I've had the idea for this tale in my head for a VERY long time, and only started writing it a couple weeks ago. I definitely know where I'm going with this, I'm actually kind of excited that I was able to make myself sit down and actually write something. I had a lot of fun with this one; it's the kind of story where I expected things to go one way, but when I hit a certain point in the story and things were drifting somewhere else I just kind of went with it. I am genuinely happy with how this one turned out, but I could certainly use any critique you readers might have here.

My old account got hacked, so I'm going to be reposting some older stories here soon. Hopefully I'll be able to stand on the merits of this tale for a while, I think this might be a pretty good one.

Chapter 1: Gateway to Hell

"Just about anything can happen in Tokyo. Giant robots, atomic lizards, you name it, we've seen it. This your first time visiting?" The cabbie in the driver's seat glanced at the guest in the back through the rearview mirror. He spoke in English, a handy skill he'd remembered to practice when he left high school, especially for talking up the dead-sexy foreigners that came to town. This one was something special, though. She was a French-Canadian woman somewhere in her mid-20's, one blessed by a slim but curvy figure that would be considered morbidly obese by the supermodel club, but to sane eyes it was a goddess's outline. Lustrous auburn hair with artificial, yet tasteful, streaks of lighter red hues fell like liquid honey onto her shoulders. She was dressed in clothes that were meant for comfort on international flights- nobody with good sense would want to wear a cocktail dress for eleven or fifteen continuous hours, after all.

"No, this would be my third, actually," she replied. She glanced out the window at passing cars and streaks of streetlights blinking by. "My father is in the mining industry. He does business with several tech firms in Japan, and on occasion he asks me to go with him." She smiled and sunk further into the surprisingly comfortable seat. "He was always very busy while I and my brother were growing up. I think he's trying to make up for some lost time."

"Ahh. Sounds like a decent guy," the driver said.

"He really is," she replied. "Oh, he can be a bit of an ass sometimes, but you know how it can be with family."

He snorted. "Trust me, I know. Sometimes I'm that part of the family myself." He let the conversation drift off; good cabbies knew when to shut up, and the poor lady had just gotten off of an international flight, for crying out loud. Quiet nights like this was what got him in the groove.

When a man is behind the wheel of a car that they know well, every motion of the hand and foot is like a dance with the entire city. Graceful, smooth, working in tandem to get to their common goals, it could be a surprisingly poetic thing to think about. It wasn't until somebody burst in on the dance floor that everybody might lose their place in step. The drive from the airport to her destination wasn't very far by car, but late night traffic was doing its best to sully the mood.

For about five minutes, the cab was silent as the driver navigated the roads, and for a moment there he honestly thought that his fare had fallen into a quick nap. A glance showed closed eyes and even breathing; he decided to keep the boat as smooth as possible for the duration of the drive. She seemed exhausted.

"I'm Hannah," she said without preamble.

"Nogi," the driver answer. "A pleasure. Thought you conked out for a minute there."

"No, not yet," Hannah said. "Nogi, could you do me a favor? I'm going to bed as soon as I get to the hotel, could you keep me up until we get there? If I fall asleep now, I'm going to be far more cranky to the desk clerk than I have any right to be."

Nogi laughed. "You got it, Missy." He looked at a sign on the road as he passed by and got an idea. "Hey, question. You ever been on the Rainbow Bridge?"

Hannah's eyes snapped wide open. "No, I haven't. Is it far?"

"Nah, it's on the way, actually. Maybe a little out of the way, but it won't add that much time to the trip. Tell you what, I already know how far it is from your hotel to the airport, I'll kill the meter when I get that mileage."

"Perish the thought," she said.

"I insist," he rebutted. "I've lived in Tokyo most of my life, ya know? The whole city is like my home. And honestly, I get a kick out of showing it off to outsiders. There's just something about the place that nowhere else has. A certain spirit of adventure, I guess."

"I know what you mean," Hannah said. "Well, it's rude to turn down a gift in Japan, if I recall the etiquette correctly, but I will most certainly find a way to pay you back."

Nogi grinned at his passenger through the mirror. "Hey, just have fun and be safe in my city, that's all I ask ya."

Hannah smiled back at the driver. "I will. Thank you, very much, mister Nogi."

Anything and everything can happen in the skies above the land called Tokyo. Like many other cities on Earth, the geographical location was a nexus of worlds and stories. Stonehenge, Atlantis, New York, Mount Everest- significant and historical landmarks, whether individually supernatural or not, were links that bound many parts of the outer multiverse together.

On this night on a warm April night, the skies above Tokyo split in half.

Without any sort of preamble, a line of fire appeared almost two kilometers in the air above Tokyo bay. It cut through the darkness like a second spontaneous sun, itself over a kilometer in length, shining bright oranges and reds and yellows, as if a crack in hell itself had forced itself into the mortal plane. The line of fire was neither vertical nor horizontal; it seemed tethered between two points in space, dropping in elevation by about three hundred meters, and the flaming tendril warbled and vibrated like a plucked string in the breeze. For thirteen and a half seconds it hung there silently; the blind wouldn't even know it was there.

And then the crack split wide open. What was one line of fire split into a gaping void, still wreathed with flames, but now more resembling a sideways eye from a devil. Wider and wider it spread, surrounding (or encompassing) what could only be described as absolute darkness.

Those who were closest to the event had just enough time to begin screaming for their lives before a stream of fire jettisoned from near the center of the void. A line of white-hot power struck the water at an extremely acute angle to the formation of the event in the air, pulsing away from the bridge and connected landmasses and out into the ocean. The night lit up blindingly bright while ocean water vaporized and channels were dug into the sea floor.

