skyartsflammingavion - Thank you for your kind words :D
(***)
"Our new recruit will be here shortly." Midoriya says to Quicksilver after he and Tokoyami returned to the (temporary) headquarters. "Show her the room. Contact Singularity and tell her not to show up here until further orders, a bit too early for their first meeting."
Quicksilver nods quickly. Midoriya turns towards Ragdoll. She is sitting on the couch. For some reason, she changed her form. Genuine cat ears and a tail? He isn't going to judge, but it's probably best that Tenko isn't here.
"Keep monitoring her until she shows up." He announces. "Just in case she was trying something fishy at the last minute."
"Sure thing." Ragdoll replies. "She's just packing her things, I see nothing suspicious. When are you going to go look for the others?"
Good question. Supremely good question. But also a very bad question.
"I won't." Midoriya replies. Ragdoll's brow raises. "They are going to come looking for me. Courtesy of Apocrypha."
Sometimes it's good to have friends in high places.
(***)
The building was 'old'. At least a century or two, perhaps dating all the way back to the Dawn of Quirks. Solid, constructed in what was once a rather stellar neighborhood. Today, however, it wasn't just 'old' - but also 'decrepit'. And that ruined the aesthetical feeling of communing with history.
It was also abandoned. The area was decimated during a battle between the first Paranormal Liberation Front and the joint forces of the pro-heroes, GSDF and the police. The neighborhood almost managed to recover afterwards, but it was eventually killed by the modern economic turbulence. And sanctions.
As a result, it was left to rot. Like many other things in this country.
She personally found it a rather odd place for a business meeting. Oh, it was a villainous business meeting, so it made a superficial amount of sense. But most of those experienced in the field picked some crowded places. To lower the chances of things going south and the meeting resulting in bloodshed. The threat of heroes appearing to kick your ass kept things civil.
Then again, the Ascending Path wasn't an experienced villainous organization. In fact, it might have been the first time it ever dabbled on that field. It was… unexpected. They didn't even have any compounds near her turf, which made them wanting to strike a deal with her rather suspicious.
She, naturally, came with her bodyguards. Biohazard and Songbird were there, wearing black jumpsuits, combat boots, tactical vests and helmets. The only difference between them was in the color of the helmets - dark purple for Songbird, dark green for Biohazard.
Even the guns were the same, it was almost surprising how much one could do without their quirk but with a submachine gun. Having both was even better.
They made some recon. Songbird's quirk was incredibly useful in that. Three people, waiting in one of the apartments on the top floor. All evidence for the meeting being a trap was circumstantial at best. She could even refer to it as 'random paranoid guesswork'. And the business prospects the meeting opened were… interesting.
"We're going inside." She announces. Her two bodyguards nod and take point without question. She feels too exposed on the street either way. Heroes are scarce in that district, but she didn't manage to carve out a large turf in the underworld through being too trusting.
Sometimes she looked back to that first combat training with All Might and the Symbol of Peace words about the truly dangerous villains hiding their nefarious deeds in buildings and back alleys. Oh, the irony.
The building doesn't explode on them. No villainous death squad charges insides, guns and quirks blazing. No governmental death squad storms in, guns and quirks blazing. The building is rundown, the only sounds they hear being those of the damaged floorboards protesting about their presence there.
They arrive before the apartment in question. Songbird uses her quirk to check everything once again. No changes. Three people, none of them near the door. One is sitting on the couch on the opposite side of the table (probably the leader).
One is walking around in circles to his right side, while the other is standing behind the couch, their back on the wall - probably bodyguards. Makes perfect sense, nothing suggests anything fishy going on.
She gestures at her bodyguards to enter. Biohazard knocks on the door and after hearing the invitation, she walks in. Followed immediately by Songbird. Who freezes for a heartbeat or two, but before her boss can react, she resumes her movement. So it was most likely not a trap that she spotted.
She walks in after them… and realizes immediately why Songbird froze. Because she finds herself face-to-face with a dead man.
"Tea, Yaomomo?" Izuku Midoriya-look alike (it can't be him, right?) says, while looking at her with a face almost expressionless when compared to how she remembered him looking. "I've got some Gold Tips Imperial, your favorite brand. Unless something changed on that field?"
T-shirt, baggy trousers, red sneakers and All Might hoodie. The only thing that changed was his age and the look in his eyes. Much more mature, much colder, much more… worrying, even.
