We return to our usual broadcast! Sorry, I got the flu last week and got no chapter out.
(xx)
Huanli prepared herself, as the five minutes passed agonizingly slow. She felt herself getting excited, against her best judgment. 'Still like a mountain, Huanli, still like a mountain…' She repeated herself, ignoring the cheeky part of her mind that wanted to point out volcanos were technically mountains.
And then, the fight begun.
Huanli rushed forward, Renlei Quan active through her nervous system. The Human Fist made her feel as fast as a rocket, though she knew it was more accurate to say her mind was working faster and her reaction time had vastly improved. She was still moving at the same speed, but if before giving an order to her body and her body executing it took a tenth of a second, now it took a hundredth of a second. She could perceive everything around her, from the gunman aiming his weapon at her – a sawed off shotgun, from what Huanli remembered of her Master's lessons about firearms – to the charge of Chojuro Kon toward one of the other participants, the glasses-wearing girl, as if in slow motion. She kept an eye on the other fighter, but she seemed to be studying the situation. Smart one.
She saw the finger of Soga press on the trigger and dodged to the side, suddenly propelling herself to the side pushing Qi through her feet to accelerate. That was the other part of Renlei Quan. No normal person could have done that, since the moment the trigger was pressed was a short time frame at that distance, but for her it was like a few seconds passed from the start of the movement to the bullets firing out, and using her Qi, she could actually do a lot with that. It wasn't a huge timeframe, but enough to move low and to the left. She pressed forward, and unleashed Renlei Quan's main offensive move. The Hyper Quadfist, four punches delivered at high speed, her body moving to action the instant she ordered it to. It had been the main creation of her Master's Master, and she wasn't going to waste it.
Soga however knew his stuff. He took the first two blows, gritting his teeth so tightly a trickle of blood came out from his gums, and moved the gun in the way to block the other two, Qi-reinforced fists and metal clanging as they impacted each other in a way that had most likely hurt both equally, before using it as a club, extending it forward and then swinging it upward to hit her jaw. The girl bent her head backward, and the weapon missed her for mere millimeters. She had to admit, had she not been using Renlei Quan, it would have hurt like hell.
She tried to test her muscle and felt her neck slightly crack in protest. Her arm was still not going in overclock, and neither were her fists, but she decided to change form. Renlei Quan was useful, but it was a good form for bulkier fighters, people that had strength but needed speed and reaction time, and Huanli was confident in her own skill when it came to being agile. So, she started rebalancing her Qi, while attacking Soga normally to keep him busy. Even without Qi, she was still a martial artist after all, and she wasn't about to let a gunman gain range.
Soon, light and dark Qi were on balance, and she had moved to using the Shou Quan. He grin turned feral, and she could feel her heart accelerate, the exhilaration from going wild taking over.
Huanli rushed forward, the Qi in her hands shaping in the form of claws as she kept her opponent close. She moved her hands, slashing and tearing, focusing all of her Qi in her hands. She knew the secret to destroy metal, and that was overwhelming strength. She watched the man's eyes grow wide as his weapon cracked and broke, but he didn't let it stop him. He threw forward the pieces instead, trying to force her back, no doubt to draw another weapon, since she could guess the large trench coat he wore wasn't just a stylistic choice but hid at least two or three more weapons. Huanli smiled wildly, feeling like a carnivore that had finally locked onto their prey, now defenseless. The Qi around her hand, keeping up the shape of the Baihu Zhao, the Tiger Claws, slashed forward, tearing through the trench coat. Soga grinned, and from the hole in the trench coat he threw a small cylindrical object, too fast for her to realize what it was until it was too late.
Her eyes widened. Which was a mistake.
-x-
"Eh. Good move. A bit derivative though." Revenant commented, as the exploding flashbang blinded the grey-haired girl and allowed Soga a chance to open the distance.
-x-
Huanli hissed, stumbling back to try and dodge the obviously incoming attack. She had managed to throw up an hastened Xuanwu Dun, the Black Tortoise Shield, but being made of Qi made it invisible, so the flash of the bomb had done its job. At least she had blocked most shrapnel, but that was a measly consolation.
