Narrowing his eyes, even as he called up a shielding Quirk, brandishing the staff he'd had designed to cover the use of the Quirks that couldn't have been explained as a facet of Panacea, Hisashi once again found himself chafing against the restrictions – a great many of them self-imposed, yes – that he operated under while in the guise of Sensei. True, such things had provided him the freedom to live as he wished with Inko, Izuku, Tenko-chan, and the family he had formed for himself during the course of all the work that he had done, first as All For One, then the Immortal Shepherd, and then by taking up the mantle of the Symbol of Hope. However, finding himself in a situation like this, holding the back lines against any of the Shie Hassaikai's reconstructed civilians who might have been able to slip past Toshi-kun and his fellow Pro Heroes, gave Hisashi something to think about.

It also gave him something of an appreciation for the frustration that Shiro must have felt, during the times he'd been forced to stay behind in the mansion where Hisashi and his forces had established themselves during the turbulent times when Quirks had first begun emerging in the world.

The sense of Enji close by, marching furiously along beside him, brought a light flutter of amusement to Hisashi as the pair of them moved forward; himself back with the main group of Pro Heroes, and Enji alongside Toshi-kun at the forefront of the battle lines. The expression that he caught sight of, those times when he was close enough to catch an actual glimpse of Enji's face as opposed to simply sensing his presence through one of the many Quirks that he used to keep track of those around him when he was in battle, or even simply when he was spending time with large amounts of people, or even just his dear family when they were all out in a park, or on vacation, provided more than a bit of amusement.

Turning his attention back to the battle currently at hand, Hisashi found Toshi-kun locked in battle with yet another in a long line of those altered civilians he'd been seeing. He'd heard from both Toshi-kun as well as Toshi-kun's friend in the police force, that the creatures they were facing had been the citizens who'd once lived in Rosaru, before the Ward had been destroyed. He'd make a point of reporting his suspicions – all but confirmed as they were, given their present circumstances – that the Shie Hassaikai, in the person of Kai Chisaki, had been responsible for the disappearances of the inhabitants of the entire Ward.

At least those who had not been killed outright, though Hisashi found it rather interesting that only those with Heteromorphic-type Quirks had been taken rather than killed.

There was a part of him, Hisashi could admit – if only to himself – that wished to deliver one of the citizens to Dr. Ujiko, so that his oldest friend would be able to determine just how the former citizens of the Rosaru Ward had been altered during the time that Chisaki had been in possession of them. Both in deference to his own curiosity, as well as the fact that Ujiko himself would have been interested in such a thing.

~MHA~

Once they'd made it back to the compound where those old cat ladies were waiting for them, with the lizard guy and his stupid glitter-slime gun both in their custody, Katsuki found himself paying more and more attention to Zuzu; his old friend was really starting to fret. It was pretty obvious that Zuzu's attention had drifted back to what Uncle Sashi, All Might, and all of those Pros who were taking their fight to that Villain group they were fighting while him, Zuzu, and all the other extras in both the Hero course classes were all working to hone their Quirks and get their feet under them. He'd have to find a way to keep Zuzu from going too far off in his own head, while Uncle Sashi was working with All Might and those Pros.

Zuzu in particular had been stuffing himself with all kinds of Quirks, getting a real workout for the mutation of the Quirk he'd inherited from Uncle Sashi, which was kind of funny to see when he got back to the room that all of class 1-A shared with each other, since Zuzu would always flop right down into the futon that'd been set out for him and go right to sleep. The really funny part was when he would wake up, of course, since there was the funniest look of confusion on Zuzu's face when he would open his eyes and look at all of them. Katsuki suspected that the first thing the little nerd would do, when he and Uncle Sashi were both back home together, was ask his dad to take some of those Quirks off of his hands, so to speak.

When the three of them, with that lizard who taught self-defense classes for anyone outside of the Hero course as their captive, made their way back into the compound where those old cat ladies lived and worked, Katsuki found himself met nearly at the door by Hedgehog and Uraraka. Though in Uraraka's case…

"Looks like your girlfriend came to meet you at the door, Zuzu," he said, turning to grin at the little nerd, even as said little nerd blushed, turning to him with an annoyed look on his freckled face.

"Kacchan!"

