologram.

"If any of you get sick, the minutes you spared will mean nothing to the time you miss." Yue Fei was the one pushing for speed over everything here, so the fact that he was that stern with the warning on safety kept anyone else from objecting over the stringent measures.

"Terrorist Search Team, TST, on me!" Star-Spangled Man called out while moving to one side of the tent.

Midoriya spun Star-Spangled Man's direction then looked back at the list. Yue Fei had made more than just Team A-2 appear on the list above the hologram machine now. There was also a display of duties for those who were staying at the Fundong FLICC. The majority were dealing with patients, staying at the FLICC itself as part of the command staff organizing the response. Others were part of various crowd-control and medical duties, and they were all below certain heroes who were given leadership roles. Zach's hero name was on its own down at the bottom, labeled only 'Reviver.' At the top of the list though was a group of six who were under Star-Spangled Man's leadership. Their team leader had just abbreviated their name and called the five other heroes currently in his search party to come get briefed.

Getting right to it then, Ectoplasm thought while moving swiftly towards Star-Spangled Man. In the corner of his vision he saw Yue Fei just nod in Star-Spangled Man's direction, and Ectoplasm thought, Not going to micromanage much then. He has to organize search teams in different cities, as well as all the FLICCs, PR, safety- shit. Heiping was right to question if we have enough, Ectoplasm looked to his right but the woman who had received them was already out of the tent as she was part of the team heading out to Beiju.

"You're with us, kid," Mt. Lady said as she was walking up behind Todoroki Shoto. "It's not going to be fun."

"I know that-"

"No," Mt. Lady shook her head at the boy and patted a hand down on his left shoulder farther from her. She pulled him along to come with her and Kamui Woods who were both being sent to Beiju as well. Kamui Woods looked over towards Ectoplasm and nodded at his fellow hero who nodded back and then gave Todoroki a serious look too before refocusing on Star-Spangled Man. Midoriya looked over his shoulder a second longer than his teacher did, and he gave Todoroki a serious nod himself a second later that Todoroki returned before looking up at Mt. Lady wondering why she had given him that look.

It dawned on Todoroki a moment later as he thought about the three of them heading out. She can make herself massive and block a road out. He can use his Arbor to block roads or create fencing. And my ice, can be a temporary fix as they build up barriers behind it. This isn't right. What are we planning for? "If I start using my ice to keep people inside the city," Todoroki started in a low voice to the Japanese hero couple in front of him who looked back at the teenager. "The people will turn against us-"

"Who said anything about your ice?" Kamui Woods asked back. He and Mt. Lady kept steady looks on their faces and did not falter while Todoroki's heterochromatic eyes widened at the implication of what Kamui Woods just said. The hero who Todoroki figured was unofficially ranked 4th in their own country turned back ahead and his eyes were dark, but he said without pause, "If it comes down to it, you may have to use your flames."

"But that's-"

"If we allow for chaos," Mt. Lady countered the boy starting to argue. He turned to her and she looked back, a softer look in her eyes that was sad and yet as resolved as ever. "Then chaos will take over. If we let a few break the rules and rush out in panic, everyone will turn and start to use force to do the same. They will all break quarantine, and any chance we have of trapping the terrorists inside Beiju will vanish as they slip through our fingers."

"It's harsh," Kamui Woods stated. His fists unclenched at his sides and he finished lower, "But it's necessary."

"We have to get there so fast. Why are we wasting time doing this when we know they just released the virus in Beiju?" La Davida grumbled under her breath, walking behind the Japanese heroes with Metallore and Le Tenebre. Her right foot tapped incessantly on the ground in frustration, "We need to go, now."

"And if after releasing the virus eight hours ago," Metallore began without turning back to the woman just behind him. "The terrorist with the Sleepless Quirk returned to Fundong and is waiting just outside here, around a corner nearby." He took another step forward and only lifted his hands to his face to tighten his facemask. "It is not five hours by car from Beiju to Fundong. It could already be back in the air just outside this tent."

"Meet with your teams. Stay in contact and coordinate your responses," Yue Fei announced to everyone, both leaving and staying in Fundong's forward command tent. He had just stepped out of the hologram for a moment but was back again and speaking faster than ever. "Those of you staying, get acquainted for a moment with one another. Do not leave as the briefing has not finished, but I need- two minutes. Two, or three- I'll be right back." A few of his cut-short sentences were spoken in Chinese, and they heard him snapping in Chinese as he stepped out of the blue cylinder and disappeared off the hologram machine.

Opportunity, Zach thought. He turned and looked around. He glanced behind him and at the three Class B students and Jirou who were still right there behind him, along with Backdraft. He was glad Backdraft was there though as he was able to shift his gaze to that pro hero who turned and started over to the Korean Heroes who had lost Wonder Man to the TST as well.

Rin looked at Zach wondering what the boy in front of him was doing. The Class A member just looked around and then started walking over towards someone else, and Rin spun his head around after a second as he realized everyone else was already moving too. Should, we go with him? Rin turned to Kendo and gave her a hesitant look that also asked her to stay with him and not leave him on his own here.

The class rep nodded in agreement with him then spotted someone herself who she motioned at. "Let's go talk to him. Buccaneer," Kendo said, raising her voice a little while starting over towards the sidekick who had not left when his pro hero had. It did not even seem like he and Coola had had a conversation about his not being on the list with her. Buccaneer looked the Japanese heroes' way and noticed that Lifebringer was not joining them. He smiled at the four who headed his way though and then met the group halfway, "You stayed even though Coola left? She must have a lot of faith in your ability."

"We trust each other," Khayone replied. "We often act independently of one another outside of a fight."

Doesn't sound much like a sidekick-pro relationship to me, Shinso thought.

"Aren't you trying to learn from her?" Kendo wondered, not seeing the utility in working under such a great pro hero if he was not going to really watch how she did things.

"I learned for a while. Now I'm training to be a pro. Doing things on my own, like pros need to," Buccaneer argued back. "I promised Coola I wouldn't get in her way when I heard she was coming here," Buccaneer added as an aside. The others looked at him in surprise but the American their age just smiled back at their group and finished, "All I needed was her word to get me on the plane."

He went so out of his way to get here, Jirou thought. No one made the request. He'd be in school right now. Instead of the middle of- We all made the choice to come here. Just because we were offered a place, doesn't make him that much more amazing…

"Well that's amazing," Kendo said to their new comrade, making the boy's smile lower a little as she said that straight to him. "I'm looking forward to working with you, Buccaneer." Kendo looked around and spotted another hero she was not acquainted with who she wanted to go talk to next as she saw the Italian woman without anyone around her.

"Uh yeah. You too, Big Fist." Buccaneer wanted to say it before the girl headed off as she looked about to leave and he had not said anything of the sort back to her. It felt like he was going to leave things like that and that all he did was talk about himself in their short conversation.

Unfortunately, Kendo lost a bit of her smile as she was looking back at Buccaneer anyway as she expected him to say some pleasantry of the kind. She brought her smile back up a second later and corrected him, "It's actually Battle Fist, in English. Big Fist is the name of my Quirk though." She made her correction and added the language she said it in to excuse the fact that he got it wrong, but as she nodded and then headed off to speak with Miss Moda, Rin watched as the South African- American hero's darker face got pink in the cheeks as he flushed with embarrassment.

Seeing Khayone blush relaxed Rin after he thought they were talking to such a big shot for a moment there with how cool Buccaneer had seemed at first. "Talk to you later. It's Dragon Shroud, by the way," Rin mentioned to the other hero. He headed off and grinned to himself for a moment while Buccaneer opened his mouth and then closed it as Rin was not waiting.

We're in the middle of an outbreak. What are they doing? Shinso thought, his eyes half-closed and looking deadpan at the others. Jirou sweatdropped as she looked to her side and saw the disapproving look on Shinso's face, then she looked farther across the room and spotted another of her classmates slowing down.