Pure instinct, something one couldn't quite be thought but she had learned over months of fighting in the gym and then, more importantly, in the Multiverse, was what drove her to duck, right in time to dodge an incoming attack that passed past her. She couldn't quite tell what it was, but some sort of missile flew right past her shoulder. She gripped her face and quickly opened and closed her eyes, forcing the eyelids to tighten together, trying to regain sight. As she did, she spotted another group of two or so indistinct shadows flying towards her and moved out of the way. She heard a weird cuss in English and took a deep breath.
'Egui Quan', she decided. It wasn't something she wanted to do. To Huanli, falling down to the Hungry Ghosts Fist was always difficult, especially in combat, so much so that she tried to avoid both it and the Axiuluo Quan. But she wouldn't let it stop her. She was going to win, and despite the danger, she wasn't going to fail doing that.
Rebalancing your Qi toward having more darkness than light was dangerous, even her master had explained it. Losing was worse though, she reasoned as she did just that.
Huanli cackled maniacally, as she felt her deepest desires take over. Rebalancing didn't change who you were, but amplified who you were in positive or negative. 'Fight. Fight fight fight fight fight.' She thought, her mind completely enraptured by her survival instinct that, picking between fight and flight, had opted for the latter, and her wild, swirling emotions, the desire to rip and tear, to win and celebrate, to prove herself. The pain in her eyes was gone, the sight itself restored, and her muscles felt like they would explode out of her skin. The Hungry Ghosts Fist, Egui Quan, was a path dedicated to unleashing your limits without fear, and it was almost intoxicating. It wasn't a case that it had been Kendo Rappa, her world's version of the Battlemaster, that had been the last Master of it before Master Itsuka. Huanli's Master herself had admitted that, the first time she had successfully executed the Egui Quan, she had lived a wild dream of carnage, ending with her 'waking up' in the middle of a cage for underground matches, surrounded by at least twenty unconscious people and a smiling Rappa. She was completely focused on violence, hungry for battle, thirsty for conflict. She knew this wasn't what Huanli was supposed to be, she knew this was dangerously close to Eri, to Number Eight, but her need to win dulled the desire to stop herself from going further.
She dodged an incoming horn – that's what those were, she realized – and then took a second right in the shoulder. Instead of stopping, she kept going, Pony shouting as she fell upon her, raining more horns toward her. Huanli cackled more, lost in the lust of battle, and grabbed the first incoming horn, using it as a makeshift club to swat the incoming ones out of the way while closing the distance. It was a suicidal charge, but in her state she didn't care. She felt no pain as one horn hit her shoulder and another her leg, instead diving forward and grinning wildly. Finally, she reached Pony. Her kick hit the horn-wielding fighter square in the chest, making her shout in pain and then gasp for air as she followed up with a Qi covered punch that struck her in the guts. Pivoting herself on the ground with one leg, Huanli followed by bringing up a kick, the sole of her feet impacting the chin of the horn wielder and reverberating through her leg. Huanli smiled.
"More. More, more! I want more!" She shouted, turning again and punching her in the sternum. Tsunotori wailed but unleashed two more horns, more a desperate last effort than a real attempt at attacking. Huanli's sharp instincts made her catch both with her bare hands. "Is that it?" She asked, her voice sharp, her smile wide, before she broke both horns by gripping them, "You are nothing much then."
Tsunotori roared in rage and kicked with her hooved legs, and Huanli smiled, using her own right feet reinforced by Qi to block the incoming blow before it accumulated enough momentum to hurt her, and then lunged forward, grabbing the number from Tsunotori's shoulder with her right hand while delivering simultaneously a fist to her face with her left that made her fall to the ground, bleeding from the nose and mouth.