Laughing and dodging as Zuzu took a half-hearted swipe at him, Katsuki turned to look over at Hedgehog as the redhead with hair that was almost as spiky as his – though not nearly as cool as his, of course – came over to where the pair of them were standing.

"Come on, Bakugo, lay off," Hedgehog said, though there was a small smile on his face, too. "The Pussycats want to talk to us about the next phase of our training, so let's get going."

"Right, whatever," he said, turning to smirk at Zuzu, before he tucked his hands into his pockets and followed Zuzu, Hedgehog, and Uraraka out of the front room.

~MHA~

Smashing his way through another one of those poor people who'd been abducted and transformed by the Shie Hassaikai, and likely Kai Chisaki in particular, given what Sir and the rest of his people had managed to find out about the Quirk he possessed, All Might tried as hard as he could not to think about just who it was that he was fighting. There was even a small, shameful part of him that was actually grateful that he hadn't managed to find out much of anything about the people who'd once lived in the Rosaru Ward. All Might tried as hard as he could to ignore that part, too.

As hard as he tried not to think about all of the people he was being forced to attack, All Might was also trying to keep an eye on his fellow Pros as they pushed forward against the forces that Kai Chisaki – the worst kind of Villain that All Might had ever had to deal with in either of his lives – had sent out to delay them, presumably so that he would be able to escape with the children that he had kidnapped. Another Texas Smash cleared a path through the rubble that had steadily been piling up around them as their front-line Heroes tried to clear Kai Chisaki's innocent victims out of their way.

All Might didn't like thinking about it, but that was the situation they were facing, on this dark, horrible night.

~MHA~

Lightly nipping his lower lip as he continued to consider his next course of action; not only in the heat of the battle he was taking part in, but in the life that he had chosen to lead, Hisashi once again found himself considering his options. The life that he might very well be making a change to during the course of this very battle, depending not only on what occurred during the course of it, but the choices that he made during said battle. The sight of Chiyo-chan, in full costume and with the syringe-looking cane that she made use of when she was in costume, as well as those few times that he'd seen her dressed as a civilian, brought a small smile to his face. Apparently, Chiyo-chan had been brought in to take some of the strain off of his own Quirk.

Or rather, the collection of stacked Quirks that he used under the guise of Panacea.

Narrowing his eyes as he sensed the stalking presence of someone who hadn't been a part of their group – someone that seemed to have a non-heteromorphic Quirk of some kind or other, given what he could sense of them with Panoception – Hisashi turned as he felt the ground seemingly lurching under him. Almost as though it were under the control of some kind of Quirk or another; however, the information that he was receiving from Panoception ran completely counter to that initial impression. Calling Puppet Master up from within All For One, Hisashi steadied his own body as he searched for whoever it was that was currently attacking their group.

Shifting his staff, allowing Chiyo-chan to balance herself for a moment, Hisashi narrowed his eyes as he focused in on their attacker with Panoception. It seemed as though there was only one of them, which was both pleasing and slightly annoying at once. Yes, it was an advantage, the assumption that both he and Chiyo-chan would be equally affected by the Quirk that their present opponent was bringing to bear against them, but it still felt more than slightly insulting. However, being underestimated was one of the greatest advantages he possessed when working as the Symbol of Hope.

Toshi-kun's own difficulties, the weight of the Symbol of Peace, served as something of an object lesson whenever Hisashi would find himself reflecting upon his own choices.

~MHA~

What in the hell?! Grinding his teeth behind his mask, as he watched both of those Heroes stumble – showing that the both of them had been caught by Sloshed when he'd closed in on them – but then the taller one in the helmet managed to stand back up, and even seemed to be looking for him. It was annoying, but Deidoro Sakaki wasn't about to let himself fail the man who'd given him a chance to actually mean something in the world. He wasn't going to let these so-called Heroes stand in the way of Overhaul's plans.

Still, even as the short, old Hero stumbled under the effect of his Quirk, Deidoro snarled, watching as the tall one in the long, white coat and silvery chest armor and helmet quickly managed to right himself. Not knowing just how in the hell some puny healer had managed to throw off the effects of his Quirk given how close he was to the both of them, Deidoro drew three of his knives and dove at the taller healer. The broad shoulders and narrow hips suggested he was dealing with a man, but that kind of thing was stupid, and completely secondary to what Deidoro knew he needed to do.

