Shoto drew out a long breath that flowed over his clenched fist. His hand hovered over the mahogany door that gleamed under the dim tungsten lighting in the spacious penthouse hallway. He gazed down the hall towards the dormant elevator at the end, the chrome shining underneath the hot lights. The beige walls were lined with ornate podiums holding precious ivory vases with primed rose flowers. It was the perfect level of richness for Momo's tastes.

Shoto's heart wronged in his neck with every bump of feet he heard beyond the front door. The scent of lilacs and cookie dough tickled his nose when a lock clanged onto the door unlatched from inside.

When the door opened, Momo rolled her grey eyes and sighed at the sight of Shoto. She wore her hero costume that was covered in flour that dotted her face

"Really?" Momo said. "You couldn't call ahead so you could see me looking like a mess. And what's up with that weird halo above your head?"

Shoto stepped up the curb of the door and held his hand out onto the wood. He pushed it open the rest of the way, but Momo kept her ground. She glared back at Shoto when he planted himself just inches away from her nose.

"Why did you ask me out?"

Momo dropped her glare and blinked. "What?"

In the white room, Megan paced around in a small circle. The rest of the students spouted off ideas as Calista typed on the keyboard for the computer.

The last few minutes, the group had been frantically throwing out possible answers for the riddle on the final page of the Salton Sea Scrolls. They had made little progress as the students in the class tried to put their heads together. Blake babbled on and on about certain ideas while Hunter shot all of them down as crazy. Leo remained silent next to Robyn who still lay dormant on the floor. That mostly left Megan and Drake to walk around the room and figure out the last secrets of this document.

"Okay, so what is the first line?" Megan asked. Square visions. Why would visions be square?"

"They're messing with us," Aslovee said. "All of this for the page, and it's a joke."

"No, it has to mean something," Drake said. "Visions. So we know you and the other three had visions. That's what makes you special here."

"Right," Isabel said. "We can do this, everyone. We don't got much time left."

"In fact, we only have ten minutes," Calista tapped at the countdown clock on the screen. "Otherwise the energy becomes to great to return and we all blow up and die."

"There seem to be a lot of scenarios where we blow up with this technology," Megan spat out.

"It's our first time doing this. Cut us some slack," Calista barked out.

"Everyone, please focus," Leo cried out. "I'd rather not blow up and end every universe."

Drake peered at the page on the screen. Calista had typed out Anton's translation on a blank document. Square. Did that mean the shape of something? The visions would be square? Does that mean they were true or two-dimensional?

"Four," Drake said. "A square has four sides."

Megan snapped her fingers. "And it's four people with the visions. So four visions that control the light!"

"Four people. Us," Aslovee said. "So do we have to actually go in there?"

The group looked at the sealed door. An ominous groan shook the frame with light still pouring out of the cracks.

"I can't think of any other way to harness it, Calista said. "We can't just point it like a gun and shoot someone with it."

"Then there's no choice," Isabel said. "We gotta get zapped by like five million different universes energy. Should be fun!"

Anton scoffed and crossed his arms. "Is there not any other way outside of frying ourselves in whatever that is?"

Drake shook his head. "But what about the other lines? Virtue to vanquish sin? And one to harness it all? So that means there is one person who will ultimately possess the power, right?"

"But virtues," Megan said. "What does that have to do with this. Sin. Sin. There's seven sins, aren't there. Seven deadly sins."

Calista gasped in realization. "Yes. This is what happened in my universe. Seven sins took over seven students in my school. And Leonhardt was one of them. He was the sin of lust!"

"I had something similar as well," Aslovee said. "I killed six people in the Games. All also personifications of sin. But I was labeled the sin of Wrath by people in my universe."

The group turned to Isabel. She stared back at the group and shrugged.

"I didn't come across anything like that," Isabel said. "In fact, the opposite. We were all really nice to each other. I mean, we had sin, but the seven people on our team were more like…Uh…what's the opposite of sin-."

"Virtue," Megan and Drake said at the same time. They looked at each other and pointed. "Virtue vanquishes sin."

