Focus.

She needed to stay focused.

She was angry. She had every right to be angry. And if anyone argued otherwise, she'd break their nose and then continue being angry. But Couturier was fast. And strong. And could regrow her arms without blinking. She needed to keep her head planted on her shoulders because Couturier was going to say something to piss her off. Maybe something about her dad. Something designed to get underneath her skin. Anything to make her lose control. That's why she refused to think about the bitch any more than necessary. If not to keep one foot out of the grave, because she needed to remain focused to prevent that freaking scissor blade from turning her into a glorified shish kabob, but because not getting angry would seriously annoy the psychopath.

And that was almost as good as beating the shit out of the bitch.

"Tch!"

Her hands clenched the makeshift handle of her Quirk's latest creation as she stood shoulder-to-shoulder with Couturier. Their blades sparked against each other in a brilliant shower of crimson and purple. A bead of sweat trickled down her cheek, followed both another and another. As hairline fractures no thicker than her eyelashes expanded outwards from the point of contact, spreading across the edge of her blade until bits and pieces of hardened blood fell to the street between her boots, Ryuko kept pushing. Because that was really the only thing she could do against someone capable of shattering her creations. Against the only person who'd ever been able to damage her creations. She kept pushing. And eventually something slipped against something else.

"Hah…hah…hah…"

The instant she felt her Quirk slide against whatever bullshit material composed Couturier's purple scissor blade, Ryuko moved counterclockwise around the masked villain, retaining eye contact until leaping backwards, "Guess you didn't learn your lesson," it felt rotten simply talking to the insane psychopath, as if pretending to hold a conversation would spread her craziness, "But I'm more than happy to beat your shit in again!"

She snarled at the mocking laughter.

Tittering like broken glass.

And despite repeating 'stay calm' to herself over and over and over, her mind returned to that night.

"Is that how you remember it?" the psychopath in the form of a blonde woman absorbed Ryuko's memory of their previous encounter with cheerfulness a parent normally reserved for misbehaving children, "Because I remember you barely holding your own, even with your friend butting his nose where it didn't belong," the purple scissor blade spun around her pinky as each word stabbed deep into Ryuko's subconscious, "I knew UA was the best school in the country, but I didn't know they were ~that~ good," a flick of her wrist allowed the masked villainess to catch her weapon mid-rotation, aim it in her direction and add without missing a beat, "Well, in that case, I suppose this means I don't have to hold back!"

Ryuko tried moving out of the way.

But knowing something was coming was different than being able to avoid what was coming.

As soon as the voice in the back of her head said to move, she moved. Only it wasn't nearly fast enough to completely avoid Couturier's bullshit quick movement. Or the scissor blade teleporting across the twenty or so foot gap between them in the blink of an eye. It was no more than a shallow cut across her arm. Barely a scratch. But thanks to her Quirk, surprise and the pressure of staying alive, blood spewed like water from a fire hydrant. It gushed onto the street in thick puddles for all of two seconds before she mentally clamped down on her blood, reducing the geyser to little more than a light trickle.

"That sure is a lot of blood," dainty fingers wriggled around purple metal as Couturier's obnoxiously blank rabbit mask conveyed her curiosity, "Sure you can afford losing that much?"

Ryuko didn't answer.

She just swung.

"Hup!"

A counterclockwise pirouette, one arm tucked against her back while the other casually deflecting Ryuko's Quirk in an upwards angle, reduced said teenager's straightforward strategy to nothing but trash. Mid-spin, blonde hair following behind the rest of her body, Couturier hopped backwards when Ryuko swung again. And then a third time, perhaps hoping she'd prove what they said about insanity incorrect. Nevertheless, tittering beneath her mask, thigh-high pink books skipping past the twin yellow lines in the middle of the street, her lithe muscles flexed before launching her over a minivan right as Ryuko decided to use said vehicle as an outlet for her frustration.

"Now that's not very nice."

When companies claimed their cars could withstand impacts up to one hundred kilometers per hour, they hadn't counted on someone like Ryuko. Stainless steel painted an awkward shade of robin blue rusted along the tire wells parted like water against the Quirk-enhanced semi-liquid crimson blade. Glass shattered and an alarm briefly blared before petering to a tense silence when Ryuko carved through the vehicle's computer.

