Desolation: A Tomura Shigaraki SI-OC
Chapter Four: Insomnia
Two more months passed. I got my ass kicked by Teach. I learned more about Japan's criminal underground from Kurogiri and Giran. Sometimes All For One would join in as well, but not often. I stopped spying on Izuku Midoriya, as he had become aware—or perhaps just more wary—of my presence.
In lieu of my new-found free time, I began wandering the streets during the dark.
(Still so tired.)
I search for the outcasts. Common crooks. Homeless people. Vigilantes. Those with less than desirable quirks, or no quirks at all. I'm not truly sure about what I am trying to search for in these people.
I avoid the crooks like the plague. I give money—and sometimes food—to the homeless people.
("Here. Get yourself something to eat."
"T-thank you, stranger!"
"Don't thank me. Go.")
I find some of those with undesirable quirks—mutants or villainous—and give them a quick spiel of my own ideology.
(I find a man who looks like a lizard in a dirty alleyway. Looks like Spinner before he actually became Spinner. I think his name was Shuichi or something. He is surrounded from the front by members of the Creature Rejection Clan—otherwise known as the poor man's KKK.
Spinner—no, Shuichi—is only armed with a single blade that is about as long as his forearm. The five bastards are armed with clubs and knives.
I'm not entirely sure I should save him. While I don't know anything about him prior to his first appearance in the manga, I know that he would follow Stain's ultimately flawed ideology to an extreme extent.
Then I looked behind him, and realized he was not alone. Children. Two of them. Both mutants. Couldn't have been older than thirteen.
I make my decision.
The hand-mask that Tomura always wore was in my pocket on the occasion that I did indeed need to fight. And my hood was drawn over my head. No further need for disguise.
I charge. As silent as I can be. No need to drop the element of surprise. One of the five CRC members charges forward, lifting the club above his head in order to preform a powerful downwards strike.
My right hand meets the left elbow of one of the CRC members—one of the ones towards the back. He screams, dropping the knife as fabric and skin disintegrate, exposing red flesh to the cold wind. He stumbles back as I move to attack my next target.
The man about to attack Shuichi pauses and looks towards me, giving the lizard man ample time to strike. After giving me a shocked look, he attacks. His cuts are shallow, but they succeed in making the man back off as he runs into the night. I latch my left hand on another CRC member's shoulder. Not even a second later, the man bats it off and runs. I can't blame him. Who would want to fight somebody who could disintegrate all he could touch?
The remaining thugs run off. Victory is ours, as is all of the loot that comes with it.
The kids leave moments later, only saying brief thanks to us as they leave. Shuichi and I stare each other down. He is nervous, just about as nervous as I am. Difference is, I have a mask thing to hide said nervousness.
"Why?" He asks. "No one else really bothers. Not even most of the heroes. Not if there aren't any cameras to capture their 'good deeds.'"
I take a moment to find my words and breath. "Because somebody should. Somebody should care about people more than fame or glory. But nobody cares enough about being a real hero anymore. And that has allowed people like these—"
[CRC, Meta Liberation, Endeavor, The Commission, All For One, so many others.]
"—to get away with too much." I stand a little straighter. "It's time that someone revealed the truth of Hero Society to the world. It's time that someone forced change, because these apathetic lot certainly won't change themselves. And talk…" I gestured to the empty streets around us. "Talking only works if people want to listen. And the people that we are both up against don't want to listen."
Silence. Then Shuichi speaks. "You said 'we'."
There is a question hidden there. I answer. "I'm looking to create a group of people like us. Outcasts. Villains and Vigilantes both. Those who have different ideas on how the system should operate and were rejected because of it. Not madmen and murderers, but true revolutionaries who would be willing to take Japan—and the world—by storm." I took out a glove from one of my pockets and put it on. Then I stuck out my hand to Shuichi.
"Will you join me?"
He looks at the hand for a moment.
"…I'll consider it."
I sighed. Can't win 'em all.
"That's all I ask."
Guess I still need to put more points into charisma.)
I encounter only a few vigilantes. Most were inexperienced and quit after a single night. One, on the other hand…
("Money. Now." A deep voice speaks from behind me. I try not to let the fear show as I turn around to face the mugger.
Fuck!
He has a gun. A sleek, silver revolver. It has no stains or scratches, meaning it was either recently purchased or well-maintained.
He's not close enough for me to grab, and something tells me that this man will be able to pull the trigger faster than I can move.
Damn.
Best bet for survival is to give him my wallet. Aside from the few crumpled bills that I have alongside the credit card, there is nothing important in there.
I reach for my pocket…and then suddenly the man screams. The gun clatters to the ground, now stained in the red life-giving fluid of the mugger.
There is a knife sticking out of his forearm. And behind him is a man well known to me.
A man with no nose.)
As for the quirkless…
(I walk through the empty streets, only stopping when I find a corpse on the ground in front of me. His shoes are missing, and blood is pooling mostly from the head. He is dressed in dirty clothes and reeks of alcohol. A driver's license is lying next to him. I make out a single word.
Quirkless.
[Twenty percent. An ever-shrinking population. No more room in the world for these people.]
I vomit. It is the first body I ever saw.
It won't be the last.)
No one wants to die. They just want the pain to end.
I feel tired.
"No one man can hold up the world forever." I say to the All Might graffiti painted on the wall of an office building. "You say you are the Symbol of Peace. There is no peace here. Only the quiet. You haven't changed a damn thing."
"Feeling cynical?"
I look towards the interrupting voice. A sort of tan-haired kid wearing a school uniform stands near the main street. He's shorter than me, can't be much older than fourteen. He is smiling, but it's nervous. Despite the darkness, I can see an object with the shape of a gun grip sticking out of his right pocket.
I snort. "Wouldn't you be? You're out here too. You've most likely seen what I've seen."
He doesn't protest. He merely walks up next to me and stares at the painting as well.
"You're such a liar." He says. It takes me a second to figure out that he isn't talking to me, but to the painting. "You said that the world was made equal. You were wrong. You lied." His breath hitches. "You said we could all be heroes. But nobody else thinks otherwise. The world only believes that people with great quirks can be heroes."
I regard him with an aside glance. "What's your deal?"
"…kids at school pick on—!"
"Don't dress it up with nice words, kid."
"…kids at school bully me because of my quirk. They want to be heroes."
I hum. "And do you want to be a hero in a world where people like them get to be heroes?"
"…no."
I didn't ask why he came back here. I saw the gun. Either he was planning to go to school with it or…
"…What's your name kid?"
He is silent for a moment.
"…Mustard." It obviously isn't his real name, but I don't press. "You?"
I consider the question for a moment.
"…Shimura. Death Hand Shimura."
I call Giran later. Tell him that it is time to create the League of Villains in my own special way.
(—A League of our own?)
He tells me he'll start looking for people who are looking to join such an organization.
All For One would probably send for people like Muscular or Moonfish. People who wouldn't fit my cause.
So I would have to look for my own recruits.
AN: Gonna focus a bit more on this, so I apologize to those of you who were reading Teen Titans: Arcanum.
Next time: Tomura recruits some wannabe supervillains and meets a certain crispy boi, along with a vampire chick!