"Maybe that's what square also means," Blake said. "Like a complete shape. So for to the shape to be complete, there needs to be equal sides. So if two of you are from universes with personified sins, then this blonde girl and Anton must both be from-."

"Universes with personified virtues." Leo stepped into the center of the room. "I'm one of them, which means there are six other people that will defeat the sin."

"Leo," Megan asked. "How do you know that?"

"I can't explain it to well," Leo said. "But it was a moment when time stopped. Maybe a vision. But it was an orb of some energy. And it called out to me. In this female voice. A beautiful calming voice. And she said I was the virtue of Patience."

The room fell into silence. Leo scanned the perimeter and found all eyes on him. He shrunk into his hoodie and kept his gaze low.

"It makes sense," Drake said. "And I doubt we have much time to debate any other possibilities."

Calista huffed. "Okay, then Anton is going to come with us into the receiving chamber. This boy here…look, I believe you. But I have no idea what you have to do."

"I don't know either," Leo said. "But I'll do it when I'm needed."

Calista nodded. "But the one to harness it all. Who could that be? Not just you since you're only one of the virtues."

"It has to be someone chosen by whoever is doing this," Drake said. "Someone who wields a power that can handle this. The strongest person we can imagine."

"Then, is it Deku?" Megan asked. "Do you four need to point this energy beam at Deku?"

"If that's the case, I have some bad news," Isabel flashed her phone at the rest of the group. "He just got wrecked!"

The ticking clock above Shoto was the only sound other than the sizzling chicken on the cast-iron skillet in the kitchen area. Seated on a plush leather couch, Shoto stared right at Momo who sat opposite him on a pink love seat. She slurped a cup of green tea that drew a smoke screen over her face. She smacked her lips and leaned on the velvet armrest.

"Is that really why you came out here? To ask me that?"

"Yes," Shoto said. "That really all I wanted to know."

"No, you're lying."

Shoto paused with his eyes narrowing into slits. "Really?"

"Why would you come over here and ask such a dumb question?"

"Because it matters to me, Momo," Shoto smacked his fist in the couch. "Maybe not to you, but it means something to me."

"It shouldn't. It shouldn't matter at all."

"You said you'd tell me one day. Why you gave me a chance. And I deserve to know," Shoto said. He looked up at the clock above him. Somehow, the ticking of the second hand grew louder with every jerk.

"You don't deserve anything," Momo said. "That's what I always had to hear from you. 'I deserve this. I deserve that.' Guess what? Life doesn't work that way! Otherwise, You'd be the number one hero and we'd have a daughter!"

"I wanted a son," Shoto said.

"No, you wanted a daughter," Momo growled. "You said it on our wedding night."

"I was drunk and in bed with you," Shoto shouted. "I would have told you anything! My deepest, darkest secrets."

"And what would those be, Shoto?"

"That I'm still in love with you."

"Stop it," Momo said. "That's not a secret."

"I'm serious," Shoto stood up and walked to Momo. He reached out to grab her hand, but she snapped it away and shot to her feet.

"Stop it," Momo said. "You're drunk or stupid right now."

"You don't believe me?"

"You're a liar," Momo said backing up to the clear glass of the balcony sliding door. "None of this makes any sense. You're the one who wanted to divorce me! You're the one that left with that Katsu kid! And you're the one that said that you'd rather be a Pro-Hero than a father! And now you come over here to say…what exactly? That you changed your mind? That suddenly I'm that important to you? Give me a break."

"It's true," Shoto said. "You don't have to believe it, but it's true. And I've never felt a day where I haven't felt in love with you. A day where I didn't feel just a second of misery because I had to wake up from dreaming about you. Do you know that split second between awakening and realization? Where you realize you are awake? That moment where you forget you ever had such a thing called troubles? That moment where you've tricked your mind that everything is fine? And then…that moment of dread when you finally realize where you are? You're that moment, Momo. And ever since you let me take you to our last school dance at U.A., you've been that moment. Before it. After it. All of it."