Zach looked towards Captain Celebrity who a pair of German heroes just stepped up to and were speaking with. He shifted his gaze away and looked behind Captain Celebrity, making eye contact with a woman who had arrived with him but was not part of the conversation between the heroes. Zach had already come most of the way towards them, and he started walking to the side, shifting the angle of his approach gradually to make it out like he was not heading their way at all in case any of those heroes noticed.

The woman who spotted Lifebringer made eye contact with him for a second, and she took that as an invitation and sped-walked towards the boy who stopped pretending not to have been coming their way at all when he saw Captain Celebrity get intercepted by a different hero before he could arrive. "Lifebringer," the woman started. She had maroon hair and smiled nervously but also excitedly as she approached him, making Jirou roll her eyes and turn away back to the others who she stayed with as they greeted different heroes themselves. "It's great to meet you."

"You as well," Zach replied. He lifted up his left hand, "You work with Captain Celebrity, right…" Zach paused for the woman about to shake his hand to give him her name.

---

14 Months Ago…

"Can someone tell me what the fuck is going on over there?!"

"The alarm stopped, but Carnage hasn't gotten in touch-"

"WAI-"

Deep underneath a Swiss night club in Geneva, a night club which was already mostly underground in the first place, a scream cut short but was loud enough that it shut most people up in the huge hollowed-out cavern around the corner. The ceiling had artificial lights stretching longways and hanging by chains, and there were over fifty people down below those lights standing at the sides of long tables covered in so much contraband that it would put every last one of them away for life if they were discovered by the heroes.

"Hey!" One of the two villains speaking up on an elevated section close to the hallway leading to the club's secret entrance called towards the voice that screamed but stopped before making a full word out. He looked at the guy on his right who had two orange claws instead of hands, but his comrade also had devices on his wrists with holes on the ends of them that started to spin slowly as he clicked his claws anxiously. "Did you hear, 'Wait?'"

"What's happening over there?"

"Is Lethali here yet?!"

"They're on their way. You three!" the man with orange claws who ignored his partner next to him yelled down to a group of villains standing at the base of some steps who had stopped working and were staring towards the same hall they had seemingly heard the shout come from too. The higher-up in the gang pointed his right claw towards the hall and nodded his head that direction, "Go check out what's taking them."

"That's what you just sent Franz to do!"

"Something's wrong here," the clawed-villain's partner muttered. He lifted up his phone while keeping his other hand firmly held on the hilt of the sidearm at his side. "Carnage, answer your God damned phone."

"Everybody!" The villains all looked to the opposite side as two of their executives as an actual leader in the gang came out of a lower hallway connecting to a darker part of this deep cavern. "We've got a situation-"

"Liam!" The man lowering his phone that was still ringing for Carnage upstairs yelled across the room. "I can't get Carnage-"

"Shut up!" Liam yelled, his voice shaking the lights on the ceiling and making several people in the room cover their ears. "Someone's attacking the club! Could be heroes, so start packing everything up! Lethali's going to be our evac, but we're not leaving any of this behind!"

"What if they find us?"

"There's no way they find the secret door in time…"

The two villains closest to the hall leading to the secret entrance each turned back away from Liam. They stared towards the shadows of that corner, and dread filled them both at the same time. They're already down here though. "Liam! That's not-"

Access lowered Franz's phone he had gone through and stolen all the information from. His photo library on there was full of pictures and videos of him and his friends, several of which showed them practicing with their Quirks on goats out in the mountains. The Access Panel on the back of the phone had already traced back all of his previous locations that were sent to their command post which Rebel was searching through now. The phone's information added to the ledger Zach had taken a picture of using his helmet's visor was creating a large pile of leads already. Zach stood pressed up just at the corner where he was out of sight of any of the villains in the next room. Ten others were stacked up just behind him, and they were all waiting for the signal from their leader who seemed to be taking too much time.

Zach's eyes scanned back and forth over his HUD though as Access sent photos all over their visors. He did not say a word, and everyone behind him memorized the faces and the Quirks they could see from as many villains as Franz had photos of. Zach was listening closely to the conversation in the next room, and he waited until the moment the villains closest to him started to yell to this 'Liam' who sounded in charge about the fact that he was already there. Their warning was not half finished when Zach's body erupted in Death and he shot out from around the corner at full tilt.

"OH SHIT!"

"IT'S DEATH!"

Zach's forces shot out around the corner behind him an instant later. Death was scary enough, but the number of dark figures sprinting around that corner at full speed made the men and women stumbling backwards yell out in horror or fall on their asses. Disorient, Zach darted back and forth, his darkness moving with him but slow enough on each run that wisps blocked part of his forces behind him and now all of them. Make them believe there're more of us, his enemies could not tell where the soldiers stopped or how many of them there were coming out of that corridor. Death's movements kept his numbers from being figured out, and the fact that he leapt straight over the elevated section and past a quarter of the enemies down below kept those farther back from pausing for a second to try and count and get a grip on the situation.

Over forty villains lost their bearings in the few seconds after Zach sprinted out from around the corner. The two who were higher-up spun and followed Death's trajectory across the room, and then they were launched from where they were standing by a rubbery forcefield that smashed into them right in their blindspot. The two hit the wall on the right of three other dark soldiers who ran by them, only for the fourth to stop and fire twice into the two of their necks as they dropped on the floor. The man with the weapons on his crab claws lifted one as he hit the ground, but the fact that he was only disoriented because of his hard shell did not stop Missappear from catching him in the gap of his armor between his neck and shoulders.

Liam was one of the few villains in the room who turned immediately and booked it back the way he came. Several others turned and sprinted after him, and Zach sped quicker to keep up and not let any of them escape. If there's another deeper part, Zach thought, wanting to stop those who were most capable of adapting from warning anyone else or getting a more organized defense ready against him. He sprinted past people while swinging his arms to the right and left, knocking over a dozen of them out in half as many steps.

"Hold them off!"

"Shoot them!"

"There aren't that ma-"

La Brava fired a live round into the kneecap of the woman shouting about their numbers while darting her eyes around the room from farther away. The woman's voice turned into a pain-filled scream which did the opposite of getting her comrades to fight back. La Brava lowered her rifle and released a sharp breath that she had held in while aiming across the room at that composed villain not running or panicking. She snapped her rifle back up though as the woman rose back onto one foot despite her other blown-out knee, and she glared straight across the room into La Brava's eyes…

Zach hit the end of the room and a group of five villains who had looked over their shoulders and seen so many others fall to Death when no one was fighting back. He was too fast to try and run from, but they had had the seconds to get ready. Two of them grabbed weapons from the table closest to the wide exit going deeper into the cavern where Zach had seen four people now get away. The back of the fourth was disappearing into the shadows behind the five men in front of him, and Zach slowed down himself instead of continuing to sprint forward as fast as he could.

I can't let them get away.

Over a block and a half away from the night club on the surface, there were a pair of cellar doors that led into the basement of a bar. The basement was where the establishment's empty kegs were kept and empty bottles were brought every night to be brought out once a week for recycling rather than thrown away with the rest of the trash. In a corner of that bar's cellar around a musty corner with a hot water machine and boiler that barely anyone went near, a stone door slid to the side and revealed a pitch black tunnel behind.

"Should we set off the traps?" A female villain asked as she shimmied behind the six and a half foot tall brute with a single shiny horn on his forehead. She was just a little less muscular than him, and he had to squeeze himself into the cobweb-covered gap in the basement that made him spit and wipe his hands across his face to get all the webs off. "They could be chasing us," her voice was low and she heard the gunfire behind her echoing down the caves.

