Chapter 69 - My Hero Perfected
Everything was cold, dying in the red particles that dimmed in the darkness.
Aksis laid ruined, his cybernetic enhancements, the pieces that made up his strength, cured him of his starvation for Ether, it all surmounted to nothing. His armour warped, weapons fried, life burnt by an indomitable flame. His right eyes were wide, staring up at the woman who led through his hells without an ounce of hesitation, who crushed his kin, razed his Splicers and tore down his ideal perfection with her flames.
Was she... upset? Angry?
Her helmet fell off to the side by his large, groaning legs, unable to lift even an inch. Her fingers curled into her palm, shaking her head. "Why... all of this pain, was it worth it?" He met her green eyes, filled with pity. "Well? Was it?"
"Ceres...?" The machine that conjured the strength of space itself approached, but his words did little to stop her anger from seeping through her cracks. Aksis didn't understand why her triumph filled with sorrow? Her fire, where had it gone?
"All of this pointless death, and for what!?" She demanded of the Archon who felt... was his life fading? He couldn't tell, his heart, was it even still a heart anymore? Everything was so hazy; he couldn't stop; he needed to |Consume|Enhance|Replicate. No... no, why... what was he...? "...I can't imagine what you've seen; the pain you've endured," Closing her eyes a moment, he again met her eyes, feeling his own secrete something, why did her words hurt so much? "Please rest; you've done a good job... for your family."
Did he? Was this... what he wanted?
He wanted to know why, why were her eyes leaking?
His hand raised to her, but his eyes saw nothing but darkness, his sensations leaving his body forever. However, he felt a warmth envelop his hand. He... missed feeling warm.
"I had made my choice long ago."
Aksis plunged his spear through Yuki's stomach, twisting it through until it pierced her back with an audible squelch of blood. Her face twisted in agony, jaw jittering before that intense pain a second subsided; blue light emanating from the weapon.
"W-what are you doing!? Aksis!?" Dren was left bewildered, horror peeling against his mask as his leader, the Eliksni that saved his life, gave him a new place to call home, his body started to break down. The blue variation of SIVA slithering into Yuki's wounds, turning her veins neon blue with their strength.
"There is no one else I'd rather fight for than the girl who called me her family," His words were without conflict, closing his eyes. "You are a fine Eliksni, Dren, but you need to move on, for your Archon died at the hands of his enemy that shed tears for him."
As an air force threw Dren back, shattering the barriers that imprisoned Rayla and Tekres. Yuki felt stronger; that piece of herself was flooding back into her veins with envigorated energy; it was almost overpowering for her senses. The less of Aksis that remained, the more her body felt as though she held the might of the entire House of Devils at her fingertips.
"Siva..." Despite their circumstances, a tear fell from her eye. "Why... you had your body again?"
That is correct | But I no longer feel clouded by doubt | You is where I am meant to be
Blue lightning discharged from her bones, tingling across her whole body as the girl who held nothing stood with the might of an entire House. Dren couldn't believe what he was seeing; the lightning manifested if only briefly, the shadows of dozens of Devils; All stood with the towering arachnid form of their Archon Prime, arms wide before his kin. Before Yuki herself.
"..." The light curled around her, motes of light enveloping her skin once more. Her barding returned, the nanomachines materializing her armour with a lighter tint of black; gone were her red accents in exchange for sky blue. Picking up her mask, she placed it against her face once more, flashing blue. "You know... could've done without the gut wound... but we'll put a pin to that."
Yuki's eyes were bright blue with a prominent horn atop her left temple, the mask jagged with blue wires coiled across her neck, forming a scarf. Her entire left leg had converted to pale black metal with blue, triangular lines across the edge, white barding underneath her enhancements.
Her right arm had transformed with a triangular pauldron. Her additional limbs were clothed in metal, embroiled with blue plating atop the gauntlets. Her twin-tail scarf was bright blue, the arrow hanging between her shoulderblades bearing SIVA's marking in white.
"Siva... Perfected... Fifty Percent!" Yuki declared, lightning coiling between her fingers. "Your manipulation ends here, Dren!"
"You... you took him...!" Dren closed his fists, his own nanomachines expelled from his body, shielding his armour in smaller hardlight barriers. "I'll kill you... AZURU!"