Momo swallowed and turned to face the balcony. The twinkling skyline of Tokyo in the dark shined like a joyful Christmas Tree. The Tokyo Tower blinked in between the cocoon of skyscrapers that surrounded it like knights protecting a king. A few cars honked below with the sliding of a bullet train hissing past.

"Why would you say something like that to me?" Momo asked in a soft voice. "Shoto, we can't do this to each other anymore. My husband will be home any minute."

Momo reached up to her cheek and wiped at it. Shoto gave off a small smile and approached her. He rested his hand on her shoulder with a gentle placing of his fingers on the silk fabric of her nightgown. She put up no resistance and placed her forehead on the glass. Shoto looked out to see her face's reflection over the city skyline. Her eyes appeared bloodshot from tears with her cheeks puffed and swollen.

Shoto tugged on her shoulder, but Momo wrenched his hand off her.

"No, please," Momo said. "I don't want to be seen like this."

"I don't care," Shoto tugged again.

"Shoto, I'm a mess," Momo said. "I don't have any makeup on and-."

"I said I don't care," Shoto pulled her around. Facing the crying Momo, he leaned down and gave her a soft, chaste kiss on the lips. She closed her eyes and felt her heart consumed by the embrace.

Shoto pulled away, the ticking on the clock filling his ears again. Now, it was louder than the sizzling chicken forgotten and now burning on the stove.

The massive hole in the ground that was once the United States Academy of Heroics and Support was desecrated with destroyed marble and burnt wood. Every object within the building had been splintered into bits of debris. The entire clearing that once held both dormitory building and school was caved inward with black streaks of soot and burnt rubber strewn about the area. It truly looked like a nuclear bomb had been set off above the school.

In a specific pile of smoldering mattresses, a small grunt could be heard. A flash of a spark ignited from a frayed power wire. A pipe leaked out drinking water and spurted onto the ground leaving a puddle of mud in front of a torn sign. The same sign that greeted students into the entrance hallway. On the sign, the phrase "excelsior" was torn in two.

From under the tower of mattresses, more grunts. Then, a wooden wand poked out. The mattress above Alistair disappeared from existence as the big crawled out of the hole stuffed with the furniture. He groaned out in pain with his school uniform torn apart. His cloak was frayed with the white dress shirt tattered in two down the middle. His tie cut at the knot, he gasped for air before falling onto his back and then picking himself up and stumbling over a pile of singed books from what used to be the library.

Around him, haphazard mounds of overturned dirt and broken mahogany boards sat in what was the crumbled and annihilated foundation of the USAHS building. An oasis of glass littered the ground. One particular shard stared right at Alistair, who could see his face with a crack down the middle obscuring part of it.

He turned the glass shard and shined it on the left side of his face. He gasped when he saw the bright pink muscle and chipped bone that now ruined half of his head. He helped and dropped the glass shard which poked into the dirt by his feet.

"What-what happened to me?" Alistair asked in panic. All he remembered was hugging Moxie atop the space ship. To appear in this disaster area was a complete shock that ran his blood cold making him shiver in the ocean breeze flowing over the site.

"Moxie?" Alistair cried out. "Moxie? Where are you? Anybody?"

Alistair took a step and turned towards the parking lot. Destroyed concrete with a junkyard of twisted aluminum and steel. A few small fires blazed, but Alistair's eyes widened at the figure laying at the top of the school's marble steps which somehow were still intact.

At the top was Deku whose eyes were closed. His body mangled with his limbs contorted, his face dropped in blood with cuts running deep into his skin. His skin pale and breathing shallow, he grunted and peeled a lazy eye open.

When Alistair locked eyes with Deku, Alistair felt his own consciousness disappear. His emerald eyes shined as a deep grin curled around his face.

"We'll, it's about time I had you to myself," Alistair said in a husky voice.

He trudged over the dirt, limping with his right ankle twisted with every drag of it on the ground. He kicked away some small folders and a filing cabinet from his path with every agonizing step through the graveyard.