"It's set up as a maze…" the man in front of her started in a low voice too. "But depending on the hero," he grimaced and glanced over his shoulder. "No. Liam would kill us if we tried it."

She nodded her head quickly and then headed farther into the room. "Do we own this place too?" She wondered with a glance up, hearing music coming from above them. The question completely changed the conversation and suggested their previous one was never be spoken of again by either of them.

The man she asked it to kept looking behind them though, his brow furrowing anxiously as sounds of a fight started too soon after Liam told him to get to the 'back entrance.' "Corno. It's up to you." She brought it back up in a lower voice much more serious this time.

"To do what?"

The voice that questioned her came from through the corridor just in front of Corno. Part of Liam was already showing as his hand had reached forward and gripped the inside of the door, but Corno's body had blocked it from the other villain who walked farther inside before turning and mentioning it. Corno turned his head with his expression dark as he glared towards the one who just suggested what Liam thought she had, her eyes opening huge as she saw the four figures coming out at once. Liam took a step into the room and slammed his hand onto the wall on his right and up above a ring on a pipe going along the wall. The ground below them trembled as his hand pushed into an unseen panel in that wall.

Three of the other men who entered into the basement behind their leader looked worried. Liam kept a calm look on his face though, and he glanced back and nodded at the last man in behind him who shut the door that the low rumbling sound continued from in the deeper distance. Liam then turned and stared towards the woman with short maroon-colored hair that fell evenly around her head just above her shoulders. "Liam," she began. "I was just suggesting… that if you were all caught already, it might be better for Corno to just blow the tunnel without you."

Liam's eyebrows rose and he stopped where he was. The other four in the room all turned and stared in surprise at the woman who just came straight out and said that. "HA! Haha," Liam stopped himself and glanced back towards that tunnel behind him again that was blocked off now. "Well, at least she's honest," he said, grinning at the guys behind him as if he had only turned around to say that to them.

"Liam, this is no time for this," one of the others behind him hissed. "Where is Lethali? If he's outside let's-"

"You know how many of our buyers have already put in advances for what we just left back there?" Liam wondered to the nervous man with buck teeth who froze with his mouth open and now his lips shaking too. "You know how many deals I'm in the middle of right now, that the sellers and buyers are all going to be after me for because I just lost it all to Death, of all people?" Liam smirked and he shook his head while the eyes of the two behind him who had no idea about Death's appearance opened huge. "When Lethali comes, we split up into two of his vehicles. Kill the drivers and meet up the place we had the party for Franz's divorce last week."

The way Liam worded it made the others in the room dart their eyes around wondering if the room was bugged. The woman with maroon-colored hair just stared straight at Liam though, and she asked in a low voice, "You really think we can run from them all? The heroes, and everyone else who will come looking for us?"

"You don't even know who 'everyone else' is, Vannessa," Liam replied, his voice lowering as he said her name. His eyebrows narrowed down the bridge of his nose, and he wondered, "So what is there to be worried about?"

"She's right," Corno disagreed. "We have to go, and it can't just be to the mountains." Liam's entire expression darkened as Corno gave away part of the location that he had coded himself for only those around him to understand in case anyone was listening. "We need to get out of the country. Far from where anyone can find us. If Death's after us. Us? The guys coming we worked with must've been in that League, or at least working for them, and Death tracked us through them."

Liam grimaced and Corno's eyes grew wide. "You knew?" He asked one of his bosses, the only one still with them it seemed.

"I know," Liam corrected into the present tense. "And I know it's not all over just because of this mess up. I have money hidden away. Contacts I can get in touch with to get us out of the country," Liam smiled again and walked forward. He lifted his right hand, and he patted it down on Corno's shoulder. He squeezed and gave the larger man on his side with a single horn on his forehead an understanding and also vulnerable look as for the first time, some anxiety showed on Liam's face. "It's not a place we want to find ourselves in, but we're in it now. Let's get the fuck out of here, yeah?"

"Yeah," a man behind Liam with a long tongue and rough green skin agreed, feeling more confident now that he heard Liam sounding anxious himself. It felt like they were all in the same boat here. "So where's Lethali? How far?"

Liam lifted up his phone and then put it back down. He looked up and opened his mouth to reply how it would not be long, despite the lack of any message updating him on their evac's arrival time. He froze though and his eyes snapped straight at the hidden doorway in the corner of the damp crowded basement. Others started looking back, and two rose up their automatic rifles at that moment. Another shot up to the ceiling and stuck to it, his body connecting on all fours but his lizard-shaped head pointed down and aimed at the door that his glowing green eyes narrowed on.

The three who were quickest to get out of there with Liam were not going to let themselves get caught now. Corno stepped backwards, glancing to his side to the double steel doors that closed in the cellar from the sidewalk above where deliveries could be brought in from. He shifted his gaze next to him at Vannessa to see if she was going to try fighting or running. He had no idea that it was Death until a few seconds ago, but he did not know if that made him believe it was more or less likely that they could win this fight.

Zach had been searching for a secret passage deep in the dark tunnels only illuminated by his glowing red vision. He was certain he found where the group he was chasing had exited through, but he did not know if they were just on the other side or if they had continued running after and he needed to speed through to keep chasing them. So he only just started sliding the wall open when he heard a voice that abruptly stopped in that same moment. A second had passed now, and it was coming on two while he stood there with the door cracked open and an unknown amount of villains on the other side with an unknown ability set.

He had had no communication with anyone else since the tunnel collapsed behind him and almost caught him too. He had been just at the edge of the collapse though and crawled out from under the rubble that dropped on top of him, and his black armor was covered in brown dust and dirt now. Dark wisps came out of his arms and legs, and his panting stopped as that voice cut off abruptly. He only started hearing it once he opened the secret door, and only in that moment did he realize he was about to sprint right out to chase after the villains right in front of him. I'm hesitating. I didn't have a plan! Zach was frozen in place, imagining guns pointed straight at the door he was about to go through. Do I have enough Death left right now to go immaterial? Not on my whole body.

"Villains." Zach spoke in a deep and scratchy voice that was modulated even lower-pitched through his helmet. "Lower your weapons and put your hands behind your heads." On the other side of the door, the villains watched as dark wisps snuck around the crack in the door. They snaked out into the basement in a way meant to be creepy and menacing. The villains on the other side did not budge nor make a sound.

"Gah-"

Zach slammed the door open and rushed inside. Bang bang- Zach pulled to the side and dodged the first two bullets that were already off their mark in the first place. Liam was opening his mouth to yell out but his breath caught in his throat as he heard the 'Gah' behind him that sounded like it came from Corno. Zach entered the room and stopped where he was too, his red eyes darting from behind his visor to lock on the woman who just pushed the rifle in one of her other comrade's hands to point up at the villain on the ceiling who was in the middle of turning around as well with shock covering his face.

Liam's eyes did not dart to the doors leading down to the cellar. Instinctively, he spun straight to the woman who without missing a beat pulled away the rifle she had pointed up while her comrade was still firing. She spun it to Liam only to get flung backwards as he yelled out, "BITCH!"

He snapped his head to the left while still screaming, "AND AS FOR YOU!" His voice shook the building and the music upstairs cut off, screams heard instead and the ceiling over them shaking as people were running through the bar.

Zach darted the opposite direction as the vocal attack was coming from. Similar to Arma. It's a cramped space- but hard getting close! Zach leapt backwards and blocked the front of his body with a wind of Death as another villain started firing at him.

The gun shooting at him had a bullet fired into its barrel, and it ripped apart as the villain shot again into a broken barrel that made his gun break and metal shards to cut through his hands. Zach shot out of the darkness straight towards another villain who was getting up and raising hands with green vines coming out of his palms covered in thorns that dripped purple liquid. That villain was aiming to the right side of the Death cloud where the wisps were starting to move as if someone behind them was running that direction, but that was what Zach wanted him to think so he could catch the man with the jaw-breaking knee that dropped him to the floor unconscious.

