Chapter 2:
A Rude Awakening
Izuku didn't know how long it took him to regain his breathing or stop the waterworks, but he was well and truly exhausted by the time he had it was getting dark and fast.
He closed his eyes and took a deep, calming breath. Then another. And another. It didn't make him feel better enough to get over the dead man next to him but he had to take act all the same. He was wet, covered in filth, in a place that no person should spend the night sleeping in. He had to get a move on. But first, he needed to collect anything useful.
He put his two makeshift clubs, see also, "steel desk Legs" into his beltline and began scavenging as the little red winged man had been doing before.
Izuku did his best to avoid the stagnant pools of water and filth, but failed almost as terribly as he did trying to avoid the swarms of flies and mosquitos. This was mostly due to the solid ground not being solid at all, but instead being clumps of grass or other plant detritus forming what looked like ground. Fortunately, he never got more than wet ankles from it. He tore open trash bag after trash bag with one word on his mind.
Fire.
It was already getting chilly and with the insect swarms harassing him he wouldn't get any rest without it, and even less safety. Dry paper was easy to come by, as was an old cloth grocery back to collect and carry it all with. He even found some dryer lent and some broken chair legs, wooden ones obviously. Metal or plastic ones wouldn't do him much good. As the sun was nearly ready to set he dug through his eighth trash bag and found a miracle.
"Yes! Nail polish remover!" Izuku whooped as if a helicopter was descending to airlift him out of there.
There was barely a thimbleful of the green liquid left in the bottle, but opening and taking a quick sniff told him it would do for an accelerant. Now all he needed was a method of ignition. And wouldn't you know it? He found a broken grill lighter. He checked it and it was clearly out of butane, but that was fine. He snapped off the end like a twig and got quick access to the flint, which still produced a spark when he clicked the button.
Now to just get out of this swamp.
There were plenty of small, wooded areas around him but they were all so sparse with vegetation that they didn't look to provide much shelter. He spotted one patch of woods, maybe ten trees in total, that was absolutely covered in shrubbery a half kilometer north and knew where he'd be sleeping for the night. Hoping against hope that it wouldn't be swampy there too he began the short trek, and after a few moments he was well and truly on dry ground.
Maybe the bogs were as small and interspersed as the trees and boulders? The latter two did appear in clumps together, but he didn't encounter any more of the former on his trek to his desired shelter. He was upon the edge of the small meadow when he remembered his murder victim and blanched. He had left him there to rot in a dump. Literally. What kind of villain does that?
He was already well on his way to hyperventilating again when a simple thought came to him.
It's not like he could have carried or dragged him away anyways. He'd have to find help to retrieve his body for his family. Which he swore he would have to do.
His to do list now consisted of starting a fire, sleeping through the night, finding civilization, getting to a police station and reporting what happened, make amends with the family. Solid plan.
It was now well and truly night, so he stumbled through the brush hoping to find a clear area within the trees, and was lucky enough not only to find one, but to discover an abandoned campsite. Long burned-out logs that had been overtaken by past moisture and plant life sat at the center of the small clearing. There was even a bed of sand where somebody had dug up the earth and sifted it into a soft place to put their sleeping bag. That meant civilization couldn't be too far away, he'd have to hunt for a deer trail or proper hiking trail in the morning. For now, he needed to work on that fire.
He scrounged blindly in the dark around the bushes around him, feeling for loose twigs or branches for dryness. He lucked out yet again that evening when he found a fallen branch longer than he was. He could pretty much just make a small fire and slowly slide the branch in throughout the night, burning off the tip like a cigarette. In fact, that's exactly what he would do.
Making use of what others had already built he bunched up the loose paper and dryer lent on top of the small coals and mountain of ash. He then VERY carefully placed the dryer lent to the mouth of the bottle of nail polish removal and let as little as possible seep into the clothlike material. He wanted to save as much as he could in case he needed to start a fire again. Then, feeling the wet spot with his thumb, he put the lighter flint to it and clicked the button.
The lint caught on his first try and with but a little blowing it spread to all of the paper and soon after that the twigs as well. From there he simply put the broken chair leg he had found into it and waited for them to really start burning. When he finally had a sizable fire within the ring of rocks and ash he had enough light with which to see and scrounge further.
The point of the fire wasn't necessarily heat, although it did that too, but his main purpose for wanting it was to keep the insect away. Light and heat wouldn't do that, smoke would. So he found the wettest, greenest leaves he could find and added them to the flame. It dimmed significantly when he did so but that was alright because he didn't want it too bright. He didn't know what other kind of crazies were out here. But he got his wish, he had smoke now. A little more than he bargained for.
He coughed and sputtered and teared up for a third time that day, although by now he was too emotionally and physically exhausted to actually cry. He might have also been dehydrated, but that too would have to wait until morning.
When the smoke cleared a bit he organized his piles of paper, twigs, wet leaves and the large branch for ease of use he disrobed to let his soiled clothes dry by the fire. After that he crawled, pitifully, to the patch of sand. As he crawled into his bed of sand he felt a strange burning sensation crawling through his skin. His last thought before bed was that he would probably wake up with a bad skin reaction to the disgusting water he had waded through, but that would have to wait because he barely managed to finish that thought before sleep overtook him in this strange new place.
