Ochako rolled the tiny flashlight between her hands as the four of them waited for the guard they knew was coming. "We've got twenty minutes, right? Should I shrink you down now?"

"I think so," Izuku agreed. "Cameras have already shown us walking away from the area, going back now while small is a good bet."

"Alright then." Ochako hopped off of Izuku's shoulder, held out the miniature flashlight - shrunken with the normal light, then set with a tiny chipped-off piece of the size changing crystal - and shrunk the other three down as well, before slipping the flashlight into her bag. The four of them walked over to the main waiting point, where the guard would get into his car.

"You know," Shouto said. "We can hide this from everyone, make it seem like Kurogiri broke himself out, but we'll always know what we did. There's no going back from this."

Mina let out a breath and nodded. "Yeah. But is it really that different from last time? Sure, before we broke in to prevent a prisoner from escaping, but this time we're saving someone who doesn't deserve to be locked away forever rather than saved, and also making sure we can get in contact with Gravity Falls. It's still for a good cause. And we still can't trust anyone else to get the job done."

Ochako laughed lightly. "Just like old times, right?"

"We only left Gravity Falls a week ago," Izuku pointed out, but he was smiling.

After that, the wait was pretty peaceful. Twenty minutes later, the man they were waiting for showed up, already dressed in his Tartarus guard uniform. While he fiddled with his keys, Ochako lifted them all up and into his pocket. They were small enough that when the guard put his keys back into said pocket, they were dwarfed by them.

Ochako held her breath, but the guard noticed nothing, and soon enough, there was the telltale sign of the car starting, and they were off towards Tartarus. In the dark of the pocket, she sent her friends a weak smile, one they each returned.

It was a long ride. Ochako busied herself by reading a book she'd also shrunk down, while Izuku fiddled with the now tiny laptop, checking over all his programs.

Three hours later, the car slowed down, and the guard got out. They could feel him walking towards the prison - and their first checkpoint.

Izuku activated his first program, and the scans and metal detectors cleared the guard. They kept going forwards. More scans, more clearances. And then they were in.

They could hear footsteps, someone approaching. "Iwata. Ready for the transfer?"

"Yeah," their guard, Iwata, said. "Kurogiri, right? You know why he's being moved so early into his stay here?"

"Something about putting him on a lower level than he's on now," the other person said. "Not really our problem, is it?"

A lower level? They'd known he was being moved, of course. That was why they'd picked this day, and this guard. But lower levels generally meant even more security. Ochako snuck a look at Izuku. Her boyfriend's face was pale, but still determined. Hopefully, that meant everything would still go well.

At the very least, they still hadn't been caught.

Getting ready for the move took yet more time, sitting through someone important lecturing on moving protocols, which the four of them listened to carefully, in case any of it turned out to be relevant.

Then, finally, the move. Once again, Izuku hacked into the different systems so that their presence wasn't picked up, and once again it worked.

Because of McGucket's version of tech, Izuku had explained. Ochako sort of thought she understood. McGucket's inventions were weird, unique, and crazy, in a world filled with the weird, unique, and crazy, and still managed to stand out. In their world, technology was a bit more advanced, but McGucket's stuff was so sideways that regular tech didn't seem to know what to do with it. Tartarus was prepared for just about anything. Technology made by a recovering madman in another universe wasn't one of those things.

Ochako could hear the sound of Kurogiri being rolled ahead of them. They'd mentioned in the protocol room that he would be asleep for the move, though that wasn't much of a change, as he was asleep most of the time. An additional prevention to keep him from trying to use his quirk, apparently.

They entered Kurogiri's new room, and Ochako took a deep breath. They could hear Kurogiri being secured into place, confirmations that everything was hooked up, including brainwave scans and deterrents from even thinking about using his quirk, and then the guards began to leave.

Izuku set all the cameras and screens running on a loop, and Shouto gave them a nod - the guards backs were turned. Ochako clenched her hands into fists, steadied her nerves, and then floated them out of Iwata's pocket and securely in the room, just as the door closed in front of them.

They were now alone in the room with Kurogiri.

