Tamaki whimpered as he tugged on the sleeve of the shirt as he and Mirio waited on a bench by a mall that was growing more and more intimidating by the second as more people were going in and out of the massive building, and Tamaki buried his face in his hands wondering why he ever agreed to this.
The idea of going to hang out at the mall had been proposed by Hado in their group chat while they were all still at their internships and everyone seemed to take it fairly well other than him, he'd asked if they could go somewhere else like one of their homes but Hado had been insistent enough that he had given up.
So here he was waiting for the rest of their friends to meet with them and Mirio was trying his best to cheer him up by telling him about his internship with Sir Nighteye. Having All Might's former sidekick himself offer an internship to Mirio was a major shock to their whole group and no one was more surprised or taken aback than Mirio himself.
Mirio had even asked the teachers to make sure there wasn't any mistake, but Sir Nighteye had been certain and how could Mirio turn down such an unbelievable offer, the others had nice internships offers too but Mirio's was the most attention grabbing.
He himself worked with a hero called Fatgum from Miyake's prompting and the experience wasn't too bad, Fatgum was a very nice person and most of the staff also had food related quirks so Tamaki didn't get any backlash from his weird-looking meals and he even got to eat some of the mice he bought earlier without anyone freaking out, a secretary with scales had even complimented him on his choice of rodents.
Suffice to say, he had been left very flustered by all of the positive attention.
Hado was just as happy with her internship with Ms. Joke and often thanked Miyake in their chat for not letting her make the mistake of going with Uwabami. Haya had voiced a similar opinion having greatly enjoyed learning with Selkie then her first choice of an underground hero Tamaki had never heard of.
Miyake himself had picked his choice with little thought and had gone off with Gang Orca stating that while he wasn't purely a rescue hero, he was the closest to a fully-animal rescue hero that didn't have a "friendly" image.
Oswald however was not as lucky and outright scowled at the list of offers he received since there wasn't a single underground hero on the list, mostly rescue heroes and limelight heroes. Oswald chose to forgo his hope for an underground mentor then went with the #3 hero Best Jeanist since he figured he could learn something about controlling his hair better, it did not end well, and Oswald had complained a lot about how invasive the hero had gotten when it came to his appearance.
Tamaki felt pretty bad for Oswald and had privately sent a message to remind Oswald about the opt out system Aizawa-Sensei told him of in case Best Jeanist's behavior got way too much for him.
It was a system put in place for the students to go home early if something happened on the internship that the student wasn't comfortable with, the only reason he remembered it was because Aizawa-Sensei made sure to remind him before he left to work with Fatgum.
Oswald had thanked him for the info and promised to do just that if BJ (as Oswald started calling the hero,) crossed a line. Oswald had also sent him a lot of private messages after that, apparently preferring to talk about his grief with BJ one-on-one and Tamaki could understand that, recalling numerous times Tamaki would abandon the group chat to freak out in private with Mirio.
And Tamaki wished that was the worst thing that happened during their internships but when Miyake and Gang Orca didn't show up to BJ's Agency as planned Oswald texted the group chat to see if they knew anything… they hadn't and collectively freaked out until Miyake texted them later.
Hearing what had happened had him hide out in one of the bathrooms in Fatgum's agency because throwing up was a very near thing.
It was a miserable story and there were news articles later about the tragedy the next day with all kinds of different views on the case and Tamaki refused to touch any of the ones blaming Ren and his father for what had happened because of how vile they had to be to victim-blame the boy.
Miyake assured them that Ren was alright and had gotten to see his father in the hospital and that everything was going just fine for the boy all things considered.
Still the bombshell of what had happened had shaken him deeply and it was the main reason Tamaki had stopped fighting the idea of going to the mall because he wanted to do anything else but think about the awful situation.
Even if it meant suffering being surrounded by thousands of strangers in a crowded building.
Listening to Mirio explain the training schedule he got from Sir Nighteye was helping a little but not by much, hopefully he could just cling to someone until it was time to go home.
"Mirio-Chan! Over here!" Hado loudly called and they both turned to see Hado rushing to them with Haya running after her, Mirio smiled waving back "Hey Nejire-Chan." Mirio replied once the girls were close enough.