"But if you're trying to kill ~me~ instead of this poor car," standing behind the destroyed vehicle slowly but steadily realizing it was now two cars instead of only one, Couturier leaned her elbow against the hood and tittered, "You're going to need to be quicker than – "

"Two Million Volt Electrocution!"

Every light within a five-block radius went dark.

Crouched down behind Ryuko, one arthritic knee painfully touching the ground, Monsoon pushed millions of volts of electricity at more than thirty thousand amperes of current into the villain. He didn't hold back. The morons calling themselves the Hero Public Safety Commission would probably be upset with an old pro going straight to killing a villain instead of taking them into custody. But he didn't give a rat's ass what those inexperienced fools thought. Someone like this was far too dangerous to be allowed to live.

"Five Million Volt Electrocution!"

The palm of his hand pressed against asphalt, Monsoon reached deep inside and pushed his Quirk beyond its limitations, not stopping even as Couturier's convulsions ceased.

He only stopped when his Quirk eventually short-circuited.

A rare feat in his nearly sixty years of active service.

"Sorry about that," it took a couple of seconds, but as Corusco Ward flickered back to life, Monsoon ignored the overwhelming odor of cooked flesh, a smell he'd recognize until the day some lucky punk with a cheap Quirk managed to finish what several particularly dangerous villains couldn't, "Was waiting for the perfect opportunity to take her out," faint arcs of electrical clung to his fingers as he shook his head and stood up, "So, you two had history, I take it?"

Ryuko heard him talk, but as she stared at Couturier's charred corpse, waiting for the villain to get up, she felt something that wasn't relief.

"I've been around the block long enough to recognize a dangerous villain when I see one," Monsoon gave his hand a quick flex, clenching and relaxing his fingers, before rubbing his jawline, "The Hero Association prefers to lock the worst of the worst in Tartarus where society doesn't have to think about how many people they've killed. Can't blame them," he'd seen far worse than the so-called League of Villains. He'd seen actual evil. Not with his own eyes, thank God, but a man whose presence was so terrifying nobody in their right minds attempted to bring him to justice, "But there are some villains that don't deserve to spend seventy years in a small cell."

His breathless sigh almost sounded forlorn.

"I'm going to guess she's the one who murdered your father," when Ryuko didn't say anything, merely glanced aside while barely holding her Quirk together, he leaned back, staring at the starry skies, "You don't have to answer. Figured it out the moment you threatened to kill her. That sort of hatred doesn't come from losing a fight," his gravelly voice conveyed a sense of confusion, as if he knew what to say but not if he should say it, "Look…Ryuko, you're, what, fourteen? Fifteen? Point is, you have your whole life ahead of you. Even if this psycho was the one who took your father…"

He motioned towards the burnt body.

"…you don't want the weight of her death on your consciousness," the hero slapped Ryuko on the back, dragging her out of her thoughts, "Me, on the other hand? Well, you'd have to get me rather drunk to hear about some of the villains I fought before All Might burst onto the stage."

Ryuko no longer heard him.

Silence pressed on her heart.

A deafening silence screaming into her ears, "…something about this ain't right."

Monsoon paused before he'd finished turning around, "What?"

"I said…" Ryuko bit her lip, each word more strained than the last, "…something about this ain't right," repeating herself, she swallowed the lump in her throat, "At UA, she goddamn regrew her arm. It just…just grew back," her heart was pounding. The silence pressed harder and harder against her thoughts until the only thing capable of piercing the tension was Couturier's smoking corpse, tattered clothing clinging to charred and burnt flesh. And the more she looked at it, the more even that seemed off.

Like it wasn't real.

A breath hitched in her throat.

She felt something move.

And without warning, she planted her hand against Monsoon's chest and shoved him moments before a disturbingly familiar purple blade skewered him from back to front.

"Oh darn!"

Floating past the older pro who hadn't noticed her sneak attack until Ryuko literally shoved him out of the way, Couturier's mood shifted between mocking indifference and genuine frustration as she landed where her corpse had been moments ago, "Couldn't have figured it out a few seconds slower, could you?"

"How the…" Monsoon trailed off mid-stumble.

"You know, it's funny," it was subtle. Something impossible to notice unless you knew what you were looking for, "This is how things unfolded last time," despite sounding cheerful, there was no mistaking Couturier's frustration, "You get angry, throw everything except the kitchen sink at me only for a pathetic nobody with a second-rate Quirk to be the first one to hurt me," emotionless porcelain stared at Ryuko before tilting towards Monsoon, "You don't know how annoying that is!"

