Hahahaha, ahhh.

"...No."

Just kidding.

Again, at that moment, I saw it. The faltering composure for the briefest of moments, the slight dimming of a smile that promised to conquer the world. It was hard to tell with the animalistic face, but I could see one of his brows rising, behaviour in the facsimile of a human. I had the feeling he would have been offended if I pointed that out.

"No?" Nezu echoed, grin still etched in place despite the weakening of its corners. Before, even though I'd been expecting it, he still caught me off guard. It was one thing to anticipate, but it was another for your instincts to suddenly remind you that you'd locked yourself into a small room with an unknown animal.

Especially when that animal was clearly smarter than you.

It made the act much easier, especially for someone who had once been a theatre kid and was acting every single day like he knew what he was doing.

Because we all make mistakes.

But this hadn't been mine.

How do you outsmart someone who can think circles around you? Simple, really. You play their game until they get complacent, and then go from there.

Could I outsmart Nezu? No. Not in a million years. It was the antithesis of all modern evolutionary trends that his Quirk actually made him intelligent. But once Nezu decided that he had already won, that the game was over with a flawless victory while he was still holding all the cards?

Nobody could account for every possibility. All I would need was one scenario he hadn't considered, and that would put him a bit closer to my level.

It would be a cold day in hell when I couldn't outsmart myself.

Pushing myself to my feet, I didn't bother warning the principal before sending my hair out, tapping against the stone furniture and metallic kettle. All of them morphed, the kettle slithering along the hair I'd sent to collect it in a twisted liquid form, while all the furniture crumbled back into the dust and gravel I'd constructed them from.

The coals beneath the kettle fizzled out, buried beneath the rubble of what had once been the makeshift stove. The candles that were still burning provided us with some light, but with our largest source gone, suddenly our shadows weren't the most intimidating or erratic things in the room.

Nezu landed on his feet. The brief flash of surprise was gone. In its place stood idle curiosity, or maybe even boredom.

Not that I believed it. Somehow, I couldn't imagine there were many people in the world who could say no to the smartest thing in any given room.

Said room around us shook faintly, like a flagpole in a light breeze. If I hadn't made our surroundings part of myself by proxy, I likely wouldn't have felt it. Nezu tucked his paws behind his back, moving before I could see if he'd been holding anything, and fixed me with a gimlet stare.

I didn't need advanced warning to know that he'd done something in that moment. The fact that the ceiling wasn't collapsing on my head was probably indicative of the fact that I'd been given a second chance, and I wasn't supposed to be aware of it.

Overhaul crackled through my whole body like the roiling clouds of a thunderstorm, begging to be unleashed to strike the nearest lightning rod. Through it I could feel the coursing energy that dwarfed anything I'd ever been in range of before, in the form of this world's closest equivalent to a demigod. Whether by unknown means of communication or sheer luck on his part, he was positioned almost perfectly over my head.

Around him, in loose formation, stood the three others. Aside from Aizawa, I still didn't know who the others were. That probably meant that I'd never met them, which wasn't all that surprising. The only hero I'd even used my Quirks around was Mirko, and she wasn't up there. At least not as part of Nezu's task force; with how clingy she was proving to be, it felt like only a matter of time before she found me in my home.

Still, the guillotine had been hung over my head. Balanced on the precipice of tension. The morbidly curious part of myself (which sounded like a combination of Twice and Overhaul's whispers, funnily enough), wondered idly who would win in this battle if it did come down to it.

Fortunately for us all, I had other plans.

"How stupid do you think I am?"

Very, the answer was obvious. I didn't give Nezu time to do more than tilt his head to the side, taking a step back to get out of the immediate danger zone. The back of my head brushed against the wall as I leaned into it, sending my perception through it and into the roots of the trees above. The familiar pressure of sensory overload vanished as soon as it reared up, pacified by the fact that even if I was feeling everything in the network of plantlife, I wasn't physically capable of processing them beyond a muted buzzing.

After a moment, All the heroes on the surface moved with me. Scowl settling on my face, I pushed off the wall, slowly circling Nezu's position.

With a split second of latency, I was followed. Which meant that somehow, they were tracking me. Never would I have assumed Nezu was close enough to plant something on me, not when I'd made a conscious effort to keep some distance.

No doubt, if I destroyed it now, I'd also be destroying my last chance of avoiding a conflict.

Whatever. Let them listen, I wasn't about to make it my problem.

"I'd given myself away before I even realised what game I was playing. It was the first thing I did when I woke up that day." I settled against the wall again, closer to the passage that would take us back to the surface. Not that I'd need to use it, but it was where my feet stopped and moving now would just be even more free insight into my head.

I'd not even bothered trying to encrypt my frantic searching. It hadn't occurred to me until days later, when I'd figured out where I'd be going from there, and by then…

It wouldn't have been too late, but if it would be giving me an advantage? Well shit, guess it was too late to figure out how to obscure that.