"Don't move Death, or I gut the bitch." Zach turned his head slightly and looked to Liam who stood behind the woman he had hoisted up to her wobbly feet. He had a knife around her front with the sharp point turned in towards her stomach. The pistol she had used to fire through one of her comrade's gun barrels was discarded to the side with some of her blood on it. Her right hand dripped with it and twitched at her side, her eyes looked half closed, and she stared towards Death in fear as Liam threatened to open her up.

Another villain with bloodied hands got up and took a step back, pulling out his sidearm and ignoring the pain in his bloodied hands. Death hesitated, but Vannessa could see the buck-toothed villain was about to shoot him. She could tell that if Death attacked that other villain, Liam was going to cut her open. She knew Death could see that as well. And then she was standing in Liam's position with one arm around his neck and her other hand holding a knife of her own into his gut. Liam's face could not have looked more surprised as he felt the hilt of his blade slip out of his fingers, "What?"

Death rushed the villain in front of him who he saw get distracted by the reversal of Liam and Vannessa's positions. Liam's expression flipped instantly. His free hand swung around to catch the hilt he had dropped in shock, his eyes darting to the side as he was going to swing quicker than the woman in his old place could stab him. If I just-

Death froze where he was. Vannessa could see that the villain looking her and Liam's way was pulling the trigger even if he was distracted. She suddenly stood where he had been, and the other villain whose place she traded with fired the gun in the hand of the arm wrapped around Liam's neck. That man let go quickly as he realized he was behind his leader, but as he was leaning back like that, Liam flipped into Vannessa's place which was where the man who just fired had been a moment ago. Liam spun himself with his knife jolting short as he was about to stab the only guy still loyal to him left in the room, but he was nowhere near that villain anymore and stopped short of stabbing Death who finally punched a fist covered in Death into Liam's face and knocked him out.

Vannessa kicked backwards and nailed her "comrade" in the gut. Her hands pressed into the floor and she kicked the back of her right heel up under the man's jaw as his body hunched over from the kick in the gut. Then she spun and caught his gun, and she pointed it behind her straight at the dark figure instead of the man dropping to the ground, already knocked out from the devastating blow to the head. She turned a second after pointing her gun and glared at the dark figure who looked back at her and did not raise up his arms.

She turned on them masterfully. Like she's been planning it, Zach thought, and he trusted his instinct on the matter just as Liam had known who it was who took down Corno behind him. "I'm fine," Zach said, hearing voices again in his helmet and Darling yelling at the others to make sure he was alright. "Stay on mission. I chased down the others."

"You really fucked everything up," Vannessa kept her pistol raised for another moment before lowering it. Her expression was still dark and pissed-off at the terrorist in front of her. "I'm not really a part of this villain organization."

Zach nodded. "Who are you?" He wondered, his voice still modulated in its deep voice.

Rebel perked up behind his computer and leaned forward interestedly at what he was hearing. "This was a two year operation you just ruined," the woman seethed, her eyes darting around at the group around her and specifically at Liam who Death knocked out rather than just took down so she could at least get something out of him. Her eyes rose back up and stared harshly at the shorter man in front of her who she noted at, "You haven't even asked if I was just turning on my comrades here, to try and make a deal with Death."

"You're not a villain," Zach said, shaking his head as he could tell that the disappointment on her face was real. He had been able to see it even as they were fighting. Like she knew that this moment was ruining months of work. "So what are you doing here, with them? You mentioned a 'two year' operation?"

"I'm an American spy, not a hero," she replied to the boy who she spoke to in English with an American accent now. That's a possibility, Zach thought as he looked at the woman whose words he questioned considering the occupation she just admitted to. "I work for the CIA," she continued to the black helmet in front of her with no emotion for her to make out, only body language for her to try and decipher.

"Why would you tell me that?" Zach asked her. CIA agents wouldn't just-

"Because the Army of Death are not the agency's enemies," she replied to the boy who was very surprised to hear that and glad the visor covered up the look that appeared on his face.

Rebel's face scrunched up and Zach heard his voice in his head, "Huhhh?"

"Only Mark Smith is-" Vannessa continued on.

"I don't know what you're talking about," Death said.

"Of course," the woman replied with a curt nod that was a step away from rolling her eyes at Death.

She has a strong Quirk. Skills in close-quarters combat. Great aim. Not unlike Mark, Zach admitted to himself. "If you've been here for so long," Zach started. "Then what were you waiting for? Back there was enough evidence to get everyone here a life sentence, thrice."

Rebel smirked and held back his snicker as he was the only one who heard Zach say that. He turned to Rampart and swung his left arm, then he rubbed his thumb and index fingers together with a smirk covering his face that made his comrade in the command center stare back in disbelief and then annoyance as he lost their bet. Vannessa did not look to think it was weird that Death used the word 'thrice' normally in a sentence even though Rebel was having the time over it.

"You think a single night club and some drugs and arms were the target here? These guys are well connected with dozens of high-level operators for smuggling of all kinds. Supplying hundreds of villain groups between them." She glared down at Liam's body and continued darkly, "I'm after bigger fish. You have no idea how many big shots are connected with the black market trade in Geneva. It connects the whole world, and you ruined my infiltration into the higher levels of that black market by coming here."

"I do have an idea of how connected they were," Zach countered to the woman in front of him. "It was Zolo-"

"You may have taken down Zolo, but he had many powerful subordinates," Vannessa snapped and interrupted the younger man in front of her. "Those high-priority villains did not start fighting for power. Instead, they're working together to keep the black market going-"

"Then I'll take all of them down too," Zach said. He cut her off this time and then continued without pause, "You have no idea how much longer your infiltration would have taken you or if you'd even be able to get all that information. You were too slow, that's all there is to it," Death paused and then shook his head. "I'm not wasting time arguing with you about this." It's a difference in methodology. "Just like I wasted no time destroying this operation. Now I'm moving on to the others connected with this one before they catch on to what happened here and scatter."

"It's not that simple," Vannessa argued, though frustrated herself as there was not much for her to do here anymore. "Damn it," she growled. "The authorities will be here soon. And Lethali's men are on his way here now. You know Lethali?"

She seems fairly knowledgeable about the workings of Zolo's under-gangs. Two years worth of experience, Zach shook his head at the woman in front of him. "But Beta squad is having trouble with the vehicles coming here. My men were supposed to be making some noise, but something's gone wrong."

"The villains here had a team of mercenaries on standby who are called on to deal with these kind of situations," Vannessa replied. "Lethali was notified that something was going down at the club. He's a deadly man himself, but his pet boy, Vorb, is the most dangerous of the bunch. His Quirk turns him into a snake with skin as hard as rock. Very deadly. I believe he has ties to Eziano." Vannessa paused and then asked with her expression tensed and her voice straining to make the request, "If you would let me stay, and help you… I am willing to work alongside you for a while, so that I can hopefully finish my mission with more results and not return home a disgrace after wasting two years of my life."

"That's fine," Zach replied. Didn't even have to ask, he thought, while keeping the fact that he was about to request something similar out of his voice. She looked surprised at his response, but she recovered quickly and nodded her head with an intense and distrusting look on her face for how quickly he answered. "You can help us anyway with interrogation as you know these people and what will work on them most efficiently so we can move faster and on to more powerful and vicious targets."

This kid's a- he's a brat! Treating me like my information can just be useful? Like he'd make do with or without me, Vannessa held her tongue as she had been the one to make the request to stay on in the first place. I'm just a side thought to him.

