TheGreatBubbaJ - :D
Jpx0999 - It does work, somehow, like that. But let just say that Star and Stripe is really, really broken here.
MosesArk Reborn2000 - To be honest, Jirou was, indeed, quite a non-character. For now? Hmph. Time will tell. As for S&S, well. Let's just say that thigs are going to backfire. And for Emoji's quirk, it wouldn't work - his quirk makes you literally unable to attack him, it doesn't alter the way you see him. It just makes attacks impossible.
Guest - Surprise :v
(***)
Today
Up until that point, the operation was going exactly as intended by Revenant and Spyglass.
The SS-Rank Heroes were falling left and right. Behemoth was dead. Old Flame was dead. Crusader turned out to be a traitor all along. Redirect was pinned down by the vigilante artillery behind the frontline. Molecular and Emoji were fighting for their lives.
The Naruhata Vigilantes broke through the 6th Division positions, pushing into the growing gap between 44th and 120th Infantry Regiment, before turning east, pushing 120th away from the main battlefield. The centrally placed 44th Regiment came under attack by the NVA main forces, including Miruko and Ms. Joke, not to mention the special anti-Invincible task force.
Needless to say, the Arch-Arsonist himself would be enough to change that fight into a massacre. Especially with Old Flame and Crusader, the two SS-Rankers that were supposed to support the 44th, being out of the game.
44th was being straight-out exterminated. All to make things as flashy as possible, while clearing the battlefield for Invincible's arrival.
The 20th Regiment was doing only narrowly better. With Revenant doing a deep raid, the command of the PLF forces in front of it fell to Yaoyorozu (Mastermind, the other of the PLF big thinkers, was assisting Crawler's artillery). And she was one of the best tacticians present in the Marukane Ward.
Seeing as Revenant, Mastermind, Spyglass and Mindscape were all present in the area, it said a lot about her skills.
Needless to say, the 20th Regiment was being pushed while being thoroughly decimated, the only thing keeping it more or less afloat was the fact that both Lemillion and Nejire-Chan were somewhere in the area. And while the latter was who knows where, the former was a menace in urban environments.
In short, with the Rapid Deployment Division practically destroyed, the 6th Infantry Division was in the process of being annihilated as well, together with its hero detachment. The only saving grace - aside from Lemillion still being operational and delaying the PLF advance through the 20th Regiment's position - was the fact that Saiko Intelli managed to survive the assassination attempt.
The casualties suffered by the PLF/NVA alliance were above the expectations, however. Landslide was arrested by Emoji, Gang Orca knocked out of the fight by Old Flame before the hero's demise, Ryukyu lost to Behemoth before Crawler killed him. Songbird and Biohazard dead by Lemillion's hand.
The casualties among the regular vigilantes were much worse, the NVA would have collapsed completely if the reinforcements had arrived ten minutes later.
That's when Star and Stripe arrived right before Invincible did, and things changed rapidly.
(***)
There are many ways in which a self-respecting deity could travel. Walking, floating menacingly (All for One, with his delusions of self-grandeur, seemed to enjoy doing that one), teleporting. Running was, in the meantime, a rather bad one.
After all, it implied being on the run somewhere, which implied that you were surprised by something enough to need to run to make it in time. What sort of god is surprised by something?
It wasn't until Marukane Ward that Aiko discovered that there is a method of rapidly changing your present location that was even less divine than running.
Star and Stripe starting their fight by punching Judgment through several buildings with a singular gut punch instantly took the first place on Aiko's 'Least Godly Experiences in my Life' list.
In front of her believers, no less.
It would be the end of the game for Apocrypha if not for Blackwing whom she wore like armor under her magical girl outfit. He covered her back and absorbed the impact (right after absorbing as much of the punch impact as he could), making sure that she wasn't splattered on the wall.
For all her firepower, she was the walking definition of a glass cannon. Fighting against someone who might have been her nigh-equal in firepower, while being much more resistant to blows.
It wasn't going to be pretty.
"You're tougher than I expected." Star and Stripe announces, landing on the ground near her. Did she just jump over the building?
"Using so much strength against a child?" Judgment grins at the World's Number One Hero. "Don't you worry about your popularity?"