Not one to hold back Hado glomped them both in a hug "I can't wait to go in and show you guys everything! There's a cool little shop in the food court that's styled like a 1990s American dinner that serves these milkshakes called malts and I don't know what they do to them, but they taste so much better than regular shakes. And the arcade has this super cool new game that lets-" Hado told them as soon as she let them go and bounced in place.
Haya grabbed Hado by the shoulders and Hado stopped herself and turned to the other girl with her head tilted "I think you might need to bring your energy down a notch, you don't want to overstimulate Amajiki." Haya suggested and Hado nodded "Right, sorry Jiki-Chan." Hado apologized taking a deep breath and letting it out.
Tamaki did his best to give her a smile back at her "I-it's okay Hado-chan." he managed to reply in a normal speaking level and Hado nearly fell over herself while holding back a squeal, it was such a small thing but last year Tamaki would've never expected to have ever been able to speak so loudly in a public space.
Before anyone could get to caught up with him though Haya looked around slightly confused "Hey any of you see Miyake? Or Oz for that matter." she asked and Mirio shook his head "Nope, you and Nejire-Chan were here first." Mirio answered.
"Huh? That's super weird, isn't Miyake-Chan really punctual? I could understand Oz-Chan being late, but Miyake-Chan wouldn't." Hado commented looking around herself and seeing no sign of their friends.
"Yeah, Miyake lives all the way out in Yaizu so I wouldn't be surprised if he might need a few more minutes if he missed his train or something, I don't know how far Oz lives... " Mirio commented bringing his hand up to his face in consideration.
"Oh wait, I think I see Oz." Haya said pointing towards a group of people and Tamaki had to squint but he did see Oswald grumbling as he pushed through the group and over to them, he likely would've seen him earlier but Oswald was in dark green hoodie, so his distinctive hair wasn't visible.
"Oz-Chan over here!" Hado shouted and Oswald must have heard her, and he stalked over to them as soon as he was free from the group of people.
Tamaki shuddered at the thought and Oswald didn't seem to appreciate being engulfed by a bunch of strangers either given his scowl was deeper than usual "Sorry for being late." Oswald said sounding rather sour.
"It's fine Oz-Chan, we just need to find Miyake-Chan then we-" Hado tried to say but she was cut off by their phones letting off various "You got a message" alerts, they shared a glance they checked their phones.
[Cannibal crew~ :D]
[Casual Cannibal: There was a villain attack at a station on my route. I'm fine but will be late, go ahead in mall and I'll text you when I get there so we can meet up.]
[Enthusiastic Cannibal: D: Noooo]
[Accessory: Are you sure you're okay Miyake?]
[Casual Cannibal: Yes, the attack was two stations after the one I planned to get off at.]
[Enabler: Ok stay safe well c u when u get here ;}]
"Guess we should go in then. Where do you guys want to go first?" Haya asked as they started heading to the entrance, Tamaki hesitated but quickly followed them suddenly feeling even worse about this without having someone there for him to hide behind and hold onto during this trip.
Miyake's constantly holding his hand while weird at first had definitely become a source of comfort, but he would just have to do without that this time, so he was rightfully surprised when he felt someone's hand grab his and whirled around to see Oswald "W-wha... ?" Tamaki sputtered face slightly red.
Oswald shrugged "Miyake texted me to keep an eye on you so you don't freak out." The pinkette told him casually.
"M-my hand?" Tamaki squeaked wondering why Oswald immediately jumped to holding his hand.
"Miyake does this all the time, I figured you were cool with it." Oswald replied and Tamaki's face felt like it was getting even redder *Yes, he does. But he does it with his TAIL! This is totally different.* Tamaki thought but didn't say anything because while it was flustering him greatly having someone to hold onto was helping with his anxiety.
Thankfully they were both behind their friends, so no one caught them otherwise he'd have to deal with Mirio teasing him about it, his friend's comments about him riding Miyake were bad enough and Tamaki did not need him getting on his case about holding hands with Oswald.
Hado being a regular at this mall was showing them around and he had to admit the malts were fantastic and he'd like to come back for more with his friends, their group popped in and out of a few places and they got a couple of little trinkets, namely little key chains with the heroes they interned with or something that reminded them of their mentors.
