Green Tea Rescue

by ss3dj

When Midoriya Izuku was 4 his quirk finally manifested. The doctor named it psychokinesis, but his friend Bakugou Katsuki called it worthless. For the next 10 years, Izuku would grow up bullied and isolated. Then, when a new student named Uraraka Ochako transfers into his class the last year of jr high, everything changes. Rated M for eventual themes.

66. We Meet Again

When Inko had dropped Eri off at the Bakugous—promising her that if she was good, then she would get to have apple pie for dessert tomorrow—Mitsuki had pulled her aside to get the down low about what the heck was going on. She didn't mind looking after the little squirt, but for Inko to say she was planning a night out, well, that had gotten her attention. What kind of night out was she going to have?

Inko pulled back her shawl to show off the dress, and Mitsuki openly gawked and pointed, instantly recognizing the dress as one she had given her friend so that she could be wearing something nice when she finally left Hisashi and wanted to have a night where she would be dragging someone to the nearest love hotel.

Bare-shouldered, with only a tiny spaghetti strap around her neck to keep the dark, almost black, green velvet cloth from letting her top be exposed. Though with the way the rest of the dress clung and accentuated her rounded curves, the only way the rest would come off, was if someone was on their knees pulling it down.

When Inko had said she might be a little late picking Eri up, Mitsuki made it clear. If she wasn't picking Eri up tomorrow morning, she would smack her.

Before she left, Mitsuki had one last question. Toshinori or Chitose?

Inko smiled softly, and said that she got the feeling a dress like this would give that poor man a heart attack, which got a faux scandalized gasp from Mitsuki.

"Inko, you sound like you're going out with bad intentions."

Nenshouki smiled back, a smolder in her eyes and a huskiness to her voice. "Tonight isn't about being good."

---

Inko was a little surprised, as she walked the streets of Hamamatsu towards the high rises of the restaurant district, that she hadn't chickened out. Not because she was potentially sticking her nose into a situation that might get her hurt. No, death didn't have the same terror it once had. Maybe coming so close to death fucked her up more than she knew.

Actually I know it did because I'm thinking like you again, Inko thought to herself while seeing Nenshouki smirking at her. Her dark reflection wasn't in her old army greens, but the old patchwork dress she used to wear for date nights, cut and sewed to make a certain pre-douche person feel a very certain kind of way.

Death wasn't what was going to send Inko back home. It was that her whole plan, if you could call it that, hinged on the fact that she had the sex appeal to go full Casanova and sweep Chitose off her feet.

Chitose had flirted with her a few days ago, and had seemed very excited at the prospect of them eating together. Inko eyed the building she was walking to, where a very, very fancy restaurant was located up in the penthouses. Yes, very excited.

But there was that, and then there was assuming that she— the round doughy woman that she was—had the charm, confidence and, to put it bluntly, the dominant sexual energy needed to get another grown woman on her knees. Even during her prime, this wasn't a fight she had much experience with. It wasn't like she flirted and sauntered her way into yakuza strongholds. She drove a truck through and came out blasting.

…

On her knees is just metaphorical.

Nenshouki rolled her eyes. Just like all the hedge trimming is a metaphor for—

…

"Oh my god, I'm not ready for this. I'm not James Bond. I can't just—"

"Oh my god, Inko?!"

Suddenly hearing her name stopped the mighty ex-eco-terrorist / yakuza slaughtering MILF from turning on her heel and labeling this whole 'plan' as FUBAR'd. Inko had reached the building, and Chitose was waiting for her.

And…

Oh. My. Gawd.

If the black sundress Inko had seen Chitose in before had been stunning on the blue woman's form—letting the world know she was fucking gorgeous and out of everyone's league—what she was wearing now screamed, no, broadcasted, a whole different and more intense message. She was a sexual goddess and she was going to have someone screaming in incoherent bliss by the end of the night.

I'm fucked.

Yeah, I think that's her plan.

Chitose strutted forward with a smile and sensual purpose. The cocktail dress was like a second skin, the black fabric clinging to her body. The top was a sash of cloth that went around her neck, crossed in a X across her collar and was pulled taught over her breasts, covering the top, but leaving her cleavage, underboob and most of her upper abdomen fully exposed, an open window of succulent blue skin. Just above her navel the dress circled around her, covering her up but hugging her hips tight. The dress ended just at mid thigh, leaving her luscious legs knee-weakening naked to the world. Her stilettos cocktail heels made sharp clicks with every step, the dagger heels pushing Chitose on her tiptoes, giving the woman another several inches of height.

Inko was way past the point of no return and it seemed like she was punching way above her weight class in the charm offensive game.

Look at it this way. You win and you get answers to your questions. And probably some really hot freaky sex.

… And if I lose?

You get to have some really hot freaky sex.

Inko took a moment to steady herself and got ready for the hardest fight in her life. Okay. Time to go full shaken, not stirred.

…

Neither Midoriya or Nenshouki was willing to take credit for that horrible line.

---

Himiko gave a startled yelp as something small and furry bolted out of the bushes and right over her foot.

"Damned squirrel," she muttered. She made it through all of 1-B's bull and it was a little critter that got her to react. "You don't tell anyone you saw that," she ordered back at Kouji, who was busy looking anywhere but at her.

Smart boy.

The bushes rustled and another critter bolted across the path. Then another. Soon squirrels, rabbits, and other furry animals were making mad dashes across their path like they were late for the ark.

Himiko gave a small chuckle. "Oh, I bet 1-B's scare tactics has got all the poor animals all wound up. That—" Himiko almost bit her tongue when several large black bears leapt by, a small sleuth in a full sprint, leaving both students to keep extremely still until the stampede was over. "Holy shit! Guess now we know what got the little things all in a hurry. A bunch of Winnie the Pooh's are hungry… Holy fuck, that was like ten fucking bears. Fuck me." Himiko had to take a moment. Doesn't matter how much of a badass you are, if bears suddenly run across your path, you're taking a moment. "You know, I've never seen a bear… Eh?"

Himiko felt Kouji grab her wrist, and plant his feet, keeping her from going on. She was a little startled at how insistent he was in making sure she didn't move.

Damn when he doesn't want to move he doesn't move. Easy to forget that despite his gentle demeanor, Kouji was a big boy.

"Okay you big scaredy-cat, let's keep it moving," she smiled. "Shouldn't you be the least scared of animals out of… anyone…here?" Himiko now had a look at Kouji. And he wasn't scared. People like to mix up the words, but what was spreading across Kouji's face was something more than 'scared.' It was fear. A deep unsettling growing fear. Which didn't fit the moment at all. "Hey, hey what…"

"The animals." Kouji's big eyes were scanning the woods. The way his head was tilted showed he was listening intently. His voice was quiet but strained, his fear pushing past his anxiety about talking to others.

"Eh? What about them? Just some bears hunting… right?"

Kouji shook his head. "That wasn't hunting. That was running. Fleeing. They were all running away. Even the bears and other predators. All the animals were running from…" Kouji stopped looking and listening as something hit him. "They're all gone."