A barrier formed to keep her fist back, the sheer force nearly throwing Rayla back as Tekres scrambled for the command consoles in an effort to disable the conflux. "Help... her!" He clicked for Rayla, her cuffs broken without the generators, releasing her flames.
"On it!" Drawing her brass handcannon marked with an ace of spades, she fired a few rounds against Dren's face, the bullets bouncing off his helmet while Yuki vanished to strike him across the nape, firing blue bursts of plasma from her hands. "Time to collect our bounty!"
"Tch, you think I can't fight?" He cooed, disappearing in a burst before Yuki's attacks could land. He grabbed Tekres by the cape, blocking his own sword from slitting the Splicer's throat, tossing the Wolf down the stairway while a great wall of light ricocheting any of Rayla's bullets from touching the conflux. "I didn't spend all this time working with Vex tech to be thwarted by some Guardian!"
"Who says 'Thwarted' these days?" Rayla snorted; Yuki nodding next to her, manifesting two swords. "I got your back, my radar's pickin' up hostiles behind us..."
Tekres pulled out his wire rifle alongside her, the pair facing the dark, spiral hallway that crawled with blue eyes. The flashes from their muzzles and the light from their attacks bounced, revealing the Splicers scampering toward them like rodents, keeping them from helping Yuki, though she hardly required it.
Diving back into her hands she evaded three bolts from Dren's modified rifle, releasing a burst continuously that forced her behind her own hardlight shield appearing between her two left arms. She rammed Dren with it, knocking him into the light wall, his fingers hooked to the surface, continuously bombarding her with arc rounds that exploded on contact.
"Kovik was right, you're far too dangerous to be left alive, that's my fault to bear!" Dren declared, pressing a button on his left arm's gauntlet, the SIVA node beside her exploding into a blue mist that knocked Yuki flying into the side of the empty cryo-pod.
She shuffled to the right as another explosive wave of arc ripped apart the ground with titanic force. These new enhancements were at full strength yet, and so long as Dren's barriers are active she can't make a dent in his armour. She folded her arms back as one- "Devils Ruin Perfected!"
Four condensed beams of light refracted off the surface of another dome, chipping away at its face until Dren retreated, their combined might shattering it like glass. A puff of smoke was all that remained until an arm clotheslined her stomach, slamming Yuki into the ground to narrowly evade a sword to the throat, drawing her own to guard against Dren's, rolling back with her feet against his stomach, throwing him away.
She brought her lower arms forward, energy building among her claws to blast him point-blank in the chest. He did the same with his rifle, both their elemental attacks stripped ribbons off their armour, tossing them back. Yuki, however, refused to touch the ground as she was pulled by her leg to gaze up at the fury in Dren's eyes, he then brought an arm high, punching her repetitively in the face, chipping piece-after-piece off her helmet before swinging the girl wide, slamming her body into the wall; body denting the metal while she slumped to the ground, earning a teleporting kick to the jaw, blood spat from between her teeth as she rolled away from an ultra stomp.
"You haven't integrated my variant's full strength, you can't even regenerate your armour," Dren chuckled darkly, posing the buzzing muzzle to her forehead. "Sadly, this isn't a fight I'll let you walk out of."
"-Dreadnaught!" From the darkness, narrowing skimming between Rayla and Tekres, three one-meter sized pillars of earth collided with Dren's side, squishing the Fallen against his own barrier, the lengths retracting in time for his eyes to bulge at the sight of two silver feet sinking his body further against the shield, splitting a few lines down its impregnable face.
Jura, while looking worse for wears, ran to his friend's side, seeing her new armour attempting to regrow with a blue outline. "Are you okay? We came as fast as we could!" He held her shoulders, receiving a flick to the nose, her eyes winking. "Heh, good - had us worried."
"Damn straight she did!" Valstrax landed, wings releasing a red burst, glowering at Dren clutching his head, shaking the stars from his head. "So that white tower in the background, bet that's important to him."
"Yes, take... care of him," Yuki nodded, adjusting her mask. "I've got a plan, buy me time."
"Right, let's go, Valstrax!" Jura declared, slamming his bloodied hands into the metal to, much to Yuki's surprise, fling metal pillars toward the slippery Captain. The first missed Dren's feet, the Splicer scampering over the metallic surface to slide under the second and third, the fourth crashing into the first to block Dren who crawled up its face before it retracted.