Still the size of a penny, Izuku sat cross-legged on the floor of the prison, checking over his work. "Okay, brain scans are set to run on a loop, and so are all of the other sensors. No one will be alerted to anything being wrong until we're out, and I can run the "escape" program. Viewing panels are still shut, but we don't know if someone is going to enter the viewing room soon, so we should act fast."

"You know," Mina mused quietly. "All of that talk about guns attached to sensors that will fire if prisoners have thoughts about using their quirk… I mean I know Tartarus is only for the worst of the worst, but I never realized just how inhumane this place is."

"Even more of a reason to bring back Shirakumo and get us out of here quickly." Shouto looked at his hands, then at the others. "Am I good to resize?"

"You are," Izuku confirmed. Ochako took the flashlight back out and shone it on Shouto, turning him back to normal, before floating the rest of them onto his shoulder.

Shouto looked at Kurogiri for a moment, readied himself, and then his hands lit up with blue flames.

Kurogiri practically exploded into mist, letting out an agonizing scream. For a terrible moment, Ochako thought something had gone wrong, that it hadn't worked, that they'd only hurt him more and ruined all their chances of contacting Gravity Falls at all.

And then the mist cleared away, the tiny bits of it left reforming into dark clouds. In front of them stood a student who could only be a year or two older than them, with dark stormy cloud-hair and yellow pupils, awake, alert, and terrified.

"What - what's going on now? Where did you take me this time? What do you want-" He paused, taking in Shouto. "...You're not the doctor. Did they take you too?" There was no recognition in his eyes. Did he not remember being Kurogiri at all?

"I'm not the doctor," Shouto confirmed, unlocking Shirakumo's straightjacket. "Shirakumo, right? We're getting you out of here."

Desperate hope gleamed in Shirakumo's eyes. "That's me. That doctor guy, and his employer, they took me, they've been running… they'll come after me, they want to change my quirk-"

"I know," Shouto interrupted shortly. "We don't have much time." He held Shirakumo's arm tightly. "Listen, this doctor, he did change your quirk, but that was a while ago. I'll explain everything in a minute. But right now, we need to escape. Can you picture a place that's safe? Somewhere no one will think of coming after us?"

"Y-Yeah. I can do that." Shirakumo closed his eyes, and in the next moment, they were all enveloped by dark clouds.

Another moment passed, and suddenly they were on a rooftop, one extremely close to the UA campus. Shirakumo blinked at his surroundings, before stepping back, stunned.

"That… That wasn't… did they already change…?"

Shouto's gaze softened. "I'm sorry. Like I said, I'll try to explain what we know. Guys?"

"Got it!" Ochako floated her, Izuku, and Mina off of Shouto's shoulder, before resizing them. "Hello, Shirakumo! We're really sorry about all of this. We will explain, though."

Shirakumo blinked owlishly at them. "Right. I'm glad to hear that. Do you think you could do that now? Because I'm very confused at this point."

Izuku activated the "escape" program, before giving him an awkward grin. "No problem."

"Thirteen years." Shirakumo ran a hand through his hair, which apparently had once been fluffy and blue-white. "I was a brainwashed villain for thirteen years."

"...Yeah," Izuku confirmed, wincing. There was really no easy way to break it to Shirakumo, but they'd done their best, telling him everything they knew about Kurogiri. It was honestly the least he deserved. "We're so sorry about all of this."

Shirakumo let out a hysterical laugh. "What are you sorry for? That doctor, his employer, they succeeded. They changed my quirk into a warp quirk. They turned me into a villain for thirteen fucking years. Apparently I just attacked UA. I attacked Shouta. You guys just made me me again. Nothing for you to be sorry for."

Which was probably an accurate way to look at things. Izuku still couldn't help but feel bad for putting Shirakumo through all of this, but it was definitely better than just leaving him as Kurogiri when they knew they could help.

"Shouta?" Mina asked.

"Yeah. You said Eraserhead is your homeroom teacher, right? That's Shouta. He's my friend." Shirakumo paused, a flash of grief overtaking him. "Was my friend? Last I remember, we were friends."

"No way," Mina breathed. "Holy shit, Aizawa was young once?"

The laugh that this startled out of Shirakumo was completely genuine. He smiled at them, and it didn't look nearly as forced as before. "He was! He was super short too."

"Oh my god."