It was the sound that was the most alien of all of this. Instead of some kind of grand rushing inferno, there was a kind of chittering, crackling noise, and each chitter coincided with the flash coming from the core of the beam of flames. Blue very briefly mingled with the whites and reds and everything in between, and as it went on the tempo increased in volume and frequency.

The disturbed waters in the bay crashed and churned, and while it was a miracle that no sea vessels had been incinerated by the blast, there were several that were being knocked around already. Even the very best of helmsmen and captains would be caught flat-footed, and in the moments following, their nerves and experience would be put to the ultimate test while they waited for assistance.

For a split second toward the very end, the fiery lance expanded its diameter by several times and took on a strange formation; what seemed to be cables in a triple helix formation, one each in blue, orange, and yellow. An instant before the end, what might have been a projectile or body of some kind was thrust out of the gaping maw and into the waters below. A crash of impact mingled in with the cacophony already in play, and of the hundreds of private and security cameras who had been in the right place at the right angles to see the show, only three of them were operating at a frame-per-second rate high enough to capture the scene. One of those three were able to even capture, in a single still image, what might have even been a face.

Before anybody could even really comprehend what was going on in Tokyo Bay, the night sky was once again as dark as it should be. Waves knocked boats into each other, and one unfortunate cargo vessel that had been going in a completely separate direction, listing sideways to the port and tossed laterally on a long, slow wave that put it on an intercepting course for one of the support pillars for the Rainbow Bridge.

From beginning to end, the sky was lit with ethereal energies for forty-one seconds, but it would be an event talked about for centuries to come.

Emergency sirens across the city began blaring, and within minutes almost every hero in Tokyo had been made aware of the disaster, though in the early hours of the night there weren't many who were already asleep. Agencies screamed from emergency lines to coordinate their efforts with each other, but nobody actually knew a damn thing. This was the kind of random disaster that had never been seen before, and mere minutes after the night sky above the city turned into what could only be described as a portal into Hell itself was not the time for debate.

Rainbow Bridge had taken a hit to one of the central pylons. Specifically, even though it was designed to be able to handle an earthquake up to about an 8.6, the direct shockwaves from both the disturbed water and floor of the bay caused something vital to shit at the foundation. The water of the bay itself was steaming-hot at the surface, almost boiling closer to where the fire had made its touchdown. An incredible plume of steam mushroomed upwards as the cool air was pushed out of the way by a preternatural sauna, and even before the bridge was enveloped, chunks of concrete and steel sounded their strain.

The pride of Kawaski Heavy Industries held its ground. The bridge had originally been constructed in the late 20th century, but as a perennial icon and landmark of the Tokyo skyline, it had been properly maintained and retrofitted every couple decades or so. The reputation of KHI wasn't for nothing, and even as the structure wanted to fall, the carefully calculated engineering held firm. Traffic on every level of the bridge had come to a panicked halt as soon as the lights went up and drowned out the gentle rainbow ride that they had all expected.

Everything was in a state of chaos, of course. Those drivers and passengers who had been closer to the thresholds of the bridge had already begun to hightail it, but there was no organized presence to keep order. Closer to the center, where the bridge had taken the most damage, the steam washed over the steel and concrete to exacerbate the confusion.

Men, women, children, they all screamed as the world clouded around them. To those that couldn't gather the courage to leave their vehicles or were trapped inside could only watch on in horror. Dozens, maybe hundreds of people tried to use their Quirks to escape somehow; most of them were untrained civilians, though, and their efforts almost unilaterally made it worse. The more level-headed focused on trying to get as many people out of their vehicles while they had time, but as the bridge began to tilt, the suspension cables strained to keep it aloft and the shriek of strained metal uttered an almost-subsonic call.

Dead in the center, just above where the bridge had taken the greatest of blows, a certain cabbie and fair sat as still as they could in their seats. "I'm gonna get you out of this," Nogi said with a calm that he certainly did not feel. When the bridge first shuddered, a driver behind him had gunned the engine in blind panic to clip the corner at the absolute worst angle possible. Nogi had managed to turn into the skid before he lost control, but the driver several lengths ahead of them had hit the brakes dead in the road. "Shit shit shit shit shit!" Nogi had screamed when the rear back panel of the driver's side clipped their back bumper.

Nogi must have blacked out for a few seconds. Shut up… I'm…

"Wake up!"

Tired… turn that…

"Help! Somebody help me! Help us!"

That ring… so loud….

"We're trapped in here! I think he's hurt!"

Drums… too many drums…

Eyes wet… rain? It… raining… rain doesn't hurt.

Rain doesn't HURT.

"Stop banging the window."

Hannah stopped mid-swing and looked up to the driver. "Oh thank god you're alive!" she breathed. "Hurry, we gotta get out of here!" Her breathing was understandably erratic and strained, blood and tears both streaking her makeup. "Please! Come on!"

Nogi took a few deep steadying breaths. Everything hurt. It wasn't the worst condition he'd ever been in, unfortunately, but at least he was alive. If he was hurting, that meant that his back and neck were relatively undamaged, but these kinds of injuries put folks in the hospital for extremely extended stays. "Wha' happened?" he mumbled.

"I- I don't know! Some kind of light in the sky, fire, earthquake, pick one!"

