SMRY: Crispy fights Chilly while trying to turn him to the dark side (which has cookies). Meanwhile, Death Hand declares 'I am here' to the world.
Desolation: A Tomura Shigaraki SI-OC
Chapter Ten: I Am Here
Shoto Todoroki steps to the left as another wave of blue flames consumes the streets of the simulated wreckage of what was once a city. The young man throws up a wall of ice with a quick upwards slash of his right arm.
The wall lasts for mere seconds as his opponent's blue colored flames creep up and around the wall, consuming it completely.
Shoto let out an aggravated huff as frost began to form on his right arm and the right side of his face. Were it not for his adversary's own pyrokinetic abilities, he supposed he would have long since froze to death.
As the inferno subsided, he saw the visage of the man who had attacked him. The man was tall and lean, and bruise-colored patches of skin were held to him by staples. His hair—while white as the snow of a new winter—was spiked, reminding him of—
(Why won't you use your left side, Shoto!)
The man grins and speaks. "Ah, Shoto, Shoto, Shoto." The man closes his turquoise eyes and rolls his shoulders. "So afraid of using the other half of your quirk. Is this because of your father?"
Shoto felt a cold rage well up within him as he grimaced. "You know nothing about what you speak!" The dual-powered teen sent a wave of ice towards the taller man, who simply lifted his right arm and let out another torrent of flames.
The man smirked. "I know everything, Shoto Todoroki. The way your father trained you. How he neglected his other children. How your mother was driven so far to the brink that the burned you with scalding hot water from a kettle."
The man threw both of his hands forward, and a tornado of blue flames consumed the streets once again. Shoto manifested a dome of thick ice before the flames hit him. By the time the tornado had expired, the ice had completely evaporated.
"…Who are you?" Shoto asked, his voice cautious and curious. "How do you know these things?"
(Things only his family would know.)
The man let out a bitter chuckle, filled with hate and madness. "I am the sins of the past, taken root in the present."
Before Shoto could ask more of the man, the door to the USJ was thrown off its hinges by a single powerful blow. A voice—a voice that everyone in Japan, if not the world, knew—spoke a well-known phrase.
"Never fear…for I am here."
The man in black chuckled once again. "Well, looks like our time here is coming to a close." The man turned his dead turquoise eyes towards the dual-haired teen. "Run along now! You might get to see the main event if you do!"
Before Shoto could fully process the man's sentence, he vanished into a burst of the same purple fog that had signaled the attack.
Shoto stared at where the man had once been, then made a beeline towards the main plaza, unaware of how the following event would come to change his time at UA.
All Might descended down the stairs with a speed that was simply god-like, incapacitating villains as he went as he moved his way towards Death Hand's clone and his lieutenants.
No. Magne realized. He's heading towards the Nomu!
As the blond behemoth charged towards the group, he hooked his right arm back, preparing a punch that would have killed most mortal men.
Most mortal men weren't the Nomu…nor did most mortal men have multiple quirks.
When the blow finally landed, the Nomu was barely phased, only giving off a subtle twitch that would be difficult to divine with the naked eye.
The clone of Shimura let out a wild, disturbed howl, followed by mad laughter as he removed the hair tie that prevented the locks of paper-white hair from flowing freely. "So, the man of the hour finally arrives!"
All Might leaps back, having failed to retrieve Eraserhead the easy way. "Attacking children and their teachers!? What do you get out of this, villain?!"
Shimura held up a single finger and gave All Might a manic grin. "I want a plethora of things, but since my better 'self' will be here soon, I'll keep this short." The white-haired villain snaps his fingers, and the Nomu dropped Eraserhead. "You will fight my Nomu—no cheats, no hacks, no glitches, and no guides or backup—while the world watches. He did promise that an easter egg would be revealed, after all!"
"Who is this 'he' that you are talking about!?" All Might questioned, his muscles rippling as he took up a boxing stance.
Then, Bakugou, Eraserhead, All Might, and the villains caught the scent of sulfur as multiple foggy portals opened in the air, dropping students and villains alike, save for one. Out of the one, stepped an exact copy of Shimura, but something was different about him. His eyes were more alive, and he stood straighter that his other self, and he just seemed saner than the other man.
With him were three others. Izuku Midoriya, Kyoka Jirou, and a young man in a school uniform and a gas mask. The other Shimura scanned the crowd of hero hopefuls and villains, his eyes lingering on All Might, Bakugou, and his double.
Then, he turned to the man named Twice and spoke. "Twice. Banish the clone. We don't need him anymore."
"Sure boss! Screw you! I'll do what I want!" The man replied.
The other Shimura melted into a pile of mud and muck without so much as a protest.
Shimura—the real one, Eraserhead thought—turned towards the two hero students, a smirk hidden under the severed hand that he wore. "Run along now, little successor and secret-keeper." The two ran towards All Might, and the safety he represented. Before the two fully crossed the distance, Shimura cleared his throat. "Secret-Keeper." Jirou turned back, her face pale. "Remember to tell All Might what you know about One For All."
Eraserhead can see All Might and Izuku Midoriya both flinch at the mention of the phrase. Whatever secret the two had, he would ask them about it later.
The heroes watch as Shimura raises a hand to his right ear, pressing a finger on what Eraserhead suspects to be an earpiece. "Haze. Bring all members save for the main vanguard back to base. Their part in this is done."
The majority of the villains vanish, leaving only Magne, Twice, and a scarred, black-clad man with white hair. Shimura turns his red eyes towards All Might's ocean blue orbs. "I suppose you've been told our terms. Fight Nomu, and your students will not be harmed. Or at least, they won't be harmed anymore."