She smiled again and looked down at the crumpled, broken form. It was that sight, seeing her opponent like that, that snapped Huanli out of her excitement, like she had been dunked in cold water all at once. She felt herself freeze, and she gasped. 'This is wrong…' She thought, admonishing herself dangerously half-heartedly due to her current state. The more logical part of her took over, now scolding her in the voice of her master. She knew the Egui Quan was dangerous for her, and here she went using it anyway-
With a grunt, she felt something hit her shoulder. She saw the rubber bullet from Soga's gun fall to the ground and breathed in. Her heart was beating like a machine gun, she realized, the voice of her older Master trying to push through and force her through the path of violence she had so readily opened with the Egui Quan. She needed to calm down. Rise up from her current state.
She needed the Axiuluo Quan.
Axiuluo Quan, the Asura Fist. A Shape that could only be achieved by mastering both the Shou Quan and the Egui Quan, by learning both how to control your Qi to form a physical manifestation and how to rebalance your Qi from Egui Quan to normal without interrupting your concentration. A form only achievable by clawing your way out of the depths of darkness.
She smiled calmly and held her hand forward, feeling the Qi taking the shape. If the Shou Quan was the Animal Fist, an ability that reproduced nature, the Asura Fist was the fist of war, and it aimed at reproducing weapons. Thus, she felt her Qi take the shape of a scimitar, and rushed forward.
Soga shot again, and Huanli calmly realized that he had pulled out a second shotgun after the first one got destroyed, but she moved the other hand forward and reshaped the Qi in the form of a shield, stopping the bullet, and then she was on him, bringing down the sword.
Qi is a form of energy. It's formed by a light component, the good Karma, and a dark component, the bad Karma. The positive Karma strengthens, the negative Karma weakens. Axiuluo Quan is a style that strengthens the Qi of someone while weakening what the Qi touches. It was the style of someone that had failed to become great, had fallen into desperation, and then had clawed their way back up, and gained power from it.
It wasn't a coincidence, from what she had seen in the Multiverse, that the last Master had been Enji Todoroki, before Itsuka Quanteng came along to learn from him.
She poured all of herself in the blow, feeling the strength of the back of her blade and the cold strength of the edge. The scimitar of Qi cut through Soga's weapon like butter, leaving him staring at two halves of a sawed shotgun. Huanli smiled and changed slightly the shape of her Qi, strengthening the light, making the bluntness take over. When she hit again, the weapon impacted Soga's jaw, but rather than being a scimitar it was a mace, a powerful weapon that was, however, not meant to kill, but to defeat. It hit hard, and it made his jaw crack and a tooth fly out, but it wouldn't kill him. She wouldn't allow it. Satisfied, Huanli grabbed the second number and felt her skin crawl. She stepped back, trusting her instinct and even pushing herself slightly with her Qi to go further, right in time to dodge the first attack of Chojuro Kon, who had managed to defeat his own opponent.
"And we have a winner!" The announcer shouted. To her surprise, Huanli realized he was right. That was three numbers for her and, most likely, one for the wolf man. "Huanli Quanteng qualifies as an A-lister, while Chojuro Kon is our B-Lister!"
The crowd cheered, and Huanli raised a fist in victory, before she found herself buckling slightly. She had switched quickly between four different Shapes of Zhandou Quan, and that took a toll. She had trained to switch between all six if she needed to, but there was a difference between doing so in training and pulling it off in combat. Honestly, if this was a prolonged match, she might have been screwed.
Had she the choice, she would have only used Renlei and Shou Quan, but the flashbang had made things more difficult and forced her to push through by using Egui to dull the pain and restore her senses. She had a long way to go still before she could be picky about what she used.
She took a deep breath. At least she hadn't reverted to Number Eight, to Eri. For all its problems, and rethinking of the match she realized it had many, the Hungry Ghosts Fist made fighting a lot more instinctual, muting off her stray thoughts from the past. She had never risked falling into being Eri once again while using it. Or maybe when she used it, she just was Eri, and didn't realize it, getting a way to vent out her other self without losing Huanli. Whatever the case, it meant that using it had most likely helped her. Still, it was the kind of cure that hurt more than the illness. She wouldn't use it again soon.