"I meant, the car," he said softly. "Hannah? Hannah, listen to me. Listen. Do I have your attention? I need you to keep it together. I'm gonna get you out of this. But I need you to help me here. Are you okay?"

"I'm, ah- ah-" She took several quick breaths to calm herself. "I'll be okay until we get out of here. I'm just banged up. How about you?"

"Prolly' a concussion," he admitted. "Ringing. Ears." But he wasn't in shock. That was the most important thing. "Car."

"We hit those cars," Hannah filled in. "I, I think the b-back axle of a truck is on the hood." She gulped, then continued, "your side is against the railing. My door… another truck."

The bridge rumbled beneath them as the steam advanced upon them. "Han'," Nogi slurred. ""We leanin?"

The question hung in the neon glow of the still-functioning mood lighting for a heavy moment. "Not exactly," she whispered. "Um. The bridge. It's tilting."

"Ah. Tiltin. Great."

Hannah let out a soft cry. With a trembling voice, she apologized to the driver. "I'm so sorry!" she wailed. "Help! Help! We're over here! Get us out! Please!"

"Nah… we'll be all right," Nogi said. "I'll getcha… safe, AARG!" One more after shock jolted the cab, and a shard of bent metal further twisted into his thigh.

"NOGI!"

"DO NOT MOVE!" he bellowed. She froze in place, still strapped into her seatbelt. "We- we gotta stay still," he said through clenched teeth.

"But we- you- if we don't-"

"We can't wait for rescue!" Nogi said. "We gotta… we gotta take care of… ourselves." A sudden stitch in his chest made him gasp and struggle to breathe for a moment before he regained his composure. "But we have to be careful and fast. I can… get you out… and maybe others… but I gotta st… stay...beh...hind…" His leg pulsed, and he felt the skin of his calf soak warmer with the trickling blood. He'd been hurt before, and badly, but nothing like this. Two, three, maybe four critical injuries. His right arm was definitely shot. Maybe his left leg, too. Once upon a time, he might have been able to escape on his own, but his Quirk would rip him apart if he tried to use it. But if he couldn't get out of there, he would do everything possible to make sure his last fare would survive whatever was going on out there.

"No," Hannah whispered. "No, no! There has to be a way!"

Nogi turned to look up at Hannah. He hadn't quite realized how beautiful she was. Western woman had never been a particular turn-on for him, but in this moment, even in her terror, she shined like the moon itself. "Nah. No, I don't thhhiiink soo… you… Quirk?"

"It's useless here," she said through some further tears. "I just make things smell good! I make perfume through my pores, that's all. That's all I... "

"Hey. Hey, Hannah. Hey. It'll be okay. Trust me." He reached a hand backward to her. She grabbed the tip of his fingers, which was the furthest she could reach. "Hold my… hand… and you'll be… fine…" She could see him straining further and further to reach out to her. She nearly tore her arm from her socket to come closer, and the instant that he was close enough, he pinched the extreme tips of her middle and ring fingers between his thumb and middle.

He slumped back into the seat with a satisfied and painful groan. "Good… go… now," he whispered. "Quirk… String Thief… you slip through… and others you… touch…" His breathing was slowing by the word. "But not… me. Only others. You have to leave while I… alive."

Hannah couldn't think what to do. This was a nightmare. That had to be it. She'd dreamt worse than this. This had to be a dream. The cold, deathly chill in her gut had to be fake. No. She couldn't do this.

"You have to go," Nogi said. "It's… okay."

"But you'll die." It was a quiet statement. Final. Absolute.

"But you… live… and others. Save as… many… alive…"

Hannah knew that there was only one decision to make. It was cruel, cold, and unfair. "But I'm not a hero!"

Nogi laughed. Hannah pretended not to see the blood on his lips. "Heroes are… everywhere." He reached his hand outward one last time to meet her fingertips. "Some… times… they just need… a little… push." Hannah's stomach turned upside down, and suddenly she was not longer in the car, but collapsing on the surface of the bridge.

"No! NO! SOMEBODY, HE-"

"DON'T MAKE ME DIE FOR NOTHING!" Nogi bellowed one final time. "GO."

Hannah really couldn't recount the next several frantic minutes while she ran up and down the bridge. Several others with the ability and presence of mind were doing their best to usher people away toward more stable ground, but the injuries sustained by many others made their contributions almost negligible. But they had to fight to save as many lives as possible, there was no real choice in the matter. Hannah's borrowed power essentially let her transport people from one place to another, but only if she could pinch their skin. All the while the steam grew thicker and breathing was becoming unbearably difficult. Hannah had been in legitimate Swedish saunas that weren't this suffocating, and more than once she almost succumbed to the heat.

Another and another and another, somebody else, if I keep helping and saving he's still alive, he's still hanging on, he can't die until I save him too, he can't die, he just can't die!

Relatively speaking, there weren't that many people on the upper levels that needed her kind of help. The heroes had begun to arrive, and while they would be of help, they might not be able to save everybody in time.

Seven minutes and thirty-seven seconds had passed since the skies had turned to flames.

Hannah felt the floating road tremble again. Who else? she thought as her body quivered in response. I can still… help… Nogi...

She heard shouting in the distance. Which way, she couldn't say. It had all become one big mess. She'd lost too much blood already. Something was wrong, but she wasn't clear-headed enough to think rationally. "I'm coming," she called out weakly. She stumbled on, determined to keep going. "I'll save you. I'll save you. I'm here." A few feet in front of her a car materialized. "Hey," she said. "I know you." Somehow, she had gotten turned around and made it back to the cab. " I… wouldn't pay my fare?"