Himiko glanced around. "Gone? Is that why it's… so quiet?"

It was quiet. Unnaturally quiet. The woods were too damned quiet and it was getting Himiko's instincts acting up. "What were the animals running from?"

"Death."

Anivoice let Kouji talk to animals. Command them. The animals couldn't talk back to him, but Kouji could understand each animal's body language. Knew what a bird's chirps, or a dog's barks all meant. Animals didn't have the same kind of understanding of the world people did, so they couldn't have conversations the same way people could. But there are things that are just universal. Death was something anyone or anything alive understood.

Himiko's hand moved up towards her waistband. "There's something in the woods that's got animals thinking they're going to die if they don't get the fuck out of here?"

Kouji nodded.

A flash of metal came as Himiko pulled a knife she kept hidden for emergencies from her waistband. Kouji flinched at the sight. His expression changed from shock to confusion when Himiko flipped the blade in her hand and held the hilt towards him. "Here."

Kouji's big eyes looked down at the knife, then back towards Himiko. He started shaking his head, but Himiko wasn't having it. "Listen to me. If all the animals are running, then you can't use your Quirk, can you? Not without screaming at them to get their attention."

Kouji frowned and nodded solemnly. With the animals already in a panic, it'd take a lot of effort to get them under control. He'd have to be loud, and he doubted Himiko wanted them drawing attention to themselves.

"Then you need to be able to defend yourself." She pushed the hilt closer to him. "So take the damned thing already." He shook his head and Himiko growled. "Damn it, I know you're scared but you can't be a coward right—"

"You need to be able to fight. You're better than me," Kouji countered, low but firmly. Standing up to scary people was hard for him, but he knew that the knife should be used by the person who could actually use it.

Himiko's face softened as it clicked what Kouji was doing. "You're a good egg Kouji. I'll be fine. I'll be able to work a lot better knowing you'll be able to defend yourself with this. Okay?" In other words, if he didn't take it, Himiko wouldn't be able to do her thing because she would also feel worried about his safety. "So take the knife and let's decide which way we're going."

Down the path or turning around.

With a timid but determined nod, Kouji reached to take the knife. But as his hand wrapped around the black faux leather, he saw the steel glinting in the dark. There shouldn't have been enough light for that.

Himiko looked at the knife, and the strange blue light reflecting off of it. She turned, and watched as the horizon began to glow a bright, hellish blue. And rising above the glow, were thick black smoke. All of it coming from the direction further down the path.

Himiko sucked in a breath. "They're burning the damned woods. Shit!"

Neither said it, but they knew what this meant.

Villains.

"Yaoyorozu, Jirou… Bakugou and Uraraka were ahead of us," Kouji whispered, his breaths starting to come in quick and shallow as he clutched the knife close. "And the rest of 1-B."

A heartbeat later, and Himiko took off, straight down the trail and into darkness. Kouji huffed and puffed as he hurried to keep up.

---

The only warning the Wild Wild Pussycats and the remaining pairs of 1-A students had before their night of fun turned into a nightmare, was when Pixie-Bob noticed that there was a scent of smoke in the air.

Mandalay was looking up towards the mountains, startled to see black smoke rising over the trees. Tiger, who had been encouraging the remaining students to prepare themselves for the test of courage, turned around. His eyes drifted up, thinking he was going to see what his teammates were looking at. But as he did, he saw above the treeline, hidden by the night sky but standing in contrast to the pitch black smoke, a flutter of green. Then, twin streaks of bright green that shot across the air like a bolt of lightning. Right towards—

"PIXIE-BOB!"

Tiger dove at Pixie-Bob, who didn't even have a chance to register anything before Tiger was right at her, just as the two bolts of green struck with sickening thunks.

In that instant, everyone froze from shock as they all looked at the two heroes laying on the ground.

"Wha—What's going on?!" Minoru yelled in shock while Tenya and Shouto took several hurried steps towards the downed heroes.

Mandalay quickly swung out a hand towards the group. "Don't move!"

Mandalay needed the kids to stay put. Suddenly, she was being forced to split her attention in multiple directions. Her friends and teammates were down. She had the kids she needed to worry about. There was the assailant themselves. Plus the unknown factor of everything else that was going on. At the very least, she needed to know where the kids were, in case she was forced to put herself between them and this attacker.

Mandalay reached out with her Telepathy, calling out to the pair, holding her breath to see if she'd get a response.

Mezou's arms spread out, eyes and ears looking in all directions. "Twenty meters up and fifty out, there's a single person in the air." The eyes narrowed. "Green cloak and… a bow?"

Tsuyu sucked in a breath. "Didn't the reports on the news say… that Shigaraki was assisted in his escape from a villain using a bow and arrow?"

"I think I'm hearing more people in the smoke's direct—" There was a twitch in Mezou's ears, as they all suddenly focused on a spot in the woods' shadows. "Two more right in front of us!"

"Awwww, and there goes the entrance you wanted to make. Oh well." The voice spoke with a feminine edge, but there was a gruff callousness to it.

"Damn. But hell, she got two in one strike. She might be a camper, but can't argue with the results," came a second voice, this one sounding lowered, like he was trying to make his voice more villainous. The second person, a lizard man, emerged from the shadows first, arms stretched out dramatically. "Pleased to meet you, U.A. students! Allow me to introduce ourselves. My name is Spinner. This," Spinner motioned back towards the woods, "is big sis Mag. You can call her Magne."

The woman that came out, was carrying a large beam over her shoulder, wrapped in a pale gray cloth, the length and size making it seem like she was hauling around a construction site I-beam. She was wide and muscular with a square jaw thinly covered in facial hair. "Hello dears."

Spinner then swung a hand up, pointing towards the dark sky. "And you've already met our very own Robin Hood, Beros."

The green cloaked archer made an annoyed tsk behind her mask, grumbling that her position was being given away by her own teammates.

"We're the League of Villains Vanguard Action Squad. And in following the tenets of Stain, tonight, we now hold everything. Because your lives are ours to spare and spend as we see fit."

Tenya flinched hard hearing that. "Stain?" A dark ghost of a feeling swirled in his gut. More shame at his previous actions. The memory of the hate he once bore against the one that had hurt his brother. "So you're followers of him?"

Behind him, Fumikage had a hand gripping Dark Shadow tightly. The shadow hissed, its body coiled up like an angry cat. "We, the school, took precautions. How did they find us?"

Spinner ignored the question, and instead focused on Tenya. "We joined the League, following in Stain's footprints. Through the League, I will carry on Stain's will, even after his unjust incarceration."

Reaching backwards, Spinner removed from his back, the giant sword he had fashioned together from knives and other smaller blades. Chained or strapped into shape with belts, the massive weapon was an unhinged tool of bloodletting. "And as one of the many that shoulders Stain's legacy, we know who is to blame for his fall."