"You had a good fight." Chojuro Kon said, pausing her thoughts as she looked up at him. The man had walked closer, without her even realizing now that she wasn't concentrating anymore, "My opponent proved trickier than I expected, but I'm sure yours were as well. I saw the flashbang, at least. So, congratulations."
Huanli nodded back. "Thank you." She said, genuinely. She was probably the worse opponent the gunman could have faced, due to her ability to shrug off his main way to attack, and he had still managed to almost make her lose by launching that flashbang. If Tsunotori hadn't stepped in, forcing him to move back, he might have been able to follow through with a better attack, depending on what else he could pull out of that coat, and maybe Huanli wouldn't have managed to use Egui Quan quite as fast. It hadn't been just her own skill that had helped, but the fact her two opponents were both unfamiliar with Zhandou Quan and wary of each other. Soga had most likely avoided attacking her until after she had taken out Tsunotori entirely because he wanted to prevent the worst-case scenario of the two making a truce to take him out first, and Tsunotori had most likely to keep an eye out for a sudden attack from Soga's gun.
She bowed to him in respect, as her mother had thought him, even if it came off as stiff, and walked off the stage.
She had done it.
A-Lister.
-x-
"We did it!" Izumi said, giving an high five to Huanli.
"We did it!" Huanli replied, returning the high five. Izuku and Zuzu cheered too, and Izumi smiled.
"Nothing like a victory to make all doubts about this being a good idea going away." Izumi replied, sitting down on a chair, "Two A-Listers and one B-Lister, that has to be a record."
"It is." A new voice explained. Everyone gasped, Izumi jumping back up. They turned toward the other door that gave access to the room, where a man with glasses stood. His black hair showed some slight signs of greying, but were still kept back in an elegant hairstyle that served to mask his age. His thin mustache were perfectly trimmed.
"Koku Hanabata. At your service." He said with a smile and a slight bow.
"I know you. You are the head of a political party in my universe." Izuku replied. He had seen the man on tv a few times before.
"Ah yes, the Hearts and Mind Party, I have heard that name a few times." He chuckled, "No, in this world I'm simply the Head of the Economics Department for the JTO. Which is a nice way to say I handle contracts, payments and everything else that actually costs money. You could say I make mister Yotsubashi's vision into reality." He paused, "Ah, but where are my manners, I'm not here just to introduce myself."
"What are you here for then?"
"Why, for this." He took out three checks and two black tickets. He first handed the checks to each of them, then the tickets to Huanli and Izuku.
"What's this?"
"Oh? I thought it was very straightforward. It's your payment for victory in the Qualifiers and an invitation for the A-Listers party, which is where you will also be allowed to pick your opponents." He looked at them both, then at Izumi, "Please note you are not allowed to inform B-Listers of their position on the bracket."
"How would you know?" Huanli asked.
"Oh, trust me, it's easy to tell. Please be aware there will be repercussions. We aren't above expelling someone from the tournament for a violation like this."
That did catch Huanli off-guard, but Izuku spoke first. "Anything else we should know?"
"We will give all necessary instructions at dinner if you wish to come. If not, you will be randomly assigned like a B-Lister, though I would suggest avoiding that." He checked his pocket watch, and nodded, "That being said, I don't wish to hold you any longer. I believe the next turn should be starting about now, and you probably want to watch this. A few interesting fighters have been slotted in the late matches, and I don't just refer to miss Huanli." He smiled and left the room.
"What was that about?" Izumi asked.
Huanli shook her head, "I don't know. Should we watch the remaining fights?"
-x-
Izuku nodded and turned on the television. Hanabata had been right, the match was starting. And, Izuku noticed, one of the fighters was none other than the Izuku Midoriya he had seen training with Chojuro Kon That morning, the one that had been called 'Zombie'.
Zombie was fighting with an axe, and Izuku noticed there was a second one strapped on his beck, above the trenchcoat. By age, he couldn't be older than his late teens or early twenties, maybe even younger. He walked forward. Izuku looked at the other fighters. He didn't know most of them, but one was a girl wearing a pair of large, red gauntlets, with long blond hair and a pair of glasses.