"Wait, Alistair," Izuku said. "There's still time for you to stop this. It-it isn't right!

"What do you know about what's right," The boy said with spit flying out of his mouth. "About what's fair? Was dying before my story was complete fair to me? Was being ripped away from my own world, my own loved ones, was that right? And you! A sheepish, dumb broccoli-head that lucked out in having a powerful quirk that was gifted to you! Yes, I know all about you, Izuku. You are what's not right."

"Then you know what I went though," Izuku shouted. "You know how I felt as an outcast! Having no quirk to begin with. Having to train and fight for it. I had no friends either. Only my mom. I was just as alone and out of place as you were. Please, we can help you!"

"You're right. You can," Alistair said. "By giving me your power. And letting me be free to return home."

From behind a crushed light pole, James dug himself out of a mountain of old desks and bent chairs that hailed over him. He saw Moxie curled up in a ball lifeless next to him. The crystal around her neck extinguished its light and rested underneath the cross hanging around her chest. James reached down and shook her by the shoulders.

"Moxie," James said. "Moxie, wake up! Moxie!"

James looked over about twenty yards in front of him. Alistair lugged his limbs towards the base of the marble staircase that led up to Deku's immobile body.

"It was fun though," Alistair chuckled. "Seeing this digital universe. Keeping the secret that this wasn't real. I really hoped someone would have gotten it sooner. At least, the greatest Pro-Hero in the world. Not a bunch of your dumbass students. To think all of this could have been avoided if you hadn't trusted your friends so much. Like Bakugo and-."

James saw his moment. With Alistair right in front of him, James took the broken street lamp and turned it in his direction. His body absorbed the flickering light, and he sparked a flash of neon in his hands. With a tight grin, he channeled the energy to his feet. Then…he pounced forward with the neon launching him in the air.

James sailed through the sky. He patted himself on the back seeing that his trajectory was perfect to land on Alistair. He lifted back his hand, and he prepared to throw a crushing orb of neon at his face.

Just as he was about to cast the attack…

Pop!

Alistair flashed his wand at James as if he had know he would be there all along. With a flick of the wood, an invisible spike lodged itself right into James' skull. Before he could even realize it, James' head crushed in mid-air and compressed into an unsurvivable vice.

James' head exploded. Buckets of blood rained down with his decapitated corpse flailing limp and splattering on the ground. Brain matter oozed out of the hole that remained of his neck, and pink mesh was soaked in the dark scarlet blood that drowned a single eyeball that floated right a piece of his skull.

When James and his headless body skittered to a halt by Alistair's feet, the blonde boy wiped a trail of blood that sprayed onto his shoulder.

Izuku gasped with both his eyes, even the one swollen shut from the blast, wide open. A silent scream died in his throat, his nerves shaking in his body with his heart plummeting into his churning stomach.

"No," Izuku screamed. "No! James!"

Izuku forced his body upward until Alistair turned back to him. He flicked his wand at Izuku, and that made his limbs unusable. Izuku forced his hands with all his might to work. He even tried to generate some form of energy with One-For-All. Nothing would work. He was trapped in his own body and could only watch as Alistair moved closer towards him.

"Playtime is over," Alistair turned back to Izuku. "It's time to finally claim what is mine."

"What have you done?" Izuku yelled. "Why can't I move?"

"Y'know, these quirks of yours are pretty worthless against a little bit of our magic," Alistair cackled. "Then again, I learned most any 'superpower' is worthless against a simple bullet. Thank my Creator that Moxie chick is currently indisposed."

From behind a bush, Katsu lifted his head up. He rubbed his head and opened his eyes to find the wreckage around him.

"Wha-? What happened here?" Katsu said before he examined the wreckage. He was to the side and in between Alistair and the foundation of the stairs. Craning his neck to look beyond the bush, he gasped at the smoking courtyard that was once his school. Suddenly, memories of a familiar wreckage flowed through his head. One that got him in jail to being with. When he accidentally blew up his parents mansion back when he was ten.