CLANG!"

"Huh."

It wasn't confusion at Ryuko managing to move fast enough to intercept her again. Or bewilderment that the teenager cared enough about some washed-up nobody to risk her own life. Nope. What caused Couturier to stop dead in her tracks, poised inches above the ground mid-swing, one foot tucked against her thigh and a single arm extended, was the terribly designed blood shield erupting from Ryuko's forearm. A bulwark tough enough to resist her cute attacks without so much as a scratch.

"Gosh, that's new," unable to resist a compliment, Couturier leaned around the crystalline crimson escutcheon and hummed, "Have you been practicing?"

The shield's existence continued for all of one seconds before Ryuko liquefied every drop of blood, reared her head backwards and bashed her forehead against Couturier's mask hard enough to crack the ugly-as-shit porcelain.

"Get out of here, gramps!"

Blood gushed from her forehead, stinging her eyes and leaving her face covered in rivers of bright red, "I can handle her!" her Quirk reforged itself into a familiar blade, excess blood floating through the air and back into her body as Couturier dramatically stumbled, "Get help or whatever! Just get out of here before she kills you!"

Monsoon hesitated.

Leaving Ryuko with the villain who murdered her father wasn't something he wanted to do, but the way things were, he'd only get in the way, especially without his Quirk, "I suppose I'll leaving kicking her ass to you. Think you can handle that?"

Ryuko felt something.

Truthfully, she didn't know what she was feeling, so she simply buried the emotions beneath an annoyed grunt, "Why are you still here!?"

As Monsoon finally took her advice and sprinted towards the hills or wherever his former agency was, Ryuko's eyes snapped back towards Couturier when the overly dramatic villain grumbled, somehow sounding both amused and annoyed, "That's going to leave a mark!" said villain was leaning backwards at an impossibly contorted angle, tresses of blonde barely touching the ground, "What do you think, Ryuko?" and then she lurched forward, shoulders quivering and fingers tracing the crack on her mask, "Does it look bad?"

"Like I give a shit!"

Ryuko smashed her Quirk against the ground, the makeshift sword transforming into a hammer halfway through the motion.

Pink boots daintily avoided the explosion of concrete and asphalt.

Lithe limbs concealing superhuman strength carried Couturier between flying pavement and other debris, "You should relax, Ryuko," leaning on her right leg, arms tucked against the small of her back and a smile noticeable despite the mask covering her face, she watched Monsoon flee into the night, aware she could catch up to the old pro without Ryuko able to do anything to stop her yet choosing to let him escape, "Oh, by the way," prefacing the question by pressing a finger to her cheek and turning subtly in the other direction, Couturier hummed, "Aren't you curious?"

A grimace pulled upon Ryuko's bloodied lips as her Quirk reverted to its standard form, "The hell are you blabbing about?"

"Oh, nothing," the porcelain mask concealing Couturier's insanity shifted when a plume of orange yellow exploded in the distance, "Just thought you'd want to know it was me who sent that Nomu after your teacher."

Ryuko's eye snapped towards the explosion.

"Hmm, to be honest, I figured she'd be dead by now. Guess I seriously underestimated her rabbit strength. Or maybe that Nomu was simply too weak," purposely, deliberate, almost as if tempted her to do something, Couturier turned around, staring at the distant fighting with both hands still tucked behind her back, "Still, even if it was too weak, it did its job of separating you. But I sure ~hate~ when things don't go as planned. Maybe I'll go pay her a visit once I'm finished playing with you."

Her sword burned between her fingers.

"I'm going to ask one more time," taking a deep breath, then releasing it, Ryuko trembled, "Why did you kill my dad?"

"Don't tell me you're ~still~ focused on that," it was impossible to drown out the bitch's mocking laughter, an insane tittering that ground against her eardrums until it filled her head and left room for nothing else, "Would me confessing bring him back? Hmm, nope! Your dear old daddy's dead! And once I'm finished with you, your friends are next! And I think I'll start with that ugly toad – "

Something inside Ryuko snapped.