"You were slightly injured during your attack on the Longbow's Hero Agency." Star and Stripe replies calmly. "The Government ran appropriate blood tests on your blood. You're an adult or a nigh-adult. I'm not beating a child, I'm beating a villain with a twisted sense of aesthetics."
Well, that's just absolutely splendid. Looks like the secret was out. There goes her chosen aesthetic.
She switches into her natural body, her body (and hair) growing longer. The clothes were elastic enough and made with that maneuver in mind to not fit regardless.
"Calling magical girls 'a twisted sense of aesthetics' while looking like a second coming of All Might wearing a US flag is such an American way of being." Judgment comments. "Well, if you want to fight god, feel free to…"
This time, Judgment didn't even notice the punch. She was no CQC expert. Blackwing was, and that's why they responded in time, covering her head with his shadows.
Even then, the blow was strong enough to punch through him, but with decreased impact. Judgment was sent flying again, Tokoyami covering her back once more to prevent her from being splattered on the wall.
It still hurt.
Also her nose is probably broken.
"There is only one God." Star and Stripe says calmly. "And I don't picture him wearing a frilly dress and carrying around a skull staff while killing random JSDF soldiers."
"Now that's a very American way of being." Judgment replies, trying to ignore the slight dizziness in her head after that blow. "Also, aren't you missing something?"
Cathleen Bates glances at the stump of her right arm, amputated by Blackwing while she was attacking. This time, Tokoyami had a baseline for the strength of her punch, and knew how much he had to put into defense. Leaving him a space for counterattack.
"Looks like I am." Star and Stripe replies, once again appearing completely undaunted. "Let me show you a fun little trick that I learned a few years ago. I, Cathleen Bates, am in possession of two quirks: New Order and Hyper-Regeneration."
Her arm begins to rapidly regrow, Judgment staring at her in shock.
That's just being rude.
(***)
Entropy might have commited a lot of mistakes in her life. But despite losing the First Paranormal Liberation War at least partially over her love for drugs and sex, she was no idiot. She was also extremely experienced in combat.
As a result, despite the total surprise of the attack, Singularity failed to touch her, being instead blasted back by Nejire Wave, flying back and crushing through a wall of the nearby building.
What the fuck was that? Garaki was adamant that the device couldn't malfunction, so why the hell did Singularity just…
Did Midoriya order her to attack Entropy on-sight explicitly? If the loyalty override malfunctioned, leaving some orders still active, it would explain her sudden attack. She would have to capture Singularity and bring it to Doctor Garaki to fix it properly, and….
"You…" Uraraka walks out of the hole in the wall, her eyes glaring murder at Entropy through her hand-mask. "... stupid, fucking slut."
What? Why would she speak to her instead of attacking if she was ordered to…
"You fucked up everything you could during the first war…" Uraraka says, her voice dripping with venom. "... because you were just a stupid, murder-addicted junkie slut. The first PLF could have been won, if not for a single detail - namely you, Entropy."
"Don't you dare…" Entropy tries to talk back. Why was she even trying to talk back to a walking wea…
"And now, instead of taking the fucking hint after Haiboro, you come back, and you seek to ruin everything once fucking more." Uraraka then says, ignoring her interjection completely. "You killed millions of people in Shikoku, and to what end? Did you even have any actual plan that unleashing Armageddon was a part of? Or is mass murder the only way in which you can make your STD-ridden cunt wet, Entropy?"
Hana Shimura has enough.
"HOW DARE YOU TALK LIKE THAT TO ME!" Entropy erupts. "We could have won ten times over if Midoriya and Overhaul had the fucking balls to do what had to be done! They took everything from me and…"
Uraraka leaps forward, her own weight temporarily negated, trying to reach Hana who was still floating up in the air. Entropy prepared to blast her with her quirk, but that's when a solid chunk of debris suddenly impacted her in the side.
She fell for Singularity's wildly successful taunt. She must have touched it after being blown through the wall, then controlling its gravity to circle around them.
Uraraka used another, smaller piece of rock as a footing, placing it perfectly to redirect her movement mid-air even without relying on her gravity manipulation quirk. Entropy was flying to the side, at least a rib or two broken, about to hit the wall with her other side, and with a one-hit-kill Noumu about to reach her.
Hitting the wall would injure her. Uraraka touching her would kill her. It wasn't a hard choice.