"Melissa?" He asked. The girl was in her twenties, but she was undoubtably the same person.
"You know her?" Izumi asked.
"I've met the version of her from my world." He replied, "And a few others, actually." He added, thinking at the ones he had met back at the League, "Though, the one from my world isn't a fighter."
As they spoke, they watched the match start and Zombie rush forward, toward a guy with a sword. The man swung the blade, and Izuku watched to see how his other self would dodge or block.
He didn't.
The blade struck his side at full force, and while it didn't cut through because it was blunt it was clear how much force was put behind the blow, with Izuku's flank bending.
And then he ignored it, instead bringing the axe down on the wooden side on the man's shoulder. He shouted and brought forth a thrust. Maybe he had panicked, or maybe he was seriously trying to wound his opponent despite this being a supposedly friendly match. Maybe he hadn't expected Zombie to put in no resistance.
The blade passed through Zombie's side and emerged from his back. The arena gasped, a few people shouting to stop the match, but Zombie didn't acknowledge the blade, buckle or even gasp. He just muttered something, that the camera caught but Izuku couldn't read, brought the axe down again on his opponent's head to knock him unconscious, and grabbed his number. He turned around, blade still embedded in his body, to face his next opponent.
"What the hell…"
"Is he immortal?" Izuku asked. They had already met someone like that after all.
"Impossible." Zuzu replied, speaking up from his arm, "Immortals are banned from participation ever since mister Izzzuku managed to sneak his way in. Even high tier Regeneration is not allowed, after the Noumu spree a few years ago started making the fights too boring. Today, if you can regrow a cut off limb in minutes, there are specific tournaments for you, but not this one."
"Then how is he alive?!" Izumi asked, pointing at Zombie as he rushed forward, blade still trapped in his body. His next opponent was a man with draconic traits, that snapped his teeth around his arm. Dark blood slushed out from the wound, but Zombie didn't stop.
"He doesn't have a sense of pain." Huanli noticed, explaining it out loud for the others, "His reaction would be impossible for anyone that can feel pain in any way, so the obvious answer is complete absence of that feeling. And his blood is thick and black. That's part of the secret behind his power, I would assume."
"Uh. What if he is an actual zombie?" Izumi asked. The other two looked at her. "What? He has black blood, almost like its coagulated, no pain whatsoever from getting stabbed, and isn't dead after getting a sword through his body despite not being immortal. There aren't that many options left."
"That would be troubling." Zuzu replied, "Zombie universes are to be put under quarantine."
"Wait those are a thing?"
"We never found one, but that hardly means anything. We found a vampire world only a few years back, and until then we thought Vampires were only minor elements in a few magic universes." She shook her head, "Anything can be in the Multiverse. I'm more worried about how Kiruka will take this."
"She doesn't like zombies?"
"Terrified of them. She read a few too many comics with superheroes fighting zombies and losing if I can give an opinion. She even suggested quarantining Spider-Man's universe when she realized it was a point of contact with the Omniverse."
"What? Why?"
"In her own words, 'There is a lot of dangerous stuff in Marvel for the Multiverse'. No one asked her to clarify, but we all know she is primarily talking about zombies."
Izuku nodded, understanding. While he wasn't an avid comic reader, he knew of the existence of horror issues in Superhero comics, and while it took some effort to accept those could be real, the fact he knew a version of himself that was Spider-Man made it far from unlikely. "Alright, so maybe we shouldn't bring up the theory to her, right?"
"It's for the best."
Izuku nodded, just as the paler Izuku was declared the A-Lister of his fight. Melissa Shield had won her own bout, reaching the B-Lister title. He did hope the remaining matches wouldn't be as worrying.
-x-
Leaving the League's Headquarters, Shoto did his best to not let his current anger and worry get to his head. He did so despite the fact that all this – and he realized that remarking this so often in his head wasn't healthy, but what else could he do – was reminding him more and more of the times before All for Deku's takeover. All the asking around and the half answers, the worry more friends would be gone… He couldn't be blamed for the thought repeatedly rolling into his head.