Whatever the Quirk that healer actually had, he'd stumbled when he'd first been affected by Sloshed, so that meant that he only had to get through was whatever Quirk was protecting him; distract him, cut him, whatever. He'd just have to land a hit.

~MHA~

As their unknown attacker – presumably a part of the Shie Hassaikai, considering where and when the man had appeared – made his approach, Hisashi found himself wondering just when they would make their full appearance. Of course, Hisashi had already been made aware of the man's creeping presence through Panoception, but the necessity of utilizing Puppet Master on himself had served to distract Hisashi's attention from determining just who their present attacker was and just what their Quirk was capable of. The fact that he and Chiyo-chan were still under the effects of the man's Quirk, hence pressing him to use Puppet Master in combat, meant that he'd little attention to spare determining what the man's Quirk or capabilities might have been, was more irritating than Hisashi would have admitted to anyone who might have thought to ask.

All that Hisashi could truly say he knew, for the moment, was that the man's Quirk involved disruption of the physical systems of one's body; little enough information to go on, to be sure, but for the moment that was the situation he and Chiyo-chan were presently in.

Snapping his arms out, hands gripping his staff tightly, he smashed the white-masked man in the face. Narrowing his eyes as the man pulled out another set of knives – a mere pair, this time, as though to contrast with the three he was wielding in what seemed to be his off-hand; if he wasn't somehow ambidextrous – charging forward in an animalistic sort of way, crouching on the ground after he'd hurled the pair of knives he was wielding, Hisashi braced himself for a moment. Then, Hisashi batted them aside with his staff, narrowing his eyes under the helmet he was still wearing.

Being forced to maintain conscious control of his body, in order to throw off the effects of their attacker's Quirk with the source of it so close by, was causing him more than his fair share of difficulties in his present struggle. Of course, the fact that he was limiting himself to purely physical attacks… It was yet one more restriction that Hisashi was beginning to find himself chafing under. When the man he was fighting hurled another pair of knives at him, Hisashi allowed himself to fall backwards, knowing from the man's previous actions that he would lunge just as soon as Hisashi had dodged out of the way of the knives he'd just thrown.

The knives themselves were merely a distraction, quite like something he himself would have done, only making use of his own stockpile of Quirks rather than any conventional weapons or Support items.

When the knife that he'd allowed the man to keep hold of, after he'd knocked the other two free from his hand, Hisashi smiled as he called up the Telekinesis Quirk he'd used during his life as Councilman Midoriya – something to tie him closer to Inko-chan when he acted as a civilian – jammed into the top of the helmet he'd worn for as long as he'd operated as the Symbol of Hope, Hisashi twisted, gripping his damaged helmet with the Quirk he tended to visualize as one or more pairs of ethereal hands. The seam that had been opened, splitting the blue-tinted visor down the center, brought a slight smirk to Hisashi's face as he felt the helmet beginning to crack.

~MHA~

When he jammed his knife into the helmet of the healer, who'd somehow thrown off the affects of his Quirk even though Deidoro had been practically standing on his damned feet when he'd revealed himself, the last thing he'd been expecting was for the guy to let himself get stabbed in the head. As the silvery helmet with the blue visor shaped like the Romaji letter "T" split in half, the knife he'd drawn to replace the one he'd lodged in the annoying healer's head suddenly tore itself out of his hand and launched itself into the rubble of what looked like at least a couple of buildings.

"What in the hell?!" Deidoro demanded, feeling his eyes widening until he almost felt like they would pop out of his damned head, before he narrowed them, glaring at the man whose face had just been revealed to him.

~MHA~

The man wearing the white mask and furred cape – the one with the odd Quirk, who had presumably been wielding knives to compensate for his rather pronounced lack of combat abilities – leaped at him nearly before the severed pieces of his helmet had fallen to the ground. Hisashi found himself having to firmly bite back a smirk as he once again called up Dragon's Breath from within the depths of All For One, searing the right hand of their attacker badly enough that he was not only forced to drop the pair of knives he'd drawn to attack them, but to back off entirely. It seemed that, whoever this was, he had at least some sense.

"Councilman Midoriya?"

The sound of Chiyo-chan's voice brought his attention back to the present – back to the choice he'd just made; a firm reminder that there were consequences to every move he chose to make – and Hisashi smiled back at her, even as Panoception tracked the flight of their attacker.