Valstrax swept down in an arc, wings missing his body while they fell, his rifle battering her face with electricity until he hooked his fingers against one of the descending pillars, landing before Jura to swipe him with his rifle, kicking the boy back while two more sprung loose to block Dren, knocking him into Valstrax's awaiting wings, unleashing a barrage of dragonblight.
She grunted, feeling the Fallen's fingers hook to her head, flipping over her back, grazed by her bladed wings that swept back in an inverted state to puncture Dren's side. Another pillar threw Dren skyward, although he swung himself with the suspension cables, releasing streaks of lightning from the rifle in a frenzy, forcing Jura to cover himself with a smaller column but it was clear he was running on empty.
The Sky Comet rocketed toward him, bringing her right-wing down on Dren, tossing the Splicer downward. Valstrax lunged, chomping down on Dren's sword to toss him across while swinging herself around to swat the rifle bolts aside. Mid-turn, she took Dren's slant to the forearm followed by a strong arc to the stomach. She lost her grip on his leg.
However, he failed to see the pillar that jutted from the ceiling before it shattered the hardlight against his back, the Splicer landing by the conflux wall. "You... cannot... win!" His rifle sparked, running low on power itself, his hardlight armour flickering.
"We know, but-" Jura poked a thumb back. "-they can."
Turning, he met Yuki's glare, the girl was thrown forward against a molten hammer threshed from Rayla's arms, her whole body ignited as though she were the sun. Held tight in Yuki's grip was another of those molten hammers, enriched by SIVA. "Inverted Wolves-!" The ring of gold shattered between them, launching Yuki like a bullet, bringing her hammer over her head against Dren's weaker shield. "-Howling!"
*BOOSH-SHATTER!*
Glass flung on either side, breaking down under the extreme heat, creasing Dren's armour until he tore his own wall down, tumbling until his back slumped against the consoles, coughing up black liquid from his mangled mask. The hammer fizzled away, burning Yuki's hand as a blue glow worked to repair her armour.
Above, a scarlet comet gleamed in the chamber, bringing its form piercing through the conflux alongside two pillars of stone and metal. The physical code sparked gold, dispersing in the air, suspending the displaced conflux that glitched and hissed.
"No... noooo!" Dren couldn't believe it. When all his planning, the months of hard labour and trials bore fruit, all of it rotted in an instant at his teeth. He pulled himself to peer over the console, the screens in the back shattered on impact with Valstrax, the conflux dying slowly without a stable grid.
Without that conflux, the Splicers were little more than faded memories in time. The Nexus would close forever on this side. "Not yet..."
"It's over," Yuki sighed, balling up her fists. "Give up, and tell me where Kovik is hiding."
The silence was palpable, Dren's anger simmered at the state of his lab left ruined by heroes, by Yuki Azuru. Then, an epiphany struck. Reaching forward, he snatched a distant piece of the conflux, embedding it into his gauntlet like a shard of glass, seeing him grunt from the injury.
What is he doing? | Stop him | Quickly!
"Wait-!" Yuki hit a blue wall meshed with white netting. Dren's arm extended to stop her, even while the coding infected his forearm.
"You took... everything from me," Cold, calculative, heartless, nothing of his sincerity remained. "So, I think, I'll take what's so precious to You." One of the lingering monitors swaying from wires flickered with a static image of Izuku, her heart stopped. "I win, Azuru."
He clicked his fingers, tearing a fissure through time itself behind him, Valstrax missing him by an inch, jaw crashing into another shield while one of Rayla's bullets shattered against the surface. "Don't you touch him!" Dren turned a few inches into the rift, only to gasp as a fist creased against his mask, dragging Yuki through alongside him.
"No, Yuki!" Valstrax lunged for them but felt only a breeze tickle her nose. Her face screwed up. "Not again... not again!"
Meanwhile, during the Raid on Shie Hassaikai...
*Ba-Bum...*
"That's it, his true feelings!" The hammer of a revolver pulled back.
*Bang!*
Time was a crawl, only a heartbeat in Lemillion's chest reverberated in his ear. Without thinking, he lunged to protect Eri who cowered nearby. He met her scarlet eyes, smiling to tell her it would all be okay, he would... be her hero, to ensure she smiled, this was worth everything.