She can't risk killing Singularity here and now, she isn't sure how well is her Hyper-Regeneration faring after so many years without proper maintenance. Instead of hitting her in the face, she instead rendered her armless, two Nejire Pike's amputating her arms.
Uraraka's Zero Gravity quirk stops working for a moment, the gravity taking back what was taken from it, Singularity starting her free-fall before hitting the ground with a loud thump. Hana Shimura joins her a moment later, hitting the wall clearly cracking at least a rib or two more, pushing all the air out of her lungs.
"F-fuck." Hana Shimura lets out, while raising from the ground. It wasn't how she expected the meeting to proceed. How did it…
Shit.
They all assumed that Uraraka Ochako was completely gone, Singularity just roleplaying as the hero trainee that she used to be at Midoriya's orders. But if something of her was left, then what Entropy just did…
Resisting a full-blown mental imprint was one thing. Resisting a small part of it… it was an entirely different matter.
In terms of numbers, her original imprint was, say, 100 points strong. The loyalty override was 110. Resisting one hundred was something completely different than resisting 11, just to keep the loyalty override from working. And if the conflicting orders gave her more of a leeway in acting…
Uraraka, once again, leaps forward, interrupting her thoughts. Her hand mask fell off during her attempt to stand up. Her arms are still missing, what the fuck does she thing she's going to achieve…
Entropy realizes that when Uraraka tackles her. Not strong enough to matter, she's not even pushed back really. She is about to blast her back, when she suddenly feels Uraraka's knee. Between Entropy's legs.
Pain. Second before Nejire Wave's blast Singularity back, Uraraka's head lunges forward, as if attempting to headbutt Entropy. But it's not that, Hana realizes that a bit too late as the pain erupts on her face as well.
She can barely stand after the kick. But she manages to do so, her hand reaching to touch her face just as Uraraka spits something out, standing up herself.
"Did you just…" Shimura says with total disbelief in her voice. "... bite my nose off?"
"It's going to be the throat next time." Uraraka replies with sickening delight in her voice, a hateful smile on her face. "Hey, you should be grateful to me for the remodeling, Hoko-chan. It's one more hole you can get fucked in, isn't it?"
Hoko-chan. Hokori Shigaraki, her old name. Oh, that pisses her off a lot.
"Looks like…" Entropy replies. "... you're more fucked up in the head that I expected. Midoriya will be delighted to know what sort of freak he was cherishing as his little morality pet the whole time."
Judging from the hateful flinch on her face, the hit connected.
"You want to know the big secret?" Uraraka's murderous smile returns to her face. "I hate you. More than anyone else aside from Garaki and All for One. You coming here and trying to make me into a tool again just cemented you as number one on the 'still living' category of my shitlist. And since I don't know for how long this moment will last… I'm venting out all the hatred and anger I had stored in for years."
Her arms are almost fully back. Entropy is calculating the ways in which she can disengage, because it's clear that the plan didn't work.
"So sorry for this, Hoko-chan." Singularity's smile grows even more unhinged. "I'll probably never be free in my life, but if I get to choose the person that'll be holding my leash, it'll be Izuku Midoriya, villain name Revenant. The man that took revenge for me and ended All for One, the man that helped my parents when I couldn't, the man that was making me mochi twice a week for the last eight years, just because he remembered that I liked them. Not SloppyCunt McBitch, villain name Entropy." Somehow, just somehow, she manages to make the smile even more hateful. "So go die in a ditch, you stupid whore."
"We'll see how you'll react when I kill your cherished Midoriya in front of…" Entropy is about to reply with her last, final taunt before disengaging, only to be rudely interrupted.
By a pistol bullet fired point blank, opening her skull and tearing through her brain, killing her instantly, her lifeless body falling to the ground.
"Well…" Her killer says, putting the gun down. He is a man wearing a ninja outfit, vaguely reminiscent of the one that Edgeshot once wore. "... this is awkward. And certainly not the type of bullshit I expected when Intelli told me to tail her."
"… Blindside?" Uraraka blinks at him. "Weren't you supposed to be in Tokyo?"
The SS-Rank Hero sighs loudly.
"So you know even the details of our deployment, how absolufuckinglutely awesome." Uraraka suddenly realizes that she might have not been supposed to say that. Oopsie? "So, a mind transfer quirk?"