The concrete was leaning at almost a thirty degree angle. Nogi's door was against the barricade to the open water below, and the rear end of a flipped tow truck was ironically smashed up against the other side. Nogi looked at her through the broken window. She could tell he didn't have that much time left. "Shoulda… charged double," he said quietly. "Getoutta here...not much…"

"Hey, dummy." With as much care as she could, she leaned against the car. The steam had turned the metal and polycarbonate unspeakably hot, but she was beyond caring. "You saved so… many. Hero. You are…" With trembling fingers, she reached into the car. "Hey. Nogi. Nogi. Hand."

Nogi sensed what she intended. With the last of his strength, he lifted his arm, and suddenly as soon as they made contact she was in the seat beside him. "You should go," he whispered.

Hannah was far too lightheaded to be rational. She took his hand into hers and brought it to her lips. "Heroes don't get left behind."

A quiet tear fell off of Nogi's eye. "Thank you. Thank you for... staying with.. me. I didn't want to... alone... You… Hannah… smell nice… like flowers... beautiful..."

Eight minutes and forty-nine seconds after the skies opened up, the lone passenger upon the beam of destruction awoke from his slumber.

"Fuck?" he said. A figure glowing a brilliant yellow with black markings along his form grumbled as he roused himself. "Where...?" Although he was technically in the bay, he was not submerged in the water itself. He was laying on his back, the surface of the water below acting more like a malleable floor than anything else. His body rose and sunk with the waves, but never tossed under with everything else.

A spike of pain shot through his head while a wave of nausea affected his gut. He rolled over and vomited into the water, disgusted at the backsplash in his face, but wiped it off as he stood up and took his bearings. "What the hell? Where am I?" He stood on shaking legs and massaged his head to reduce the ringing in his ears. The sirens replaced the immediate trauma, and over them he could hear screaming coming from the distance. The pit of his stomach fell when he realized that there was some kind of disaster nearby, and there was a decent chance that he was somehow at fault again.

"Great, I don't know where I am, when I am, or what planet I'm on," he mumbled while taking a few tentative steps. "Beaten half to death, hanging on with literal string. Heh." He zeroed in on where the people were screaming from. "Always somebody causing trouble whenever I come to town."

He took a shaky step, and was instantly several hundred meters in the air above the bridge. He could see the lights diffusing through the steam at this height, and hear the cries for help from below. With a snap of his left hand, physical copies materialized around him and descended onto the bridge and waters below. As they neared the structure, however, they phased into physical nothingness, invisible and perhaps even immaterial. "It's better if they don't know I'm here," he muttered to himself. The mist hid their approach, and he was banking on the fog to hide their movements and origin. "Who knows what they'd think about supe… Oh. Hello."

Oh, this was that kind of universe. "Who the hell are you?!" one of the figures behind him asked.

Six, seven… seven heroes, I guess. Two women, four men, and some kind of seemingly-sentient blob monster made of innumerable particles of silver shards surrounded him in a loose circle, none closer than ten meters.

"What have you done?" one of the women asked. She appeared human, but had an extraordinarily slim physique that was almost grotesque compared to how tall she was. Butterfly-type wings were keeping her aloft, but she didn't seem to need to flap too hard to hover.

"Woah, hold on here," the glowing man said. "I didn't do that. I just got my ass handed to me and I woke up down in the water, like, two minutes ago." He looked down at the people below.

"Explain. Quickly." The fairy-girl allowed herself to drift closer to him until she was within arm's reach.

"You wouldn't believe me if I told you," he assured her.

"Bullshit. Talk."

"How much time do you have? I could monologue, or you can help. Pick a side."

She raised a finger at his face, her own furious and enraged. "You- You! Aargh!" She turned and glared at her compatriots. "Come on! We can't waste time on him!" She pointed at the blob creature. "MirrorWave, keep an eye on him! The rest of you- with me!" She pulled back and glared daggers at the man, and without another word, pulled her wings in close, and together with the rest (with no shortage of poison-filled eyes) she plunged into the murk.

The blob- no, MirrorWave- collectively sidled closer. "I would not run if I were you," it said in a girl's voice. "I am very good at keeping up with runners."

He blinked at her. "Okay, excuse me if this is rude, but I didn't realize you were a person until just now."

The cloud made a movement that was very clearly a shrug. "I get that kind of a lot," she said. "Are you a hero too?"

"A hero? Er. Not for a long time now." He laughed and shook his head. "Man, it's been a long time since anybody's really called me that."

MirrorWave circled around to examine him from all sides. "You don't look like any hero I've ever heard about," she mused. The mist that made her body drew closer until it was hovering just in front of him, and a woman's face appeared to manifest. A head poked out to complete the partial transformation, and what seemed to be a Japanese girl no older than perhaps twenty looked into his eyes. "Hmm. I wonder who you could be? Are you a foreigner? Did your fight simply happen to wind up here in Tokyo from somewhere else? No, no, I am not receiving any news on a similar event, and it would be noticed by somebody."

"You're looking into me?"

"Yep!" she smiled brightly. "My body has the ability to transform into nanomachines, and I am hardwired into the internet. Basically, I'm always online and keeping tabs on events. But you, you're… hm. Who are you? Wait, don't tell me, I want to figure it out." She pursed her lips, her eyes glazed over for a second or two, and her mouth went open into an "ah". "You don't appear in any of the hero registries, or at least I can't find anything matching you. Glowing yellow, flight, those markings? No cross-references are giving me hits. And you somehow can also materialize those copies of yours, but… I don't suppose you have multiple Quirks somehow?"