*Ba-Bum...*
The wall webbed, lurching forward. And the sky bled.
Izuku tore through the wall, the debris obscuring his vision but he could make out the incident within. A red, Quirk-Destroying bullet was hurdling toward Mirio who lunged to shield Eri. Meanwhile, Overhaul was close to bringing his hand down on the concrete again.
Yuki's body was squeezed through a needle, emerging with her fist still snapping a portion of Dren's mask, her eyes scanned with her new depth of perception, seeing a frightened little girl with beautiful scarlet eyes and wavy silver hair. She and Mirio were in trouble.
"Lemillion!" Yuki and Izuku called out, the former's body phasing through Dren who warped away. Their feet came down on the earth, erecting a large enough wall for the bullet to bounce off of, saving the pair. Then he leapt to the side, mirroring Yuki's reaction. "Deku/Aksis!?"
"More heroes!?" Overhaul growled, holding his fingers taut on the floor. "You're all just a disease! Stop getting in my way!" The ground instantly shattered into spikes hurdling toward them.
"Deku!" Lemillion, who held onto Eri, called out.
Yuki brought her leg forward, swiping the air with nothing but air force to knock back several of the inclosing spikes while Izuku grabbed Mirio, vaulting from an uprooted slab toward the exit he carved open, using the force of his kick to send the slab flying into the man who attempted to shoot Eri, Dren forced to roll away from the debris in time.
Mirio saw it all pan out slowly, Yuki retreating too. "They used the debris to block the bullet and lessen how many spikes Chisaki could attack with while simultaneously putting distance between us, taking out the gunman." He smiled brightly. "Wow, these two really do work together perfectly!"
Once safe, Eri was set behind them, staring wide-eyed at the familiar face of Izuku from before, and the girl beside them, her face obscured by a mask but the heat she gave off was mingling with Izuku's. "You've changed." Izuku looked at Yuki. her armour lessened but something about its new look told him it was much more than a colour pallet switch.
"Blue's the new red," She quipped. "Lemillion, take out Chrono."
"We'll deal with Chisaki and Dren!" Izuku added, the pair sparing no time for a chat, moving as one toward the enemy. Overhaul nodded to Dren who vanished in a burst of light. The spikes erupted from the concrete in a massive bramble of thorns.
Yuki and Izuku swivelled between the waves, streaks of emerald and sapphire behind them with every motion until they were within inches of Overhaul, one of Dren's barriers erected though it did little to impede a single punch between them. "SMASH!" Pulverizing the shield, Yuki dipped ahead of Izuku, blasting Dren point-blank with two orbs, knocking him into Overhaul who tossed the Fallen aside, shattering the ground with spikes again that Yuki summoned her own barrier for, rolling onto her back.
Izuku hopped to her feet, thrown high enough to touch the ceiling, embedding a large circle in the deformed rock and metal. With one spin, he drew his leg high, electricity overflowing from his body. "Manchester Smash!" The sheer force of thirty percent left an indent several inches lower into the floor, reducing a massive portion of the environment to rubble with a white streak from his boot, sadly, Overhaul evaded.
"You're fast, but far too complacent!" His hands crumbled dust between them, or they should have, his eyes shot open. The slab he stood upon wasn't connected to the ground anymore.
"We weren't aiming for you," Yuki huffed, seeing Dren had been thrown into the air by the attack, unable to warp through so much moving matter at once. "You're the predictable ones."
Izuku split through the bottom like an arrow, Yuki doing the same, knocking Overhaul high into the air as she used the leader to vault toward Dren, kicking through his weakened hardlight. Both were left suspended in the air, unable to defend themselves from the combined bullets that were Yuki and Izuku, bouncing off the debris to punch and kick with a resounding force that disintegrated the rubble.
"So long as you can't touch the ground your Quirk is severely limited!" Izuku proclaimed, battering the Hassaikai boss, himself left no room to recover.
"I've spent too long suffering because of what you and Kovik have done to my life!" Yuki warped around Dren, faster than he could ever achieve, striking his face while stripping the armour from his body, reducing the places his hardlight armour could manifest. "I refuse to let you pry anymore from me!" Her bleeding words shattered his mask, a ring of blue expelled before Dren was sentenced to a shallow grave within the concrete wall.
