8- Stain's League
The Hero Killer: Stain. He had heard about him, the man was infamous around Japan for killing dozens of high-grade heroes. He had done research into the man and found that it wasn't simple bloodlust or anger fueling him, it was a determination to bring down "false" heroes. He admired the man's goal, as it was quite similar to his, but the act of killing was a barbaric thing he didn't want someone trying to improve society stooping to. So he sought him out.
He had last been seen in Hosu, where he had done irreparable damage to the hero Ingenium's legs. He briefly told Kuroi his plan, to which she objected, but let him go anyway.
He sat in the train, slouched and completely covered by a trenchcoat. He would put on the Judge's mask once he found the Hero Killer. Noatak tapped his foot in boredom before pulling a book from the coat. It was something Kuroi had given him, a thriller book about a detective trying to find a killer. Although he could sense the plot twist of the killer being his partner from the first few chapters, it was still good.
The train rumbled on, occasionally hitching or bumping.
"Please hold onto your seats passengers." The passengers erupted into screaming as a massive, grey form burst through the side of the train, groaning as it dully looked around.
"Stay here!" An old man in a hero costume slammed into the monster with incredible speed, dragging it out of the train and the city outside.
A boy, probably a hero student, dressed in green poked his head out of the hole, yelling, "Gran Torino!"
Out the window, he could see the city erupt into flames and screaming. A villain attack. Both good and bad. With so many heroes roaming the streets, the hero killer could easily pick one off in the chaos, where Noatak might be able to find him. But that also meant there would also be a lot of heroes, confident heroes.
It would probably be Noatak's last chance to find the man though, as Stain would probably get arrested today with all the heroes in the city. His lips thinned in a line as he hung out of the hole in the train, if he didn't even find Stain he'd be really pissed.
He jumped out, bursting forth water from a hydrant to cushion his fall, also soaking his coat. Great.
The Hero Killer liked to operate in alleyways, so he jumped across rooftops, quickly checking the alleys beneath him as he did so. Screams and panic flooded his ears from the surrounding city, but he paid it no mind, slipping his mask on as he approached an alley where the sound of battle came from. It could have just been between a hero and one of the monsters he had seen roaming the city, but there was no harm in checking.
The glow of flames was barely visible in a street, and as he neared he could hear a man yelling. As he peered into the street. He felt his blood run cold.
"The streets will run with the blood of hypocrites!" The Hero Killer, eyes blown wide and hair wild and frazzled, was yelling, with deadly determination at a group of heroes including the number two hero Endeavor, freezing them all. "False heroes! I will reclaim the title of Hero! The only one who will kill me is All Might! Only All MIght is worthy!" His vision wavered and tunneled as the man challengingly stood against the heroes, his jaw quivering.
He wasn't talking anymore.
"Oh." Endeavor seemed to snap out of his fear, gingerly approaching the man. "I think he's out."
Noatak stumbled, regaining his senses. The heroes below were still stunned, Noatak could easily attack them, but Endeavor would definitely take him down if he tried.
The whole trip to Hosu was a bust. That man's willpower and determination could have been something amazing. If he had convinced Stain to join him, they probably could have taken down even All Might. Now, Stain would be taken to Tartarus, highly improved since his escape, and would never see the light of day again. A shame.
–
He walked through the streets of Musutafu, phone pressed to his ear. "How was it?" Kuroi asked.
"Total bust. Guy's never gonna see the day of light again, no use for him anymore."
"You see the news? Some video of him ranting got out and people are raving over it, probably gonna result in a wave of villainy."
"I saw it in person actually. Got there just in time to hear it." He turned into a wide plaza, a sparkling fountain, and various screens adorning the area.
"Guess that's a dead end then. Hey, have you ever considered-"
"Hold on," Noatak said, lowering his phone. One of the screens displayed a newscast with photos of Stain and two unknown figures next to each other.
"We have reason to believe there is a connection between the Hero Killer Stain and Shigaraki Tomura's League of Villains. This League was the same group that attacked the USJ in an attempt to kill All Might. New information is still-"
He raised the phone back to his ear, turning around and picking up his pace. "Kuroi. Do you remember that sleazy broker with the purple jacket who tried to recruit us for some job to kill All Might?"
"Yeah?" Kuroi hesitantly answered.
"I need you to find him, I'm gonna go scour alleys and other places he might be. He's connected to the League of Villains, and they were working with Stain." He grinned, "Looks like it wasn't a bust."
"Are you sure?"
"Absolutely. Anyone that man worked with must have the same determination and morals as him, I need to get in that group."
"Fine. Stay safe."
–
Kaina grinned. Only one student in her class had failed the Final exam, compared to the five kids from 1-A. She would rub it in Aizawa's face the entirety of the training camp, and she wouldn't feel bad about it now that he wasn't wrapped up like a mummy.