Eventually they ended up at the arcade Hado mentioned and the lights and sounds were a bit much for him, so he sat in a corner with Oswald while Hado and Mirio had a dance battle on a pre-quirk game that had been re-discovered a few years ago.
Oswald suddenly nudged him and he turned away from Mirio and Hado "I'm going to get a drink, you want anything?" Oswald asked and Tamaki shook his head "'Kay be right back, don't go anywhere." Oswald commented before standing and leaving him alone since Haya had gone to the coin exchanger to get more tokens for everyone.
Tamaki took a deep breath and rubbing his arm trying not to wince when one of the games let out a loud series of beeping noises, for once though his mind wasn't on the suffocating number of people around him but Oswald, Tamaki had noticed the pinkette was oddly... quiet during their visit to the mall.
Oswald hadn't made one snide comment though he had plenty of opportunity to make them, and that was a touch concerning because this wasn't the first time Tamaki noticed Oswald being so subdued, in fact ever since Miyake explained why he didn't go to meet up with BJ Oswald seemed to be troubled by something.
But Tamaki just wasn't sure how to ask Oswald about it without overstepping and he couldn't ask someone else what to do because the others just hadn't seemed to notice yet, maybe he could get Oswald to go somewhere alone and ask him about it.
Before he could come up with a solid plan though something was thrown through the arcades glass window, and he quickly brought his hands up to protect his face from the glass.
Shocked and panicking Tamaki peeked through his hands and saw a local hero getting up from one of the machines that had been crushed and yelling at the group of kids to get out of the way before someone with a wolf quirk jumped onto him and they started fighting in the arcade.
Panicking Tamaki ran the wrong way and went deeper into the arcade which was clearly a big mistake as he was almost hit by something that flew right over his head and broke the door to a supply closet.
Making a split second decision Tamaki opened the now unlocked door and proceeded to hide in said closest, he covered his ears and tried to keep from hyper-ventilating as he listened to the two fighting outside.
The closet was dark other than the hole in the door and he flinched whenever a shadow crossed over and he was left in complete darkness as he panicked over someone finding him, it felt like time was stretching out as the fighting continued on yelling, howling, and crashing going on outside.
Tamaki bit his lip to keep himself quiet once tears pricked the corner of his eyes, afraid that once he started crying someone could hear him and find him in his hiding spot. A painful ache building in his chest whenever he heard a scream and he cursed himself for being so pathetic for cowering in a closet when he should be out there helping.
If he wanted to be a hero so bad, why wasn't he out there doing something? Sure, he couldn't help the fight but he could be out there helping lead others away from the fight until backup arrived for the hero, Tamaki was sure he saw Mirio and Hado both doing that before he ran off.
Sinking deeper in his thoughts Tamaki buried his face into his knees and wept, hugging himself.
"Jiki!" a voice hissed making his breath catch then before he could think the door to the closet opened and Oswald stood there staring down at him with wide eyes "Jiki, thank god." Oswald said quickly rushing over and hugging him.
Tamaki sputtered for a second, but Oswald shushed him and used a tendril of hair to shut the door "O-Oswald-San?" Tamaki whispered and Oswald pulled away then sat beside Tamaki on the floor.
"That wolf-thing ain't the only fucker attacking the mall, the heroes are busy evacuating everyone else. I ran into the others outside and they had no clue where you were, so I came back in to find you." Oswald explained and Tamaki's heart leaped in his chest.
"You did?" Tamaki whispered staring at him in awe, Oswald tsked looking away "Of course I did you idiot, the others would be here too if they could've gotten past the heroes blocking the entrance. We weren't going to just leave you here to die dumbass." Oswald responded wrapping his arm around Tamaki's shoulders and pulled him close.
"It's too dangerous to go now so we'll have to wait this out here, and Jiki I swear to god if you ever worry us like this again, I'm going to knock you out myself." Oswald told him and Tamaki being so close noticed how Oswald was trembling.
"I-I won't, I promise Oswald-San." Tamaki shakily promised "You better not." Oswald huffed back pulling him closer.
Then the two of them fell silent in the closet as they waited for the fighting outside to calm down, though Tamaki was still petrified he felt much better having someone here with him, and for once the small space that he was trapped in wasn't suddenly suffocating with another person there with him.