Bakugo glares down at his hands, shaking with effort to get his quirk to blast through the prism's power – but to no avail. He looks back and watches Mia's head bob as she shifts and stirs, waking slowly and grunting in pain. Steven Starling sits beside his sister.
Stella Starling is beautiful and deadly. Raven colored hair, thick and shiny, reaches her waist. She has big, doll-like eyes that are the same color as an overcast sky. Her skin is soft and pale, but if you look closely you can see the lines of age forming at her eyes and the corners of her mouth. She wears her golden corset under the black tailed coat. Her long legs are covered with fishnet stockings and tall, shiny black boots. A garter is holding an embellished dagger against her thigh. Stella smirks at Bakugo when his expression hardens.
"We returned your thief, now let us go." Bakugo demands. Stella's thin eyebrows dart upwards. She lounges back on her couch and sighs.
"Yes, I know, and I'm very grateful," she holds out a hand, the bald woman is there in a second with a glass of dark liquor. Stella chuckles, "You have no idea how much this little virgin is worth."
Both Starlings laugh at this. Now Bakugo understands this intrinsically gross feeling about them he got the moment he met them. They're sick, and clearly up to something. Their voices have this slimy, seductive air about them that makes Bakugo's skin crawl.
"Witch," Mia hisses groggily. Her insult just makes Stella's eyes twinkle while she takes a tiny sip from the glass. Her lipstick leaves red marks.
"You see, boys – Oh! I should tell you I already took it upon myself to find out who you two are. Izuku Midoriya… Katsuki Bakugo. You two are really something, huh?"
It's like she's flirting with them. She keeps biting her lip and looking them up and down. Either that or she wants to eat them.
"Why are you holding us hostage?" Midoriya asks, his voice more calm, less shaky now. "What are you going to do with Mia?"
"We'll have her properly punished, of course," Steven chimed in as if it was obvious.
"You can't just go around doing whatever you want with her! She's a person! She deserves a fair trial and fair treatment!" Midoriya shouts.
This sends the Starling siblings into a fit of laughter. "Of course we can, you idiotic child! Do you know why?"
Stella stands. She meanders to the prism and sips her drink, "Because we own her. We own this Circus, right down to every person, beast, and flea-bitten what-have-you in it."
She waits for them to reply, but they're both too stunned to speak. Bakugo's eyes are harsh as he watches her. Her once gleaming expression fades to an intense stare, her eyes bearing into him.
"You two could be a pretty addition to our company," her eyes flicker between them as she says this. "Or… maybe someone out there would pay top dollar for you."
"Just let them go, Stella!" Mia snaps, tugging against her binds, "You got me back so let them–"
Stella turns, eyes wide with terrifyingly intense fury. She splashes the contents of her glass in Mia's face and screams viciously, "SHUT YOUR FUCKING MOUTH!"
Mia rubs the alcohol from her eyes with her shoulder, blinking hard against the sting. Stella's eyes are on her, unblinking. She slowly sits back on the couch. Finally, her eyelids flutter and she seems to have snapped out of the rage, "You," she begins in a low voice, "have made a very big mess tonight."
"Think of what we've done for you," Steven agrees, "We adopted you, fed you, clothed you, we gave you a place to call home-"
"You USED me!" Mia's voice is thick with emotion. "This isn't a home! I'm not your daughter, I'm your prisoner! You took advantage of outcasts and orphans and made them your pawns to cover up all your dirty work!" She looks at Bakugo and Midoriya, "They've been helping the League of Villains!"
A pit formed in Bakugo's stomach. Midoriya let out a surprised gasp. That's why she tried to force us out, Bakugo thinks. She saw them in my past.
Stella and Steven Starling both just beam with wolfish grins. Mia continues.
"They've been smuggling black market items across the world for years. But now... they've been trafficking humans with certain quirks to the League of Villains for an army."
"An army?" Midoriya repeats in disbelief.
"Telling them this doesn't make a difference, Mia, baby," Stella purrs, "They'll be coming with us. They are from UA after all, I'm sure the League will be very pleased with us."
"No," Mia defies through grit teeth.
"No? Are you going to stop us? You going to play hero?" Steven says between mean, patronizing chuckles. He leans close to her and puts a gloved hand on her chin, forcing her to look up at him, "Haven't we gotten that through your pretty little head, Mia? Girls don't get to be the heroes. You just sit here and look beautiful and leave the hard stuff to the big boys, hm?"