She sat down, idly chatting with Mandalay, the leader of the Wild Wild Pussycats, as they waited for the students to make their way to the forest for dinner. They were in the middle of a forest, far from the reach of villains, where with the help of the cat-themed hero group, they would push students' quirks to their limits to improve them.
"There's no way a villain attack could occur here." The woman next to her said as they stood up, watching as 1-A students appeared and gathered around the edge of the forest.
"Yeah," Kaina replied, shifting on her feet and playing with her fingers.
–
Noatak sighed, taking a sip of his drink before setting it down. He had finally managed to get into the League of Villains, only to find a lazy, stinky, rotting, black-haired pile of flesh, a man-child, a dramatic stage performer, and a manic little girl. A drooling, braindead psychopath sat restrained in his seat, a hulking figure sat at the bar, shrouded by a cloak, and a boy, barely out of middle school cleaned his gun in a somehow dramatic manner.
"Hey! Hey!" The blonde girl ran up to him with a smile on her face, eyes dilated like a curious cat. "So what's your quirk? Muscular won't tell me, Spinner seems embarrassed about it, Dabi's too stinky to ask, Moonfish is an idiot and Mustard just starts rambling about righteousness and blah blah blah! What's up with you? What's with the mask?"
"Blood control." He replied. He had expected something… Better from Stain's group. The leader Shigaraki, the petulant man-child with a hand covering his face, would just rant about killing All Might when asked about his morals. When he had asked about any connection to Stain, he gave iffy answers, neither confirming nor denying it.
The girl hadn't spoken in a while. In the hour he had spent here waiting for the mission to start, the girl hadn't shut up once. He looked over at her, only for her face to cover his entire field of vision.
"Blood?" She grinned at him like a deranged serial killer, which given where they were, she probably was. Her pupils formed slits like a cat waiting to pounce on a mouse, trained on the eye holes of his mask.
He scooted away from her, deeper into the booth. "Uh, yeah."
"Show me! Show me!"
He forced some blood to pierce the skin of his forearm and idly spun it around into patterns and swirls. He just barely relaxed as the girl's eyes dilated, locking onto and tracking the blood. She probably wouldn't attack. Probably.
"That's awesome! So you're like me and Stainy! I really like Stainy, which means I'll really like you!"
He raised a brow to that. Was she like the Vlad King guy he had killed when he was a teen? "Really? What's your quirk?"
She pulled out an empty syringe from a pack on her back. "I can transform into a person if I drink their blood! Can I have some?" She pointed at his arm and the blood coming out of it.
"No." This was what Stain's group was like. A bunch of weirdos. Nothing at all like the man. He could barely understand how these people could reflect Stain's ideas. The lizard seemed like a Stain fanatic, but he was also weird.
Her eyes narrowed, but she stuffed the syringe back where it came from. "Fine! But I'll get some soon because we're gonna be friends! I'm Toga Himiko! What's your name?"
He let the blood flow back into his arm and rolled down the sleeves of his trenchcoat. "Call me Amon."
"Oooh, scary."
Toga badgered him with a few more comments before they were interrupted by the raspy voice of Shigaraki addressing every villain in the bar. "Hey! Shut up!" The chattering in the bar, which was mostly Toga, halted. "The attack on UA will start in a bit, get ready. Remember, All MIght won't be there, so you'll be fine. I want Bakugou and the Midoriya boy captured." He glared at the braindead one and the cloaked one. "Alive."
The man massive grumbled dismissively, "Yeah. yeah, whatever."
Noatak sighed as a purple void appeared in the room. If this was a waste of time Kuroi was going to rub it in his face for months.
After seeing Toga walk through, he plunged into the portal, shivering at the cold sensation and the odd feeling of his gut twisting.
Toga slipped on a mask, attached to some tanks on her back, complaining about how "uncute" it was while another guy told her to suck it up. These guys were annoying.
Dabi, the burnt man, stepped to the edge of the cliff. "The League made a mistake using a bunch of fodder to attack the USJ. A small group of elites is what they need. The first thing we'll do is take away their sense of peace, and show them that their lives, rest in our hands. The Vanguard action squad will show them."
Dabi seemed just to hate heroes. He could sort of relate to that, but the burnt man's, along with what seemed like everybody else's, ways of dismantling heroes were barbaric when he could provide a simpler way.
Noatak sighed, allowing Toga to annoy him as they set up a small camp. They'd attack the next night when the students were playing a game around the forest, scattered and easy to pick off.
–
Kaina sighed, trying to silence Monoma as he ranted and bragged about how amazing 1-B was. She appreciated the praise her class was getting, but Monoma was also insulting 1-A to their faces.
"Should we start with practicing evasive maneuvers?" She asked, giving up on silencing the boy.