"Oh no," Katsu held his hand to his mouth. "Not again!"

Alistair, mid-stride, stopped and peered at Katsu. "Oh, Katsu Muteki. A quirk that absorbs and dispels the same amount of energy. Pretty nice power until you overcharge and blow up. Have your parents found a new place to live yet from the last time this happened?"

Katsu growled and lifted himself up. His bare chest coated in dust and burnt chips of wood, he pushed forward and sprinted for Alistair in a lackadaisical fashion.

"You bastard," Katsu yelled. He charged for Alistair. With no energy within him, his quirk was useless. He simply relied on his own brute strength as he ran for the taller teen and prepared a punch to the blonde's face.

Alistair rolled his eyes and claimed the wand at Katsu. The boy cried out when he slammed to a halt as if he hit an invisible brick wall. The magic raised him up into the air by his throat. The boy choked, his eyes bulging out with his grip faltering around his neck to claw away at the force choking him. No energy built inside him. It was only the pain of his body being squeezed an all sides.

When Alistair flicked his wrists again, Katsu's arms ripped off his shoulders like a kid tearing a piece of paper. Katsu screamed with the pain blinding his gaze. His legs slept upwards and split his body in half upwards, his entire frame cut in two with his head cocked open like he had been sliced with a sword down the middle. Both sides of his body collapsed into a heap on the ground. His eyes remained open and lifeless staring upward at the periwinkle sky.

"Stop!" Izuku struggled within the bounds of the magic. No matter how hard he tried, he could not move nor activate his quirk. "Please, Alistair. We haven't done anything to you!"

"So?" Alistair laughed. "You've seen it yourself, haven't you? All the evil that permeates this world? All the destruction caused by people like you? People who think they're gods that can have their way with the world? The fact that people like you and I exist is what's unfair. But, if it's us with the power, why not exploit it? Makes things for more interesting, doesn't it?"

Right at the base of the stairs, Austin threw a rock that covered himself off a pedestal. He dug out of the wreckage, completely naked, and picked up his smashed glasses resting on the floor. He spied Alistair walking to the steps, and then saw a strange blue blur run after him from behind.

It was Abel. Sneaking around torn bits of ceramic and marble, he tiptoed over the twerrain and then climbed like a spider onto the top of a chopped facade of brick that stood upright in the middle of the wreckage. He stretched out his arms like a wrestler and launched himself off the top of the bricks towards Alistair.

Alistair, somehow, sensed Abel's attack and simply outstretched his arm behind him. Abel froze in mid-air, his music slowing to a halt in his headphones with the small buds falling out of his ears.

He dropped his hand to the ground. Abel slammed onto the broken concrete with a loud shout. Only for Alistair to raise him up again and shunt him onto the ground a second time. Spit spring out of Abel's mouth with the air escaping his lungs from the impact.

Then, Alistair twisted his hand sideways.

Snap! Abel's head twisted until his neck was completely broken and turned around. His head now faced the opposite way with his dead eyes staring blank behind him. Abel's body sat on the ground with his arms limp at his side.

Alistair yawned. "So easy. I thought you would have taught these kids something by now, Deku."

Austin gasped and squeezed the edge of the desk he hid behind.

"No, Abel," Austin whispered in horror. The knuckles in his grasp turned white, and his body shivered in fear when Alistair started to climb up the steps towards Izuku. His head throbbed and his throat was patched. His skin dripping in leaking water from broken pipes that spurted out water on his bare shoulders, he dug his way over a tipped over aluminum trash can and kicked his way on top of a bed of torn soda cans.

Alistair's ear immediately caught onto the sound. He smirked and revolved his head to the right and saw Austin attempting to crawl away. He pointed his wand at a marble pedestal and floated it in the air. He aimed the tip of the wand right at Austin's head.

The marble smushed Austin's head. The blood painted the base of the statue like a halo tatooed into the white surface. The red liquid dropped over a plaque on the base that was etched into the steel. "In memory of All Might. Worlds Greatest Hero."