"Wh…" Momo is actually taken aback by the sight. Enough to just stand there for a few long seconds, staring at them with her jaw dropped. Her legendary self-control (that she worked so hard to achieve, especially after becoming a villain) failed her spectacularly.
But, eventually, Counterfeit - an S-Rank Villain according to the police - takes the reins from Momo Yaoyorozu. Only a few seconds of unquestioning surprise on her face, but still much more than she was comfortable with. Especially in front of THAT man.
He got her good. He probably intended it that way. Business meeting of people of their stature and skills, especially after years, was going to be a battle of minds more than anything else. And he just drew the first blood right off the bat.
"Nothing changed." She says, taking her hoodie off. It's not like there is any point in hiding who she is. It's not even a secret to them. "And I won't say no to the tea. It's been really hard to get in Japan since the sanctions started."
She takes the seat on the other side of the coffee table. The tea is already there. Brewed, judging from the smell and warmth, to perfection. He knew exactly when she was going to enter.
Clear sign that their arrival was somehow monitored. But how? Technology or a quirk? So many questions, so little answers.
She didn't recognize the circling woman, who now retreated into the corner of the room, her leg regularly tapping on the floor. But she did recognize the other bodyguard. Tsuyu Asui, the Butcher of the Marukane Ward, in flesh. Giving her a rather emotionless stare. It only added to the mystery.
"I know." He replies, before giving her a faint smile. "Getting it smuggled in just for this meeting would be a bit of a waste of time and effort, but I happen to like it as well." She knows. She also knows that it started because she shared some of it with him. How many years ago was that? "So I got some for myself. A lifetime supply, I'd even say."
She gets the feeling that she missed out on an internal joke. Asui is mostly unreadable, but she does glance at Midoriya for a second or two. Maybe she got it.
"I see." Momo replies while tasting the tea. Yes. Just as she likes it. Songbird and Biohazard are standing behind her in silence. Both of them aren't exactly talkative, although for different reasons. "I must say that I didn't expect to see you again. It's… quite a pleasant surprise. What happened to you?"
She knows that whatever she hears will… probably contain a rather scarce degree of truth. Deep inside, she is both utterly terrified of the implications of Midoriya Izuku resurfacing after the years and absolutely giddy with excitement. Not to mention, the potential business prospects this opened…
"Mmm… you mean, besides the part where the HPSC turned me into an object of popular hatred after pinning the responsibility for All Might's demise on me, the quirkless runt that shouldn't have tried to become a hero in the first place?" He asks back. His voice is much less bitter than she expected, then again almost a decade has passed. She notes it down while focusing on the tea. "Well, I did what most disillusioned with the hero society did back then. I joined the Paranormal Liberation Front."
She blinks at him over the tea for a moment.
"Well, I almost said something akin to 'I can't believe that the hero trainee I knew would do something like that'." She admits. He gives her an almost amused stare. "But it would be rather hypocritical of me, now wouldn't it?" He nods, taking a sip from his tea cup. "Quirkless Liberation Front?"
"Superficially the most logical of options, yes." Midoriya admits. So, Yaoyorozu missed. But who else… "I spent more than a year being pretty much an assistant to various bigshots of the PLF. Brewing coffee, carrying papers, indulging in some political debates, helping plan deaths of various heroes, these sorts of things."
"Looks like the HPSC logic of 'he's quirkless, what's the worst thing that can happen if we piss him off' really blew up in their faces." Momo admits. Midoriya this time looks genuinely amused.
She still remembers what Kirishima said on the bus to USJ. That Midoriya didn't get a quirk because (considering how much his plan destroyed Kirishima and Bakugou during the battle trial) it would be unfair to the quirked people.
It was a bit of an awkward way of saying it to a quirkless person, considering what they tended to go through daily. Kirishima lacked tact, even if he had good intentions. And Midoriya realized that. What Kirishima meant was that Midoriya's intellect could make up for his lack of quirk. And there was more than a grain of truth in his words.
Midoriya was intelligent. Very much so. Oh, in academics she beat him, yes. But he was way more cunning, calculative, almost… devious. Always with some heroic goal in mind, yes. But once his goals changed…
"They expelled and publicly destroyed the person that was Nedzu's personal student, even if only for half a year." Midoriya replies. "Publicly destroyed… but didn't kill him, confirm the corpse's identity in every possible way and then incinerate it. They didn't even try to keep track of him afterwards. Honestly, is it that surprising that so many people died?"