"You ok?" Power Suit, the Izuku with a metal arm, asked. Shoto hadn't thought to ask how he had lost it. It sounded like the kind of personal question that would be better kept for when the two became closer, if it happened at all.
"Yes, just… Thinking." He shrugged, "This reminds me of home, and not in a good way."
"Weird, I was thinking the same thing." He paused, "Well, at least the feeling that something bigger is going on is familiar." Midoriya frowned, murmuring something that sounded like 'But I know he is dead here.'
A bit worrying, for Shoto at least. Before he could talk though, Uraraka pointed to a parking lot and the building behind it. "There we go." She parked the car in front of a twenty-stories building, that looked more glass than cement from the outside. The name of "Britain News" was shown on a large, bright blue insigna, the island of Britain colored in red with white borders. Ireland was also included, the north colored in red and the rest in green, to show the news station also covered the Emerald Isle.
Uraraka, wheelchair bound but adamantly refusing to let them push her, quickly led them to the reception. Looking around, Shoto found a very standard location. The coming and going of people wasn't unusual, and he couldn't identify anyone that stood out for carrying themselves as unusual. The guard posted at the entrance was keeping an eye on them, but not more than he was on anyone else in the facility. He carried a gun and didn't show outside signs of a Quirk. Of course, magic could come into play, but Shoto considered it likely he could overpower him before…
He stopped himself. 'I'm not back home. I'm not being hunted.' He told himself. It wasn't easy, to fully abandon his usual thought processes. When you have spent years being hunted, large public spaces start to make you paranoid.
"We are here to see Taneo Tokuda." Uraraka said meanwhile, having reached the front desk, where a young girl with blue hair, azure skin and webbed hands was sitting. She fixed her glasses and nodded, quickly making an internal call. A moment later, she pointed to the elevator. "Mister Tokuda has reserved a meeting room. Fifth floor, tenth door to the left, you should be able to see him."
Uraraka thanked her and led the charge, quickly making her way to the elevator. Power Suit and Shoto stashed themselves with her. "Alright, so far so good." Power Suit commented.
"Nothing that could go wrong there." Shoto pointed out, "Tokuda did give us an appointment."
Uraraka nodded, "Yes, now comes the hard part. A journalist is hardly going to betray his sources. Usually for good reasons, but we need to figure out where he got all this. It's going to be unpleasant. Especially because he has the advantage. If things go south, he can kick us out."
"Then let's make sure it doesn't come to that." Power Suit replied, before slamming his right hand on his forehead, "Oh, before I forget, Kyoka said tonight we are going at a pub. Mariah and Bakugo are coming, and I should be able to drag Hatsume out of the lab. Want to come too?"
"Is it really the time?" Shoto asked, "With the emergency going on?"
"We need to unwind a bit." Power Suit replied, "Mel and Isaac are off looking for the other patrollers, and Kyoka is leaving tomorrow to do the same thing, once she is sure we don't need her for another transfer to the Star Tower."
Uraraka nodded, "It's good to take the respite we can."
Shoto frowned, "And who is going to guard the Headquarters?"
"You mean aside from the two AIs that have full control of everything within the building and are more than ready to put themselves on the line, accompanied by the people we kept here, who are the ones we think are more capable to defend themselves?" She snickered, "I wonder."
It was true that Shoto had noticed a few people from the group he had put on the list. He had thought about asking, but with everything going on, it just seemed like a bad moment to do so. Thinking about it, Itsuka, who was a One for All wielder, was definitely among the people that had stayed at the Headquarters instead of being moved to the Star Tower. "Fine." He said, "I can't really say no."
"Good, you shouldn't." She slapped his back, "I'm not going though."
"What? You just said…" Power Suit started, but the woman chuckled.
"I know, I know, but I'm afraid I won't be of much company. You youngsters belong in a pub more than a woman in his sixties and on a wheelchair. Last thing I need is getting tired and bringing the mood down."
Power Suit and Shoto looked at each other, "You sure?"