Austin's body lay half-crushed and limp with his bare back coated in dirt. Alistair chuckled and climbed up the steps. A quarter way. Now halfway. Nobody in sight to stop him.

Izuku wanted to scream in agony, but his throat would not vibrate a single vocal chord. His green eyes shifted to every corner of the wreckage. Corpses of his former students dotted the former school. Smoke arose from small fires burning away at the remaining linens and plywood that made up the building. His own head leaked blood from a laceration that ran over his right cheek onto the marble steps. The blood stained the surface and dripped onto his limp hand that remained pinned by his side. Within minutes, this strange blonde kid with a stick for a weapon had rendered the worlds strongest hero completely immobile and defenseless.

"Alistair," Izuku gurgled out with his mouth filling up with blood. "Please. My students, they have nothing to do with this. Just…leave the rest be. Let them go home."

"You're right, they're completely innocent," Alistair rose up another step on the staircase. "I also don't care. This isn't my universe. What do I care if a few random characters in some faraway story are dead? They're not even real people!"

Just then, a cane smacked into Alistair's forehead. He gnashed out in pain when Synaes, covering her body in a lavender towel, jabbed her cane square into his face. With the boy doubled over, Synaes snapped off a strand of his blonde hair and ingested it. Within her sight, white orbs filled up her vision and computed each movement of Alistair's like a supersonic calculator.

Alistair pointed his wand again. However, Synaes detected the magic before it made impact and avoided it. Alistair frowned and cast another spell. Synaes dipped and dodged with the litheness of a trapeze artist. She lunged forward jammed the cane into Alistair's stomach. He grunted as she pushed him closer to the precipice of the staircase edge.

They exchanged blows, but Synaes' quirk allowed her to predict each and every move. The magic was not as fast as Synaes who ducked down and twisted with every attempt Alistair made at attacking her.

Bap. Bap. Bap. Synaes landed each hit on the boy, blood spurting out of the wounds on his face and drenching his previously uninjured side of his face in blood that coated his forehead and cheek.

Almost at the end, Alistair had enough and snapped his fingers. In Synaes' view, the dots switched off like a dead lightbulb. She gasped, her sight suddenly black and useless. Her quirk was turned off by Alistair's magic.

"What? How?" Synaes asked.

Alistair pointed his wand right in Synaes face. With her shoved expression hidden behind sunglasses, her head exploded with a disgusting churn of erupted brain matter and bone that bounced off Alistair's face. His unhinged smirk grew as Synaes' body collapsed by his feet and rolled down the staircase. The limbs flailed lifeless until the torso of the corpse landed with a thud on the final step.

Alistair, now just ten feet away from Izuku, smiled up at the boy. His glowing emerald eyes struck a chill in Izuku that he had never quite felt before. Not since he last fought Shigaraki and All-For-One. In fact, if he looked further at Alistair's eyes, he would see that….

Wait. The tugging in his heart. The sensation down his spine. The feeling of dread that he felt the whole year up to this point. A familiar emotion that plagued his thoughts ever since he took the mantle as the World's Greatest Hero.

"It's you," Izuku whispered. "All For One."

"Ding ding! Winner!" Alistair laughed as he traversed the final steps. "I didn't think it'd take you so long to piece it together, but here we are!"

Alistair loomed over Izuku. He kneeled down and lifted his chin up with his fingers to stare deep into his eyes. Alistair's own were crinkled with maniacal happiness. Izuku stifled out a groan as he looked at Alistair horrified.

"I couldn't escape Tartarus, nor could I defeat you in the real world after centuries of trying. So imagine my delight when I found out you were stuck in this digital universe like a buffet I could feast upon," Alistair said. "All I needed were some useful accomplices to render All-For-One into code that could then be uploaded into a person that would enter this world. Imagine my surprise when Alistair Leonhardt popped up on our computer, fresh from another universe and sent to us by The Creator! I thought I'd have to upload myself into one of your dumb students, but Alistair made things so much easier! And the magic he possesses! We are unstoppable together."