Izuku Midoriya woke up to a loud crack from the fire and the moving of shadows dancing in the night. A very large shadow, standing over his fire and tending to the branch.
He gasped, louder than he probably should have, and scrambled away from it... and away from his two metal clubs and only means of self defense against the full-grown adult who was now looking at him.
She stood up at her full height showing herself to be tall for a woman, but then she backed away from the fire and, in turn, him. This game him more space and clamed him down somewhat, and gave him a good look at her. And wow, did she look like a proper hero or what?! Her suit had a lime and dark green color scheme with gold trim and even golder jewelry. Jewelry he suspected were support items based on how they were composed of matching cuffs on both wrists, ankles, neck and even her waistline with a strange tri-pronged headset that wrapped around her skull. The odd thing about her outfit was the classic underboob, a design heroines hadn't been using for decades but this lady was trying to bring back like the up and coming Bubble Girl. The design of her top showed off every tones abdominal of her stomach. For some reason Midoriya always just attributed well-toned abdominals with heroes and hard work, and villainy with laziness.
He suspected her abilities were either psychic or elemental in nature, maybe both. He'd guess electricity.
"I am Isendra of the Zann Esu clan. May I rest in the warmth of your fire young one?" She asked by way of an introduction.
Izuku nodded vigorously, absolutely ecstatic at the prospect of meeting a hero he'd somehow never even heard of before.
"You smell atrocious young one, as do your clothes. I would consider them a loss." Isendra of whatever clan said as a conversation starter as she advanced on her large pack, which she had left propped on a tree.
"Oh, um, yeah. I sort of appeared in a bog filled with trash." Izuku told her.
She rummaged through her pack as he talked, pulling out a couple waterskins and a leather pouch that looked like a leather feed bag. She stopped when he finished his explanation and looked at him.
"What do you mean by appeared?" She asked before standing back up and moving over to his pitiful fire, but not before tossing him a waterskin.
"Oh, um... One of my classmates had a warp ability of some kind he was playing with on furniture and he sort of, accidentally, used it on me. Thank you." He explained the embarrassing story before picking up the waterskin.
She paused in her mission of putting cured meats and potatoes onto metal skewers to raise an eyebrow at him.
"You are a student? And one of your classmates can warp people long distances? That requires a lot of power and skill. What school is this?" She demanded.
"Aldera junior high." Izuku said. "And skill not so much, we are all way too young to have any control of our quirks. We aren't allowed to go to hero academies until we're eighteen."
She stared at him some more.
"I have never heard of this school, and many of the words you use are bizarre to me." Isendra admitted before sitting down cross-legged and giving him her full attention. "Tell me about your nation, these quirks you mentioned and these schools and academies."
She was looking so attentively at him, like a student before a teacher, that his usual nervous tendencies returned with a vengeance. Let the muttering commence.
"Oh, well, I don't know what you call them here but quirks are supernatural abilities people are born with. Some people have emitter types, mutant types, transformation types, strength types and in my classmates case warp type. Hero academies are for training people with powerful quirks to use them for societies benefit against criminals, I'm sure you have those here too..."
She watched him attentively, stone-faced, as he explained all of this.
"And these quirks, how many do people have?" She asked.
"Oh, everybody just gets the one." He said. "Do people have multiple ones here?"
"No young one. We do not have these quirks at all." She said. "I find the concept very interesting. What is yours?"
He turtled up and tried to make himself as small as possible at that question.
"I don't have one." He said, honestly.
Then he registered her words. Were there still any countries that didn't have quirks appearing? Last he heard even isolated tribes like the Sentinelese have been developing quirks, and somehow this turned out to be the catalyst for them making contact with Indian society and becoming civilized. So where in the world was he.
"So, not everybody in your country has these quirks?" She summarized. "And they grant people a single ability, but a potent form of that ability."
"Not always. Izuku told her. Some peoples are weak. My mother can only move small things with her telekinesis." Izuku said.
"So, your mother has one of these? What of your father?" Isendra asked
"He can breath fire." Izuku said.
Isendra hummed as the smell of the now cooked food filled their meadow.
"So having parents with these abilities does not guarantee you will have one? Are you quite certain you don't?" She asked.
"Positive." Izuku said confidently. "Everyone has their quirks express themselves in childhood, by the age of five. Nobody has been such a late bloomer as to reveal it after ten."
"You seem rather dejected by this loss." She said.
"Well of course!" He said in frustration. "Who doesn't want the ability to move things with their mind or decimate evildoers with flames of their mouth? I had so wish to have one of my parents abilities, or an odd fusion of them like most people do."
She shook her head pitifully.
"No. There is more than that. Tell me." She insisted.
He made himself small again but muttered his answer obediently.
"I want to be a hero. Like all might I want people to fear the evil and hurt no more when I am there." He said. "But I don't know how I can become that without a quirk."