Stella stands up again, her gray eyes not leaving Mia's face. Her movements are unsettlingly slow as she saunters over and kneels in front of her. She puts a pale hand to her cheek, "Your only purpose is to make us money," she mutters, the strange sensuality still thick in her voice. She caresses Mia's cheek, then runs her sharp fingernails up and down her jawline. "Poor Mr. Shephard would have been so sad if you didn't come to America with us."
"I won't!" Mia cries. Stella slaps her. Her hand on Mia's cheek sounds like the whip of a lion tamer.
"And what can you do to stop us?" Stella snarls. There's a thick pause.
"C'mon, Stel," Mia's voice has changed. It sounds casual, nonchalant. "You're the one who taught us all the magic tricks."
Mia pounces on Stella in a sudden start of movement. Her hands clasp around Stella's neck and forces her to the floor in a hard thud. Mia then lunges across the table for the bald woman who set the prism on Bakugo and Midoriya, but Steven Starling unsheathes a small dagger and stabs it right through Mia's hand and into the table. Mia howls and screams in pain.
"You stupid little bitch," Stella gasps, trying to catch her breath. "How did you get free?"
Mia takes deep, jagged breaths, watching the blood pool around her hand. She whimpers as she takes the dagger handle with her free hand and yanks it up. Blood pours out onto her lap. She looks at Stella, "Circus trick 101. Everyone here can do escape acts. It's as easy as card tricks."
Bakugo's fists are shaking. As an aspiring hero to sit there and watch is infuriating. He has never felt this way. Quirkless... Helpless... And none of this would have happened if he had just let her go.
Mia flipped backwards, narrowly avoiding Stella's grasp. Landing lightly on her feet, Mia didn't waste a moment. She sprang into the air, using a nearby tent pole to propel herself higher, out of Stella's immediate reach. Bakugo saw her face scrunch in pain from using her cut hand. He could see it shaking while she was perched above them all.
Stella hissed in frustration, her eyes tracking Mia's every movement. "Running away already? How disappointing."
"Not running," Mia shot back, her voice echoing from above. "Just getting a better view."
With a powerful leap, Mia launched herself from the tent pole, somersaulting through the air and landing gracefully behind Stella. Before Stella could react, Mia struck with a series of rapid kicks and punches, her agility and speed giving her the upper hand. Stella manages to land a punch on the side of Mia's head, making her stagger back. Mia darts swiftly past Stella, but Stella lands a few more blows, on her ribs, her back, and her bad arm that makes Mia shriek.
Stella hadn't noticed Mia steal her bejeweled dagger. Mia leaps over the couch and lands the blunt handle on Steven Starling's temple. Nobody had noticed him cowering behind the couch with a cellphone to his ear. The shock makes his body tremble and go rigid before going limp on the couch. Stella and the bald woman jolt into action. Mia pushes herself off the table and does an aerial right over Stella's head. She grabs a fistful of her black hair and yanks her to the ground again. But the bald woman lands a hard kick right in Mia's stomach. She flies backward against furniture and crashes down hard to the ground.
"GET UP!" Bakugo suddenly screams from the prism. He slammed his fists against it, "COME ON, KEEP FIGHTING!"
The bald woman is on her, but Mia rolls out of the way. She twirls, handspringing and flipping to avoid any punches the woman throws. The flashy display of movements makes it hard to keep track of what she uses in offense. As she lands in a handstand, she twists and kicks the woman in the head. Her head hits the ground with a sickening thud. The prism flickers and vanishes. Bakugo and Midoriya take a stance beside Mia, ready to fight.
"M-my quirk still isn't working," Midoriya says, flexing his hands.
"Neither is mine," Bakugo growled in frustration.
"Your quirk won't come back for the amount of time you were in the prism for," Mia explains quickly, eyeing Stella staggering to her feet. "They should come back in a few minutes."
"Alright, I guess we're doing this old school." Bakugo puts up both fists, ready to beat this bitch. There's a flash of white light at the very top, center point of the tent. The spot turns a grayish-white. As if the tent had become stone. The gray spreads outward, covering the entire top of the tent. Bakugo notices that as it spreads, the ripples in the tent freeze.
"Oh FUCK, " Mia shouts, "We have to get out of here!" She turns and makes a break for the side of the tent, grabbing Bakugo's arm with her bloodied hand.
"Are you stupid? We gotta blast this lady to hell!"