"We'll take these five with us. The heroes are already at the club. I doubt anyone in Lethali's group will turn on Eziano but we'll see how interrogation goes," Zach looked behind Vannessa and up at the opening steel doors to the sidewalk of the street next to the bar. Vannessa spun around and lifted up the pistol in her hand, and she came face to face with half a dozen dark soldiers aiming right back down at her. Her eyes grew wide, and then she turned to her side as Death walked past her at a brisk pace. "Get them into the vehicles."

He was lying about his team having trouble? Checking to see if I was going to turn on them?! Or was it to judge my reaction…

Death did not slow down as some of his men ran past him. A few were giving the woman behind Zach strange looks, but he continued loudly, "She's coming with us as a temporary consultant. Keep helmets on and move out. We're moving on to the Indigo production plant underneath the Labberwagon car factory in Munich. It appears on the ledger more times than anything over the past week, so the drug is spreading…"

---

"This another one on your list?" Death wondered to the woman on his right who was wearing a black helmet to keep her identity secret, as Zach had suggested to her five raids back after the first operation where one of their targets had slipped through their fingers. Vannessa was staring past Death at a chair an Israeli man was tied to in the next room shouting answers to the three dark figures surrounding him asking questions and threatening him. There was red paint splashed around the floor of the wall, and right as the leader of the gang and direct contact of Zolo's had been dragged in, he had seen an unconscious body of one of his lieutenants drenched in red getting dragged out the other side of the room.

Nothing held him back from yelling everything he knew, and he knew quite a lot. Vannessa nodded her head slowly as she watched the villain yell all this information without the least amount of physical torture other than how roughly the dark soldiers had tied him to that chair. Her initial misgivings and hesitation to come with Death and his group of international terrorists had all but faded into the back of her mind.

How long has it been? I'm not tired at all, but they're not slowing down, her eyes darted to her right and the shorter man at her side who was looking through the one-way mirror at their terrified target who it took the last three raids to finally pin down the location of. This is the most influential of all of Zolo's men who I thought was responsible for keeping the others together. Who the hell is Amaterasu? He was considering turning on King?!

"I've heard that name once before," Zach muttered. "Recently… The last villain mentioned how she rivaled the League of Shadows. Didn't convince me then. Less convincing now. Seems she wants to take some of their power rather than she had a similar amount. Figure out what else he knows about them," Zach finished as an order to the men inside who were mainly finding things out about Zolo's organization and how things had started adjusting since his arrest. King's lieutenants apparently were acting as superiors to the subordinates of Zolo, though they were also keeping their activities and locations secret from even those uppermost members which Zach's comrades were pretty sure was true when the villain they were interrogating started crying in fear while yelling how he really did not know.

"He may have considered it," Vannessa started. "But it's clear that King's in charge still. More than ever…" Her eyes grew wide at what the crying villain in front of them started saying was all he knew about King's current agenda other than what the Shadow Boss's lieutenants had relayed to him. Vannessa looked to her side at the kid and stared at the side of his dark helmet with her expression shaken, though the boy's body did not react in the same way. He just kept staring through the glass even as his own subordinates froze up and listened with worried looks and anger spreading over their masked faces.

"Stay calm. Knock him out and get out of there. We'll call in heroes and move. Now," Zach ordered it in his firmest voice and shook the other three back into the present. He tilted his head back and ground his teeth, King's after the heroes who took down their HQ? He's no longer in the shadows, so to him it's all out war then. And I didn't just come after him myself. I brought heroes into it. I made this a fight between us and him, and the heroes too! Fuck- Jupiter? And Drop-Mujer's accident was no accident! FUCK! He's put hits out and has Eziano working with him. All the world's assassins targeting the world's strongest heroes. As fast as I move, I can't counteract all the negative impacts that losing top heroes will have to a nation, let alone several countries!

I need more men. I need to spread everyone out farther, and I need someone closer to King! I need to intermittently take out King's men and figure out who's on his current hit list at each interval. Warn them. Protect them. I can assume the entire ADTF. But were Harriman and Yankee Woman targets too or just killed in villain incidents normally? The rate of hero deaths is speeding up. I should have realized. Is this a warning from him to stop? Getting King on the first raid was vital and we let him slip away. He's gone with the Digger and his best men, and the world's going to pay the price for it now. Every second wasted is a second he's gathering new strength and regrouping from his losses.

Amaterasu can wait. Whoever they are, they may one day become the biggest threat. I have to focus on the current danger though. King may be as protected as it gets, but there's one more Shadow Boss who will give me every bit of information that Turbo and Zolo would have had that I couldn't get with them going straight into the heroes' hands. Bolivar is the next target. Saving heroes and stopping all the villains along the way, making sure he doesn't see me coming for him. He's priority one. "With this, your bosses will be more than satisfied," Zach started.

Vannessa froze while looking at the shorter figure who turned and looked into her eyes. She was a few inches taller than him, but his figure appeared more imposing than ever to her. Vannessa looked at this boy who she knew was only seventeen years old. He's given me far more than I could have ever expected my operation to get. He has men calling in tips to heroes all over with this information we're getting. "Anonymous" tips worded so precisely, but in such a way that most won't even be able to tell where it came from! "I, have to thank you-"

"You helped me as well," Zach countered with a shake of his head back at the CIA agent. "Your information was vital and I appreciated your help. I believe we moved faster because you were here with us."

"This isn't over," Vannessa began. She hesitated, and she gulped when he kept staring straight at her awaiting to hear her continue. "In the past day…" the anger she had before was no longer in her voice after seeing how this boy fought for the past day she had spent almost constantly by his side. "You got far more than I ever did. Everyone I was after. Their safe-houses. Businesses that worked with them. Names and phone numbers of more, locations of distant organizations." They weren't even asking about those groups! The villains, they just told them everything. I've never seen people so afraid!

Is this every day here? How strong are they really? What we know from the League of Shadows' raid suggested they were far weaker than the ADTF they went in with! This- this wasn't anything like what I'd heard…

Things are moving quicker. I think she thinks we've always been like this. The last few days alone though, I've doubled how fast we're moving. I need to. And yet, Zach thought about what the villain his comrades had just knocked unconscious had to say about the vast network of villains that existed throughout the world. The underworld was enormous and every operation he went on, he wondered if two more bases of villains sprouted up at the same time it took him to take that one down. I have to be making a dent! Villain incidents are down, but it's not the hit I needed them to take! The world's teetering on the edge, and there's no time to let her come to her own decision.

"Doing things this way though," Vannessa started. She looked hesitantly at the leader of the terrorist group who she posed a question at, "How long will they be in jail for? So many are not caught in the act but just found unconscious, and only with their outstanding warrants-"

"Many have prior convictions," Gentle remarked, and Vannessa turned her head to see the Gentle Criminal had entered the room with his helmet on. He had a purple visor and purple cape, but she knew from earlier when he had taken his helmet off in front of everyone despite Death's orders for them to keep identities hidden around her. He was mostly in disguise from his infiltration into the club though, and he had not seemed against someone seeing his face and knowing who he was. He continued to the woman as he wore his full AoD armor now though, "And thus the gun charges will give them long prison sentences." Most of the villains they left behind had their weapons and drugs covered in their fingerprints littered around their unconscious and broken bodies.

"All will be arrested for being in these villain groups, for intent to carry out villainous acts based on all the evidence we have left behind," Gentle spoke down to the woman questioning their methods that had been working perfectly so far.

"We know how to make it so villains receive their due punishments," Zach said sternly while facing Vannessa. "And you've seen it. You know it's working."

Vannessa's frown shook and her face scrunched up frustratedly. She nodded her head though, and then she froze in place as Death asked her, "And we're in need of more people to help us. Care to stay?"