Spinner hefted the weapon up, so it was pointing at the class. "You Four-Eyes. And you too, son of Japan's false idol." Shouto frowned. "We know about that nutcase from the sports festival and Midoriya. We know all of you, and that false disciple, were instrumental in what happened to Stain."

Mange smirked, leaning on her weapon. "Look at you, you're enjoying this, hmm? Always nice to finally get to be heard."

Spinner tried not to flinch when above them, Beros floated so everyone could now see her. "You want to make a statement? Stop standing around boasting like a forum poster and do something!" Reaching back, she pulled out more arrows, and the kids all were very aware she was taking aim at them.

"Take out the last adult and these kids will scatter. She's in so much shock she hasn't moved a bit." Spinner turned his weapon towards Mandalay.

Mange seemed fine with that. "Well then, kitty cat, time die like the rest of your little tea—"

Beros glanced down, and saw that the hero wasn't wearing a stunned expression, but one of concentration. And at no point, she realized while cursing that she'd been forced to babysit a bunch of rookies, had either of the two below her checked on the bodies of the heroes she had shot. She whirled around so that she was aiming at the hero now. "She's not in shock, you idiots!"

"Now!"

Mandalay screamed out, signaling the counter-attack. After the initial attack, Mandalay had asked the pair to give her a sign they were okay. Small taps on the ground by each had been the only signal they could give. Tiger rolled off the ground, and rushed towards the two villains on the ground, ripping the arrow out of his shoulder. At the same time, Pixie-Bob, clutching at an arrow in her abdomen with one hand, slammed her other hand onto the ground, sending giant spikes right for Beros, who had to push herself hard to float out of range, firing several arrows to destroy a few spikes that got too close.

Mange got her weapon up to block Tiger's assault while Spinner backpedaled as Mandalay soon joined the assault. At the same time, she screamed out to everyone at camp. "Everyone! We're being attacked by three villains! With more deeper into the woods! Everyone who can move, get back to camp immediately! Even if you come across the enemy, retreat and do not engage! You hear me Kouta?! Get back to camp! I'm sorry I don't know…where you're always running off to… I'm sorry Kouta I can't come for you, so you have to get back to camp! …Please, if someone knows where he is, if you see him, please get him back!"

She swiped at Spinner before she yelled at the kids. "That includes all of you! Retreat back to the camp site now!" Her tone left no room to argue.

Tsuyu, Shouto, Fumikage, Minoru, Mezou, Tooru, Mashirao, Hitoshi and even Mei all clearly disliked the idea of running. But Tenya begrudgingly soon got all of them moving. Pixie-Bob, still on the ground, threw up a wall to cover them as they retreated into the darkness.

---

"Everyone! We're being attacked by three villains! With more deeper into the woods! Everyone who can move, get back to camp immediately! Even if you come across the enemy, retreat and do not engage!"

Izuku had frozen in place when he saw the smoke and fire. He knew none of 1-B could have or would have gone so far as to set whole swaths of the forest on fire for this test of courage game. It could have been another test—he wouldn't put it past U.A. to suddenly drop a surprise catastrophe on the classes and make them work to deal with a sudden forest fire—but, Aizawa had pulled students out for extra lessons. If this was a U.A. thing, he wouldn't have done that.

That just left the impossible, and Izuku was trying very hard not to think about that. A villain attack was impossible. U.A. had taken steps to make sure they wouldn't be a target. Even going so far as to keep All Might away.

So whatever this was, had to be something else. Is what Izuku had been thinking right up until Mandalay's telepathic warning shattered that desperate hope.

Her words were still sounding the alarm in his head as Izuku's feet started pounding the ground, propelling him forward. The fire was deep in the woods, where 1-B and the first few groups of 1-A were. Mandalay's warning to the students to retreat and not engage wasn't even registering. Kouji, Katsuki, Kyouka, Momo, Himiko and Ochako were in the middle of this attack. And he would be damned if he turned tail and ran.

"You hear me Kouta?! Get back to camp! I'm sorry I don't know…where you're always running off to… I'm sorry Kouta I can't come for you, so you have to get back to camp! …Please, if someone knows where he is, if you see him, please get him back!"

Izuku came to a screeching halt, sucking in a deep breath through his nose. Eyes wide, Izuku turned, looking up towards the direction where he could just see a small rocky hill peeking up above the treeline.

No one knows about Kouta's hiding spot?

Izuku's mind raced as he started playing things out. He had no idea how many villains there were. What their Quirks could be, aside from potentially one that was fire based. He didn't know where anyone from 1-B was, as he wasn't deep enough into the woods to have run into anyone. He knew who was in the forest right now from his class, but not where they were. Assuming they were still even on the path. He knew where Kouta was, having seen the boy sneak off earlier. He knew that even if they were being told to run, if push came to shove, some of 1-A's most dangerous fighters were more than capable of fighting back if they had to.

But Kouta can't…

It hurt Izuku to make the choice. But it also was incredibly easy, too. He knew any villain stupid enough or unlucky enough to run into Himiko or Ochako was going to get absolutely destroyed. That's what he knew and believed. So really, there wasn't much of a choice for Izuku to make. His friends could defend themselves but Kouta couldn't.

Well?! Get going! He could hear Ochako yelling.

So Izuku turned and bolted off the path and into the woods, towards Kouta's hiding place. Trusting that Ochako would be able to take care of herself.

---

"So," Tomura spread out his hands, acting calm and non confrontational, "I suppose you're a little surprised to see—"

"FUCKING BLAST THIS FUCKER!" Ochako screamed in rage, while at the same time Katsuki was already throwing his hands up, explosions popping and crackling along the way, creating an arc of orange light.

"DON'T TELL ME WHAT TO DO!"

The blast was a cone of orange fire and ear splitting noise as it tore through the air and ground, straight for the flat-footed villain. His careless attitude, though, wasn't from naive thoughtlessness but because he knew he wasn't going to get hit.

Out from the trees, something blacker than the night shot out, slithering at high speed over the ground and covering the distance between the treeline and Tomura. Coiling up, Katsuki's explosions slammed into the black mass, fire and smoke rolling off its body while behind it, Tomura was not affected at all.

Katsuki clicked his tongue in annoyance and slowly lowered his hands, but kept his palms facing the smoking area. Ochako sneered, but bit her tongue, fighting her instincts to scream at Katsuki to keep going.

"Not going to say anything?" Katsuki could see the stress etched on Ochako's face.

"I'm fucking pissed. Not stupid." Ochako hated this. She wanted to see Tomura's body shredded, his corpse tumbling across the ground in mutilated pieces. But she was trained by All Might, Gunhead and Miruko. Each one of them had instilled a very particular lesson: Keep your eyes open and see. So she and Katsuki had taken immediate notice that his explosion hadn't done anywhere near the amount of damage it should have.

Even with whatever had moved to block Katsuki's attack in the way preventing the heat and fire from getting past, there was no reason that Tomura should have been able to just stand where he was and not get sent tumbling backwards just from the concussive force of the explosion.

And yet he stood, still as a statue. Completely unharmed.