All Might grimaces. "Indeed. I suppose that is why Iida was allowed to escape."
"Indeed. How far did he have to run to reach you by the way, given that you weren't here to protect your students already? This behavior is quite negligent of a teacher, All Might." Shimura taunted.
"…Just send your creature at me already."
Shimura smirked. "As you wish."
The Nomu attacked, each of its blows struck All Might with the force of a freight train. All Might threw his own punches, slowly escalating the power behind them as the Nomu did the same. But no matter how many blows landed, the Nomu seemed to absorb the damage.
Regeneration. All Might thought. Or maybe shock absorption.
Either way, that meant that this fight could be won. That this lifeless thing had limitations, and thus, weaknesses that could—and would—work against it.
All Might continued escalating the power behind his blows until he found the limit, sending the creature into the stratosphere with a single blow—that if it was not concentrated on the Nomu—that would have wiped an entire city from the face of existence.
The battle had devastated the courtyard, and most of the students—along with Eraserhead—had been blown back by the sheer force of the power being thrown around. Out of the twenty-eight observers of the fight, only seven remained within the area of the fight, the others having been blown away, or rendered unconscious.
All Might felt his muscles become less defined as steam began to emanate from his body. He didn't have much time before One For All wore off.
Guess I'll just have to fake it till I make it!
He turned towards the remaining three villains as the one covered in severed hands stood up from the rubble.
"You're 'Nomu' is finished, villain! Desist now, and I will let you leave."
"YEAH!" All Might heard Young Kirishima roar. "That'll show 'em! Great job All Might!"
Oh shit.
All Might suddenly paled as he saw Kirishima along with Midoriya, Bakugou, and Jirou. Out of the four of them, only Midoriya knew what was wrong. And as the Symbol of Peace focused his eyes back on the white-haired villain, he found that the man was smiling.
Which meant that he knew as well.
"On the contrary." The young man began, starting to stretch out his right hand. Then, the villain lunged forward as a purple-black portal manifested in front of both him and All Might. The villain's pale appendage emerged from the portal in front of All Might, and the gloved hand gave Toshinori Yagi a hard shove.
All Might stumbled back as he felt the strength One For All provided leave him, and he transformed back into his thinner self.
He turned back towards the children…only to see three shocked faces and one face filled with horror. Then he heard the victorious laughter of the villain as he began to speak.
"Oh All Might." The young man began. "Did you really believe that you could hide such a weakness forever, much less take the existence of One For All to your grave, as well as the grave of your apprentice, the boy known as Izuku Midoriya?"
"…All Might? What is he talking about?" Kyoka Jirou asked, fear coating her voice as she and her classmates watched the image of the invincible hero that no one could ever amount to become just that…a mere image.
"You thought that you could keep the world safe just by standing at the top and shouting 'I am here'!" The man snarled. "Well guess what 'All Might'! Being there is not enough! You have failed to act against the evil that plagues the alleyways and the government offices! You have failed to make actual change; you have failed to bridge the gap that separates us all from being a unified and equal world! You have failed to erase the inequality that divides us! What you brought wasn't peace! Merely the calm before the storm that I am going to bring!"
All Might finally spoke, but not with the deafening tones of the hero he had built himself up to be, not as the god that all of society worshiped, but with the wheeze of an ordinary man who was passing his prime. "Who are you, and how do you know about One For All!?"
The villain's next words hit Toshinori like a gunshot. "I am Death Hand Shimura, apprentice of the mighty All For One."
No. Impossible! She had no children! No other relatives!
Then, Death Hand Shimura turned his head towards somewhere behind him. "Oh, Toga? You can stop recording now. We have what we need."
A blonde teenager with catlike eyes and some kind of black, skin-tight suit stepped out from behind some fallen rubble. "Whew. I almost got hit a couple of times there!" A foggy portal opened up behind the four villains. "Well, see you back at home base!" The girl and Shimura's two lieutenants stepped back through the portal, soon to be followed by Shimura.
Just as the white-haired villain was about to enter the portal, he turned back towards the heroes, his eyes focusing on Izuku Midoriya. "Etch this lesson into your minds, wannabes. Being there isn't enough."
Then he stepped through, and the portal vanished.
Seconds later, Iida and the rest of the UA staff appeared, collecting the students and tending to the wounded.
On paper—and to sixteen members of class 1-A—this was a victory. The villains had been driven off and no one had died or been permanently injured. The worst one off was Kaminari, who had been forced by Bakugou to use his quirk so that he, Tsuyu, and the aforementioned electric teen could escape the ocean zone.
But the school staff—along with the four members of class 1-A who had seen the whole fight, along with the aftermath—knew otherwise. Despite their losses, the villains had got exactly what they had wanted. And now they were left to wonder what their next move would be.
Meanwhile, three students pondered the phrase 'One For All'…and a fourth thought about how he would explain it to them.
Something had changed. This, Nighteye knew.
There had never been a change before, not in any of the futures he had predicted. And yet, he now felt that something had changed drastically, and he had yet to tell if it was for the better or for worse.
He would have to talk to All Might after the Sports Festival.
AN: And that is the end of the USJ Arc, and the end of the First Chapter. Next, we will see the aftermath of the attack, as well as what the villains are planning to do with the footage, along with some filler stuff.
Also, a hint at what is going on with Clone!Shimura. All of Twice's clones retain the personality of the one being cloned...so what if the one being cloned is not alone in his own head?