"Sure enough. Also, someone has to keep company to Lissa, since she can't go out drinking with you all and doesn't know anyone else at the HQ."
"Right…" Power Suit sighed, "Suit yourself, Uraraka. If you change your mind you are welcome."
With that, the door opened, welcoming them to a large corridor. It was intersected with various rooms with glass walls, and Todoroki realized those were meeting rooms meant to be observable from outside. There were ways to keep people from looking in – or something like that, because he could see one of the room's glass walls had turned black, probably some sort of high tech equivalent of a curtain – and the rooms were clearly soundproofed since they could see a few people talk inside one, around a meeting table, but not hear a single word.
Still, it was clear what this meant. Tokuda had taken precautions to ensure they didn't try anything funny. Which meant he expected their meeting to get heated.
True to his words, they found Tokuda sitting at a large table. The meeting room he had chosen had one side formed by one of the large glass panels that formed the front of the building. Entering, Shoto caught a sight of London that he would have probably found beautiful in different circumstances. Aside from the table itself, and the chair, the room had a large screen on the wall opposite to the door, a few potted plants and a small library, most likely just to give it more color, and a water dispenser.
"Miss Uraraka, good evening." Tokuda said, before looking at the two, "I was told there were guests, but I hoped it would be Miss Mariah and Mister Midoriya."
"I am Mister Midoriya." Power Suit replied, moving his metal arm forward, "Izuku Midoriya. Nice to meet you."
Tokuda seemed almost wary of the arm for a second, before he finally took it and shook the hand. Shoto could understand. While the metallic prosthetic was elegant and well designed, it still gave the distinct impression Izuku could easily crush someone's flesh-and-bone hand with ease. He probably could, to be fair. "Pardon me, I was merely under the impression the name was Isaac. Easy to get confused, I suppose."
Todoroki raised an eyebrow. He didn't know about other Izukus then? Or was just playing innocent? "And I'm Shoto Todoroki." He said, shaking Tokuda's hand.
"The barista from Korea, or his twin brother that has an office job in Japan?" He asked, "I must say, your parents must have been very unimaginative."
Shoto glanced at Uraraka. Alright, the man knew and was putting up a bit of theater. Annoyed, he sat down next to her, as she quickly pulled herself from the wheelchair to the chair Tokuda moved for her. "So. You seem to know a lot." She said, as Power Suit took his own seat.
"I have found out a lot of things, in my time investigating you." He replied, "What can I say, nothing escapes a good journalist."
"Then you won't mind explaining your own theory." Power Suit replied.
"Or you might first tell me the truth." Tokuda said, with a smile, "For starters, you could start explaining why there are currently two living Shoto Todoroki with the same DNA, and one deceased Shoto Todoroki who showed an uncanny resemblance with them." He paused, and looked at Shoto, "Oh, I suppose I should say that there are three living Shoto with the same DNA, going off a limb."
"How would you know that?"
"It's remarkably easy to get a DNA test in the modern world." He casually replied, "And no one ever remembers that social media don't disappear when a person dies. I just had to find out the school mister Todoroki the elder went to, and I got all the pictures I needed to compare. By the way, I should mention there is also an elderly, now deceased, Izuku Midoriya, who does not appear to be the same as mister Isaac Midoriya and mister Izuku here." He snorted, "A bit of a mouthful to explain out loud, but I'm sure you understand."
"Yes, I think we got the message." Shoto replied, feeling anger boiling up and doing his best to cool it down. This guy's attitude was growing really annoying, "What we don't understand is what you think we are doing."
Tokuda smiled, "So you are doing something."
"That isn't really a question." Power Suit calmly replied, "You knew."
"Yes!" He jumped up, "I waited for so long for you all to admit you weren't just a private business like any other. So, here is my theory. You are running a secret cloning facility."
Uraraka blinked, "… What?"
"It all makes perfect sense. Uraraka Ochaco, a woman in her eighties that is a retired police officer from Japan, is still healthy, while you, Uraraka Ochaco a woman in her late fifties, are in a wheelchair. It's well known clones tend to suffer from various illnesses, so I theorize you are an older model of clone that wasn't completely healed."