When you travel around the Outer Multiverse like he did, you learn to roll with the questions until you have enough information available to reach a convincing lie. Quirk? I guess that's what they call their powers here, he thought.

"Don't bother trying to lie to me, I'm really good at that kind of thing!" she said with cheer. "My nanomachines are programmed to monitor vitals and detect deceit!"

He crossed his arms and tilted his head. "You know, you coulda just waited until I tried lying to pop that one off," he told her.

"Yeah, but what's the fun in that? Now I get to see what you look like when you lie and tell the truth at the same time."

"You the kind of girl that likes watching people squirm, aren't you?"

"Very much so, yes. Now, would you please tell me your name?"

He shrugged. "Not much of a point, I'm not from around here. Wouldn't be on any database you'd have access to, anyway."

"You'd be surprised at what I can do," MirrorWave challenged.

He sighed and rubbed at his forehead. "No, listen, I'm not-" A sudden crack of concrete below stole his attention for a second, then he continued. "I'm not somebody you could find out about. But right about now, everybody should be off of the bridge already, right?"

MirrorWave frowned. "Already? They just started evacuations, and- wait, what?" She turned her head aside as if trying to have something like a private conversation. "What do you mean, they're gone? All of them?" She looked up at the man. "How? Where did they go? The streets? How did they get there? Who- I can't talk to twenty people, Andrew, you talk, everybody else shut up for a moment!"

The golden man grinned and took a proverbial step back. "Hearing something good?" he asked.

MirrorWave side-eyed him while she received some sort of status update. "They're saying that… They're safe! Everybody who was on the bridge has been somehow displaced to nearby streets and sidewalks!"

"Casualties?"

MirrorWave held eye contact while she received another update. "So far, there aren't any reported deaths," she said cautiously. "A lot of people got pretty banged up, and it looks like a few might be in critical condition. But it doesn't look like anybody died yet."

A weight lifted from the man's shoulders. He wasn't directly responsible for the catastrophe, but he wasn't disassociated with it, either. "Oh, thank the noodle gods," he breathed.

"Eh? Noodle gods?"

He raised his hands in a "so what?" gesture. "When you're so badass that you can't pray to a higher power, take comfort in what you know. Noodles have never betrayed me."

"Noodles?"

"Well, except that one time, but that wasn't their fault. They had been raised in a bad home, it's not their fault that their chef was a conniving scumbag that used their powers for evil."

"Evil noodles?" MirrorWave shook her head. "You're fucking with me, aren't you?"

"Oh, absolutely not. I never lie about noodles. It may be a religion of one, but the sacred texts must be honored!"

MirrorWave pulled back from him a little. "I honestly have no idea if you're telling the truth. Who the hell are you?" Her head began to rise to the apex of the mass, and from shoulders on down to her waist her body began to reform. The rest of the mass transfigured into a tail-like appendage to curl under her in a tight corkscrew, and it began rapidly rotating to keep her aloft.

"Like I said, nobody you've ever heard of," he said. "Neat trick, Genie."

She snorted. "I swear, I get that every other month." She sighed and hung her head. Her costume wasn't complex, she didn't even have a mask on. From what he could see, it was a simple reflective material, possibly Lycra or something like it, and relatively form-fitting. "Listen, right now I'm pretty sure that you aren't a terrorist, but there are going to be a lot of questions for you, and it's not exactly like I can just let you walk away from this. You're coming with me."

"Oh, am I now?" he asked. He was curious about this woman, but he also couldn't afford to waste too much time here.

"Oh yeah. It's your choice how we do it."

"And let me guess, there's an easy way and a hard way, hmm?"

"I prefer to think of it as using a carrot and stick." She held up one hand. "Over here, we have the carrot. You get to come down to the street with me. There, police officials with the support of local heroes will escort you to the closest branch they have for questioning. After that, you might be held and tried for your contributions to this fiasco, but if you are innocent of any wrongdoing, after a thorough investigation, then they might let you off the hook. Eventually. And in this hand, we have the stick."

"Oh, I can't wait."

The corner of MirrorWave's mouth twitched. "The stick is my Quirk. I will beat you with the stick, and then I'll bring in the carrot, but it's not going to be as nice a carrot."

"Ahhhh, okay. I can see how that might be a good negotiating tactic." He gave her a semi-sarcastic slow clap. "But before you do decide whether to start whacking, would you humor me one moment?" He could see her shoulders shift ever so slightly into a defensive posture. She's young, but no amateur. What kind of heroes are these guys? Organized? Yeah, probably. Doubtful they're vigilantes, somebody was called by his real name a moment ago. And she's probably in continuous contact with her team. Probably police, too. Lawyers. Assume I'm broadcasting? Play it up?

"What?"

I wonder who's going to hear this, he mused. "First of all, I'd like to say this for the record."

"You can wait until you have an attorney for that, you know."

"Yeeaaaahhh, I could, but I'm not going into custody just yet." He held a hand in front of him, palm up, fingers extended, as if cupping a bowl or a ball.

"Hands up!" MirrorWave darted backwards, and before he could blink her hands had turned into some kind of cannon.

"Woah! Easy there, cowgirl!" he said. "I'm not fighting! Calm the fuck down! Easy on that trigger finger!"

MirrorWave eyed him down the sights of her right arm, extended and aimed at the man's chest. "My finger is the trigger," she said. "Don't make me shoot you."