"Yeah, sure. Should we pair them in groups?"
"Everyone!" A loud voice shot through her head, courtesy of Mandalay's telepathy quirk. "We're under an attack! Two villains attacked us, there may be more incoming. Everyone return to camp, we're regrouping."
Aizawa ran out the door, and she could hear the sound of a brief battle before more students began talking outside. Good. That meant Aizawa had won. As the students shuffled in, she cracked a window open, opened her arm to reveal her rifle, and took aim outside. She scouted the outside for any villains, ready to shoot to cripple. Tense minutes passed, waiting for any possible disturbances.
She hoped she wouldn't have to shoot.
–
"Ochako, are you okay?"
"Yeah," A brunette girl replied to the question her frog-like friend asked, "It's just a scratch."
Amon stood behind Toga, ready to assist her if she needed it. Shigaraki had placed them together for no other reason than they both had blood-related quirks. It was stupid when he could have been doing something more important.
"Mmm." Toga hummed, unsatisfied as she inspected her knife. "It's shallow. Not enough blood. So boring."
The frog girl used her tongue to fling the other girl away as Toga dashed, getting a small cut on the tongue.
"Get back to camp!" The frog yelled.
"Tsu, come on!"
As Amon readied to help keep the Ochako girl there in the little clearing, Toga paused, turning around to reveal a blush adorning her face. "Tsu… Tsu! That's such a cute nickname! I'm gonna call you that too! Hey Amon! Let me have fun with my new friend, don't interrupt." He sighed, why was he even here?
"Don't even think about it, only my friends get to call me that!" The girl leaped away, but Toga threw a syringe with deadly precision, pinning her to a tree by her hair.
The girl squirmed as Toga happily skipped up to her. "Yay! Then that means we're friends!" Noatak winced, looking away as Toga got uncomfortably close to the girl's face, fawning over her while waving a knife around. "You're bleeding," she said with false pity, "I could just eat you up." He could hear the demented grin growing in her voice.
He looked up as the sound of running approached Toga.
Ochako yelled as she threw a punch at Toga, only for it to be dodged as Toga quickly swiped her knife at her cheek, narrowly missing. Performing a takedown by grabbing Toga's arm, the girl was slammed into the ground.
"Stay there Amon!" Even pinned to the ground, Toga grinned, a bright blush on her cheeks. "I'm just playing with my new friends."
"Fucking weirdo." He muttered, crossing his arms.
"Ochako," Toga started, "You've got the same smell as me. You have a crush on somebody, don't you? I can tell, we're just two lovesick girls." Toga squirmed beneath her, manically grinning up at the girl. "Don't you wanna be like them? It starts out cute, you start dressing like them and talking like them. But then, you start acting like them, and you can't help but wanna become them. And once you're at that point, there's no going back. I like people who have been cut and slashed up, which is probably why I always end up cutting people up." The girl pinning her down seemed as grossed out as him, uncomfortably shifting. "Isn't this fun? Just two girls hanging out!"
Stab!
It took a while for anyone to realize, but Toga had plunged a syringe into Ochako's thigh, siphoning blood.
"Suck- Suck- Suck."
"Uraraka!" The yell of a boy snapped everyone to their senses, Ochako pulling the syringe out as Toga slipped out from under her, falling back to Noatak. "Are you okay? Who are they?"
The girl got to her feet, glaring at the two of them. "They're villains! The girl's crazy!"
Toga gasped, her eyes locking onto the battered green-haired boy on the big guy's back. "Amon!" She squealed, "I want him!"
He sighed and held his hand out at them. With a difficult pull, the boy was ripped off the big guy's back, and into his grasp. He held him tightly by the back of his neck, presenting him to Toga.
The group, growled as they stepped forward, and the green boy, who he realized was the one from Hosu, yelled out in surprise.
"You try anything, I blow his arm off." He threatened the group, freezing them in place. "Hurry it up Toga, this one's strong, I won't be able to hold him for long."
"Thanks, Amon!" Toga smiled, plunging her syringe into the boy's side as she stared into his eyes with a creepy grin. "So cute!"
Amon's eyes blew wide as a noise echoed throughout the forest. Anyone else might have passed it off as Mustard going trigger-happy, but he would never forget that sound. That distinct sound of a bullet made of hair being fired through the barrel of a rifle. He hadn't heard that sound in eight years, but he could never forget it. He dropped the boy, causing Toga to yelp.
"The bastard." He growled as he ran, abandoning her as he broke through branches and stumbled through bushes towards the origin of the gunshot.
–
Through the window, she could see a scarred, black-haired man. She fired, pinning him in the foot. As she reloaded, she could see the man move out of her vision and towards the front door. She burst out of the room and through the halls, getting outside just before the villain could get within attacking distance of her.