Then there was the explosion itself. Katsuki had ripped off one of his strongest blasts, fully intending to fuck up the creepy bastard. Flashes of Inko's lifeless body had driven him to use way more power than he normally would, but in that instant, he wasn't interested in anything other than making Tomura a charred paste on the ground. The impact of Katsuki's attack should have cratered the ground and sent up a cloud of fire and smoke into the air. And while there was definitely an explosion when the blast hit, it wasn't anywhere near what it should have been. Somehow, when it hit the black thing, it had been weakened by a huge factor.

"Fucking… shit." Katsuki hated that the effect reminded him of something he'd seen.

Ochako was on the same page. "Shock Absorption?"

They'd both seen the Nomu at the USJ walk through Katsuki's explosions. And this seemed oddly similar.

"Maybe." Katsuki narrowed his eyes as the black thing began to uncoil. "That black bastard tanked 'em. But it didn't do that."

Ochako nodded. Casually, it seemed the same, but there was a difference. The USJ Nomu hadn't affected the explosions itself. It just wasn't affected by them. Slowly, the black thing began to uncoil, giving Ochako and Katsuki a good look at what now stood between them and tearing Tomura limb from limb.

Its black skin gave away its monstrous origins as a Nomu, but unlike the one they saw at the USJ and the ones in Hosu City, this one was far less humanoid in shape. Its upper body, chest, torso and arms, were the only part that still had a human-like appearance, though stretched. More so with its arms, which were easily twice as long as they should be, black skin pulled tight over tightly coiled muscles, fingers long and gangly.

The rest of it was more animalistic. The Nomu's neck was long and serpentine. Black skin hung down around its neck and folded in, giving the Nomu a loose hood that hid its face from the world, save for a pair of glowing yellow eyes that pierced the darkness. Along the Nomu's back, jutting out from the vertebra, were malformed black bone nubs that either had skin stretched over them, or had fully pierced through, giving the spine horrid looking, knuckle-sized, dorsal plates.

While the top, even with the elongated parts, still resembled something human, its lower body did not. Its torso ended into the top of a body resembling a horrific cross between a lizard or snake, and a centaur. Its front 'legs' were another set of arms, far larger than the ones at the top, engorged with muscle, looking as if they had been pulled off the USJ Nomu and then Frankensteined into this new monster. Its fingers ended in flesh-rending claws.

And where the Nomu's navel should be, Ochako and Katsuki were shocked to see twin rows of long, fanged teeth. Its mouth was right at its stomach. From the enlarged front legs, the rest of the body was long and slender, with two hind legs near its rear. These were actually legs, and much smaller than the other limbs, with talon-tipped toes. Long past its legs, its body continued on into a long prehensile tail that was almost as long as its whole body itself. At its end, a cluster of spikes, some as long as a forearm and as thick as fingers, ready to impale unfortunate victims.

All in all, while not a muscle-bound hulk, this Nomu was no less a monster. Its glowing yellow eyes narrowed as a hissing growl escaped its long throat.

"Easy now," Tomura warned. "You stay right there."

The hooded Nomu twisted its serpent neck around to glare at Tomura, but did as instructed.

"To chickenshit to face us yourself, huh," Katsuki seethed. Ochako wasn't sure if he was trying to draw Tomura out from behind the Nomu, or if he was just being his normal self.

"You're assuming I came here to fight," Tomura said with a sigh. "If I was here to fight, do you think I would have just strolled out to meet you?"

Ochako narrowed her eyes. "Right. You're just here to ta—" Ochako's biting comment was cut off as suddenly, a voice screamed into her head. At the exact same time, Katsuki also flinched.

"Everyone! We're being attacked by three villains! With more deeper into the woods! Everyone who can move, get back to camp immediately! Even if you come across the enemy, retreat and do not engage! You hear me Kouta?! Get back to camp! I'm sorry I don't know…where you're always running off to… I'm sorry Kouta I can't come for you, so you have to get back to camp! …Please, if someone knows where he is, if you see him, please get him back!"

When the message cut off, Ochako whirled around, eyes scanning the horizon, and gasped "Oh god."

"You motherfucker!" Katsuki growled, taking a step forward. The hooded Nomu's neck twisted back around and hissed out a warning. Katsuki wasn't impressed, raising a hand palm up and letting small explosions pop and fizzle as a warning. "Hiss all you want, you hood bastard. I got more where that first one came from."

The Nomu's large arms lifted its body up, while its claws dug into the dirt. At full height it towered over the angry teen, while its long neck let its head slither down to eye level, weaving around like it was ready to strike.

"Oi!" Tomura rapped his knuckles on its side. "I said, you stay where you are. I got business to take care of."

"Business?!" Ochako pointed out towards the blue glowing horizon. "You're attacking us, you fuck!"

"Ah, I guess that one hero with the telepathy Quirk got a warning off, huh. That's annoying. But when you're dealing with pros… oh well." Tomura waved Ochako off. "The League of Villain's Vanguard Action Squad is attacking you. I'm here to talk." He paused for dramatic effect, before pointing at Katsuki, "To you." Katsuki looked enraged that Tomura apparently wanted to talk to him, while Ochako felt her stomach twist. "So unless you want to waste more time…?"

Tomura watched the pair and smirked when he saw they both looked like restrained predators. "Oh. I bet that hero said something like 'don't fight the villains.' Didn't she?" He laughed at the angry faces the pair made. "Ha ha ha! Oh, that's rich. And here you two are, now trying to be good little students and follow the rules? It's a sick joke." He then turned to address Katsuki. "But hey, that just gives me more to talk with you about."

"And what the fuck do you have to say?" Katsuki growled out.

Ochako's eyes went wide as she whipped her head around to look at Katsuki. "You're actually talking with him?!"

"Pink Cheeks, we're under attack. The pros might actually want to hear what this bastard came to say," Katsuki seethed back.

Ochako looked disgusted, and she took a noticeable step away from him. Suddenly, her hostility wasn't just directed at Tomura at this moment. Some were starting to get pointed at Katsuki.

"Bakugou!" Ochako called after him. Her eyes narrowed into slits, with death reflecting in them. "If you ever do anything to betray the trust Deku's given you, I will kill you."

That confrontation in the hallway after term finals, that pointed warning was bubbling up in both of the teens' minds.

Katsuki frowned. "Fuck you."

Ochako didn't back down, and she wasn't even bothering to hide her open contempt. "You want to talk, after what he did to Deku's mom?!"

"In my defense, I feel kinda bad about that whole thing." Tomura added, with a raspy chuckle, "Really."

Ochako ground her teeth while Katsuki looked ready to spit blood. "What? Do? You? Want?"

Tomura held out a hand, like he was expecting Katsuki to take it. "To offer you a chance to join the League of Villains."

"…The fuck?" Katsuki didn't know whether to be grossed out, enraged or just plain confused.

"You know, I've seen you in action twice now. At the USJ when you were having a blast destroying all those worthless shits I brought, and when you took a swing at me back at the mall." Tomura smirked. "You're a person that loves to destroy stuff, aren't you? You were relishing the chance to cut loose and use your Quirk."