"They're teleporting!" Mia points to the consuming grayness, "Anything it touches goes with it. If you want to be sent to the other side of the world, in the middle of fucking nowhere with these people, then be my FUCKING guest!"
Bakugo hesitates. Stella stumbles to the edge, places a finger on the graying tent, and she freezes and turns to stone. It's only then that he races under the tent flap and follows Mia and Midoriya. They weave through the paths of tents, watching as the carnies brace themselves and wait for the gray. Some of them call out to Mia, but she ignores them and races past. They get to the clearing where her backpack still lies in the grass. She scoops it up and onto her shoulder as she passes without missing a beat. Bakugo finally feels a tingling, almost stinging sensation in his hands. He reaches forward and lets out all the pent up frustration and anger from being helpless into one massive explosion against the fence. It's so intense the shockwave nearly knocks Mia over.
"HEY!" The group of circus girls appear and chase after them, "Mia, wait!"
The gray is closing in faster than before. Mia sprints through the opening Bakugo made and stops on the other side. Bakugo and Midoriya follow, but remain tense. The girls skid to a halt just on the other side of the fence.
"Mia, what are you doing? Come back," One holds out a hand, her eyes darting from Mia to the Heroes.
Mia shakes her head, "I'm sorry."
"You can't just leave us!" Another protests, shrill with sudden realization that Mia is not going with them, "We're all in it together, remember?"
Tears stream down Mia's face and she looks away. The girl shouts her name one more time. But the iron fence before them is gray now. They link arms, and one girl sadly reaches out and touches it. Bakugo then notices the clouds above them. They are swirled and have a small opening in the center, like the eye of a storm. Mia still doesn't turn to watch as the Starling Quirk Circus turns to dust and floats up and into the sky and vanishes. The hole closes. Thunder rumbles and the clouds release rain hard and fast.
The three of them are frozen in place for a moment. Mia drops to her knees and lets out a sob. Blood has soaked her own white glove, the tear in the center of her hand dark and oozing still. Blood drips from her nose, it's caked in her hair that was once so beautifully in place. She looked like a super star before. Now she just looks fragile, thin, and sick. She clutches her back pack to her chest and sobs again.
Bakugo nods to their right and says to Midoriya, "Looks like everyone is over there."
Their classmates looked on from a huddle near an array of fire trucks and ambulances. The bystanders all gawked into the sky and at the large opening where the Circus had been just seconds ago.
"Come on," he says. He leans down and firmly, yet with a surprising gentleness, pulls Mia to her feet and begins walking towards his teachers. Even from this distance away, Midoriya and Bakugo can sense the anger-aura seeping from Mr. Aizawa. Mia staggers, both Heroes catch her and steady her again. As they get closer, Bakugo sees Mr. Aizawa's expression shift.
"What on Earth happened?" He demands, looking back and forth at the unscathed students and the bruised, bleeding acrobat.
"We can explain everything," Midoriya says, "But we need to get her to a hospital…"
All Might was already waving down the paramedics nearby. Mia is suddenly rushed by people in white uniforms, asking questions and pushing her onto a gurney. Her eyes widen in panic and she moves away from them, refusing to sit. She ends up behind Bakugo, clutching her backpack and scowling at everyone.
"Hey, it's alright," One paramedic says soothingly with a hand extended, "You're pretty banged up, we'll take care of you."
Mia doesn't move.
"What's your name?" The paramedic tries again.
"Mia," She answers, her eyes flutter and she sways.
"Mia… Mia what?" The paramedic inquires.
But Mia went pale. Her eyes rolled back into her head and she timbers backward. Bakugo and Midoriya lunge to grab her body before it hits the ground. They help the paramedics load her into the ambulance and turn to their teachers. The rest of their class had already been ordered to board their bus.
Bakugo and Midoriya waited for the inevitable lecture, but Mr. Aizawa let out a heavy sigh and wordlessly motioned for them to join their class.
"You saved someone?" Kaminari asked as they took their seats, feeling exhausted.
Bakugo scoffed and put his head in his hands, "Not at all…"
"Well... what happened then?"
Midoriya looks out the window at the ambulance with Mia inside driving off in the pelting rain. "She… she saved us…"
Hello readers! Ok I have to admit I didn't change too much of this story than I thought I was going to. I haven't looked at it since 2020, the manga is basically over, and I realized my new ideas for Mia just didn't bring the story where I wanted it to go. Make sure to review and let me know what you think if you're a new reader! :)