"Not really, no." Yaoyorozu admits. "A perfectly reasonable outcome, one that I can't find it in myself to condemn. What they did to you was a large step in my route to where I am now. It was a disgrace."
"Indeed it was." Midoriya agrees with her. "But enough about me. I kept track of my former classmates all those years, and… honestly, I can scarcely believe what happened to you, Yaomomo."
How much does he know? How exactly did he keep track of her? How exactly did he know how to find her? How much better did he get during the past decade? So many questions she had no answers to. It was… infuriating.
"And I can scarcely believe someone like you having ties with the Ascending Path." She shoots back. Hopefully her probe will get her somewhere. "You never struck me as particularly into religion."
He chuckles.
"From my experience, spending too much time in the underworld can have three results when religion is involved." He replies, dodging her probe entirely. "First, you stop thinking about it. Two, you start thinking about it, because you hope to get an afterlife without suffering… for a change. Three, you start thinking about it, because you hope that some people you know end up getting an afterlife composed of nothing but suffering."
That, more or less, lined up with Yaoyorozu's experience. If you remembered that the first option made for a solid 95% of people out there.
"And which group are you in?" She asks.
"Who knows." He shrugs. Once again, dodging the subject. This is suspicious, and probably weakens his standing in this talk. He's going to have to provide at least a tidbit of info if he doesn't want her to be able to use a 'you're not telling me anything, this is sus' counterargument when nee… "But I happen to have a very good contact with someone in the Ascending Path. Someone very, very high. When I asked, they were glad to be able to organize our meeting."
"Someone very, very high?" She asks, raising an eyebrow. "Someone in their priesthood?" She DID learn as much as she could about them before agreeing to the meeting, of course. But certain bits in the official data about its highest ranks weren't exactly adding up in her opinion and…
"Would you believe me if I told you that I was, in a way, a childhood friend of their god?" Midoriya says. After a few seconds of a stare, he sighs. "Yeah, as suspected. Well, you're going to remain without that particular tidbit of knowledge for now, Yaomomo."
Because of course she'll have to. Pain in the ass. What's worse is that she was almost certain that he wasn't lying to her. At least, not entirely. White lie? Omission? Some intentional misunderstanding? But if so, what the hell…
"I know that you left UA after the Todoroki… situation. With Hatsume and Jirou… it's nice seeing you again, by the way, Earphone Jack. Or, do you prefer Songbird?" Her bodyguard says nothing. It's not like she could, not with Magne tearing her vocal cords apart during the Training Camp Massacre. But she also doesn't try to sign towards him.
"Oh, and it seems that you also recruited Miyuki Tagawa." He continues speaking with a faint smile, while Yaoyorozu is busy shrinking on the inside. "I'm a big fan of your work as both a member of the Meta-Liberation Army and the PLF's Vanguard Action Squad, Biohazard."
It looks like the talk is about to proceed into a much more serious subject. Because Momo Yaoyorozu can't imagine this little speech of his to be anything more than establishing his superior position in the talk to her - by making her realize just how much he knows. And it worked.
Just great.
She has no idea where he got Tsuyu Asui from, she has no idea who's his other bodyguard, in short, she's getting the short end of the stick. Badly.
"So, I assume that it was… due to your fundamental disagreement with the direction the hero society was taking." He returns to the subject. "Shoto Todoroki was probably the proverbial last straw, hmm?"
"Yes." She replies. There is no point in hiding it. "I've decided that I can no longer be a part of the system that allows things like that to happen. It's also when I turned my back on my family. I loved them, but… they were a part of the system." She sighs. "I might have worked as an independent supplier for both Miruko and Aizawa-sensei afterwards."
It greatly contributed to her establishment as a villain. Great business deals, and ones that she genuinely agreed with on the moral ground. Good times, even if it all fell through at the end.
"I see, a businesswoman AND a revolutionary." Midoriya nods, with a knowing look on his face. "And how exactly did that end up devolving into you selling Trigger to kids for quick cash, Yaomomo?"
If he thinks that he's going to provoke her with that, he's wrong.
"I'm a black market trader." She replies. "I do not sell Trigger, nor any other drug, to kids."
"No, you merely supply local gangs with them in bulk." He shoots back. The eyes on him are those of a scientist observing a lab rat that was just injected with some new serum. He is testing her reactions. "The same gangs that then sell them to the kids. Do you think that it's enough to keep your hands clean?"