Tomura motioned at Katsuki. "Look at you. You're chafing under the heroes' rules. They're holding you back. But if you joined the League of Villains, well…" Tomura swung his arms out. "You'd be able to destroy and cause as much chaos as you could ever want. No more holding back. No more letting yourself be collared and controlled."

Katsuki glared while Ochako was just about ready to grind her own teeth flat with how tense she was.

"If you think about it. Because the way the world works, you'll always be a prisoner. The heroes don't like people like you and me. Or anyone in my League. We question their authority and demand the right to be ourselves. But because we're different, because we see the world for what it is, a fake held up by a single pillar, we're hunted and persecuted."

He held his hand back out to Katsuki. "But if we destroy it all, we can be free. You can be free. Isn't that what you want?"

Ochako realized she was holding her breath as she waited to see what happened next, her eyes darting between Tomura and Katsuki. Different scenarios were playing in her head. Almost all of them started the same way, and left Ochako wondering if she could cover the distance between herself and Katsuki before he got his hands pointed at her.

And snapping his neck.

Katsuki's hands twitched.

Ochako's legs tensed as she started to launch herself forward.

Only to get a step when Katsuki swung one hand up, the other gripping his wrist for extra support, and bracing with the palm facing Tomura and the Nomu. Katsuki's Quirk made several pops and crackles before he unleashed an explosion that was bigger than anything Ochako had seen him throw before. The force knocked her off her feet and sent her tumbling backwards. Even Katsuki was thrown back by the force of his own attack. Landing on his side, he rolled until he and Ochako were more or less tangled together on the ground.

"The fuck was that?!" Ochako screamed while she rubbed her ears.

"My fucking answer!" Katsuki seethed as he worked to untangle himself. "Motherfucker thinks we're the same?! He can go take his offer and shove it up his pasty, chapstick needing, ass! I want to win, you dipshit! And I've seen the look All Might has when he beats you sorry ass villains!" Getting a hand free, he pointed at Ochako. "As for you and your paranoid bull…" He trailed off when he saw that Ochako wasn't looking at him, but at what should have been a crater. When he turned, he ground his teeth. "The fuck?"

The smoke was already clearing, something that shouldn't have been possible from an explosion as big as Katsuki had fired off, and the Nomu was once again perfectly lined up to be between it and Tomura. Once again, it had lessened the power of Katsuki's attack when it made contact. Tomura, unharmed, was dusting off his clothes from the dirt he got sprayed with.

"Fucking, cheapass Shock Absorption bullshit," Katsuki seethed as he got to his feet.

Ochako was back on her feet, though she was staying crouched. "We need to get that Nomu out of the way if we're going to get to Shigaraki." The Nomu's head twitched.

Katsuki glanced down at her and tsk'd. "You got the same look that damned nerd has." Ochako looked up. "It's the look he gets when he's about to do something braindead dumb."

"…I'm going to charge the Nomu."

"Fucking hell," Katsuki swore out, but he wasn't exactly jumping at the chance to tell her to stop telling him her plan.

"Look around it. It's absorbing the impact of your attacks, but not all of it." She indicated towards the torn up ground. "So there's still some force making it through. I bet whatever its Quirk is, it's a weaker version of what the other Nomu had that attacked us at the USJ. That one was tanking All Might's punches."

"And?"

"So, if you can lay down some covering fire, I can charge in and touch it. Since it doesn't look like it can absorb all the impact from your blasts, once it doesn't have gravity, you should be able to launch it into the air." Ochako gave Katsuki a look. "Assuming you can be accurate with your Quirk and not hit me in the process."

Katsuki got his hands up. "Because blasting your ass into space would be the worst thing I could do tonight… Fucking fine. We'll try it your way." His eyes then moved past the Nomu and landed on Tomura. "But after the hooded freak is out of the way, I'm ripping this shit-stain apart."

Ochako growled, "If you think I'm letting you beat me to ripping that bastard apart myself, you're deranged. He's going to pay for what he did."

Ochako got ready to charge. Mandalay's order to run away being summarily ignored.

Katsuki's hands were already starting to sizzle and crackle.

Then—

"The round whore will shut her mouth. Or this time, no fire will stop me from snapping your neck." Twisted and inhuman, a new voice echoed in the dark woods, hissing and tinged with unhinged malice and reverberating with an unnatural echo inside itself. "Don't compare me to that trash."

You could hear a pin drop in the next few seconds as Ochako and Katsuki had to work out that the one talking was the hooded Nomu. The fanged mouth in its abdomend growled and hissed as its long head turned to look back at Tomura. "Boring talking is done. I want what was promised." The hooded Nomu's long neck twisted back, its head moving like a hunting snake. "Give me Bakugou."

---

"Aw man! We wanted our courage tested," Mina complained as she laid her head down on the desk.

Eijirou was leaning back in his chair. "Feels like the finish line just got moved back."

"Wait, isn't that supposed to be the goal line?"

"Same thing."

Neito pointed at them. "Even though your class is hyped up so much, look at how many of you have to be here. It's hilarious!"

The members of 1-A all gave him dry looks. Yuuga retorted with some classic french wit, "Trou du cul."

"Easy," Midnight warned with a low energy hand wave. "I happen to know some french."

"And Momona, you should take this time to worry about yourself, and not 1-A," Vlad King added.

Aizawa came walking in. "As for the rest of you. You wouldn't be complaining if you truly understood the real problem you all are facing." He eyed his students. "None of you seem to be aware that you're falling behind the others in your class. And that if you don't fix your behavior soon, that difference between you will only grow larger."

Midnight could tell that the kids from 1-A had some very strong opinions on that. A couple she was sure were going to voice some complaints. To feel like you're working hard and then get told you're not working hard enough could really sting the ego. That was probably why, while the morning's extra lessons were accepted with 'good grace,' these ones were being met with a lot more complaining.

But at the very least, the kids were accepting the situation. Begrudgingly, but accepting it nonetheless.

"Everyone!"

The sudden voice in the group's heads brought the room to a stop. Aizawa froze as he wrote on the rolled-in blackboard, and all the kids stopped slouching around.

"Oh, it's Mandalay's Telepath," Denki said as he glanced around.

"It still makes me jump. Having a voice in your head is weird," Mina chuckled.

Hanta rubbed his ears. "Would be nice if it was two-way, so I could ask her not to be so loud. Why is she screaming, anyway?"

"Quiet," Aizawa grumbled, his attention focusing on the voice.

"We're being attacked by three villains! With more deeper into the woods! Everyone who can move, get back to camp immediately! Even if you come across the enemy, retreat and do not engage! You hear me Kouta?! Get back to camp! I'm sorry I don't know…where you're always running off to… I'm sorry Kouta I can't come for you, so you have to get back to camp! …Please, if someone knows where he is, if you see him, please get him back!"