He rolled his eyes. "Damn, did you practice that in the mirror? How long you been waiting to say that one?"

…

"Two months."

Snerk.

"Quit laughing! I'm being serious here!"

Snort.

"Bastard!"

"No, nono no no, I'm not laughing at you, I swear!" he protested. "You kinda… you remind me of a very old friend. I haven't seen her in what feels like a thousand years. May I? I promise, I'm not going to hurt anybody."

The cannon eventually lowered by a few centimeters and went off target of his chest. "What are you doing?"

It seems that the heroes here all have some kind of power, probably born with them. From what the clones on the bridge saw, damn near everybody around here has some kind of abnormality. Interesting, but not unique. I'll try to set up a Door on my way out if I can find something fitting. Could be a fun little vacation spot after I kill off that blood cult. She asked if I had multiple, what? Quirk? I guess it's more politically correct than calling them mutations or abnormalities. Everybody has one, or close enough, and some have two? Must be rare.

What is the most convincing truthy lie I can tell to get away from here?

"Watch and learn," he said. "You asked me if I had multiple Quirks? I really don't. But what I do have is this one neat trick that gets used enough that I've found some unconventional uses for." True enough. "You're wondering how I got up here when I obviously don't have any sort of propulsion or lift, right?" Thick black lines spring into his hand and coalesced into a small sphere about ten centimeters in diameter, black as sin, and twice as heavy. "You see this? This black substance is a part of me." Still technically true. "It is a power source that I was born with. After years of practice, I can use it to do a lot of crazy shit. While it's in my body, I can expel a portion of it and it acts as the core for a cheap copy of the real me. Those clones act on my behalf, with my memories and personality, but I don't see through their eyes or anything."

"And?" MirrorWave asked, nudging her arm to indicate that she was becoming impatient with his explanation. "Stick, remember?"

"Yes, yes, patience is not your virtue. Anyway, while it is a power source and medium, there are plenty of secondary effects. My body is nearly indestructible, and even if I get hurt, as long as I'm alive it will hold me together or patch me up so that I can heal. I can even bond the yin with outside materials, form it into shapes, a lot of cool things. It's a pretty versatile power."

"Cool trick," MirrorWave admitted. "What's the point?"

"Point being, I don't just destroy things. I'm not big for making stuff, but I'm a decent repairman." He pointed his palm down to the ocean floor below, just off center of where the support pylons had been damaged. "Cards on the table, I've never used this trick on a structure like this, but it can't be much harder than keeping a skyscraper from collapsing, right?"

"What? Hey, wait!" But MirrorWave could not react in time before he lowered his hand to soundlessly shoot the orb into the sea. "You bastard, what did you do that for?"

"I don't just break things!" he said. "Come on!" He held a hand out to her. "Let's go!"

"I'm keeping the guns, just in case," MirrorWave warned him. "Now, let's get do- Hey, wait!" The glowing man seemed to fall backwards, but instead of landing (he looked as if he was standing on solid air the whole time, not flying, that bastard) and entered into a headfirst freefall. "Idiot! Come on!" She herself took a swan dive to catch up to him mid-air. "You are officially in custody! I don't care, I'm gonna arrest you!"

"We'll see about that!" he said with a smile to match hers. "Let me show you something!" He righted himself about ten meters above the water and came to a hover just by the supports. The glow from his body illuminated the night like a bonfire.

"Careful! Don't make it worse!" MirrorWave barked, but he waved his hand to get her closer.

"Hey, shh! Look!" He pointed at the surface of the water where the cement met.

"What are you pointing at?"

"Just a second… Riiiiiight… there!" Massive chunks of the pillar were damaged or outright missing, and the exposed rebar was not a welcome sight. The strange black substance that had been thrown into the water was creeping upward into the damaged areas, spreading out from the bottom up, like black mercury falling toward the sky instead of the ground. It filled the void left behind by destruction, and as more and more bubbled up it swept over the surface and raced upwards to the very top. Every crack, each damaged brick and splintered shard of steel, was encompassed by the concoction. Slowly, with a continuous groan that could only come from heavy industry, MirrorWave watched in awe as the sloping frame of that section of the bridge was elevated back to level.

"What. The. Ass."

They weren't alone anymore. The other six that had intercepted him in the air were now forming a barricade behind him, and he could sense that several others were close by. "Oh hey, Elf Lord!" He hovered aside and did his best Vanna White impersonation. "Ta-daaa! See! Not a terrorist."

The butterfly lady's face contorted as if he'd just waved a bag of elephant dung under her nose. "My name is Monarchy!" she snarled.

"Oh? Does that make you the queen bee?"

"Oh, I'm gonna kill him!" she screamed, but before she could lunge at him, one of the men placed himself in the way and raised an arm.

"Calm down, Nessa, I don't think he meant any harm here," he said. He was the anomaly of the bunch; while the others had some kind of costume or uniform on, this one had sensible work boots, jeans, and a tank top. There wasn't any visible means of lift for him either, but he positioned his feet as if he was standing on air, not hovering in it. "Before my colleagues get much more feisty, could you at least tell us what you did to fix the bridge?"

"Oh, come on, Trooper, it's obvious he's playing us!" the woman called Monarchy said.

The big man- Trooper- crossed his arms, and something about his demeanor indicated that, even if unofficially, he was in charge here. "Be that as it may, we don't know that yet. You saw his first reaction to what happened, same as I did. I don't know how he did it, but that had to be at least a thousand copies of him that helped get people to safety. Still not sure how you got them all out of there without anybody seeing, that's the part that bugs me."