"I'm afraid that we both know from the autopsy that the 'slippery slope' isn't always a fallacy." She responds calmly. Judging from the faint smirk on his face vanishing for a brief moment, she finally got a solid hit in. Did he expect her to be conflicted about it? "Also, drugs are only a part of my business. Illegal support items, weapons, stolen goods, I trade a lot of things."
"The gossip on the street says…" He says, his eyes narrowing a bit. "... that you trade more than just things."
"The gossip on the street…" She responds in kind. "... isn't always trustworthy." Which, he probably realizes, isn't a straight no. But then she finally understood what it was about. "It's a job interview, isn't it? Not merely a business proposal." She asks. He actually grins at her, although the happiness clearly avoids his eyes.
"In a way, yes." He agrees. "I have a… something in the works. Something much greater than the Ascending Path. I'm not interested in buying things from you. I'm much more interested in having you work for me. Full time. For now, I'm just… checking out how much you've changed. How much you fit what I have in mind."
It was… honestly, interesting. What was big enough to warrant him trying to recruit her? Many tried. She ended up having to annihilate several villain crews that for some reason didn't get the memo that she doesn't work for anyone.
It wasn't ENTIRELY off the table. Especially not when Midoriya was involved. He was… intellectually brilliant. After years of dealing with halfwits that populated the underworld, she longed for an occasion to work with someone who could force her to actually use her brain to its full potential.
Midoriya, unless something changed significantly, was probably better than she was. She beat him in academics, she equalled him in operation planning - but he surpassed her when strategy was involved, and his quirk analysis was… delightful to watch.
"And what would the job be?" She asks. "Job AND the expected duration. A main supplier of goods for whatever business you're opening? Going to carve yourself a turf in the underworld or…"
He doesn't let her finish.
"The job I offer you… is that of the commanding officer of the new League of Villains." He says and she finds herself staring at him in shock. "For the duration of the Second Paranormal Liberation War."
"Y… you're insane." She announces, interrupting the dead silence after what felt like forever. Her mind, in all its brilliance, simply failed to process his words. "This can't be…"
"Maybe I am. Maybe I always was." He replies with a shrug. His eyes are locked onto her the whole time. Unblinking. "But what really matters is that I was the unofficial third member of the triumvirate leading the first PLF after the government destroyed Deika. I was the architect of most of the PLF victories, Yaomomo. And I believe that this time it'll end differently."
Idiocy. Suicidal idiocy. But something deep in her heart, something that Counterfeit thought that she killed long ago, stirs at those words. Something that hasn't happened ever since the Aizawa-sensei's plot fell through. Ever since she gave up on changing anything.
She helped some of the conspiracy members hide. Those that could were no longer in Japan. But Recovery Girl's heart gave up. Old age finally caught-up to the old nurse. And Momo was there when it happened.
The old woman's last words were an apology for failing Momo and the rest of Japan so badly. The hero trainee deep inside Momo knew that the good people shouldn't die crying.
Counterfeit thought that she killed that hero trainee. Trying to fight was hopeless, so she decided to focus on her criminal career. Discovering that the corpse tried to rise up again after hearing those words from Midoriya was a shock.
No. She'll kill it for good this time.
"The government has the army, the pro-heroes, the Sword of Damocles." She shoots back. Midoriya doesn't seem to be fazed by that. "You can't win against that. Miruko failed, Eraserhead failed, hell even All for One…"
"One hundred days." He says calmly, interrupting her outburst. "The government will collapse exactly one hundred days after the first stage of my plan. Many of us probably won't be there to witness that, but I promise you that this will happen."
"You are delusional." She says while standing up from the couch. "Songbird, Biohazard, we're leavi…"
"Will you change your mind…" Midoriya, once again, doesn't seem shaken by that in the slightest. "... if I get your boyfriend out of Tartarus?"
She freezes. Then after a few seconds of silence, she turns towards him.
"What?" She says with complete and utter disbelief. She didn't hear him correctly, right? No one has ever got out of Tartarus, especially not out of the maximum security wing, it was…
"Twenty-four hours, Yaomomo." He says calmly. "I'll get Shoto Todoroki out of Tartarus in twenty-four hours. It's probably your last chance to see him, by the way. The wardens aren't particularly nice to him, and my source on the inside tells me that without urgent medical attention he only has a few weeks left. Maybe months. Full. Of. Pain." He adds after a second, his eyes meeting hers, each word feeling like a stab in a chest.
"You…" He doesn't let her finish.
