Rewind

Chapter XIV: No Backing Down When Destiny Calls

Once their shock had died down some, Izuku ordered the others to carry Puck back to the campsite. About half of them agreed immediately, all but one agreed when he gave them a look colder than even Shoto could produce. "You're going after Kats, aren't you, Midoriya?" Kirishima demanded. "Well if you are, then I'm going as well and there's no way you're leaving me behind!"

Izuku just shook his head, knowing there was no way that Kirishima was going to be left behind. Kirishima had been so upset the last time because he couldn't help, and they hadn't even been dating at the time! (Apparently the trip to I-Island had been their first official date this time around.) But how would he react to Kacchan's plan? Izuku could only guess, though he didn't think it would be very pretty. "Alright, you can come. Just to warn you though, we're probably going to have to deal with Dark Shadow first."


Shoto was groaning inside. Why couldn't Izuku have told them how creepy this maniac was? "Bakugou, how precise can you be with your explosions?" he asked his partner as he raised a new ice wall.

"Not precise enough for what you're thinking, Icy-Hot," the blond growled out. "This camp has been focusing on increasing our power, remember? And Deku never worked with me on precision attacks, little bastard." Shoto silently grumbled about the blond, as he was sure it was mostly his fault and not Izuku's that he'd failed to create any precision attacks. Bakugou was definitely the type to go for power over precision, and Izuku had worked with him several times on precision attacks.

What was even more frustrating though was the fact that Shoto could feel that something was happening to his quirk. It had started the day they arrived and only grew stronger with each passing day. His ice was growing stronger, his fire hotter, and it took longer for him to become uncomfortable with the extreme temperatures. Now wasn't the time to focus on that though, he had to protect himself and Bakugou from this guys' … were those seriously his teeth? "Moonfish," he growled out, finally recognizing the villain. The cannibal had been taken down by some hero he'd honestly forgotten the name of and sentenced to death for his crimes, only to escape even with his quirk being suppressed.

Then his ice walls shattered as the teeth struck them and came after the teens. Damn it, I got distracted! Shoto raised another ice wall, but he could tell that something was different now. Moonfish tried another attack, but to everyone's shock, his teeth were what shattered on impact, not the ice. The man struck the ice again, only to get the same result.

"What the hell, Icy-Hot? Why didn't you do that sooner?"

"I don't think I could have," Shoto responded. He raised his left hand to call up his flames, and discovered that they immediately came out blue, and he couldn't cool them down to their normal red. What was more, he could … sense them in a way that he couldn't before, much like Kido said that his quirk worked, as well as others with telekinetic powers. And that raised some interesting questions. What could he do with his fire now? So, while Moonfish showed his insanity by continuing to attack the ice wall, Shoto started experimenting with a small fireball and soon discovered that he could make it do anything he wanted it to. Oh yeah, he could work with this!

"Oi, Icy-hot! Stop playing around! That maniac could break through the ice any second!"

"No, he won't," Shoto stated with certainty. He didn't know how he knew, but he knew that his ice was all but indestructible now.

"Then he'll eventually wise up and go around! Either way, we need to keep an eye on him until Birdboy shows up!" Shoto decided that just keeping the serial killer busy was too passive for him and threw a fireball into the air. "What the hell are you doing?" Bakugou demanded. Shoto refused to answer, focusing on the fireball. Once it was clear of the ice, he turned it, sending it to the heat source that he knew had to be Moonfish. An interesting new perk to his powers was that he could 'see' heat, almost like he could see the world through infrared now. Combining that with his new pyrokinetic powers and he was guaranteed a hit. However, since he didn't want to be a killer, he extinguished the flames after the villain had burned for about ten seconds.

"Okay, how the hell did you do that? Since when could you control your fire like that? And since when could you extinguish them on command? Can you do that to my explosions too?"

Shoto turned to stare at the blond. "You're reminding me of Izuku right now, you realize that? I'm starting to see how you two were friends when you were kids."

Bakugou started stammering at that, but was spared further embarrassment by a crash from the forest and the sound of people yelling. "Hey Kats, Todoroki! We need some light!" Kirishima yelled out.

"Huh, that's different from the first time," Bakugou said, creating a series of small but constant explosions.

"Well, he did pass the test this time," Shoto explained as he lit his arm up. "Besides, he is your boyfriend. I'd have been more surprised if he didn't come."

Once everything had calmed down, Tokoyami attempted to apologize for losing control of Dark Shadow. "Shut up," Izuku interrupted. "It's not your fault, anyone might have lost control in similar circumstances. But we do need to deal with this. And for that, I need to talk to Dark Shadow." Dark Shadow appeared, looking just as contrite as Tokoyami had a minute earlier. "Now, do you have your own name?"

"I call myself Kuro," the being answered. Tokoyami stared at it in shock. How had he never thought to ask that question himself?

"Alright Kuro. Now, we need to talk about what just happened. Like Tokoyami, you have no need to be upset with yourself about losing control. However, attacking Tokoyami was too far!" The shadow whimpered at that, almost like … he feared getting punished? "That's something that we're going to be working on, understand? You need to be able to work with Tokoyami no matter how enraged the two of you are. But that will need to wait. Can you maintain control for the rest of the night?" Kuro nodded and prepared to defend his partner and Tokoyami's friends.