The glowing man gave Trooper a lengthy once-over. He was massive for a Japanese man, built like a lumberjack with only the slightest body fat on a body that looked like it was built to break human limbs. His eyes were steady, though, and without guile. "That's what bugs you? That? Out of all this-" he waved a hand in the air, "and that's what is tripping you up?"

Trooper shrugged. "Dude, it's my day off. Nobody's dead yet. I'm assuming you had something to do with all that, but I really don't think you're a perpetrator here."

"At least not here," he said. "If you gotta know, those clones have a special ability. One can swap locations with another on command. I had half of them turn invisible and mingle in the streets and near rescue units. When one of them touched somebody in trouble, they teleported with the clone to safety while the replacement went about and kept the chain going. I had the thing cleared out in what, a minute and a half? Top to bottom, right? Please tell me I didn't miss anybody."

The assembled heroes traded looks with each other. "No, I don't think so," MirrorWave said. "There's still a head count to be made, but initial scans look airtight. No heat signatures that we're aware of."

"Oh, thank noodles," he muttered. "Is there- was-"

"No fatalities," MirrorWave confirmed. "It was bad, but the worst of the bunch was a cab driver. Most of the real injuries came from people crashing into each other bumper to bumper. Lots of emergency surgery and PT in his future, but he's on his way to the hospital now." She put a hand on the stranger's shoulder and gave him a reassuring smile. "It's going to be okay. You didn't kill anybody."

"Excuse me?" The third woman from the original group had raised a hand. This one was costumed like some kind of Arabian princess, and was held aloft by some kind of… rug?

"Let me guess, they call you the Genie?"

"I swear to God I'm going to kill my manager for making me use this schtick," she grumbled.

"..."

"... Call me Genie."

"Yes? How can I help you?"

"I have about fifteen questions here, most of them begin with 'what the fuck' or 'who the fuck' or even 'why the fuck', but I'll try to be quick."

"Ah. I think I know what you're saying." He pointed a finger into the air from his waist. "Extremely long story short, I was fighting a lot of somebodys somewhere else. Most of them were really strong. We were fighting in this crater, must have been a couple kilometers wide, used to be an active supervolcano. I had the upper hand for most of it, but they managed to snooker me by opening a portal when I wasn't looking. Somebody reignited the volcano from dormancy, rather violently if I might add, and the instant that I was shoved through it the whole damn thing erupted. The collective heat from a primordial eruption was carried through with me, and that wouldn't be a problem under normal circumstances, but-"

"Woah, hold on a minute," Monarchy interjected. "You tanked a volcano?"

"Nnnnnyyyeh, that's one way to put it." He tapped his forehead. "When I'm in this form, I can pretty much take endless punishment, as long as I have the resources to shield myself. If something's gonna get through this, it has to be concentrated and sharp, relatively and such. Heat's just another form of energy, and if I can push outward unilaterally with an equal and opposite force, I'm fine."

Stunned disbelief was on all of their faces, save for MirrorWave. "He's… telling the truth," she confirmed. "Or at least he thinks he is."

Trooper turned and in a sotto voce tone asked her "Psst, any news on volcanos?"

"There wouldn't be," he answered in her stead. "I've been in there for a while now, actually."

"This oughta be good," somebody in the background muttered.

"You said it was a portal of some kind? A rift in space?"

"And time," he clarified. "Anybody here know basic wormhole theory?"

"Me!" said MirrorWave like a schoolgirl trying to be called on by her favorite teacher.

"So you know what happens when something goes in, theoretically? See, just because there's an opening, that doesn't mean that there is an exit, not immediately at least." The faint smile on his cheeks fell as the memories of his experiences rushed back through. "I think I was in there for a long time. I'm really not sure how long."

"You can't really expect us to believe this drivel," Monarchy said.

"Lady, I really don't care what you believe," he said flatly. "I'm way too tired." He took a slow and steady breath before continuing. "The other guys were banking on me never getting out of there alive."

"Who exactly did this to you? And why?" Trooper asked.

"Some murdercult located in the Pacific, I'd have to get a map to show you the general location. I wasn't really concerned with latitude at the time."

"Let's say we buy that," Monarchy said cautiously. "Which I don't, but assuming I do. You took on all those people by yourself?"

He shrugged. "Basically. I really wasn't thinking about tactics when I was rushing in to kill them."

"...Kill?" Trooper said in a dangerously low tone.

"Well, I didn't crash their party to have a picnic."

MirrorWave had been the closest to him, but she darted back from him without warning. "You're a killer?"

"I…" He sighed and rubbed the back of his neck. "I wouldn't say that."

"Ain't many ways around that," Trooper pointed out.

"You're probably right about that," he admitted. "I had my reasons."

"Why? You can't just kill!" MirrorWave said.

"Did you not hear the part when I called them a 'murdercult' a moment ago?"

"But that doesn't mean-"

"It was my daughter." Everybody stopped talking. Nobody said a word. Nobody dared to.

He floated himself over to the concrete, and for the first time since coming out of the flames, settled down on something solid. He sat down and leaned back against the unyielding wall and stared into the sky. With all the lights on the bridge and in the city, he couldn't see anything but the very brightest of stars. "I… they… Where I'm from, I'm kind of a big deal. I tried to protect my daughter, but I wasn't there. Not when I needed to be. I thought she was… protected. Safe. Nobody should have been able to find her. It wasn't possible. I think somebody I trusted might have let it slip, or I was betrayed. I don't know. I found her. I got her out of there before anything… before things got violent. I swear. I couldn't let her watch all that. She's, she is… or was? Innocent."