Isendra removed the skewers of meat and potatoes from the fire and handed him one. Izuku hesitated, confused as to when she had gotten so close as to be able to hand him anything, but he took it all the same. Remembering the waterskin in his other hand he took a gulp and dug into the food.
"You tell an interesting story. One most people would not believe and one I advise against sharing ever again." Isendra said. "I only believe you because you are such a painfully honest and sweet child and are clearly not insane. And your being out here is explained by your tale."
Izuku stopped chewing on the tough meat and blinked dumbly at the woman. He decided to keep his manners and finish chewing and swallowing before responding.
"What's so interesting or hard to believe about it?" He asked. "Similar warp accidents happen all the time. When I get to a police station I can call home and the school and confirm it if you want."
"I do not know what a police station is or what you mean by calling, which are yet more pieces of evidence that you are telling the truth." She explained. "Plus, I saw this garbage patch you mentioned. I have seen the objects from your homeland, objects unlike any from any land I know of, and I know of them all. I also have confirmed, multiple times, that they had been warped through the gap between worlds. You are not on the planet you know anymore young one. And pray nobody beyond me learns of this."
Izuku stared at her.
She stared back.
"I don't believe you." Izuku said simply before taking another bite of the meal she had provided him.
She laughed, a genuine mirthful laugh.
"And what reasons do you have to doubt me?" She asked.
"Well, besides the strange way you talk, I was already attacked by gibbering lunatic who clearly had a quirk. So far you're the second person I've met and I'm working from the assumption that you yourself may be insane." Izuku told her a bit bluntly. "Even after you said you're sure I'm not. Plus multiple worlds theory is barely even a hypothesis. The realm of fantasy."
She didn't get angry at his matter-of-factness or rudeness, merely smiled more deeply. It had reached her eyes now.
"Well, young one. You will find that your manner of speech is the strange one here. And in time you will come to accept what I said. Or maybe you won't. That is up to you.," Isendra said. "Having found you out here I feel a responsibility to escort you back to the encampment. There you can get new clothes and food. Especially with this."
She picked up one of the table legs and held it up to the light in admiration.
The only reason Izuku didn't panic at the sight of his "weapon" in her hands was because he was all but certain that even with both of them he had no chance of surviving if she decided to get violent. So he was working under the acceptance that his life was in this crazy ladies hands.
"This is quite possibly the highest quality steel I have ever seen in my life." Isendra told him. "I think Charsi may pay a high price for it, and then you can afford clean clothes, basic camping and survival gear and meals for some time. From there, your fate will be yours to decide with or without me."
Izuku nodded with every crazy word she said. He could safely ignore the woman's claims that the cheap steel legs from the desk were at all valuable and the existence of this Charsi person. No point in asking about these delusions. But something she said did warrant curiosity.
"And why do you feel responsible for helping me?" He asked.
She looked at him and gave him a much warmer and kinder smile that the amused one before.
"Because, young one. I want to be a great hero too."
Izuku didn't know when or how, but he'd managed to fall back asleep after his conversation with the crazy - but nide, he mentally added - lady. Somehow despite doubting her sanity he felt supremely safe with her watching over him. Did that make him crazy too? He would be justified in thinking the entire evening and night were a fever dream, but he woke up in that meadow all the same and Isendra was still there watching over him.
He also still stank and was covered in bug bites despite both of their efforts to keep the meadow smoky. Of course, most of the itching, red marks could have come from the swarm of insects he'd waded through the day before.
"Your trousers, boots and socks are all ruined." She told him. "But you cannot be walking around the Blood Moors in your undergarments and bare feet, so you will have to suffer wearing them today and get new clothes this evening. Followed by a bath... in liquor and tomatoes juice. If we can find any."
He couldn't disagree with either of her suggestions, aside from the unpleasant day of walking ahead of him.
"I think I can loan you socks at least." Isendra said. "Hopefully that will assuage some of your discomfort. Breakfast is bread. Get dressed and get ready to go."
She left the clearing to give him some privacy, already laden with her pack. He found that she had folded his pants on top of his shoes and even laid out her own clean socks on top for him. He sniffed his shoed and gagged. Yeah, that was gross. As were the bottom halves of his jeans. He noticed that above the knee heigh of the jeans he hadn't really ruined the jeans and he could get away with turning them into knee-length shorts.
He picked up one of the knife she had seemingly forgotten next to where she had used it to cut the meat for the skewers last night, and used it to slice off the offending cloth. With that done he donned his new pair of shorts and socks. Then came the repulsive part. The shoes. He closed his eyes and held his breath as he put each one on. They were thankfully dry but he still shuddered at wearing the things he had just smelled.
With those tied he put on his belt, fastened his makeshift clubs into it, sheathed the knife and walked out of the meadow towards whatever craziness the day may hold.
This story was ghostwritten by NonsensicalRants as commissioned by Magikuser. You can hire NonsensicalRants to write your stories as well, all you have to do is provide him with a rough outline and contact him on his patron.
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