Pushing off the ground, neon danced off her sweaty face as she twisted her upper body, one arm crossed over the other and slammed her Quirk into Couturier's waiting sword. Sparks danced in front of her narrowed eyes. A cacophony of light predominantly purple and vermilion. Her ears rang from the impact. Her arms quivered, muscles burning with exhaustion as she pushed herself beyond the melting point. And then she pushed even harder. And then, despite pushing back equally as hard, Couturier slowly slid backwards, gravel spreading around pink boots before they escaped the earth's gravitation pull. Assisted by a supersonic explosion that shattered whatever windows remained intact, the masked sociopath found herself flying backwards at speeds comparable to the train she'd taken to Corusco Ward.

But that wasn't fast enough to keep her from keeping up.

BOOM!

BOOM!

BOOM!

She swung a total of three times.

And three times, despite tumbling chaotically in every possible direction through the night, Couturier's purple scissor blade met her Quirk in a shower of blinding sparks.

"Gosh," upside-down relative to the ground, a flash of blonde ducked beneath a crimson blade, "Was it something I said?" salmon billowed in the twilight as she spun clockwise next to Ryuko, meeting the teenager's attacks every step of the way, "Don't tell me ~that~ was what it took to get you fighting seriously!" after nearly five blocks, roughly the point where civilians were still evacuating the ongoing battles, Couturier's right foot regained contact with the ground, followed by her left, "Because if I knew that, I would have threatened your friends a long time ago!"

The side of a building crumpled, glass and concrete ripping themselves apart.

"Almost got me that time!"

No longer caring to parry Ryuko's increasingly wild swings, Couturier began dancing around the dangerous attacks, moving just enough to avoid scraping her skin, "But as I was saying before you so rudely interrupted me…"

Hovering behind Ryuko, floating seemingly upon the air and hues of green and purple dancing across her mask, affording the porcelain an almost menacing aura, Couturier whispered into the frustrated teenager's ear, "…you might as well forget about me telling you anything and focus on the here and now! For example – "

Crimson arced through the night as Ryuko spun around on her back heel and attempted – attempted, being the key word – beheading Couturier only to slice through a truck. Reacting more from instinct and experience than knowing something was coming, she flipped her Quirk around and desperately blocked the purple blade from slashing her face. And it worked to a point. Because Couturier was freaking strong. And despite blocking the attack, the superhuman strength behind the swing knocked her down the street and into a parked taxi.

" – you surviving the next five minutes," mirth oozed from the masked woman's voice, "Would honestly exceed my expectations!"

Ignoring the new warmth trickling between her eyebrows and down her cheek, Ryuko grabbed either side of the taxi and yanked herself free.

"But how about we make it one minute?"

Her heart skipped a beat when Couturier was suddenly there.

And she moved, scrambling out of the way of the purple instrument of destruction before it sliced through the taxi, street, sidewalk and the front of the building behind them.

Pelted by debris and asphalt kicked up from the weapon pulverizing everything in a straight line ten feet from impact, Ryuko ignored the warmth trickling down her cheek. She used that blood, merging it with her weapon. She clenched her teeth until her jaw hurt, pushed off the ground, spun counterclockwise underneath Couturier's lazy swing and barely caught the bitch's actual attack. A mid-swing adjustment impossible for a normal person's shoulders and spine yet easily enough something the masked psychopath pulled off with a laziness almost frightening in scope.

Her costume over her hip ripped.

Followed by a spurt of blood almost like rain in the night.

And pain.

Staggering backwards, Ryuko resisted the urge to hold her hip or curse or anything unproductive. She gasped, spittle and blood trickling from the corners of her mouth as she matched the blonde's passive giddiness with pure hatred. She could feel her blood boiling. A heat already causing her skin to warm. With a metallic clink, gripping blood hard enough that the hardened liquid warped and twisted, she sprinted towards Couturier, covering half a block in the blink of an eye.

It must have been faster than the bitch expected because her knee connected with the latter's stomach

And her following punch sent Couturier's head snapping sideways before her body impacted the ground at an awkward angle.

"You ~are~ stronger!"

The sound of rustling fabric assaulted her ears as Couturier recovered faster than humanly possible. A joint or two cracked. Landing on her feet, only a smudge of dirt on her costume as evidence something happened, the masked woman laughed. And then, in the blink of an eye, returned the favor. Caught off guard, Ryuko felt her Quirk go haywire between pulling blood back into her body or forcing more into her blade. The villain's sheer speed was almost too fast to see. Every swing carved trenches out of the street. Every parry left her arms feeling like she'd bench-pressed a truck. Blood coated most of her face. Rips opened across her costume. Her right eye was blurry. Her mouth tasted like copper. The Seki Tekko were hot enough to burn her skin.