"Overhaul!" Chrono ran to aid his boss only for Lemillion's fist to strike from the surface, passing through his own counterattack to punch the back of his head. Chrono spun around, a left cross to the chest, then an uppercut followed by a snap kick, rolling him across the ground.
He recovered to see the grinning blonde with his arms crossed; Immediately going for the left hook it was caught; used to punch himself as Mirio dipped into the earth, grabbing Chrono by the legs to throw forward into the air. "He's too fast... if I can just slow him down!" Chrono hated this Quirk. "Extend! Short Hand!" His hair split through his hood like an arrow toward Mirio who was without anything to phase through.
Mirio grinned, allowing the arrow to slide through his face, striking Overhaul in the back as he was pulled through by Chrono's hair. He flailed his arms. "Ah, s-sorry Overhaul!" The pair collided and Mirio put his hands on his hips with pride, Izuku sliding through his body to finish the pair with a combined roundhouse kick with Yuki.
"Manchester Smash/Perfected Impact!" The duo shouted, slamming the villain back into the battlegrounds in a shower of dust and rock. Eri couldn't believe her eyes.
The dust settled, revealing Izuku and Mirio standing side by side, Yuki walked over to join them with her hand raised for a high-five-
*Ba-Bum!*
"Aaah!" She choked on her breath, collapsing to curl up on her knees in pain, static coursing over her armour that flashed erratically. "W-what? I-It feels like my body's being torn apart...!" She jammed her eyes shut, biting her cheek while slipping her mask over to her temple. "F-Feedback!"
"Aksis!" "Are you okay!?" The boys knelt beside her, Eri staring at the girl with worry.
I was afraid of this | This new power is beyond SIVA | Your body cannot handle its new heights
"It's even stronger than one-hundred percent? Great..." She grimaced, shaking her head while wiping away the sweat with a nervous grin. "I-I'm fine, went a-a little too far."
"Yuki..." Izuku murmured quietly, holding his arm around her back gingerly with Mirio supporting her shoulders to sit upright. She leaned over to nuzzle her boyfriend's neck, sighing.
"I've had the worst day ever, like of all time." She chuckled once, seeing him smile too. Then she peered to Eri, curled up tightly in Mirio's cape. "Hey, so you're the adorable little girl these idiots are here to save?"
Eri didn't say anything, staring blankly at her eyes mingling with scarlet and blue wonderfully.
Meanwhile, while suspended in the air above Chrono, his subordinate didn't move, keeping incredibly still. "Overhaul, they haven't realized it yet but I lied," He peered over at the trio comforting Eri, discussing what to do with them probably. "I struck you with the longhand, my Quirk will wear off in a few seconds, then we can strike."
Overhaul looked down at the earth, then to the walls surrounding the underground. "This could work..." His hand was slowly regaining velocity, inching closer to the floor.
Inch by inch.
One. Single. Shot.
His hand slapped the earth, sending a torrent of spikes toward not Eri but the bluette unable to move given her Quirk's feedback on itself. She winced, trying to push Izuku out of the way in time to shield Eri. Izuku raised his hand toward her, face scrunched up in horror while she braced for the impact, sadly, it was Mirio would was faster, taking the lead spike straight through the gut.
He lurched back from the force, all eyes expanding without a word, his body falling forward for a moment, chuckling. "Heh, cheap trick," He stood up with a fire in his eyes. "But it'll take more than another threat to keep me from saving those in need." His Quirk had saved him from the fatal blow.
"Oh, I know," Overhaul's jaded yellow eyes didn't lose sight of that.
The realization met Yuki too late. "Lemillion!"
*Blam!*
A wire rifle's trace shot fizzled between her eyes, seeing the red bullet inject itself deep into Mirio's shoulder, himself never once losing his smile, even as he fell to a knee, feeling his Quirk burn inside of him, that energy dimming into a faint, ghostly whisper.
"Hehehehe... hahahahaha!" Dren cackled from atop the wall, lowering his rifle until he appeared next to Overhaul. "I was aiming for Azuru but you... well, that's still one less nuisance!" Worst of all, Mirio's whole left arm went limp, blood caking his right side from the piercing shot's secondary impact. Combined with his other scrapes and bruises from protecting Eri without Permeation, he had lost his only trump card.