Gentle did not turn away or even get a surprised look on his face at this point. He had seen this coming from the moment Zach had this woman follow them along. She spun to Gentle and then back to Death though, sheer shock on her face at the suggestion. "Is it really that simple for you?" Vannessa asked. Her thoughts on their entire organization were shaken as she wondered about all the other terrorists she had been working with and had been starting to feel like were more of just a group of vigilantes than international villains. Zach did not respond and just waited for an answer from the woman who got an even angrier look on her face at what he was asking her to do.

"I had to be vetted for years to get to where I was in the CIA. To become a spy and do what I do. To be trusted for that kind of work- and you would just have me join you in an instant? You still don't know that I'm really who I say I am! If I was a smart villain I could have gotten us to this point easily, and you'd be offering me a place in your organization right now!"

"The CIA sucks," Zach said. Her jaw dropped and Gentle smirked off to the side of the room. In the next room over, a man who had avoided Vannessa all day kept his mouth shut though he was feeling anxious about this as he knew he was a target of the CIA. Mark's eyes opened wide though while he listened in to the conversation in the room behind him, "The 'Mark Smith' you think is your enemy fled the agency because they were forcing him to blood-bend on prisoners. Torture that he couldn't do anymore because he's a great person. He left, only to learn that leaving wasn't an option for them."

"And in your group people can just leave at any-"

"My people can leave," Zach interrupted harshly as the woman was countering angrily something that was indeed true. She froze again, and he continued at her in a lower voice, "They have left before if they thought I did something that went too far, or if I asked too much of them, and I didn't hunt them down." Zach glared at the woman in front of him who stood still with a stunned look on her face. "I told them goodbye and thanked them for all their help and service. I told them that they may have been leaving now but what they did while they were here helped a lot of people. I regret losing them, but I would never consider hunting down my comrades because they did what they thought was right and left. Your organization cannot say the same."

"Now do you think that in the rest of your life working with the CIA, you'll be able to stop more than one, maybe two other villain groups?" Zach asked it of her and rose his tone to see if she had an answer for him. "The way you think you have to do things. The way you had been doing them, you could maybe stop some villains once every few years. Do you think you can go back to doing that now that you've seen how fast we operate? Vannessa," Zach stepped towards the woman and repeated himself. "I offer you a place in my Army."

He's… serious.

"We need more people. We need recruits, and pre-trained ones are best. Vigilantes, former heroes, and secret agents and spies." Zach paused and then told her from his heart, "You'd be helping me save the world. Not just protecting America's interests or spying for some distant 'long-term' results." Zach's voice rose and Vannessa stared with awe as he declared, "I want an immediate change in the number of villains in the world. A significant drop in the rate of villain incidents. Extinction of firearms and large-scale bombs. Eradication of drugs like Riot and V and Indigo and Double Trig, and so many others. I want to make it where civilians aren't being killed by villains every day, where citizens aren't caught in crossfires of battles, and innocent people aren't losing family members for nothing. Can you join me, and make that into a reality?"

Vannessa shook her head around. Snap out of it! She had been entranced by how much conviction was in his voice as he requested this of her. Vannessa froze though as she opened her mouth to deny him. Everything he just said echoed in her mind. As his words bounced around in her head, she saw herself in grade school with a piece of construction paper on her desk and crayons in hand. She leaned away from the paper that her teacher looked down at then smiled up at her, telling her 'I think you would make a great hero.' The picture of the little girl with maroon hair and a cape of the same color flying across the sky with a 'V' in the middle of her chest and on the back of her cape, turned into a white paper showing her the terrible scores on her practical exam to get into the hero high schools she had applied for.

And then she saw the woman with long black hair in a business suit who sat across a table from her while she was strapped into a polygraph test. She saw the others falling behind her as they ran around the track without using any Quirks, as all of them needed to be able to show usefulness while acting Quirkless. Vannessa saw the chart with names in the program dropping below her, her name rising up that list, and then the board of high-ranking officers sitting in front of her behind a long table as she was interviewed.

Then everything faded, coming back to show her in the deep cavern basement of a Swiss night club where a homeless thief trying to steal from behind a bar had been dragged. She heard her own laughter echo in her mind over the sound of Death's offer, as she watched that man so hungry for food used as target practice for her comrades in the gang she had infiltrated. And then she saw her own arm raise with the pistol in her grip that she aimed straight at the screaming man's head-

"I won't join you."

Vannessa said it before she could question herself for another second. What am I thinking? He's a charismatic person. But the entire world has declared the Army of Death a terrorist organization. It doesn't matter what they believe they are. They've angered the entire world. And yet, they reacted so strongly when Wikiyak talked about hunting the very heroes tasked with taking them down! They're, they're better than… "I can't join you," she continued, though her voice was not as quick and snappy as what she just said. "I can't abandon the oaths I took."

"That's admirable," Gentle remarked. "For a government lapdog-"

"Gentle," Zach said sternly, quieting his comrade to his side. "Can I get you to reconsider?" Zach asked, his voice taking a pleading tone that made Gentle grimace and look at the younger man angrily for lowering himself with no sense of pride. "We know we're fighting an uphill battle. But I won't give up. I won't stop until it's over."

"If you keep moving at this pace," Vannessa started, her voice lowering. Her eyes shifted to the floor and she said in a dark tone, "You're all going to get killed."

"Not if experienced, skilled people like yourself join us," Zach countered. She tensed up and rose her gaze again to meet his dark visor.

Zach reached up and grabbed the side of his helmet as she faced him again with her look more shaken than it had been yet. "Don't-" Vannessa started, but Zach continued and pulled his helmet off in front of her. "Why… would you trust me?" She asked it through a strained voice, her eyes shaking as she looked at this teenage Japanese boy who looked back at her in a steady way but at the same time hopeful for her to change her mind.

"Because I can't waste time doubting everyone around me. We fought together in battle. I trust you want what's best for this world," Zach said it as if it was that simple. "Don't you believe the same about us?"

We have the same goal? Is that what you're trying to say?! It's not that easy, to just turn on everything I've spent my adult life… This is Lifebringer. "I…" she paused. I want to. "I can't," she whispered. "I'm sorry," she added on top of that, shaking her head and losing the hesitation on her face which told Zach that his efforts were for naught. "My job is important. You may not think it's as important as what you do… and I might, not either," Gentle's eyebrows rose and he looked at the woman who was surprising him with this response. She looked seriously straight into Zach Sazaki's hazel eyes, "But I believe in it. In our methods. Your 'Army' is no army at all. It can't survive in this world without any help. It just can't…"

Zach's eyes grew wider. The way she trailed off and the thoughtful yet anxious look on her face suggested to him what she was considering. She pursed her lips, but then she said to him anyway, "I will help you though. If you even need it. Zach Sazaki-"

"Death," Zach corrected her.

She paused and got a confused look on her face why he would correct her when he just took his helmet off anyway. Vannessa shook her head though and then continued, "Death. I don't know how it is I can help you. I cannot join you myself, but I won't do anything to stop you. It is not in the CIA's best interest to take you down. I will make sure that remains the company line."

"I cannot promise you that I will be able to help even if you ask. I will promise you this, however: Anything you need from me that is within my power, I will help you. You have given me so much more than I can repay. I will do what I can to pay back that debt though…"

---

Present

"You work with Captain Celebrity, right…"

"Vannessa. Vannessa Johnson," the American woman in front of Zach responded when she took his left hand in hers and shook it. "And yes, I work for Captain Celebrity as an assistant and the lead of his support staff."

"I saw Captain Celebrity recently on the news," Zach continued, measuring responses in his peripheral vision as did Vannessa in front of him. "Do the American authorities know yet what happened in Arizona?"

"Captain Celebrity has not heard much news on a conclusive analysis other than what's been publicly reported, though he has access to a little more such as how the Freedom Fighters who were captured gave conflicting reports. Even the ones who agreed they were responsible for Gondorhan."