Yet Ryuko didn't stop.

"But it's not enough to ~kill~ me," the sociopath used their clashing blades to lean close enough to whisper into her ear, "If you want that, you're gonna have to try a little harder!"

"Shut up!"

Streaks of crimson followed one final attempt to split Couturier in two before the masked woman hopped backwards and leapt several stories into the air.

"For someone who couldn't save her daddy, you're really giving it everything," perched on the edge of a roof, flames from the distant battle between Mirko, the Nomu and the heroes who'd come to help, Couturier propped her chin on her palm, crossed her legs and tittered, "Do you still have nightmares, Ryuko? How often do you dream about stumbling on your dear old daddy gasping for breath? To have such a fun Quirk yet be unable to save the one you love. The guilt must be gnawing on your soul."

"I SAID SHUT UP!"

Screaming until her lungs turned raw, Ryuko leapt onto the bisected truck. Her foot dented weathered steel, rust flaking off green and silver paint as she bent her knees and jumped as high as possible. Ten…twenty…and finally sixty feet. She leapt until she stopped. And then she ran up the side of the building, arms pumping back and forth, vermilion light radiating from her hair and the distant flames from Mirko's battle illuminating the psychopath's mask's every imperfection and crack. She didn't stop running. Not even when gravity attempted pulling her back down. She just kept pushing herself higher and higher, spittle and blood tearing out of her mouth.

In a heartbeat, she floated eye level with the insane villain.

And then her spine crumbled.

"You really should have asked yourself 'why on earth am I announcing my attack before actually doing it?' before doing anything," lowering her foot, which had the honor of breaking one or two of Ryuko's ribs as it sent her flying across the roof, Couturier watched said teenager crash into an air condition unit before continuing the conversation, "A real hero attacks first and then says what they did. Gee, I would have thought you learned ~something~ at UA."

Silence.

Not even a curse.

"Come on, Ryuko, I don't have all day."

The tapping of Couturier's purple scissor blade against the roof was louder than it should have been, "How long are you planning to –"

Thump!

What could only be called confusion trickled through the villainess's thoughts when something smashed into her stomach, tearing through her salmon dress in the process and leaving a gaping wound. She looked down, mask cocked slightly to the right, staring at the blood oozing from the unexpected wound. A hole no larger than a marble. Or her fingertip. A jagged hole closing as quickly as it appeared, leaving her good as new yet with a costume that needed fixing, "I don't know what you did," prefacing her curiosity at whatever Ryuko did with suitable astonishment, Couturier grabbed her sword with both hands and split it into two shorter blades, "But miracles only happen once!"

"A miracle, huh?"

Gasping for breath, Ryuko stumbled onto her feet, collapsed and once again managed to stand, one hand holding onto the fire escape, "So, if I do it again, what's that make you?"

"Interesting question!"

Another explosion shook Corusco as Couturier spun her newfound twin blades, "But if you think I'd actually fall for such a cheap trick," darkness danced across her mask. Shadows of the deepest black caused the porcelain to obtain an almost malevolent sheen in the twilight glow when she spun around and deflected the blood sword Ryuko had dropped moments ago, "Then you've got another thing coming!"

The mentally controlled weapon shattered upon impact, dissolving into millions of shards of solidified blood.

"Was that seriously the best – "

For the first time in a really long time – in fact, for the first time in her life – Couturier was at a loss for words. Leaning her shoulder against the fire escape for support, blood covering most of her body, Ryuko was pointing two fingers at her. For a noticeable fraction of time, she wondered what Ryuko was doing. And then her mind pieced together the truth. Bright blue eyes within the shadows of her mask widened. Something ephemerally resembling bewilderment registered on the edges of her consciousness as every drop of blood lifted from Ryuko, flowed through the darkness and condensed into a small orb in front of the battered teenager's trembling fingers.

"…oh."

Her dull astonishment was interrupted when a liter of blood formed into a sphere no larger than a marble smashed through her mask, penetrated her skull and exploded out the back of her head in a bouquet of blossoming crimson.