"First of all, I'm in my sixties, so thank you, but I hate to say you are off the mark." She pointed at her back, "This is the result of a fall."
He looked at her, then at the other two. "Yeah, sorry, I'm afraid I'm not a clone." Izuku answered.
"Neither am I." Shoto added.
"Dammit." Tokuda sat back down, "Well, then please explain. What are you?"
"First, our turn to ask the question." Uraraka replied, "Who put you on track?"
"Pardon?"
"You didn't start coming after us by chance. Someone sent you our way, and we need to know who that is." Uraraka replied, "We already gave you enough."
"Woah, that's not how information works. I don't sell out people that come to me with a story. If I did, they could get hurt and I would never see them and their stories again." He shook his head firmly, and for once his look showed a unique seriousness, "No matter what you offer, I'm not putting someone in danger."
"Mister Tokuda, I don't think you understand the situation." Power Suit replied, "Let me ask a question. Did you find information on a certain Yu Takeyama?"
"The giant?" He moved his files a bit, "Yes, I did. I found out that her apartment rent was being paid by one of the accounts that went back to your… workplace. So I tried to figure out why she was getting this treatment. I was planning to interview her."
"How long ago did you find out?"
"I don't know, about a week?" He shrugged his shoulders, "I don't remember exactly. She wasn't a major crack in the case anyway."
"Yu Takeyama died two days ago." Shoto coldly replied, "I was there when it happened, actually."
The smug smile on the man's face fell all at once, confusion and genuine surprise, at least as far as Shoto could tell, creeping in. "What?" He gasped out.
"Dead. Killed. Murdered."
"No. No, no, impossible." He started going through his papers, "Did anyone else do that?"
"Camie Utsushimi. Chiyo Shuzenji. Sen Kaibara. Ryuko Tsuchikawa." He looked at him, "Four more people, disappeared without trace. The only reason we found out about Takeyama is that whoever did that decided to be less subtle." Which was a bad thing, he didn't say. Whoever they were, they were getting bold.
"No. No, no, you are kidding." He pulled out his phone and a few pages from the folder and started going through them both, biting his lip. Judging by how quickly he moved, he found what he was looking for on the screen quickly, because he shoved it back into his pocket with a grunt. "How long ago?"
"From what we can guess, this has been going for a while. A few weeks."
"Shit. Fuck. Shit." He pulled out the pages, "Would you say a month is a decent timeframe?" He passed a hand through his hair.
"Yes." Power Suit nodded, "It would fit what we think happened."
He slammed the documents on the desk, "That fucking liar!" He pulled out a cigarette, before probably remembering where he was and tossing it aside with a grunt, "Alright, that changes things."
"How?"
He took a deep breath, "A few weeks ago, some… six weeks, I'd say, maybe a few days more, a woman showed up to my house. Tall, lean, red hair, rich from the way she spoke. Didn't give me a name, but she said she was part of a group interested in researching your group. I was… doubtful, but they offered both money and some starting documents. Stuff I would have never managed to dig up myself, buried deep in banking accounts, but once thrown in the hands of a journalist like myself, you are basically giving me the perfect material to start. The deal was that I would show them first what I found, and then I would get to present it to you and even publish it." He grabbed a piece of paper, "This is her. Or well, not her, but what I supposed was a clone of her. I thought that was why they were so interested in it."
They all looked at the page. Itsuka stared back at them.
(xx)
The multiple Shapes of Zhandou Quan are a topic I always enjoy exploring. Four out, two to go (or three?). I wonder if you can guess what the remaining Shapes do with someone's Qi. Including a short appearance from Revenant (from Locked in Digital by Rogue_Druid) was a small addition but fun anyway.
We also get our introduction to Zombie's powerset. If you can call it that.
And the investigation for Team Shoto resumes too with our first breakthrough. I'm sure some people had guessed, but yes, Tokuda wasn't in the know. Where he goes now is a very interesting question.
Not a bad start for the year, I hope.