Shirakumo laughed again. "So he's really a teacher? He never mentioned being interested in teaching. Is he good?"

"I mean…" Ochako trailed off awkwardly. Izuku couldn't blame her - he didn't really feel like getting into their issues with Aizawa with the guy who was apparently a close friend of his.

Shouto had no such issues. "On our first day of school, he had us skip orientation to take a quirk assessment test and threatened to expel whoever ranked the lowest."

Shirakumo choked. "Seriously? Oh my god, Shouta no."

This time it was Izuku's turn to laugh. "I mean, other than that he's been pretty good, I guess. We did spend a few months in Gravity Falls after that before returning, so I think that part has just stuck out in our minds."

"Makes sense." Shirakumo's expression grew more serious. "Right, speaking of, you mentioned Gravity Falls, and how Kurogiri's portals got you there and back. I'll definitely try to help if I can, but I don't remember how Kurogiri did it, or got hijacked, or whatever it was. If it doesn't work-"

"Then getting you out was still worth it," Ochako insisted. "Knowing what we knew, we couldn't just leave you like that."

Shirakumo rubbed the back of his neck, smiling. "...Thanks. I will try to help though, if I can."

"Speaking of," Mina hedged, "Maybe don't tell anyone we broke you out? We kind of made it look like Kurogiri broke himself out, so we were hoping to just tell people we found you afterwards."

"No kidding. Even for a good cause, that probably wouldn't go over well." Shirakumo gave them a thumbs up. "It's not like I remember being Kurogiri anyways. If anyone asks, I'll just tell them that the first thing I remember is you guys finding me. Which is true!" He paused. "Although I'm still legally dead, so I'm not sure who I'd tell… or where I'm going to go… holy shit I'm legally dead."

Izuku winced again - even though, like before, he knew that the whole "legally dead" part wasn't their fault, he couldn't stop a part of himself from feeling guilty that Shirakumo had to deal with this now.

"You can stay with me, for now? If you want to!" he offered. "We're all over there most nights anyways, and it's probably the best out of the four of us for houses to go to."

"Agreed." Ochako played with her hair, a similarly awkward grin on her face. "I mean, my parents would also be happy to have you, but we're… not exactly in the position to host someone long term at the moment. And Mina's parents are super weird about who she lets over, and Shouto's dad is a shitstain."

"If you're okay with it, then sure," Shirakumo agreed easily. "Although, do your parents know about this? About me?"

Oh, right. "Um… Mom doesn't know yet?" He offered weakly. "If you're going to be staying over, we should probably tell her something, I guess. I mean, we'll definitely go with the whole "we found Kurogiri after he escaped and then helped you be you again" story because I don't think she'll react well to the whole thing, but that also means explaining why we really need to contact Gravity Falls right now…" He shot a glance at Shouto.

His friend grimaced, before nodding slowly, a thoughtful expression crossing his face. "If we're going to tell her, I'd like to tell Fuyumi as well. I… I think, out of everyone, she also deserves to know."

"Fine with us." Mina nudged him lightly. "She's your sister. We trust you on this." Shouto nodded again, looking relieved.

At the very least, Izuku mused, he wouldn't have to deal with explaining to his mom alone.

Inko opened the door and smiled at the five of them. "Come in! Shouto, your sister is already here." She turned to Shirakumo. "And you must be the one Izuku mentioned. It's nice to meet you."

Shirakumo smiled. "It's nice to meet you too, Ms. Midoriya."

"Oh, you can just call me Inko." She let them in, and Shouto immediately noticed Fuyumi sitting awkwardly on the couch. Her eyes caught his, and lit up as he gave her a wave.

As soon as they were all situated, Inko began. "Alright, so what's going on?"

"Um. Well…"

"This is Shirakumo, and when we found him, he was Kurogiri," Mina blurt out. "But he's not Kurogiri anymore! And he wasn't Kurogiri originally, and he's really nice, and he's going to help us connect to Gravity Falls, which we really need to do right now."

Shouto's hand smacked against his face.

"Maybe we should start a little further back than that," Ochako suggested.