"I want you..." He announces. Once again, his eyes are that of clinical interest. With next to no emotions. "... and your bodyguards for the League of Villains, Yaomomo. That AND I'm going to require Hatsume and her little business. Full-time. How's she doing, by the way?"
The bait is too good. She knows that she is falling right into his trap, but… against herself, she sits on the couch again.
"... not very well." She admits. In her mind, chaos. So many questions, so many analyses to make, can he actually do that, and if so, how?! "Let's just say that I'm her … dealer, in more ways than one."
That he clearly didn't expect.
"Mei Hatsume… on drugs?" He asks, his eyebrow raising skyhigh. "Wow. I think I'd prefer All for One to return from the dead." She is almost entirely sure that it was a joke. There was something akin to a brief flash of hatred when the name was mentioned.
"She is as much of an inventor as she always was." Momo replies. She is, honestly, thankful for the brief side-track of the talk, she needs more time to think the main subject over. "Perhaps even better. But she… she isn't emotionally coping well with what happened to Japan. With what happened to Power Loader. She stopped asking questions… and started taking drugs. Occasionally. I vouch that she gets the job done, on time and with the same quality as always, just… you probably won't like the thing she's doing off-work."
He sighs, practically shrinking in his seat.
"Well, I guess I don't exactly like most of the things that happened to the people I knew back then." He says. His voice is suddenly very tired. "That's very par for the course. Not part of my plan, and I guess I'll have to test out if she still has the skills needed, but… it's not something I need to do now. Back to the main subject, then. Do we have a deal?"
That was a VERY good question.
"... you aren't even going to ask Kyoka if she wants in?" She decides to ask. One more small test of character and intentions. She expected many different reactions, but not him laughing as if he just heard a very good joke.
"Oh, please." He says after he managed to more or less calm himself. "I worked with Entropy for a much longer time than I'm comfortable with. I can recognize a murderous maniac when I see one. She's your little personal attack dog, you're keeping her on a leash, keep doing that."
He looks at Songbird, briefly narrowing his eyes.
"Still, a shame that the UA fucked up the psychological counseling bit." He says. "And that you kicked Kaminari at the villains back then during the USJ. His death was the start of a really nasty downward spiral, eh?"
"Kyoka, don't." Momo replies. The chances of her lashing out were small, but… she could see Songbird fingers suddenly grasping on the gun. "Stop provoking her, please. Cleaning after her is… time-consuming."
"... just testing the limits of self-control, Yaomomo." Midoriya replies. She realized that much. "Looks like she isn't as batshit crazy as Entropy used to be. Less a maniacal murderer and more someone that simply enjoys harming people way too much. I can work with that. The question is…" He looks at Yaomomo questioningly. "... will I have an occasion to do that?"
That was… a question. He really got her good, didn't he? Just the perfect bait to catch her. Just the one thing that - even after all those years - she simply couldn't say no to. He outmatched her during this talk on almost every level.
Was she ready to throw everything she had built all those years for what was pretty much her teenage crush (even if, in his outwardly cold yet inwardly blazing hot way, reciprocated)? She knew that neither Biohazard nor Songbird were going to refuse her, the only problem was persuading Hatsume to go along, but it should work if she…
Ah. She is already figuring out how to do it. Midoriya, it seems, grew by far during those past ten years. Watching him at work was going to be… interesting. Fascinating. Terrifying. And something that both Creati and Counterfeit might have agreed upon for the first time in forever.
Creati, if anything, wanted the modern heroes to burn more than Counterfeit. The latter was … too business-minded for zealotry.
"... get him out." She finally says. In Midoriya's eyes, satisfaction. On Midoriya's face, a victorious smirk. "And we have the deal."
(***)
The next installment - a mass murderer bit gets explained... and, perhaps, recruited.
In case you were wondering about the backlog:
Class Reunion Arc [9 chapters], which focuses on the recreation of the League of Villains - Done.
House Divided Arc [5 chapters], which focuses on the recreation of the Paranormal Liberation Front]- Done.
Revival Celebration Arc [6 chapters], which hails the start of the Second Paranormal Liberation War - Done.
World That Was Arc [1 chapter], which is basically first of several chapter-size flashbacks that will be put between arcs from now on - Done.
State of Emergency Arc [1 chapter], a direct aftermath of the Revival Celebration and the war starting properly - Well, just one chapter, there'll be more, at least 7-8 methinks.
Feel free to continue guessing about what happens :P I'm giving you a snippet after a snippet for a reason after all.