"A bit of a surprise, Chiyo-chan?" he asked, settling back into the relaxed, easygoing persona he'd built for himself as Councilman Midoriya.

It seemed as though he was going to be making more use of it, now that he'd made his decision to reveal the true face of Sensei; to join Toshi-kun in the half-light that Nana-chan's successor had been living in for such a long time.

"It certainly is, young man," Chiyo-chan said. "Of course, knowing you, you'll probably wait to explain more at the press conference."

Hisashi bit back a secretive smile, chuckling under his breath, even as he found himself wondering how Toshi-kun and the others were doing; if one of these stragglers had managed to slip past them, they might very well be forced to face off with more of the Shie Hassaikai sooner than later. Or perhaps they would be faced with those the Hassaikai had altered, and Hisashi would have his chance to take a sample. Even if only a bit of blood or hair, or perhaps a severed claw; these people were in possession of heteromorphic-type Quirks.

~MHA~

Smashing his way through the walls of the compound, All Might found that there wasn't a single one of the Shie Hassaikai's higher-ups in the twisting maze of tunnels that he and Endeavor had been smashing and blasting their way through. More and more, it was becoming clear that Kai Chisaki had managed to either figure out what they were doing on his own, or else the young Yakuza head was simply paranoid enough to evacuate his entire operation in the wake of his encounter with Stendhal. The sound of crackling fire, followed swiftly by thoroughly infuriated sounding growl, let All Might know that Endeavor was approaching.

And that he was furious, but that wasn't exactly new for the Todoroki patriarch; he couldn't help the feeling that receiving One For All would be the best thing for young Todoroki, considering how his father was prone to act.

"Bastard must have evacuated before we got here," Endeavor snarled, the shroud of fire he wore on his face and shoulders crackling more wildly from his obvious fury.

"Yes, it looks like he did," All Might said, finding his speech-patterns falling into the semi-formal style he tended to use when he was working beside his fellow Pros as the Symbol of Peace.

The sound of charging footsteps drew his attention then, and All Might turned to watch as Fatgum, Sir Nighteye, and the rest of the group he and Endeavor had come with. The lines of tension and fury in Stendhal's stance, as the Freelance Hero stomped into the room they were gathering in on his heavy-cleated, armored boots, drove All Might to chew the inside of his right cheek briefly. Even as he reassured his fellow Pros about what had just happened during the course of their abortive raid on the Shie Hassaikai's compound, All Might found that the sight of Stendhal's clear fury wouldn't leave his mind.

It was beginning to seem like the talk he'd had with Stendhal – even as the Symbol of Peace – hadn't managed to get through to the man; he didn't know if anything he said had even made the slightest impact on the Freelance Hero at all.

Holding himself up as well as he could, his bright grin feeling more than a little forced under the circumstances, All Might fell in beside Endeavor as the pair of them led their fellow Pros back out of the compound. However, once he saw who was waiting for all of them – more than that, when he caught a glimpse of the state his old friend was in – it was all he could do not to rush right over to where Hisashi – the broken mask of Sensei having fallen to the ground somewhere out of sight – was standing. What kept him back, even more than the need to keep up the image of the Symbol of Peace, was the calm smile that Hisashi was wearing.

It seemed as though his old friend had finally decided to step into the light with the rest of them.

The curious voices of his fellow Pros, most of them – with the obvious exception of Endeavor, who still seemed just as angry as he'd been when they'd started this whole operation – more than a little confused to see Councilman Midoriya standing at ease in the devastated battleground that had been left behind.

"A battle like this can't truly be won without resonating sacrifice," Hisashi said, a gentle smile on his old friend's face as he took up the staff he always carried – All Might wondered for a moment if he'd keep using it, considering that he was clearly going to need to reveal at least some of the true nature of his own Quirk, considering what he'd just chosen to do – making his way to the center of the group of Pros. "This, I suppose, is mine."

That was pretty much the answer All Might had been expecting from his old friend; Hisashi might have enjoyed teasing his friends and playing with his family, but he also had a tendency to think in literary terms. It was kind of funny, really. All Might sometimes found himself wondering if Hisashi would have been happier as a writer than anything else.

Still, if there was anything All Might knew about his old friend, it was that he was determined to live on his own terms.