It didn't help that the Australian judicial system kept records forever, even in the case of a prisoner's death. It was just my luck that the preservation of data was advanced enough before the introduction of Quirks for them to not completely fuck over its usefulness. Gone were the days where burning down a single library was enough to obfuscate humanity's progress in its entirety.

Really, that just meant that even from centuries beyond the grave, Mineta continued to fuck me over by simply existing. What was it with this world and dead people being a pain in my ass?

"You've known for months because I told you." I crossed my arms, the muscles in them bulging. It worked well to bleed some of the anxiety out. "And I've known for months that you knew. Those accounts didn't just reactivate themselves."

The forum account had only been the start, explosive as it turned out to be. The expression on Mirko's face in the picture I'd taken was still enjoying an underground meme status, only held back by the obscure origins. The best ones included the whole picture with the stack of money I'd set on fire, in my opinion.

It had taken me over a day to notice the issue with that. Namely, the fact that the account wasn't deactivated, like it had been for the last two hundred and ninety-three years. No, it had been reactivated barely a few weeks before I'd found a use for it, much like a few other accounts I'd held in my previous life.

Seemingly dead accounts were used as a puppet occasionally. That wasn't all too surprising. Seemingly dead people were a different story.

…Dead people being used as a puppet may have been the basis for one of my favourite movies, but that was beside the point!

"I'm not interested in being a tool, or a minion, or a student."

"You gave me the rope." Nezu unclasped his paws from behind his back, bringing them into view. In his left he held a saucer, while his right was occupied with a full cup of tea. After knowing Gentle for so long, it didn't even make me blink.

"And you hung yourself with it." I rolled my shoulders, huffing out a breath that was harsh enough to puff my cheeks out as it passed through. "I told you, don't waste my time if you were going to fuck around. You're lucky I'm even letting you walk out of here with your Quirk after that shit."

I was almost certain that the way Nezu was staring at me while sipping his tea was specifically engineered to piss me off. Pushing off the wall, I circled the room once again, ending up almost exactly where I'd been standing before. My hand came to a rest on the sealed entrance, Overhaul rejoicing at finally having something to do other than work as a glorified sonar.

The entrance didn't emerge gracefully from the stone. The wall blasted outwards like I'd just strapped a breach charge to it, vibrating the whole room enough to knock some dust from the ceiling. That wouldn't be enough to galvanise the heroes, but I almost wished that it would be. Getting the chance to beat the shit out of someone would have been really nice.

Having to deal with the subsequent war I would spark? Not as tempting.

I presented the new doorway with my hand, a glacial smile in place as Nezu finished his tea and tucked both the cup and the saucer back into his vest.

"Seems you can't help me after all."

"I believe we can help each other just fine. You want to go home." It wasn't a question. Nezu's arms twitched. It gave me the impression that he wanted to steeple his paws together, to really get into the examinatorial mood. Instead, he had to settle for weaving his clawless fingers together in front of his stomach. Whatever was going through his mind, I already knew I didn't want any part to do with it.

And yet I would probably have to, if I wanted to actually get somewhere.

"Do you care to guess why I'm in charge of a school?"

"No." I gestured to the opening in the stone. There was no chance in heaven or hell that I would be the one walking through it first. "You can either leave my property walking, or with a boot print up your ass. Pick one."

That did it.

Nezu exploded. It had been coming for a while, given how violent the reaction to my words was. High pitched peals of laughter rose from deep in the rodent's chest, one arm curling over his heaving stomach while the other rose to cover his braying mouth.

It was different from what I had been expecting. The maniacal, borderline evil cackling of a madman who'd predicted everything down to the nanosecond was absent. This was a gasping, giggling mess that was struggling to stay on his feet, reacting like he'd just heard the greatest joke of his life.

Flattering, truly, but I wasn't about to give him the benefit of the doubt.

I remained still, my face set in granite just as unmoving as the compositions in the walls when I wasn't actively manipulating them. It took a minute for Nezu to bring himself back under control, smoothing down his suit with a paw as he coughed off to the side, a few stray giggles slipping through with every second shuddering breath.

Eventually, he cleared his throat, taking a deep breath through his nose in an attempt to settle his expression. The twitching of his lips belied his efforts on that front.

"You will care to guess, eventually." He shook his head, strolling forth without a care in the world. I returned the smile he shot me, keeping it friendly in an attempt to unsettle him even slightly.

It didn't work. Even now, he was refusing to take me seriously. As though a good laugh over a threat that I was perfectly willing and able to deliver on would be enough to break through all the tension that he had caused.

"You will care, and you will guess correctly, once you understand why I came here."