Together, the five of them wove a mostly coherent story, explaining a bit about Cipher and how Shouto was seeing his memories and having his thoughts, how they "ran into" the escaped Kurogiri, but because of the weirdness knowledge, already knew he was Shirakumo and changed him back, and how they were trying to get in contact with the shack because they needed help with said Cipher thing.

By the end of their very abbreviated tale, Inko's eyes were as wide as saucers. "...I think I understand? But if you don't mind me asking, Shouto, how did this "Cipher" get in your head in the first place?"

Shouto winced. "He took over my body for a bit. It wasn't fun. I really don't want a repeat of that, even if it's not exactly the same thing."

"It won't happen again," Fuyumi vowed, looking close to tears. Shouto desperately wanted to believe her.

"I knew you were avoiding talking about a lot of your time in Gravity Falls," Inko admitted. "I was worried that you didn't want to bring it up because it was dangerous, and your lives were at risk. I was right, wasn't I? You're not telling us most of what happened there, even now."

"Mom…"

Inko wiped away the tears that were now streaking down her cheeks. "You know you can talk to me about anything, right? Even if you just need someone to listen, I'll always be there."

"I know," Izuku admitted quietly. "There… is more that happened, yeah. And a lot of it involves Cipher. I don't know if I want to talk about it now, but… maybe sometime?"

"Whenever you're ready," Inko promised. "That goes for all of you kids as well. If you need to talk, I'll listen." She turned to Shirakumo. "And you're welcome to stay here for as long as you need, Shirakumo. Just be careful, alright? Especially if someone connects you to the Kurogiri who escaped that prison."

Shirakumo bowed gratefully. "Thanks, Inko. I'll be careful. And, actually, you guys can just call me Oboro. I'm more of a first-name kind of guy anyways."

The group mostly broke up after this, and as soon as they were alone, Shouto found himself swept into one of Fuyumi's hugs.

"Sorry for worrying you," he murmured.

Fuyumi let out a small laugh. "You know I'm always worried. I'm just… we'll figure this out. Whatever we need to do."

Shouto swallowed. "I. I almost killed the old man, last week. When we were sparring and I started getting Cipher's thoughts. I stopped myself, but I could've - what if-" The words petered out, and he tried again. "I didn't want to kill him, and I didn't but what if it was you? Or one of my friends? I'm…" He hated the way his voice cracked. Even after everything, a part of him still protested showing this much weakness to someone. "I'm really scared."

Fuyumi hugged him tighter. "That's not your fault," she whispered. "I'm so sorry you had to go through that. We're going to find a way to fix this."

In his sister's arms like this, Shouto could almost accept those words as true.

"...And that's homeroom dismissed." Aizawa sighed. "Midoriya, Todoroki, Ashido, Uraraka. A word outside."

Ochako blinked. She'd had a bit of trouble concentrating the entire period - it was almost as hard to reconcile her teacher with the shy boy Oboro had described as it was to reconcile All Might and Small Might. Still, she got up and followed Aizawa outside the classroom, sharing a confused look with her friends.

Aizawa's expression was grave, and Ochako wondered what exactly had happened that he felt the need to tell them privately like this.

"Kurogiri broke out of Tartarus."

Oh. Right.

Ochako let her eyes go wide. Next to her, Izuku sucked in a breath.

They'd have to play this very carefully.

"I thought it was supposed to be impossible to escape Tartarus," Shouto said flatly.

"It was, until Kurogiri escaped." Aizawa sighed. "Apparently they weren't prepared for a warp quirk as strong as his."

Izuku took her hand. "Sensei, if you don't mind me asking, why are you telling us this privately instead of letting the entire class know? I know we were sent to Gravity Falls, but everyone was affected by what happened at the USJ."

Aizawa's response was blunt. "The Hero Commission doesn't want anyone knowing about this, at least until Kurogiri is found. Principal Nedzu insisted that as his most recent victims, you deserved to know the potential threat to your safety. I know the situation isn't ideal, but please don't go telling your classmates this. It was hard enough getting them to agree that you should be informed."

"...Okay." Despite Mina's unhappy expression, she nodded along. Ochako wondered how much of that expression was fake, because some of it did seem real. Even if not for the reasons Aizawa might think.

It was hard, not telling him about Oboro. Oboro had vouched for him, but the Aizawa Shouta he had known was a seventeen year old. They didn't know how thirty year old Aizawa would react.