Overhaul joined Dren in laughter, bending back to admire the sheer look on their faces, how their hope was snuffed out in only a single shot. "You're diseased, your Quirks allow you to dream you'll be something bigger but that way of thinking is an illness of the mind! We're offering the world a cure!"
"Ironic, you came here to save this girl and it's her power that took away everything you came to rely on!" His face was twisted behind his mask, his skin breaking out in more spots while sinking his nails against the dirt. "You're Powerless!"
Then a blur cut between him, striking his forearm with a right hook. Izuku ensured to protect Yuki and Eri; Mirio... was fighting! "I am not powerless!" He threw Overhaul back with a warcry. "I Am Still Lemillion!"
The last of Overhaul's gloves disintegrated, reaching for the hero who dipped onto his left hand, striking the villain with his leg across the face, rolling away from Dren's swords to bring a right uppercut against the fangs of the Fallen, knocking the reptilian creature backwards.
"No, he won't stop," Yuki struggled to pull herself up against Izuku who kept any of Overhaul or Dren's attacks from harming the girls, even if every pore in his body screamed to him, begging him to fight, and yet... he couldn't. Yuki was the same, clawing at the earth as Mirio slammed his fist against Overhaul's mask, grabbing Dren by the face to throw him into Overhaul. "Like me, he... will never stop moving forward."
With Overhaul sprouting spikes at every moment, Mirio evaded them all, grazed and bleeding he was, he never stopped fighting. Dren rushed Yuki from the side, Izuku diving in to intercept his blade, allowing it to lacerate his right arm, blood flying before the girls. "I won't let Lemillion's... or Aksis's sacrifices be in vain! I will protect them!"
"Don't you dare USE THAT NAME!" Dren thundered, unleashing a barrage of slashes that sliced through Izuku's armour, drawing more blood.
"Izuku...!" Yuki bit her cheek, trying to muster even a spark, but her body simply recoiled in agony. Her power had evolved, she couldn't muster a fraction of it! "Please, Siva, we can't let them die!"
|...I cannot... you will die too|
Mirio took a blow to his shoulder, leaping back from the wall of spines shot forth, covering his face, using one of them to slide forward and kick Overhaul in the gut.
Izuku used Air Force, inaccurate as it was, to pummel Dren backwards, his rifle shredding his costume across the hip and shins, but he too couldn't aim under close quarters.
Yuki shuffled closer to Eri, the girl tearing up until Yuki embraced her against her chest. "It hurts, watching them bleed for you; I know it does," Eri saw that Yuki hadn't taken her eyes off either of them, she was shaken with grief, refusing to look away. "But they will never stop trying, not until you're safe; So will I, we won't let anyone hurt you again."
The boys let out their rage, bleeding against adversity until Dren dived away from Izuku's air force smashes. "All your efforts... ARE FOR NOTHING!" Overhaul slammed the ground, long pillars of spikes travelling over the battlegrounds toward Yuki and Eri.
The girl curled up against Yuki's chest, and her own sprung with blue light. With her right arm, she forged her armour to block the spikes, one of them impaling her forearm entirely. Izuku took one to his own left arm, grunting at the fire in his bones. Mirio held back one piercing his torso for them all. Their blood spilt for the girl who had suffered enough.
Overhaul's eye twitched, so in a fatal twist of his hand, the pikes extended further.
"I'll be a hero and save people!"
"Can I be a hero too?"
"Please, help me save her!"
To Be Continued...
I really hope this recreation of events was to everyone's liking; I had thought about Mirio not losing his Quirk but I feel then there would be no real threat or sacrifice involved aside from Dren but he focused primarily on Yuki who is already in the flow of danger. I dunno; but a lovely little animation gave me the scene I was struggling to envision so I won't take all the credit for this.
And that final part with all three taking a blow for Eri was a scene I had wanted to write since thinking about Season 4. For them all to burden themselves with the pain she had endured. I hope you enjoyed, appreciate the support as always; seeya in the next chapter, Heroes!
P.S. THANK YOU SO MUCH FOR 20,000+ VIEWS! Amazing Milestone thanks to everyone ^_^
Next Chapter: One For All Perfected
Mirio: We won't let you hurt her anymore!
Izuku: To save Eri and win!
Yuki: This ends now, Dren!
Siva: Coming soon, One For All Perfected.
Siva: Go Beyond-
All: PLUS ULTRA!