The Hydra wasn't one to play around. Takuma barely waited two hours before the first movement of troops began. Seated on the terrace of a café, he sipped a strong cup of coffee. This part of town was nearly empty during the day, with barely a thousand people around, so he didn't have to struggle to enjoy the moment. He'd been there since delivering the information to the gang, and his wait had been worth it. The Black Dragons' lieutenants were out in force, leading the men and women of the gang to pre-established points to begin their assault on the hideouts of the C.R.C.
The lieutenant was what interested him. High enough in the organization to be trusted to lead, she was a prime target for some snooping. Her mind was slightly harder to penetrate than the average person's—a strong sense of duty and belief in what she was doing made her a difficult target. Magong was all show, no substance in comparison.
Sayaka was leading a group of ten members of The Black Dragons. Their orders were to wait for the signal to launch an attack once every group was ready. Pushing into her memory, Takuma found what he was looking for. She had been in the same room as the Hydra—a man in his forties, strong-backed with tattoos and a thing for suits, it seemed. He was a cold, calculated man, and he knew of The Chemist. His alias was paying off. The gang was moving to take out the remaining members of the C.R.C., and the Hydra had already sent out feelers to search for the serial killer. He wanted Magong and the notoriety that taking out a chapter of the C.R.C. would bring him.
Everything was going according to plan so far. The attack would wait until the early hours of the night, and he trusted that The Black Dragons knew not to risk civilian casualties. The C.R.C. would lose the last bit of manpower they had, and Magong would be left with nothing to continue her reign of carnage in this part of the city. That meant his only remaining problem was keeping an eye on her to ensure she didn't do anything too stupid or too smart. With that thought, he paid for the coffee and left.
Takuma walked back to the hotel, still sending a flirty wink at the receptionist, who chuckled good-naturedly as he took the elevator and returned to his room. Extricating the unbroken toothpick from the lock, he unlocked the door and let himself in before closing it behind him. All the while, he made sure Magong was still there—and she was, if the dozen men who had been invited to the penthouse were any indication.
Diving into the woman's thoughts, he discovered that no, they hadn't been invited. Sundered Will, the bunch of druggies he had disregarded as irrelevant, was making a play for Magong.
Takuma felt his good mood vanish. "Fuck."
He knew next to nothing about them, and Nova's data wasn't much better. Magong's mind was alert in her office. Another mind, far tougher than anyone he had met in the last few days, was with her. Takuma linked himself to her ears and eyes to follow what was going on.
"-danger for us," the woman said as she poked around Magong's wardrobe. "What do you have to offer?"
Masayi swallowed thickly as she thought of her answer. Takuma could feel her fear and how violated she felt having this woman look through her belongings. She also knew that if she didn't give her what she wanted, she would be killed.
The woman in question was young—early twenties at best—and Takuma looked into Magong's mind for a name. Nyx. Takuma's stomach dropped. This wasn't just a name. This was a Villain name. A Villain was at the head of Sundered Will.
'Shit.'
Short black hair with a noticeable scar under her right eye. Her clothes were blue jeans and a stylized shirt from some rock band he had never heard of. She could pass for any college-aged girl, but here she was, intimidating a chapter master of the C.R.C. for reasons he didn't know. He needed to be careful—he had no idea who she was.
A quick check around revealed that the two guards were dead, and her staff had been corralled into a room her men were guarding.
Refocusing his efforts on Masayi, he waited to see what would happen next.
"You could use The Founder's name. If you want to go after The Black Dragons, I have men who would be more than happy to hit them where it hurts. One of my operatives has already dealt a harsh blow to the Hydra by taking out two of their lieutenants. I'm sure she could use your knowledge to take out their leader with ease if you're willing to work with me."
Sundered Will wanted to go after The Black Dragons? Taking care of Satori was already paying off as he listened to Magong negotiate with her life hanging in the balance.
"Only two?" Nyx asked, smiling with all her teeth. "I would have thought a chapter of the C.R.C. would have done a better job of taking care of nuisances."
"The resistance from the Carmine was... unexpected," Masayi replied, internally panicking at being called out on her affiliation.