In the meantime, Izuku had contacted Momo and confirmed that almost everyone had made it safely back to the basecamp, and that she had placed a tracker on a nomu that had been beaten back by Kaibara Sen and Shoda Nirengeki of B. The only ones missing now were his group, Uraraka and Tsu, who should be fighting Toga, considering how similar things were playing out. "Right, as far as we know, the Pussycats are still fighting the League in the clearing, so the safest route is to cut straight through the forest."

"Is that an actual strategy, or based on your knowledge of the future?" Kirishima asked.

"Pure strategy, because the first time, they had attacked us on our third night during the Test of Courage and Puck wasn't a member, not to mention we all had a harder time against the League. Now, do you want to argue more, or should we head back?" Kirishima and the others nodded, and they cut through the woods, only to encounter Uraraka and Tsu fighting Toga, though it looked like she hadn't gotten any of their blood yet. The three girls stopped fighting when the boys showed up … and Toga couldn't take her eyes off of Izuku. Her distraction allowed Uraraka to get the upper hand and Kirishima to capture her.

"Sorry, but you're not taking her. She's crazy, but I actually like her," a raspy voice called from the woods. Izuku and Shoto stared at the man before them, Izuku checking to see if there were any differences between the two times he had seen the older man and Shoto for any sign that their suspicions were correct. The older man though only had eyes for one person. "Sho, tell the old man that the day of reckoning is coming, and he shall pay for his sins. Mr. Compress, it's time to go." With that, he raised a wall of flames and the two villains escaped. Wait … Mr. Compress?

Izuku and Shoto whirled around to look at their group, only to realize that Shoji, Tokoyami and Bakugou were all missing. "You bastard!" Izuku yelled at the masked villain.

"Now, now, I'm only doing my job, no need to throw insults around," Compress called back.


At the rendezvous point for the Vanguard Action Squad, Dabi was dealing with the craziness that was Twice. The dual personality was such a pain in the ass to deal with, yet it was also charming in its' own way. He was a little disappointed that Toga had only gotten the blood of two people, but it could have been worse. He was also a little worried about Toga. What kind of person could she have fallen for out here? Then a rushing sound came at them, and Compress crashed to the ground with Kirishima and his baby brother on top of him, while Midoriya crashed on top of Twices' arm. Twice cried out in pain, before he started laughing of all things. "Twice, get it together," Dabi said. "We need to get out of here."

"My arm, it hurts, but even though it hurts, I'm not disappearing! Dabi, I couldn't be better if I tried! Heroes, it's time for you to learn just how good I am with my quirk!" With that, Twice started making copies of himself, something that Dabi and Shigaraki had learned that he said he would never do! What the hell happened?

Wait, Compress! Dabi sent a wave of fire at the two heroes, only to be surprised when his fire seemed to just disappear a few feet from the trio. "Sorry, but fire's not going to work against me any longer," Shoto called out, his left hand raised as if he'd been blocking the fire. Dabi stared at his little brother in shock. Since when could he do that?! The old man couldn't do that, so how could he? "Kirishima, keep Compress under control," Shoto ordered. The redhead nodded, and Shoto came charging at Dabi. Then, to Dabi's surprise, Shoto cut the two of them off from the rest with his ice. "Hello, nii-san," Shoto stated. "You could have warned me that you were coming today, you know."

"Now where's the fun in that?" Dabi asked. "How did you even find me, little brother? And since when could you control fire like that?"

"Finding you, well, that's a bit of a story, but let's just say that Midoriya has some interesting contacts. For the fire, that's new. Do you like it?" he asked, showing his new, blue flames.

"Your quirk awakened? Baby brother, I'm extremely impressed. But, we need to get back to our real lives." With that, the brothers melted out of Shoto's igloo. Dabi stared at the results of the fight. Twice still had a small squad of copies, but Valiant was easily defeating them. Toga had been knocked out, with another copy of Twice (he thought,) holding her. The nomu was gone, probably through Kurogiri's portal. Compress though was still held down by Red Riot, so Dabi sent another wave of flames at the young hero.

The hero instinctively dodged the flames, allowing Compress to escape, but he called out "Got them! Let's go," before running back towards their camp just as Kurogiri and the nomu arrived.

Dear little Valiant though wasn't ready to go or let them escape though. He sped to Compress, only to hit him on the back of the head, forcing him to cough up three of his marbles. "Sorry, but no magician's trick is going to fool me twice!" Wait, what? What did that mean?

Fortunately, he only grabbed two of the marbles, allowing Dabi to reclaim the third. "Which one do we have?!" he demanded. Instantly Compress undid his trick, revealing that they still had the most powerful of them: Bakugou. "Let's get out of here, now!" Dabi ordered, placing his hand around Bakugou's neck.

Kurogiri's warp gates allowed each member of the VAS to escape, though not before both Toga and Bakugou got some last words out. Toga went and flirted with Midoriya, while Bakugou called out "Stick to the plan, Deku!" Well, that was curious. Just one more thing to discuss with the explosive blond.


When the final count was finished, four students had to be treated for gas exposure, five had injuries of varying degree with Izuku being the worst off, and Bakugou Katsuki had been kidnapped. Izuku just smiled when he heard the results and whispered to himself "Phase one, complete." Honestly, that could have hardly gone better!


Around the nation, word had spread of Bakugou Katsukis' kidnapping by the League of Villains, and one group was already planning to take advantage of it. "The storm has come," the masked man stated. "Prepare for it to break. You know what to do."

"Yes, sir," his nine most loyal stated. What they couldn't know was that their actions would shake the entire nation.