"Not another step! The next bullet goes through your lung. And I don't miss."
The man lazily grinned, locking onto her with bright blue eyes. "Doesn't matter if I lose here anyway. We've already won. UA and hero society are so strongly linked. With so many slip-ups on your end, so many villain attacks, so many… missing kids, faith in you will break down, and with it, faith in heroes." She glared at him, rifle aimed directly at his lung, she could take him down right here, with a shot to the knees or-
Her face contorted as the man's face drooped, melting into brown liquid.
"It's too late, hero."
–
As he broke into a clearing, he made out a head of purple hair in front of the man building, scoped in against a melting double of Dabi.
His throat tore as he screamed, rushing towards the woman like an animal. "Nagant!"
The moon cast light on her, but not enough to make out her face. He hoped it was contorted in fear. He stumbled as a voice came out of his earpiece. "Vanguard Action Squad I've got the target, converge at the rendezvous."
Bang!
He gasped and wheezed, his hand rushing up to his chest. That bullet had hit his lung. Somehow, her next shot missed, landing right next to his foot. He glared at her as she reloaded, tearing out a chunk of her hair and shaping it into a bullet.
He had to leave. "Next time-" he choked on a glob of blood, "Next time I see you, I'm gonna fucking kill you! I'm gonna tear your spine out and shove it down your throat!" He turned and ran, forcing the blood to stay in his body. He would struggle with breathing until his lung tissue recovered, but he was lucky. Like the other times she had shot him, the bullet had pierced his body, leaving nothing to clean up.
He barged into the rendevouz clearing, to the sight of Dabi telling Twice and Toga to shut up.
"Woah Amon!" Toga rushed to him, followed by twice. "What happened to you?"
"Oh my god, you got your coat all bloody, what a shame! Serves you right, I don't like you asshole! Anything I can do to help?"
Dabi squinted at the sky before his eyes widened. "Shit!"
Something crashed into the ground next to them, sending dust into the air. As the dust cleared, he could see Compress, the man who stole Bakugou, pinned down by the big guy, the green-haired boy, and another boy with two-toned hair.
"Woah woah I know those dudes! Who the hell are you?"
"Give us back Kacchan and Tokoyami!" The boy's demands were reduced to a scream as Dabi blasted a torrent of blue flames at the group, who barely managed to dodge it.
Twice rushed the two-toned boy, pulling out a razor-sharp steel measuring tape from a component on the wrist of his suit.
Toga lunged for the green-haired one, introducing herself as he narrowly avoided her knife.
"You got them?" Noatak wheezed out to Compress, ignoring the fight around them.
"Yes of course, I'm a professional."
"Good, let's get outta here."
The big guy yelled at his friends, protecting them from attacks. "Come on, I swiped Bakugou and Tokoyami from his pockets! We can leave!"
Noatak groaned in frustration, as Dabi raised his hand. "Dammit Compress." Flames licked at his hand before Compress laid a hand on his wrist.
"Now now," Purple voids coalesced behind them, "I said I'm a professional. And pros always have a trick up their sleeves." He took a step back into the portal, raising a hand to his mask and pulling it off. "Here's a tip, students. If you think you outsmarted me, it's cause I wanted you to." He let his tongue roll out of his mouth, revealing two marbles lying on it.
"Ha." Dabi chuckled, "Sorry for doubting you."
As Compress put his mask back on and bowed, Noatak stepped into the portal to meet the grinning form of Shigaraki.
Toga rushed to him, fawning over his wound. He'd like to think it was concern, but it was more likely hunger.
"Oh my god! Can I have some? Pretty please?"
He groaned. "No."
Dabi and Compress emerged from a portal before it closed, Dabi clutching a blonde boy by the neck. "Lost the bird boy, but we got Bakugou."
Shigaraki let out a raspy giggle, his nails clawing away at his neck. "Good, good. Very good."
–
An-
I really feel like Toga would quickly try to latch onto anybody with a blood quirk. Her character is defined by a want to feel accepted as she is, and somebody witha blood quirk who she feels might hav egone through the same struggles as her would stand out as someone who could accept her. Clearly, by noatak calling her and everyone else a weirdo, he does not feel that way.
-I dont like working with the cannon parts but it is neccesary for a fanfic. Canon is important to the story, and while I can just skip a lot of it as it doesnt relate to the fic, i do still need to write some of it, which means going back and watching the show and trying to kinda keep things consistent.
-I like doing the original parts more, which is nice because the best parts i have planned will be mostly in original settings
-this wont be one of those fics where I COMPLETELY change canon and have weird time skips to like 2 years later or something itll mostly follow canon. I dont really care much for changing the other characters arcs because MHa characters are actually really well written and have good arcs wasted on this fucking fandom. Most of the story will revolve around the characters I dub important
-love you :33