"But whose…whose The Creator?" Izuku said. "

"Don't worry your pretty little head about it," Alistair said. "Just know that this magic that has been our providence is far more powerful than anything you could imagine. Truly a gift from a more powerful being."

Just then, two white wings sprouted out from Alistair's back. They ripped slits in his shirt before fanning out just beyond his arm span and beneath his shoulders. His eyes softened, and his grin disappeared as he leaned in towards Izuku's face.

Izuku, within his mind, was now nothing but that bullied little boy back in Japan. With no ability to stop Alistair and All-For-One, he could only blink away the tears that welled up in his eyes. He tried to push his head back on the marble, but it was no use as Alistair grabbed his wand and pointed it right at Izuku's heart.

"Sayonara."

An alarm blared out in the white room. The lights turned to red with a flashing screen blinking on the computer monitor. Calista gasped in shock and clicked a button on the screen.

On the screen: SYNCHRONIZATION: 90%.

85%.

"Oh, no. No no no no no!" Calista shouted. "Synchronization is reversing."

"That fast?" Isabel squeaked. "I thought the timer was accurate."

"It was," Aslovee pointed at Isabel's phone. "But Alistair just got more powerful."

Isabel gasped at her phone. On the screen, Alistair had the wand pointed right at Deku's heart. Izuku screamed in pain as an emerald electric cloud burst around the two of them.

"If Alistair gets Deku's power, then his Creator gets it," Calista said with a steel glare burning in her blue eyes. "And if he gets it and becomes powerful enough to stop synchronization…."

"We won't be able to send the energy back," Drake said. "All these universes will end."

Calista grabbed Isabel by the arm. She lunged at Anton and pulled him for the room. "We must go. Now!"

"But we don't even know what we're doing," Anton shouted. "How do we even interact with the energy?"

"There's not time," Calista yelled. "All we know is that we can handle the power. We'll play the rest by ear!"

"Then what are we even going to do with it," Anton stammered.

"Aim it at Deku," Aslovee said. "He's clearly the big guy in this universe. He could probably handle the power."

"It's our only chance," Calista said. She yanked Isabel and Anton to the door. Aslovee put on his head visor and followed Calista to the frame. When the four were together, Calista reached for a button on the keyboard and pressed it. The portal slid open to reveal a small port bridging the white room with the receiving station just on the other side of the second layer of doorway.

The light nearly blinded the rest of the class. Calista pushed Isabel and Anton inside and moved to allow Aslovee in. She looked back out and locked eyes with Drake.

"There's an intercom button on the computer," Calista said. "Click on it if you receive any pertinent info. I hope to see you all again in a few moments after Alistair is defeated."

Drake nodded. "Understood. We'll keep thinking."

Calista flashed a hint of a smile. "You seem like you'd be a good chess player, correct?"

"Uh…yes."

"If this works, I'd like to play a round with you," Calista said. Then, she looked over Drake's shoulder to the rest of the class. "But if this doesn't work, I'm truly sorry. I won't forget any of you."

Calista slid the door shut.

"Moxie! Moxie! Wake up!" A hoarse voice whispered.

The girl cracked her eyes open at a hair's length. Lloyd's bright yellow eyes bore into her as he shook her with the ferociousness of an earthquake.

"Lloyd?" Moxie croaked out. Her body was covered in frayed and twisted power cables. She examined Lloyd whose clothes were torn to shreds with gross clumps of dirt and blood mixed into his body. His face was swollen on one side with his hair drenched from the sweat he endured being buried underground for a few minutes.

"Moxie, that blonde boy up there," Lloyd cried. "He killed people in our class. He's doing something to Deku right now! I dont…I don't know. I'm scared, Moxie."

Moxie jerked up and rolled to her side. She looked over the wreckage to see a pair of wings on top of Alistair's back. A tower of emerald light shines upon him and the obscured body at the summit of the staircase. The light rose up into the sky; an endless column that travelled to a plane not known by humans.