"The blood drinkers hide their strength well—only a moron would have thought them easy to deal with," the younger woman said as she stopped perusing the other woman's belongings and slowly walked closer to her. "And here I have the biggest of them all under my tender care," she added, sitting on Magong's lap and pushing her face closer to hers—far closer than the leader of the Founder was comfortable with.
Takuma himself felt ill at the second-hand touch, even worse than normal due to him tapping into her thoughts. He could feel Nyx's weight, how she pressed herself against him/her. He took a step back, cutting his link to her sense of touch and focusing only on her thoughts and hearing. He knew where this was going.
Magong, with more ego than sense, wasn't willing to take things lying down. "I am not stupid, they even hav—"
Nyx kissed Masayi to cut her off.
"Do not—"
Another kiss, wet and sloppy this time, as the Villain greatly enjoyed cutting off the older woman.
"Cease—"
This time, she cut her off by grabbing her face and digging her nails into the flesh of her cheek. "Open your mouth," she ordered.
Magong hesitated, then did as she was told. The hand moved to her throat as Nyx feverishly kissed her, with Masayi remaining still, unwilling to resist the younger woman.
Takuma quickly cut the link after that little display. He shuddered in disgust, feeling like he was going to vomit.
'Fucking power move.'
He moved to the bathroom, splashing cold water on his face to ground himself in the present.
'Fuck this.'
He didn't dive back into either woman's mind as Nyx wasn't done establishing dominance over her prey. He focused on the bruise and pain from the member of Magong staff, it helped deflect most of his discomfort for now.
He was reminded of all the women who had sex with him—not for the sex, but for the dominance. Having a homeless guy to toy around with for a night did wonders for some women. There wasn't much better to destress than taking it out on someone who couldn't fight back. His hand shook, and he couldn't really do anything about it.
'I really wish Mei was here,' he thought, before reminding himself that being far away from this situation was better for her. He wished he wasn't here instead.
Changing targets, he turned his Quirk toward Nyx's men. He couldn't yet risk going into her mind without more information. Villains were too dangerous for his usual approach. Most of the men working for her were scared shitless. He felt nothing for the druggies—they weren't victims themselves, just low-lives forced under the wing of a more virulent leader. The last one had died, murdered, a week ago. Torn by shadows. Maybe her Quirk? The Villainess had taken over in a single night, with threats of death and slaughter for any who disobeyed or tried to run. She had killed a few of their members, skinning them with blades made of pure shadow before slitting their throats. She was not to be messed with.
A sadist and a hedonist. He didn't want to think about what she would do to him if she knew what he was about to do. He used his Quirk and closed in on the light that was her consciousness. Earlier, his spying had been done with the grace of an overweight cat rolling down the stairs. Now, he was slow and steady, wary of any trap or reaction from her Quirk. Some had the capacity to feel his snooping, and he didn't want to gamble with his life, not when he was starting to enjoy it for the first time in years.
Nyx—she didn't think of herself under any other name. She enjoyed the power she had over Magong, the glee that filled her as the woman danced to her tune. She didn't want to fuck her; she simply enjoyed playing with her food. Pushing into her memory by heightening her joy at making the woman she straddled suffer, he searched for a memory that would explain why the Villainess was here in the first place.
An order, from high above, she was part of an organization. Sent here to curtail the Black Dragon's rising power. An enforcer? This would explain why someone of her caliber would be down in the mud with the rest of them. The local struggle for power was nothing to the great crime syndicate unless one of them had something to gain from stopping the Hydra in his tracks. But who?
He fished for more information, ignoring the litany of threats the young woman was sending to Magong.
Flashes of memory, of people he didn't know. The details were blurry due to Nyx's mental strength. But there was someone she recognized in her memory. Nova. Nyx was an enforcer for The Madame.
'How is this shit getting worse?'
He quickly searched for a more recent memory and found it. Unfortunately, Nyx wasn't the serial killer. Takuma rubbed his face as he took in how bad things truly were.
The Founders were about to be dealt with by the Black Dragons.
The Carmine were the ones killing most of the Founders over the last few weeks.
He had an agreement to deliver Magong to The Hydra after the serial killer was caught.