It was a testament to their pro hero training that Aizawa, Midnight and Vlad King didn't hesitate to act. Even as the kids started to let out gasps of surprise and their panic began to rise, Aizawa was moving. "Vlad, I'm leaving this place to you! Keep them safe while I go protect the other students!"

Vlad was giving orders to the kids, getting them to move desks and chairs to the windows, boarding things up to help make sure the room could be secured. It might not do much against an attack, but it kept the kids' minds on doing something, preventing full-on panic.

Aizawa was out in the hall, turning to close the door behind him, but Midnight was already on that. Both were soon sprinting down the hall for the exit.

"This place was supposed to be a secret!" Midnight hissed, her mind racing to figure out what the hell was going on. "How the hell did the villains know where we are?"

"We can worry about the how's and why's later," Aizawa grunted. Not liking the line of thoughts he was already considering. When they both rushed outside the building, Aizawa took a second to scan their surroundings, and he could tell that this was the USJ all over again, possibly even worse. Out here, where their isolation was supposed to help preserve their safety, their greatest defense was now the noose that was going to hang them. They were alone, with no one to come help them. If they couldn't repel this attack… "…This is bad."

BOOM!

A sudden explosion echoed over the tree tops and Aizawa's frown deepened. He knew where Mandalay was supposed to be, and that hadn't come near her. Which meant—

"Eraser! Down!" Midnight dove and tackled Aizawa to the ground, just before a large tree trunk was hurled over their heads and crashed into the building behind them, ripping off a long chunk of wall and the door, before the nearly full tree was left embedded in the building.

Both heroes quickly checked to make sure they were alright as they scrambled to their feet. Midnight whipped her head towards the building where the students were, and let out a breath as she saw that the huge thrown object hadn't gone deep into the building, most of the damage just being kept to the exterior thanks to the angle the projectile had arrived with.

"Midnight. Eyes front," Aizawa grunted. Pulling down his goggles, he had a hand on his capture cloth. "This one may be trouble."

Midnight turned back around, and hissed. Coming out of the trees into the clearing, was a villain that had an air of experience about him. If he had been the one to throw the tree, he was strong. But she knew Aizawa already had his eyes on him, so strength should be off the table. Though looking at the man's insane mutations—a wolf's head, claws and a reptilian tail—there could easily be other factors at play with him. The fact that he was casually strolling up to them, cigar clamped between his teeth, gave off an alarming confidence.

Chimera sucked in a lungful of cigar smoke, and expelled it as he pulled the thick roll of tobacco from his snout and held it between two fingers, which he pointed at the pair. "You two. Probably two of the biggest potential pains in the ass for this whole operation. You don't know the headache I had to endure to talk that mall-ninja prick into staying in the woods and let me deal with the two of you." He glanced over towards the building. "Vlad King is in there too, right? Looking after the kids?"

He stuck the cigar back between his teeth and took another deep pull. "Erasure, Somnambulist and Blood Control if the third hero decides to leave those students of yours. Yeah, that crispy turd wouldn't have lasted long here at all." The last of the cigar fell away and Chimera flicked the small remains into the grass. "The name's Chimera. Welcome to the night your world ends."

---

Inko had never considered herself a woman who could be swayed by the sins of the flesh. She was not so shallow and crass to let physical pleasure whisk her away and make her abandon herself. Even in her younger years, she was in control. But god save her, if what was being done to her right now wasn't about to make her moan in a way that would probably get her thrown in jail and live the rest of her life on a government watchlist.

But what was being done to her tongue should be criminal.

Chitose smiled as she leaned back from over the table, her eyes dancing with mirth and knowing. She knew what she had just done to Inko and wasn't bothering to hide it. "See." Inko didn't trust herself to say anything right then. "Isn't that the most tender and juicy little cut of steak you've ever had?" she asked as she put her fork down.

The slice of meat, cooked just past rare and cut into strips the size of matchsticks, almost felt like it melted as it danced on Inko's tongue.

From the moment the two had been seated, it was obvious that Inko had entered Chitose's arena. In this place, she was known. In this place she had power. With just a look or a small twitch of her fingers, she had multiple waiters rushing—or whatever the fancy version of rushing was—to bring anything and everything to their table.

To Inko.

Fresh bread that was still hot from its baking oven and herb butters that were probably made from France's own Brittany. Her wine glass—which was so heavy and thick meaning it was probably made out of solid clear crystal. and the gold adorning it was completely real—was never allowed to get close to empty. There was always someone ready to pour from a bottle Inko was sure was not only from the pre-Quirk era, but from a year that had a one in front of it. Trolleys with plates filled with appetizers that Inko was sure a single order of just one, would have been what she'd spend on groceries over at least two months.

The appetizers was also the first, and definitely not last, time Chitose had taken the chance to feed Inko. Always leaning over the table. Always making sure Inko saw exactly what she wanted her to see.

"You're literally eating out of the palm of her hand," Nenshouki warned the third time Chitose had done it. Though her younger self had said this while pouring herself another glass of wine.

"One day," Inko finally spoke when she was sure she could make sounds that wouldn't make a rich person's monocle pop out, "you are going to tell me why it feels like you own this restaurant."

Chitose smirked from behind her glass while she sipped at her wine. "Oh? Curious are we?"

"Stockholder?"

Chitose put her glass down and examined the different plates of entrees they had. Again, like the appetizers, she was taking wining and dining to an extreme, debaucherous, level. A single main plate didn't have much food, and Chitose was making sure they both could have their fill so the night went as long as needed. "Oh, I'm sure I have some. But I'd hardly call myself a majority shareholder."

Inko picked up her spoon, and lazily swirled it in a red leek soup. "Hmm, then maybe it's simpler. You have something on the executive chef." Chitose let out a dramatic scandalous gasp. "You did say you were a journalist before."

Chitose put a hand over her heart. "You would accuse me of doing something so horrible?"

The acting on display would make most Spanish soap stars say she should reel it in. Inko gave her a look. "You're a journalist that somehow worked her way up to executive director. Don't you sit there and say you don't know how to blackmail people." Inko ended with a very approving smirk. A very smoldering look. Showing she didn't just approve, but enjoyed the very idea.

Chitose smirked, and without a hint of shame bragged, "Okay. So maybe I would… and have done. But not in this case." She leaned in, chin resting in her hands. "But if I had, you wouldn't have a problem with it? Such a striking thing to say. To think the beautiful woman in front of me holds such a dark side."

Inko smiled, and taking a page out of Chitose's playbook, leaned over the table, holding up her spoon for Chitose to try some of the red leek soup. "Oh, you have no idea." Chitose didn't lean in right away, and Inko tried not to lose her nerve when it was obvious Chitose was openly admiring the way her breasts hung in the dress while she was leaning over the table.

"Steady." Nenshouki tried to reassure her. "You want her looking. That's the whole point of this hairbrained scheme of yours. She's just looking…. And licking her lips."