"No," Moxie breathed out. With regained purpose, she climbed to her feet and stumbled on her foot. Lloyd grabbed her arm and steadied her. Moxie hissed in pain realizing her right foot was twisted, but she furrowed her brow and limped ahead with Lloyd's assistance.

"Moxie," Lloyd asked in her ear. "What are you doing?"

Moxie should have been horrified. She should have been panicked and nothing but a large vat of tears to shed on the ruins of her old school. She should have stayed hidden in the wreckage and wait for someone else to come in and save the day. She should have been mournful and drowned in sorrow at how quickly things had gone wrong. She should have been disappointed in herself for not stopping Alistair.

"I'm gonna stop this," Moxie said in a surprisingly steady tone. "Even if it kills me."

"No, Moxie. Please stop," Lloyd begged while they stepped closer to the stairs. "We can call for other Pro-Heroes. Assistance. We can't beat him. He already killed our classmates. Members of our family! He-he killed…oh, God, Moxie," Lloyd sobbed and wrapped an arm around Moxie's shoulder. "Moxie, we can't do this alone."

"We ain't alone," Moxie said. "We got something that no demon gonna stop."

Lloyd gagged when he saw James' beheaded corpse still leaking fresh blood next to where they walked. He hugged Moxie tighter and buried his head in her shoulders. "Oh, God, Moxie. This is a nightmare."

"I know Lloyd," Moxie said. "Don't look at them."

"How can I not look?"

"Lloyd, you remember Paul's letter? In Second Corinthians?"

"What?"

"Therefore, we do not give up," Moxie said. "What did Paul say next?"

Lloyd tempered his breathing and focused on the piece from the Bible. "Even though our outer person is being destroyed, our inner person is being renewed day by day. For our momentary light affliction is producing for us an absolutely incomparable eternal weight of glory. So we do not focus on what is seen, but on what is unseen. For what is seen is temporary, but what is unseen is eternal."

"For we must all appear before the judgment seat of Christ, so that each one may receive what is due for what he has done in the body, whether good or evil," Moxie said.

"That's not in that chapter," Lloyd said. "It's the next one."

"I know," Moxie said. "But it seemed to matter to what's happening to us now."

Moxie reached for Lloyd's hand and grabbed it. She squeezed and tugged him along as she started to regain strength nearing the base of the steps.

"And whatever happens next," Moxie said staring up at the green light. "Whatever it is…it will set us free...Amen."

Moxie Lee should have been horrified, but as she opened her mouth to shout at the blonde wizard from another universe, she felt none of those emotions.

Instead, she felt angry.

She felt determined.

She felt ready.

"Momo," Shoto said. "What if I told you other universes exist?"

Momo sniffled and wiped away another tear. "I knew it. You are drunk."

Shoto laughed and held Momo closer. "There's one important thing I have to do, Momo. And it's something big. Something that stretches across universes. Something that will save us all."

Momo blew out a deep sigh. "It's dangerous, isn't it?"

"In fact, I know I'm going to win," Shoto said. "But I just want you to know that…whatever happens to me next…I don't care if we meet again in a universe where I'm never a Pro-Hero. Or universe where I'm quirkless. Or a universe with no quirks at all. Perhaps I'm just some guy under a cherry blossom hearing you talk about onpam. As long as it was with you…I'd all we did was drive our daughter to school and file boring taxes…with you…that'd be just fine for me."

Momo cried and wrapped her arm around Shoto's chest. "I…I'd be fine with that, too.

Shoto, finally, felt at peace with the world. Nothing left unsaid, the halo around his head glowed brighter and brighter. Momo seemed to pay no mind as she squeezed tighter and shut her eyes. Stroking his hand through her big hair, he nuzzled his nose into the top of her head.

Ding. Ding.

The clock chimed. Shoto looked up. Somehow, it was midnight. The clock stopped moving entirely with only the bell ringing in the end of the day.

"By the way, Momo," Shoto said with one last glimpse at the girl. "Merry Christmas."

ALMOST AT THE END OF THE STORY! PLEASE REVIEW AND TELL ME WHAT YOU THINK!