Magong was now the toy of Nyx, now leader of Sundered Will, who was, in fact, an enforcer of The Madame, part of the same crime syndicate as his friend Nova, who was the one who asked him to deal with the situation in the first place.
The Hydra would strike in a few hours. And Nyx was busy pulling any information she could out of her prey, like the location of every relevant safe house. She would, without a doubt, want to take control of them with her own men soon, which would clash with the Black Dragons. There could be blood running down the streets this very night, and Takuma would be responsible for every civilian caught in the crossfire.
Takuma was here as a P.I. and didn't care for any gang in particular, besides the Carmine. The Chemist was aligned with The Hydra, and if he was taken down, then this alias would be well and truly burned.
This was a shitshow of the highest order, and it was only going to get worse.
Takuma let himself collapse. He hit the ground harshly and just curled into a ball. "I could just leave," he said to no one in particular. "Nobody knows I'm here."
He could just leave, go back to Mei, and forget about everything. Why did he have to do anything when the one person who wanted him here didn't realize she was sending him to work against her own organization? Which would have her killed in a heartbeat if they learned what Takuma had done as a 'personal favor.'
Everything felt wrong. Not even maiming a member of the C.R.C. brought him the joy he was used to. He was just disgusted and tired. So FUCKING tired. Living was taxing, plunging into the minds of so many people was taxing, and dealing with inter-gang politics was taxing. Takuma already wanted to call it quits, and the shit hadn't even hit the fan yet. It would, probably tonight. Meaning he wouldn't be able to go home.
He felt something wet on his cheek, his vision blurry. "I'm not crying," he said out loud to no one. "I've got no reason to cry, it's just business as usual. I'm not sad, I'm not."
His words sounded hollow, even to himself.
How many times did he nearly die because two gangs couldn't co-exist? How many friends did he lose after being caught in the crossfire? Too many. Why couldn't he just do what needed to be done without being a little bitch? He hadn't even properly taken care of Satori. Chopping some fingers off wasn't enough. But he couldn't be bothered. He had a way out, and somehow it was enough for him to lose his steel.
"I guess this is the first time in my life where I have a place to return to," he thought out loud. "No, not somewhere. Someone."
The house meant nothing to him. The woman living there did. But she was so far removed from his way of life. Hell, the only other person his age he interacted with was Midoriya, and he wasn't much better. When those two interacted, he felt like an alien that had just landed on another planet. He wished he could care about what heroes wore and what gadgets they used. But he couldn't. He just wondered how he would go about dealing with them, how he would take them down. How strong would they be against his Quirk? That was what occupied his mind every day. How to keep himself safe. How to survive.
'Push, even if you're scared. Keep moving. Forward.'
That was how he dealt with everything. When he was scared, sad, or angry. He just had to keep moving forward, whatever the cost.
Takuma stood up, dusted himself off, and wiped his tears as he breathed deeply. "Alright, what am I going to do about this?"
The gangs would fight tonight, that was certain. Most civilians had probably gotten wise and stopped going out at night. If it wasn't because of the serial killer, it was because of the C.R.C. attacks. That meant most normal people would be safe and sound at home when The Black Dragon and Sundered Will fought it out.
The only ones at risk were the homeless population and whoever was either too dumb to hunker down or not from this part of the city. They would be caught in the crossfire unless someone was there to give them a hand. Meaning he had a job to do.
"Vigilantism it is."
The serial killer could wait. He had his own kind to look out for this night. The canvas bag he had bought all those months ago was opened, and Takuma grabbed the shock maul and attached it inside his jacket. Mei had once again shown why she was a genius by making small adjustments that were so obvious once they were done. He grabbed the two grenades she had not-so-sneakily snuck into his bag. The pink one was her sticky grenade, and the other was a concussion one that would help thin a crowd in case of emergency. Both were stuffed into the quick pocket his hero costume possessed. He flexed his shoulder and made sure the breastplate and collar sat in the place they were meant to. He was going to jump feet first into a shitshow of his own making. Blades were the least of the things he would have to look out for tonight, but one couldn't be too safe. He had someone to go back to, and he refused to make her wait longer than necessary.
"Alright. Don't get caught. Don't die. How hard can it be?"
Things aren't going to plan ? Wonder why.