Uhm. Blindside was right, this was suddenly very awkward. Was she supposed to attack him?
"One of the delayed effects, yeah." Uraraka replies cautiously. It's not their secret, right? "Must have changed Nejire Hadou's behavior slowly, and one day, after her divorce, suddenly replaced her ego."
"You think…" Blindside glances at the lifeless corpse of Nejire Hadou. "... that it's The End for her?"
"Fifty-fifty, I think?" Uraraka's arms are finally back, and she can feel her programming slowly kick in. Slower than she expected it to. For now, she can still act like she wants to. "She picked up an old Noumu that can deploy temporary backups of people connected to it. We ended up running into Dabi, Beast, Muscular, first Eclipse and Purity when we were shutting down Armageddon, errr, you know him as Necromancer. She might as well have Garaki and herself copied as well. And, well, maybe Armageddon too."
Blindside groans loudly.
"I should have listened to my momma and become a lawyer, instead of 'chasing my dreams' I guess." He then says, sounding utterly done with himself. Uraraka, against herself, chuckles. "Look, I should probably try to apprehend or kill you, just as you should probably try to kill me. But I get the feeling that the government finding out that Entropy might still be around is in everyone's interest. Soo…"
Uraraka comes to a decision. It might be the last time she ever decides on something for herself, but…
"Fine, you're free to go." She says. Blindside salutes her, and vanishes into thin air. She uses her quirk to fly away instantly, just in case he was actually trying to sneak close to her and shoot her dead.
(***)
Bloodcurdle finally kicks in, Emoji stopping his final slash before the blade could reach Lady Murder and falling to the ground like a marionette with its strings cut.
Not a second too soon.
For someone with a quirk like his own, he was no slouch in terms of proper combat training. She didn't even try to slash him again. It would have ended with her death.
She barely survived either way. Dozens of cuts, his blade stopped at the last second before cutting her neck in half. Her right ear cut in half, her right arm barely working after a slash severed some tendons. She lost a lot of blood.
But she won.
"It was the best fight of my life, I'll give you that." She says to the downed hero. It was the sort of thrill that made her actually enjoy being a part of the PLF, even if you exclude the fact that she actually got to meet her parents thanks to Midoriya.
"Make it quick." Emoji wastes no time, sounding winded and resigned, but also calm. She obliges, her blade going through him. She could find the heart easily, and she made it quick.
She manages to take three steps before her legs give in. She doesn't fall to the ground because someone is there to grab her.
Rini Akaguro groans loudly.
"I'm still not calling you dad." She announces. Stain just sighs loudly, before helping her limp off the battlefield.
(***)
"I think…" Star and Stripe says loudly. "... that it's time to wrap this up."
Judgment agrees with her wholeheartedly. She can, to be honest, barely stand. Nothing she has tried thus far seemed to stick, Cathleen Bates simply healing herself in an instant.
Aiko expected her to be a broken character. Just not this broken. Was this a power of someone with a quirk on Judgment's level, just with decades to work with it? Was there anything Judgment could do to win this fight?
"Your entire country is shitty beyond comparison, and I have a long list of grievances with your quote unquote 'heroes'." Star and Stripe says. "In America, we still arrest villains whenever possible. And since I don't trust the locals to not kill or torture you if I hand you to them, you'll get to be trialed and incarcerated in the United States. And no one there really likes the Japanese Government, you know?"
It took Judgment off-guard so much that she actually messed up her newest quirksong.
"Seriously?" She blinks at the hero in shock. "You're trying to make me surrender?"
"I don't think…" Star and Stripe says. "... that All Might would beat a teenager to death, even if they were an SSS-Rank villain. Even if they were a child of All for One."
So she was fucking sandbagging the whole time. Not even fighting Judgment, merely keeping her occupied, letting her struggle until she would have enough fighting. Well, that was just splendid.
How much percent of the effort was Star and Stripe putting into this fight? 10%? No flashy movements, just standing there and getting hit, proving to Judgment how utterly useless her attacks in the end were.
"Unfortunately…" Aiko replies, glaring at Star and Stripe. "... I've learned not to trust heroes, especially ever since the death of my mother. And for all the hype he has around, I really don't imagine All Might being even nearly as virtuous if he found out who my father was as you claim him to be. So, my answer is a big, fat no."