I kept my eyes on him as he walked towards the exit, my mouth set in a grim line. It wasn't a hard question. I could have given him three separate guesses, and all of them would have been correct, but there would be something hidden in there that I would overlook. He would be able to use that against me for something, run circles around me seemingly without even trying, because doing so would be his daily dose of entertainment.

Maybe blindsiding him had earned some respect. But it had also made him wise to the fact that I could think far enough outside the box to do it.

All mastermind types were the same. The only way to win their games was to not play in the first place. How long did that remain an option before they adjusted the box to entrap you again?

Shit like this was why I never played chess, even if I wasn't terrible at it.

As Nezu drew level with me, he stopped. His paw slowly reached into the pocket on the front of his vest. With my eyes on him, I kept Overhaul at the ready in case something that I couldn't see moved, but nothing was out of what had become our ordinary down here.

Maybe he'd pull out a knife and give me a reason. That would be nice.

What he did pull out and present to me could have cut me, but not in the way I'd been somewhat expecting. My gaze flickered between his face and the envelope he was holding out to me, the seconds ticking by in my head as I waited for the other shoe to drop.

We could have stood there forever, waiting for the other person to move. I was spiteful enough to do it, and I was in possession of a Quirk that could supply me with the nutrients I would need for the continued upkeep of my body.

Unfortunately for my staring contest win ratio, I was the first to get bored. A strand of hair snaked away from the wall to slap down across the top of the envelope, sticking to the paper and pulling it out of his paw. Nezu didn't seem the least bit phased by the disrespect, merely tucking his arms behind his back once more with nary a care in the world.

"Your situation will present a unique challenge. I'm eager to take it on." Turning away, Nezu strolled over to the stairs, where he began to hop up them at a sedate place.

"I wonder…" his voice echoed through the tunnel as I went, his bulky boots not hampering his progress in the least. "Do you really understand what your desires will cost you?"

For a moment, I battled the urge to just collapse the tunnel so I would never have to deal with this cryptic bullshit again, damn the consequences. If a Quirk could beg, Overhaul would have been on its knees. Unfortunately, Nezu's pace was sufficient enough to get him out of the danger zone before I could decide. It would be much harder to claim it was a mistake if I buried him alive on the surface.

…It could have gone worse. It could have gone a whole fucking lot better, true, but it also could have gone a whole fucking lot worse. At least everyone was walking away alive, in spite of any of my feelings on the matter.

Either way, even if we did make this awkward alliance work out, I would never be making it a priority to spend time with Nezu. For his own safety, and the safety of everyone who would be around when I would inevitably snap and murder him.

Did I trust him? No, of course not. Were either of us stupid enough to actually start something that the other wouldn't be able to finish? I hoped not, I really did.

Nothing on the envelope jumped out at me as being dangerous. Poisons that weren't based in Quirks were very out of fashion in this day and age. That wasn't even getting into the fact that I could purge my body long before my cardiovascular system was turned against me.

Even so, my curiosity was going to get me killed eventually, of that I had no doubt.

The envelope yielded to my superior bench press record. The quick, near dismissive glance I took at it morphed into a double take, the paper nearly tearing in my grip as I swallowed a mouthful of air and almost started to choke.

The worst part about this was that I knew for a damn fact that this… This was probably the only bit of information he'd given me during the meeting that wasn't designed to fuck with me.

I shook my head, pocketing the paper. Hero, huh?

Man, what a fucking joke.

"You rat son of a bitch…"

Setsuna and Eri were waiting on the couch once I got back to the house twenty minutes later. It would have been five, if I hadn't taken the time to search for and subsequently destroy every little piece of technology that wasn't supposed to be here.

Including all three of the bugs that had somehow ended up on my clothes.

"So…" Setsuna looked up from her phone, throwing a smile my way that was almost believable. "How'd it go?"

With the grace of a criminal mastermind, I flopped onto the couch, my heavy impact sending Eri bouncing upwards. I caught her with one arm looping around her midsection, planting her back onto the couch as she gasped and giggled.

"Great. I sold my soul to the devil."

Eri flopped into my side before I could remove my arm. Accepting my new fate, I let my head fall onto the back of the couch and closed my eyes, enjoying the softness of the cushions after sitting on literal stones.

"Oh… cool." Something soft drifted across my nose, carrying with it a faint scent of mint. Scrunching my face up, I cracked an eye open, not the least bit surprised to see Setsuna's head floating right above mine, though upside down. "Why?"

My eyelid drifted shut once again. The arm I had around Eri tightened, and she responded to the movement by doing her utmost to burrow into my abdomen. I barely felt the stubby horn as it jabbed me right below the ribcage.

"Because it's my only option."

On the TV, Hero Hero's voice narrated over the tearful reunion Hero Heart was having with her parents.

Why had they been separated in the first place?

That was a damn good question, and I didn't have an answer.