Mercifully, Chitose finally took the offered spoon between her lips. Though even that small movement was done with such sensuality that Inko was worried her nose was about to start bleeding. Those luscious lavender painted lips sliding over the spoon. The way she let her tongue just slip out to lick it clean as she pulled back. Each and every movement was there to drive Inko's imagination wild.

"Welp, she just won tha—"

Before Chitose pulled all the way back, the hand Inko had kept cupped under the spoon so it didn't drip reached up, and she ran her fingers up Chitose's neck. Letting them briefly hold her chin when she finished. "But maybe tonight you'll find out how wicked I can be. Power tends to bring out the worst in me."

This time, it was Chitose's turn to blush purple while Inko slid back into her chair. Outwardly looking completely calm.

Inwardly?

"The fuck did that come from?"

I don't know!

"Bullshit! Where did you get the idea to try that!"

… So you've met Toga.

"Oh fuck."

I panicked! We… I needed to score some points otherwise we aren't going to accomplish anything!

"You do realize you just let this fucking blueberry succubus know that touching is now allowed right?"

Inko gulped.

"And that thing you're feeling right now. That's her fucking foot sliding up your calf. Congrats, you get to play footsies now."

Chitose smiled wickedly as her foot, hidden by the table cloth, slowly traced up Inko's leg, lifting the bottom hem of Inko's dress so she could gently rub and tease the soft skin around the side and back of her knee. "Lucky for me, I'm a very powerful woman."

---

Chitose let her fingers linger on Inko's neck, gently tickling the sensitive skin as she feigned moving a few strands of Inko's hair back behind her ear, paying close attention the way Inko's eyes fluttered and her breath hitched.

Oh you poor woman. How long have you been without? It was obvious to her now, that she had hit the nail on the head with her earlier observation about Inko. This woman was desperately touch-starved.

Throughout the rest of dinner and as they waited for their desserts, Chitose found any and all reasons she could to make sure she was in contact with Inko. Playfully reaching for things on the table so her hand would come to rest on Inko's. Taking more opportunities to have Inko try bites of food, but now she would cup the other woman's chin. And of course her little game, seeing how high she could move her foot up Inko's leg before she looked like she would combust, had been as entertaining as it had been wickedly fun.

She had made it up Inko's thigh several inches. Maybe she could have gone further, if she hadn't overplayed and tickled the soft skin with her toes, making Inko shimmy, and move her legs closer together.

Not that this deterred Chitose. She just went back to climbing up Inko's leg like how she had started. Slowly but surely working her way back up to that spot.

Hmm, in one meal I've made more progress with this woman than that suck-up was going to make the rest of the year. Chitose winked at Inko, and giggled when she blushed. A near death experience and she comes to me. Oh Inko, you made the right choice. You've let yourself become dragged down by this world. You must have realized I could be the one to free you from it.

Chitose was confident she would have Inko back by the end of the night. Though, as her eyes lingered over Inko, she figured that it wouldn't hurt to wait to call in and report her success until the morning—Inko shuddered at another touch—until the afternoon afterward.

Of course, Chitose would need to figure out the next steps. Getting into contact with Izuku, and making sure that contact was constant. But that was for later. Tonight, she was going to enjoy herself. And enjoy Inko too.

On the other side of the table, Inko knew she was all but done. Dessert was served, and if Chitose happened to take some of the chocolate icing from one of the little cakes, smear it on her lips and kiss her, she was pretty sure she'd not only let her, but she was going to be reciprocating. Because, holy shit, had tonight drove home that she missed physical contact. Every nerve felt like it was on fire where Chitose had touched her, and she'd be damned if it wasn't an incredible feeling. This woman, Inko now knew, knew how to touch someone.

The problem was, Inko was all but certain she'd blown her chance to get answers to any of her questions, because unlike the plan she had to get Chitose to heel, she was the one panting and hot.

All her attempts failed to move past the small talk phases, since before she could dive into how Hisashi might be connected to her, look for any clues as to how Izuku could be connected, or anything about all those people from the dinner, she'd get too flustered after Chitose did something to drive home that apparently, this wasn't the meal she was looking forward to tonight.

Tonight had been a complete bust. And given how her other self had teased about what failure would entail, she expected some jokes. Or snide remark. Anything.

But at some point as the empty plates for dinner were taken away and the new dessert plates brought in, Nenshouki had started pacing around, head on a swivel and eyes scanning the room. Inko knew that look. During her whole campaign against the yakuza, she had that look almost every time she looked in the mirror. Paranoid and twitchy. Ready for something, anything to go wrong. That was the look Inko had when she was ready for the yakuza to figure out who had been killing them and come after her.

Nenshouki was looking for the enemy.

When Inko's thoughts focused, Nenshouki spoke up, "Something's not right."

Nenshouki's paranoia, Inko's paranoia, all stemmed from one simple fact. Chitose hadn't answered why it felt like she was running the restaurant. That strange little thing, stuck in the back of Inko's head, a little chip of ice keeping enough of her cooled off to not lose herself completely.

A glance here.

A twitch of the eyes there.

Inko might envision Nenshouki walking around and observing the room, but it was Inko herself carrying out the act. The more she looked, the more 'Nenshouki' became guarded. Then twitchy. Now, she looked ready to drop all pretenses and kill someone.

"Doesn't matter how over a barrel she has the cooks, the staff or the fucking owner of this place. The fact is, this woman has all but stripper-crawled over my table. That should have turned some heads."

Inko's eyes twitch, But it hasn't. People are just eating.

Chitose looked down as she spooned herself some cinnamon custard. Inko took a second to glance around as subtly and quickly as she could, confirming that who she could see were just eating their meals. Like nothing out of the ordinary was going on.

Rich people do tend to be weird. Maybe when you're at the point you can order the food here, you tend to just mind your own business. Logical, but dismissive. And Inko hadn't survived Bespin by being dismissive. Bodyguards? I'd bet she must have some that follow her around. Maybe to avoid drawing attention she has some acting as diners. If they're hers then maybe that's why they aren't reacting?

Nenshouki was getting twitchy inside Inko's head. She could feel her pacing. Hear the mutterings of trap and stupid.

Inko pretended to savor a bite of cake, closing her eyes and doing what helped her kill so many yakuza when she had been outmanned and outgunned.

Fact, Chitose brought me to a multi-Michelin Star restaurant on extremely short notice. The moment we got here, it has felt like she's been calling the shots, with staff, managers and definitely the chefs. During our whole evening, she… Well, both of us have been so overt with flirting that people should be gawking, or awkwardly trying not to look our way. But people aren't… at least the ones I can see. So those are probably bodyguards. Which makes sense I guess… but she didn't have any at the mall, right? Or maybe they were hiding then too?

Inko tried recalling everything she had been noticing. How many people hadn't been paying attention. How many looked like they were looking away. How many that seemed to not care.

There's the other thing too, Inko thought with some sudden growing paranoia. Nenshouki's twitchiness was now working its way through her. Chitose didn't just get us a table. If I'm right, she would have had to get tables for everyone. Which seems crazy. But then… Back in the day, for such a short amount of time. Inko once could do that. Back when she was leading her MLA and was in control of Bespin, she could have easily gotten herself, friends and some others too, seats anywhere. Granted, there weren't many places to go, but if she wanted something, she got it.