They'd have to tell him, of course. Just… hopefully after they managed to establish contact with Gravity Falls.

"We'll be careful, Sensei," Ochako promised.

According to Izuku and Inko, Oboro was a great houseguest. Despite being a little messy, he was always eager to help out and do his part, and he generally tried to contain his teenage sloppiness to his own spaces.

He was also, Mina learned, completely earnest when he promised to try and help them reconnect with Gravity Falls.

"I've been trying to figure out more about Kurogiri's quirk, to see if I can trigger whatever had the loci-thing opening the portal," he admitted, about a week after they'd sprung him from prison. "From what I can tell, I need to have a solid picture in mind of a place that I've already been to. And if I haven't been to a place I want to warp to, I need coordinates to get there. Which doesn't really help with getting to Gravity Falls, because it doesn't actually exist here."

Which was true. They'd looked it up out of curiosity, and there was no sign that there had ever been a Gravity Falls in Oregon. Mina wondered if Quinten Trembley hadn't become president in their world, which might have stopped the town from being formed.

"What does happen if you try to make a portal to Gravity Falls?" Mina wondered curiously.

Oboro concentrated, and a circle of storm clouds appeared, fluffier and more solid than the purple mist of Kurogiri, but still not quite the clouds he apparently had for his original quirk. "The portal doesn't connect, just hovers here-"

"...Got…We can…Hang on, we're connecting!"

And then, in front of all of them, the portal became clear, and Mina could see Ford and Stan on the other side.

There was a sort of ping as Mina felt the touch of the genus loci again. Next to her, Shouto started, and judging by the look he gave her, he'd felt it too.

"Connection established!" Ford crowed. "This is only a viewing portal, but it shouldn't take long now to make one we can actually cross. Kids! It's so good to see you!"

For a moment, they all just sat there, stunned. Then Mina wiped her eyes and beamed back. "It's good to see you both too! We missed you!"

And she really had. It was so good to see them again.

Stan chuckled. "You miss us already? It's only been a couple of weeks on our side! That's gotta have been nothing for you."

Izuku blinked, quickly wiping away his tears. "Actually, it's been a couple of weeks for us as well. Have our world's times synced together? Can that happen with just a couple jumps between them?"

"...It shouldn't," Ford admitted, looking baffled. "Two worlds might start flowing a bit more in sync, but it takes a lot for them to perfectly match up like this." He frowned. "Unless they were originally in sync, and something decided to temporarily make them out of sync. But it'd have to be pretty powerful to do something like that."

"Such as a genus loci, which we realized was the thing that brought us both in and out of Gravity Falls by hijacking Kurogiri's portals?" Shouto suggested quietly. "Maybe so that we could help with a potential Weirdmageddon, and then be home in no time at all?"

There was a moment of silence as they all digested this.

Stan winced. "Geez. That's some freaky level of preparation."

"But not impossible for something like the living consciousness of Gravity Falls itself." Ford tapped his chin, intrigued. "It might not have been powerful enough to stop Cipher, but it could nudge things in place for his defeat. Fascinating."

Right. Cipher.

Ochako was the first to breach the subject. "...We've got some bad news, on our end. Well, not everything is bad - you know the portal villain? Well, he's not a villain anymore! Turns out he was brainwashed and experimented on, and now he's himself again." She looked around, even though they all knew Inko was out of the house at the moment and couldn't overhear them. "Although we did need to break him out of prison to help with this."

Oboro leaned over so that Stan and Ford could see him and waved awkwardly. "Hey there. I'm Oboro. Nice to meet you."

Ford smiled. "I had wondered why the portal seemed so different this time. It's nice to meet you as well, Oboro."

Next to him, Stan looked even more delighted. "Broke him out of prison, you say? You didn't get caught, did you?"

"We made it look like Kurogiri broke himself out," Izuku told him. "Our story is that we found him after he broke out and helped him re-become Oboro then."

"That's my kids! Great job! I want a play-by-play later, you hear?"

Mina couldn't help but laugh. Even with everything that had happened lately, there was still something so comforting in Stan being Stan. "You got it."