"Holy shit," somebody said quietly.

He held a hand up. "You see this? This body, this form? It's a last ditch effort. A bastardization of a trick a very old friend taught me. It's weaker than what I could do with his help, but more stable in the long term. Middle ground compromise. My daughter lives?" He groaned as he pushed himself to his feet. "Anybody here got kids?" He could see the eyes of everybody around him, and knew that there was some sympathy in there.

"Hey, parents. You look at me and tell me you wouldn't kill to protect your kid. You wouldn't genocide a group of the most vile, unsympatheitc scum-sucking parasites to keep your kid from that. I've been through hell. I've been cooking for years inside of my own slice of it. Truth is, I was almost done for when I managed to find a crack through to this dimension. Anybody want to see what my body looks like underneath all of this? Butterfly lady, what was it, Monarchy? Want to see some charbroiled side of super ninja?"

"I think I'll… pass."

"Good call. I hate watching people puke."

"Hold up a second," Trooper interjected. "You said 'a crack through to this dimension.' You were somewhere else?"

"Ahh, mmmmmyes? Mmmhmm, I guess you could say that."

"You can't mean something like an alternate reality or something," somebody said. "Like a, what is it they call it in science fiction?"

"Multiverse?"

"That's it."

"Ugh. You lot seem nice and all, but I really don't have time to explain the extended version of hyper-multidimensional theory right now. Hell, I only know enough of the practical stuff to get by. Some of the people I hang out with know more than I do."

"MirrorWave?" Trooper turned to the woman with a raised eyebrow.

She shrugged. "Don't even look at me. I'm still trying to process the first half."

"The volcano?"

"Yeah."

"Don't bother," the glowing man said. "Mystery solved. You have as many answers already as you need to satisfy your curiosity." A sudden wave of exhaustion began dragging him down to his seat again. "I'm getting tired, guys."

"He doesn't look so good," somebody said.

"Volcanos do that to ya," he said with a soft laugh. "Everybody's alive, right? Bridge is… safe?"

"Hey! Guys, we gotta get him to a hospital!"

The man raised a hand. "Nah, no hospitals. What you guys got can't help me right now. I just need to… rest… here…" He patted the bulwark. "Most of what I had in… reserve… is right here. If I stay… close to it… I'll be okay. The bridge will… repair… over time… and my juice will… come back and… heal." They all could see his eyes flickering closed, and while he slumped further into himself, the light that had just a moment ago been a burning torch had dimmed to barely a glow.

"Hey!" MirrorWave went to his side and deactivated her Quirk, returning to her human form. She was quite a ways smaller than him, but she just managed to be there to hold him up from falling into the water. "Hey! Look at me! Come on, don't die, don't don't die, please don't die! Come on! Listen to me! What do you need? What can we do to help? There's gotta be something!"

The rest of the heroes had abandoned any pretense of aggression. Two of them flew off to get medical attention anyway, while the rest scrambled to think of what to do next.

"I don't even know your name! I, I'm Lily! Lily Santiago! I, I am J-Japanese on m-my mother's side, m-my dad, he's Spanish! Stay with me! Come on!"

"MirrorWave-"

"I wanted to b-be a hero ever since I was a kid!" she continued. "I w-wanted to help people! I p-promised I'd n-never let anybody down!"

"Lily-"

"And, and, my f-favorite food is apricots! Apricots! How weird is t-that? And I like dogs, I hate s-social media, I p-play video games when I'm supposed t-to be sleeping, because it's fun!" He had slumped into her lap by now, the golden aura about him nearly completely gone. But not all the way. A trace of it hung onto his body like a mirage, only barely there. A flickering candle in the breeze, if anything at all. "You g-get better! And, don't die, and we, we can go and, and, and…"

"Hey." He opened his eyes and looked at her. She could feel the tension in his body when he lifted a hand to her. "Li… ly. I told you… I'm not dying. Just need some rest. A few days. A week… maybe more… I'll be fine. You… you're good. Good. You are… good."

She took his hand in hers and held it tight. She had only just met him. She was crying for him anyway, a perfect stranger, and yet still had no idea who the hell he even was.

"Lily, it's okay," the woman called Monarchy said as she set down beside her. Her wings furled up, she sat down and leaned on Lily's shoulder. "It's okay, sweetie. He said he'll be okay."

"Right," he said. "Don't… worry."

"How could I not worry?" Lily asked. "I don't even…" Her words were lost in the midst of tears.

"Hey, kid," Monarchy said gently. "Look at her. I think she deserves a name in case you get a toe tag."

"Monarchy!" Trooper bellowed.

"Nah… 's fine…" He gave Lily's hand a gentle squeeze. "I am from… the land of Fire… a son… a father… friend… stranger… monster…" His eyes flickered, but before he fell into hibernation, just barely, Lily was able to hear his last words. He finally slumped into submission, and the world seemed to go quiet.

One awkward silence later, the hero called Genie piped up. "What did he say?"

Lily looked up at the group and collected herself before answering. "I think I heard right," she said slowly. "He said his name is… Uzumaki Naruto"

A/N: Yeah, it's gonna be one of those stories. If this is something that interests you, follow, I should be posting again in a few days. It's way too late to write more than this, and I think I got the beats right at this stopping point. Leave a review, I subsist on positive reinforcement.

Don't peace out- FlyteItOut!