"Regretful." Star and Stripe sighs. "Looks like I'll have to be a bit more serious, then. From my personal experience, this will end it, even if you have a Class-Six quirk. In the area of space of fifty meters in front of me…"
Blackwing, somehow, realized what was happening. She could feel him enveloping her body, leaving her clothes just enough to have a solid footing, enough to throw her backward. There was an empty street behind them, the impact of her landing was going to hurt, but…
"... quirks do not exist." Cathleen Bates finishes her order.
… not as much as seeing Fumikage Tokoyami, her High Templar, her most trusted protector and confidante for years, vanish in an instant, his very nature extinguished by the New Order.
"You dodged that?" Cathleen Bates appears to be surprised by it, her voice somehow carrying over even such a distance. "You're good for your ag…"
"SHUT THE FUCK UP!" Judgment yells at her, fury filling her face. "HOW DARE YOU TAKE THEM AWAY FROM ME!"
Cathleen Bates didn't realize it. But she just did the worst thing she possibly could. To her, she just extinguished a quirk that Judgment was using to defend herself. She either didn't read the part of reports about the Ascending Path which mentioned the exalted, or simply treated them as autonomously existing quirks.
To Judgment, the heroes took someone she was close with away from her. Again. And this time, yeah, this time she was done with that.
There were a few quirksongs that she never used. Because even testing them wouldn't exactly be low-profile. Her personal list of mass destruction songs. She isn't sure if it's going to work, but…
That's what you get for playing around, Cathleen. You could have ended it in a few seconds if you genuinely tried to.
"Total…" She says, her other mouth singing the sound combining the area of influence of Chart with the effects of the quirk of her cousin. Star and Stripe, through her years of combat experience, realized that something terrible was going to happen. She had no time to issue a New Order rule to counter it, instead lunging forward with her strength-amplification rule on. "... Decay."
Everything within a kilometer distance from Aiko Midoriya turned to ash in an instant, creating a massive crater where a city once was. Including fifty-seven soldiers, twenty-four PLF members, seven pro-heroes - and Star and Stripe, the World's Strongest Hero.
All of that happened after Cathleen Bates' final attack reached its target, her punch practically pulverizing Judgment's abdomen, causing injuries of nigh-instant lethality and sending her flying once again.
As she feels herself falling into the basin of gray ash that a big part of Marukane Ward changed into (knowing full well that once she reaches the bottom, hitting it will probably end her either way), Aiko Midoriya starts singing her final quirksong.
Despite her frantic attempts, she won't make it in time.
(***)
Seven Days Ago
"To be frank, in light of the full list of Invincible's quirks that I'm going to present to you in a moment…" Midoriya says. "... our one and only chance of winning against him is to have him pinned somewhere for a precious few seconds that Judgment needs to blast him with her Extinction Ray. Nothing else can even potentially work on him."
"And what if…" Spyglass decides to ask. "... hypothetically speaking, she won't make it to the battle?"
Midoriya spends a few seconds calculating how honest he can be about it.
"Frankly speaking…" He then says. "... I don't think we can do an awful lot more than trying to escape while losing the lowest number of people possible. I have something of a rough sketch of Plan B, but…"
Yeah, it'll get ugly if that happens. And while the primary plan has something like 90% chance of success, his secondary plan has… what, 20%? And that's being generous.
(***)
Today
The figure floating in the air in front of them, above the ruined street, is painfully familiar. White and red bodysuit with a large I in front, making him a rather clear Superman rip-off (just in the colors of the Japanese flag).
There is even a red cape. And an expression of sheer, livid fury on his face, his eyes glowing red.
Apocrypha isn't there, yet. And if the message that just got to them was to be trusted, she wasn't going to join them ever again.
Uraraka and Tokoyami didn't make it to the battle, either.
"Well… fuck." Frostfire speaks for them all.
Time until Invincible's arrival:
0 minutes and 0 seconds
(***)
This time it's so short because Star and Stripe from entirely different genre and tried to play it out like a canon hero would. Let's just say that the Japanese Government is going to pay the price for Cathleen lethally half-assing the fight AND that whether Aiko is truly gone only really depends on what was the success condition of her final song... and whether something like 'partial success' was a possibility.
Next chapter is going to include detailed showcase of Invincible's quirk... and a lot of dead characters.