She sobered. "Right, but the bad news is, we have a serious problem. Cipher… he's not exactly dead. Or he is dead, but part of him isn't. Shouto's getting his thoughts and memories."

Stan and Ford both froze. "You're kidding."

Shouto shook his head. "I think it started after Weirdmageddon. It wasn't noticeable, at first. But now… I keep seeing things, and knowing things I shouldn't know, and thinking things that I wouldn't usually think, and I don't know how to make it stop."

Ford's eyes widened. "Your fire. It's pure chaos energy, and it must contain some of his essence. If he wanted to rebuild himself after death…" He grimaced. "It still wouldn't be him - his soul is still destroyed, and it would still be Shouto's soul that everything would be built around - but only by technicality."

"You're saying he might be trying to make Shouto into a copy of himself," Izuku said, clearly trying hard to keep his voice from wavering.

Ford grimaced. "Cipher is over a trillion years old. If Shouto were to receive all of his memories… his fifteen years of life would be quickly overwhelmed. And… this new Cipher would already have a physical form. No bargaining or rifts required."

Shouto looked sick. Mina leaned over and pulled him into a side hug. Ochako and Izuku leaned in on the other side.

Stan's hands balled into fists. "Great. So how do we stop it? After everything it took to get rid of the bastard, we're not going to let him kill Shouto's personality and turn him into another Cipher."

"Absolutely not," Ford agreed. "The trick will be how. I can create a charm that'll suppress Cipher's influence for the time being, but hearing how much Shouto's already been affected, it'll eventually be like putting duct-tape on a dam leak. If we want to permanently fix this, we're going to need to invoke something even more powerful than Cipher, which is always a risk."

"More powerful than Cipher?" Ochako repeated. "Is there something like that out there?"

"There is," Ford confirmed. "It's called the Axolotl. I've seen theories that it's some sort of anti-Cipher. Cipher's cosmic opposite, so to speak. Making the charm shouldn't take long - about a week - and we can use that as a temporary solution until the Axolotl is contacted." He sighed. "But again, with beings as powerful as that, there's always a risk involved."

"The alternative is whatever's left of Bill - Cipher, left of Cipher - trying to use me to fuck up our reality," Shouto grit out. "I'll take the risk."

"Agreed," Izuku piped up. "We've stopped Cipher plenty of times before, right? We can do it again."

"Exactly." Mina squeezed Shouto's side tightly. "We still defeated Cipher, back during Weirdmageddon. This is just… getting rid of the leftovers."

"As soon as we can get the portal running as an actual portal, we'll come over," Ford promised. "Oboro, is there any way you can keep this viewing portal open?"

Oboro seemed to concentrate, before nodding. "Yeah, it seems to be kind of like how my clouds were - once I make them, they stay there until I dissipate them. That's got to be useful for making a stable portal, right?"

"Oh yes, that'll make things so much easier. Thank you."

"Ford is on the case," Ochako said to Shouto, as Oboro moved the viewing portal to a corner of the room. "It's going to be okay."

Shouto hesitated, before nodding. "Yeah. It will."

"Do you…" Izuku hesitated. "Do you want to talk about it?"

Shouto stared at the ceiling. After their talk with Stan and Ford, he couldn't help but feel like his emotions had just been through the washing machine - twisted and spun in all different directions, coming out wrinkly and almost unrecognizable.

"It's stupid," He finally said, "But it feels unfair. I made a stupid mistake months ago, and now… it keeps coming back. Over and over again. It feels like I never stopped being his puppet."

"You're not-!"

"I know. But - I don't need to hear that right now." He ran a hand through his hair in aggravation. "I just…"

He thought about his arms, still wrapped up in bandages. About seeing Mina fall off that cliff, about the fire that was still occasionally out of his control, of Cipher calling him a puppet over and over, of almost killing his father, of slipping up and calling Mina Shooting Star.

"Why…" His voice wobbled involuntarily. "Why can't he just leave me alone already? He's dead, and he's still fucking me over. Why can't this just stop?"

No one had anything to say to that, but Shouto could feel his friends hugging him tighter.

Reunion! Axolotl! And, next chapter, we're finally going to start getting into actual sports festival stuff. I'm so excited.

Anyways, I hope you enjoyed, and please don't forget to leave a review, let me know what you think!