Vannessa spoke without worrying that the ERT was listening. She had collapsed into its smaller size to put in her pocket like most of the others, but first she had removed the microphone from it just as Zach had subtly done when no one was looking so he was not as concerned about eavesdropping either. He kept Jirou in his sight anyway, knowing he had to be cautious of her even if she thought he was just speaking to some random support staff member of an American hero agency.

Conflicting reports in taking credit for the crime means the Freedom Fighters don't actually know what happened. Unfortunate.

"…Some of them claimed they would never have gone so far, but Captain Celebrity just thinks that many of them were left in the dark by the more extreme villains who did not want to lose their loyalty." The woman paused then added, "Which could be why they did not claim responsibility earlier on."

"What else could it have been?" Zach wondered. He asked it as if the explanation "Captain Celebrity" had determined was the most valid explanation they had.

"The town is still quarantined. Unconfirmed photos I saw online of the bodies inside the town showed similar matters of death across the board, heroes and citizens, villains in their jail cells, a mother in the middle of labor, children at school."

"Were the symptoms they displayed similar to what we're seeing here?" Zach's mouth moved in a different way than the words that came out of his mouth. Once again it looked like he mouthed the words 'Captain Celebrity' as if that was the focus on their conversation. Vannessa kept speaking, though she was surprised to see the amazing false movements of his lips that she envied and told herself in that moment to practice as she saw him using that skill in the perfect moment for it.

Vannessa wished she had the skill too for how she was about to respond, as she stopped speaking in the same manner and got a more serious look on her face as she responded to Zach Sazaki. "That is what I am here to discern." She reached up and tightened the straps on her mask, pulled her safety glasses tight, and she nodded at Lifebringer with a serious look that appeared to conceal her excitement as she showed her intensity off to the most famous hero of Japan.

Even with the safety gear it's not a sure thing she would be safe here. Zach smiled as the woman turned and started away from him. I respected her decision then, even if it wasn't what I needed at the time. And I respect that she's here now, trying to save millions from the terrible fate she is privy to about Arizona.

You kept your word. Informing me on info about Gondorhan I would not have known otherwise. We can't speak to each other for long now or we'll draw attention to us. I am able to have a longer conversation later with the woman who I just got to know here and who it won't be strange if I go to talk to again now that we're acquainted. Zach glanced towards Captain Celebrity then turned and made his way a different direction. He had to look one last time to make sure it was clear that he was hoping to get a free moment to go talk to him, even though he did not see anyone watching him.

What are the chances the first person Sazaki spoke to here was that woman? I don't know her. I knew almost everyone who arrived on the American team, Star-Spangled Man continued speaking with the others on the TST without looking towards Zach or the woman who just had a conversation that looked cordial but showed no signs of the two of them having met before. Is she one of his? That's a jump to the most extreme conclusion. But I know his power. It's not impossible. Exhaust every possibility without losing any time that needs to be spent tracking our enemies here. I cannot allow Death to roam free any longer.

"Alright everyone! Gather up!" Yue Fei ran into the hologram. His appearance was flustered but he composed himself as the heroes started rushing back around the machine that Yue Fei's face was shown clearly above. "The United States, Canada, Mexico, Romantro, and Turkey have all instituted a mandatory 24 hour quarantine of all arrivals from China," he spoke frustratedly and yet kept his voice steady and intense as he moved past it without criticizing their actions.

"Don't they know the virus is not spreading person-to-person?" Jedenwurst questioned. "This step seems to do no good for anyone."

"Foreign governments and their authorities are not willing to risk the preliminary information being wrong and the virus potentially spreading in their countries," Yue Fei rationalized their actions without changing his expression that was in disagreement with them. Calling this a second Gondorhan may have gotten the massive response I needed, but it's also created the biggest possible stigma about the virus. "The people of their countries don't know if we're hiding things from them so many demanded an action like that. Hopefully those countries stay the odd ones out, and the sentiment does not spread everywhere."

I understand with the U.S., Jirou admitted to herself. After Gondorhan I can't see how they'd risk this coming back around.

"We might be here because it's the right thing, but governments represent the people's interests. Not ours," Francois spoke and Jedenwurst turned his head as he felt the Frenchman's eyes on him.

"Our interests are the people's-"

"They get to decide that for themselves," Francois said with his eyes narrowing more as Jedenwurst started to counter him. "That's why we live in a democracy. No hero unelected by the public, has the right to overthrow its leadership."

"Francois, we understand that sentiment here very well. Just leave it for-" The Wall started.

"I will not apologize for arresting villains. And I stand by what I have done," Jedenwurst countered the others who did not hide their harsher looks towards him now that it was out in the open. Some people around the world had even been calling for Jedenwurst to receive an Arutu Peace Prize, which did not sit right with the heroes who due to Jedenwurst had to fight more villains trying to take advantage of weakened governments. Jedenwurst went on with his eyes shifting to a glaring Szechuman on his right, "If it took what I said to galvanize your people, and your fellow heroes-"

"And because of that we now face a crisis with no central government!" Szechuman yelled at Jedenwurst who froze with his mouth open. Szechuman's expression got darker and he growled with half the room sweating under the tension thick enough to cut with a knife, "How many people will die here because we didn't have the response time we would have, with a-"

"You're wrong." Szechuman stopped and he snapped his head only to freeze as he looked to the teenager with black hair staring straight at him. "Jedenwurst only did what was right. No one can see the future. Two days ago we had no idea what was happening here or how bad it was." Zach's eyes narrowed at the second ranked Chinese hero who started looking angrier, and he told the man, "Your government knew about and funded the development of weapons with capacities that exceeded international standards. Do you deny it or do you believe the Chinese government was above the law? Or was it really just the people here demanding you heroes take action which caused you to finally act?"

"Lifebringer's right," Zach watched as Szechuman paused again with his mouth opening to turn to another teenager from Japan who stepped forward away from Star-Spangled Man who looked over the boy's head and straight at Szechuman which is what actually caused that hero to stay quiet. Deku looked Zach's way as his friend turned his head partially to the side and made eye contact with him. Thanks, Midoriya, Zach thought as he looked to his friend who backed him up there. Then the curlier-haired boy in all green spoke up in a calm and more appeasing voice, "We have to stop all villains, no matter who they are. No one could have seen this coming, and it doesn't make Jedenwurst's actions-"

"The consequences of what he did are not seen here in China alone-" Francois interrupted.

"ENOUGH!" Yue Fei yelled as Jedenwurst's mouth was opening to retort about taking down their own leaders, which Francois was dealing with fallout of himself since President Chuvreaux and most of the executive branch had been removed or resigned over. "Leave your petty quarrels for another time, heroes. With permission from Pi Leng, governor of the Gangwe region, I am declaring martial law." Yue Fei stated it and made the two European heroes stare at him with their expressions hardening instantly at the new drastic measure Yue Fei was taking despite how low the death toll for this incident still was.

"Isn't that, a bit excessive?" Captain Celebrity began hesitantly.

Yue Fei paused. He stood there and his expression got more grim. His eyes lowered from the heroes all looking to him, and he bit down behind his lips. Zach's eyes shifted towards Francois who was focused back on the hologram but still had a bubbling frustration in his eyes. I'm glad Francois is here on this team, Zach thought. I don't trust him. If he would allow the Fundonte to get away with what they did just for the possibility of future victories, that's not a heroic move. He probably wished his government had weapons of mass destruction hidden away. And in a situation like this where heroes are given so much power, I need to keep an eye on what he may try to do here…

"I need you all to get started on your mission objectives as soon as possible," Yue Fei continued. "Organizing control over the mitigation measures, treating and taking care of the patients already in quarantine… reviving the dead," Yue Fei looked specifically at Lifebringer who nodded back at him as an answer. Yue Fei's look was grim though as he continued looking into Lifebringer's eyes for a few more seconds, "We have yet to have any recoveries from the novel virus."

There was a brief pause, then Yue Fei continued in a low voice as if he had to make sure that no one else could hear him other than those he was speaking directly to right now. "Symptoms start mild and get worse gradually over a span of several days. Luckily the early symptoms show within the first twelve hours which allows us to track patients within our resources. That is the only 'lucky' part about the virus. Symptoms grow worse by the day. Things never get better for more than a short reprieve for some patients… most never get a break."

"What are you saying?" Star-Spangled Man asked, as this was all leading to what was sounding like the most grim news so far.

"The death toll is one hundred percent." Yue Fei's statement caused a chill to shoot through the spines of the heroes who were moments ago bickering among themselves in the FLICC. Jedenwurst took his eyes off of Yue Fei for a second to look towards Szechuman who he had been upset about how strongly he was arguing with him when he had never considered Szechuman one to back the side criminals of any kind. Szechuman's hands were balled in fists and his eyes were shaking as he thought on Beiju where he knew this virus was spreading, and where none of the people knew just how bad it was going to be.

"You said it was 28%-" Miss Moda started in shock.

"Out of the infected patients at the time of my announcement, only twenty-eight percent had died. Since then, still none have recovered." Yue Fei continued darkly, "The death rate still would not be officially what I just claimed, as long as the infection rate continues to rapidly increase, as we know it will as we show no signs of cornering the villains. We don't even know who they are or why they're doing this." Yue Fei's face scrunched up for a moment but he brought it calm again only to tell the heroes staring at him in shock and horror, "The death toll will never be 100% as long as there are still infected patients still alive, and yet the mortality rate is 100% of all those infected. This is the absolute worst case scenario."

Only one foreign hero in the group was not stunned to hear what Yue Fei was telling them. Zach rolled out his shoulders and shrugged his head to either side. No time to waste. No more time to waste. I could have left with Recovery Girl and Momo to head straight to the morgue. I know where I'm needed. Zach turned and started walking away.

"Those of you going out into Fundong to help keep control, be on the lookout for the early signs of Sleepless. The rate of deterioration for patients can be slowed if they are given proper medical care. And the slower the sickness takes them, the more chance we have of saving their lives with the cure that tens of thousands of doctors around the world are working on as fast as they can. I can only pray they complete the cure soon," Yue Fei's voice got quieter behind Zach as he walked to the opposite side of the command tent as the short tunnel to the outside. He walked down a much longer one to a wider connection tunnel between the two patient tents, and he heard Yue Fei louder back behind him as he filled his ears and mind with Death, "…The symptoms start off mild: sweating, chills, coughing, runny noses, watery eyes… coughing blood, fever, dizziness, and weakness in the muscles and bones comes next. The dizziness leads to loss of vision, accompanied with a loss of bowel control and diarrhea. Pain throughout the entire body. Sepsis. Shock, which leads to the coma they fall into which they will fight the virus in for 24-48 hours with our doctors doing whatever they can to help them. They will be kept alive to the best of modern medicine's capability, and then they will die as their internal organs shut down, though that's just the medical terminology."

"The organs don't just shut down," Yue Fei specified. "They can't function anymore because they've broken down. The tissue surrounding the organs breaks apart from the Sleepless particles, and those organs can't hold together so they practically turn to mush. It's like the patients' insides melt. The only consoling fact is that they are unconscious during the worst of it, but it is called 'Sleepless' because all stages of the infection are too painful for a victim to fall asleep again. Agonizing deaths await all those who are infected, Star-Spangled Man. Every second the terrorists are still free, thousands more will have to face that death…"

"Where is the morgue?" Zach asked the doctors in front of him, in a room in the central wide tunnel between the two massive tents of patients that there was a lot of noise coming from.

Not one of the three doctors turned around. They were gathered behind a computer and a table with a stack of charts on it, yelling at each other while a fourth figure also in a HAZMAT suit was trying to write a list of materials needed for all the new patients he had a list for who just arrived on a bus gathering from various hospitals throughout Fundong. Increased testing for Sleepless had shown much larger numbers around the city than once thought, and Zach repeated himself to these doctors who sounded like they were on the verge of panicking, "Tell me where the morgue is." He spoke Chinese this time, and his voice rose louder to quiet the group in front of him.

They turned and they stared at the boy behind them who stood six foot two inches and was broad at the shoulders. They saw his scars through his clear mask. The doctors were frozen in place, and then one of them shook her head around quickly, "The morgue! Yes!" She realized who this was in front of her and spun, running forward and calling out over her shoulder, "Thank God you're here Lifebringer! The dead are piling up and the morgue is so full we've called in meat trucks as a temporary place to store the dead who-"

"Just take me there…"

---

A/N First off I wanted to make note of this: Aruto prizes, R2 prizes. Like R2D2 ;). I've been doing that a lot because it happens often in the BNHA world, but I also do this thing where I translate words from other languages and make hero names based on them. Then later on as I reread, I've totally forgotten the clever thing I did XD and can't even remember what the word really meant... Anyway, just wanted to put that here for you guys and for my own memory sometime in the future when I'm rereading this. Secondly, hope you enjoyed the chapter! Thanks for reading! Heroes have arrived from all over the world to assist in China, and half of our initial team splits off this chapter to head to Beiju which is the biggest city in Gangwe and is getting hit hard by the virus. Lots of new characters, some old ones, and a few flashbacks this chapter introducing the CIA agent who's joined Captain Celebrity's agency and who's pretty familiar with Zach already. Started up on the next chapter now and I'll try to get it out soon! Leave a review below telling me what you think, predictions for the upcoming chapters, etc. Review response time:

GuestP chapter 222 . Apr 22

Hello hi good evening
It is I GuestP
Have I yet said that I am always somehow on my toes with every f-ing chapter
gosh dude, never change unless needed cus this story is like a freshly made banana and strawberry smoothie in the morning
And that's saying a lot
So... can't wait for shit to hit the fan
Bye bitch wuv u 333

Hello again GuestP! Thanks for the review and glad I can always keep ya on your toes! Made a blueberry, stawberry, peanut butter, banana and chocolate whey smoothie while I was editing this chapter actually! (I worked at a smoothie joint for a few months a while back, so I'm kinda a pro XD ) thanks again, and hope you enjoyed the chapter! Fan shitting is coming!

JV321 chapter 12 . Apr 21

12 chapters in and Im in love with this fic. Well done.

Glad you're loving it! Hope you catch up soon and see this reply!

Momozaki chapter 222 . Apr 18

HYYYYYYPE
You're update rate has been crazy. As a follower of this story from day 1, I'm truly proud and impressed.
It's nice to see this chapter. Heroes are often fighting villains and everything, but to see them discuss the effects of an epidemic. Goes to show their range and effectiveness.
It's nice to see the subtle exchanges between Momo and Zach recently. Hopefully this improves and the SS Momozaki can set sail again

Eyy glad you're excited and enjoying the story still so much! We see more of the heroes and their varying views on dealing with the epidemic, government corruption, command and interacting with other heroes this chapter. We'll see on that last bit Momozaki... we'll see. ;)

Mr. Heart chapter 221 . Apr 21

I really hope Darling is ok. We haven't seen her in a while. And I really hope Zach can see her again soon. Even though I know that's not gonna happen.
I... know it's a bit strange, but I really like her. Even if she was a bit crazy in the beginning.

I hope so too! And hey don't count anything out. Maybe he will see her... maybe not. It definitely felt like a real ending thing with her huh? She was a bit crazy in the beginning, and a little off in the middle as we see in the flashbacks this time... and she was def a bit crazy at the end- Maybe she's just crazy! XD Thanks for the review and glad you're worried about her, and who knows? Maybe she'll be back... or not, no spoilers. Sorry!