This isn't just someone with money pulling some strings. Or power to blackmail. Chitose has authority. Inko recalled what she had thought the other day. How now, it didn't make sense for Hisashi to find people from the island to remake the MLA. He should find people of money, and influence. At least that's how she would do it now.

"She's MLA?"

Coin flip. There's no chance she's following Hisashi.

"No kidding."

So…

"So?"

I don't know. I need to figure out what's going on right now. When Inko finished her bite of cake, her old self was the one that put her silverware down. This whole scheme was so counter to how she did things, and it had blown up in her face. But she was going to wrench control back. And the first step to that, was figuring out exactly where she stood in the restaurant. It seemed like everyone she saw was expecting the flirting, so they were actively not reacting. So, the old Inko decided, let's do something that'll get a reaction.

Making sure her plate was moved, Inko started to lean in over the table, like Chitose had done so many times already. Then, there was the briefest flicker of red around Inko's arm, before she threw out a Fa Jin powered jab that made the air crack.

---

Tomura clicked his tongue against his teeth, making an annoyed tsk sound. "I liked it better when you couldn't speak."

The Nomu hissed, "Don't care. I want what's mine."

Tomura waved him off. "He's too arrogant right now. Maybe getting his ass kicked will get him to see reason. If he's too dumb after that," Tomura shrugged. "Well, it's not like the world isn't full of other people that want to see everything burn."

"He he he he, I get to play!"

There was something deeply unsettling hearing that twisted laugh, but not hearing it come from the Nomu's head, but down below towards its abdomen. The disconnect was unnatural.

While the Nomu and Tomura went back and forth, Ochako and Katsuki were only just coming to terms that whatever this thing was, it might be even more dangerous than the Nomus they'd run into before. Hulking, unfeeling bio-weapons were scary. But suddenly having one talk, and apparently feel insulted and giddy, was a pants-changing kind of fear.

Ochako's plan of rushing the Nomu suddenly felt like one of the worst ideas she'd ever had, and Katsuki wasn't about to give her shit when she shifted her weight into a much more defensive position, no longer looking like she was about to run at the thing.

"Oi, Round Face." Katsuki wasn't going to admit it was a little hard to talk after hearing that thing speak. "What the hell did you do to piss that thing off? When'd one of these things almost snap your neck?"

Ochako raised her hand and touched her throat. "There was one in Hosu City, but… It wasn't this Nomu. It was yellow and had wings." She didn't elaborate, since she wasn't sure how much she could elaborate on. How this thing was connected to the one she had fought to save Izuku she had no idea. "What about you? It knows your name. How?" Unlike previous curt back and forths, this question lacked the bite of an accusation. It was more suppressed panic and fear making her ask.

Katsuki didn't know, and he hated that he didn't know. In fact, he hated that he didn't know more than he was freaked the fuck out by the talking Nomu. "HEY! YOU HOODED FREAK! WHAT THE FUCK DO YOU WANT?! AND HOW THE FLYING FUCK DO YOU KNOW MY NAME?!"

Ochako openly gaped, "Really?!"

The Nomu's head twisted to the side, looking at Katsuki with its head sideways. "He he he. Always with the nicknames. Always cleverer than smart." The Nomu's head shook as it laughed. "Am I Hood now? He he he, Hood Hood Hood." Its neck twisted more, so that it was looking at Katsuki upside down. "I. Am. Hood. My name now."

"Oh look, you made a friend," Ochako deadpanned despite feeling more and more unnerved by everything she was hearing.

"Fucking thing acting like it knows me, the fuck is going on." Katsuki was on edge, twitching and clammy. He didn't start looking any better when the newly named Hood began to advance slowly towards them.

"Oh, I know you. Or…" The fanged mouth widened into a grin. "I knew who you were before you became so weak." He slithered forward. Even as his legs pulled him on, his upper body stayed close to the ground, a terrible serpent advancing towards his prey. "Before you let that worthless Deku beat you."

Ochako's head snapped up while Katsuki scowled. "You don't know shit about me. So fuck off with your bullshit mind games."

How does this thing know about Bakugou and Deku? Ochako was trying to put pieces together, while being extremely aware that Katsuki was starting to look more and more unhinged. Whatever this thing was, it was getting to him. Using Izuku to get under his skin. This thing wasn't just talking, it was using strategy. Which was terrifying.

"I. know. You." Hood almost sounded giddy. "The three of us used to show that pathetic little worm he belonged in the dirt. We always had so much fun beating him up." Katsuki knuckles popped as he clenched his fists. "You were so strong then. But now, so weak. Weaker than Deku. Weaker than me. I wonder, is Center Part stronger than you now?"

"Center Part?" Ochako blinked. That wasn't a name she had heard since middle school. Yubi used to be one of the boys that was always tagging along with Katsuki. He was able to stretch out his fingers. There was absolutely no reason why this Nomu should know who that was. In fact, it shouldn't know anything like this. The Nomu were effectively brand new weapons that had only popped up a few months ago. But this thing was talking like it had been around before then. "Bakugou, how does he know about Yubi?"

Katsuki did not look good. He was breathing shallowly, and he looked ready to pop off. He didn't look like he was in control, which was a state Ochako had never seen him in. Even at his most unhinged and violent, he was always in control of himself. Now though…

"You don't know shit," Katsuki screamed back. He lifted a fist and pointed his thumb at himself. "You think I'm going to be freaked out because you looked me up? Of course shits like you would do that. Weak fucks like you need every advantage you can get to try and beat me. You think just because you found out me and Deku have history, it's going to get under my skin? It's not! You think just because you know some names it's going to freak me out?! Anyone can look up Center Part, Deku or—"

Hood suddenly reared up, arms spread out so it was now towering over the pair. From its back, two black draconic wings grew out from its skin, spreading out to cast them in its shadow. Another pair, larger than the first, grew out from behind its massive forelimbs and then a third pair, smaller than the others, from behind its hindlegs. The skin around its neck unfurled, flattening out like a cobra's hood and leaving its face exposed. Its head was wedged and narrow. Along the side of its head, was the exposed brain that all the Nomu's had, with two narrow yellow eyes sunken into the gray matter. Where you would expect to see a mouth, there was a metal gas mask, looking like it was fused to the monster's black skin.

Its giddy laugh turned into a deranged cackle. "We used to have so much fun together. I wanna have fun again! Don't you remember!"

Ochako recognized the Nomu's face immediately. She had gotten an up close look at it once already, back in Hosu City. It wasn't exactly the same, but that mask was telling. Add the wings, even if it had more now, and what it had said earlier about snapping her neck and suddenly Ochako knew. "It's the Nomu from Hosu City!" There was no doubt in Ochako's mind that the Nomu from back then and this Hood were the same.

But what the fuck happened to it?! The last time I saw it… "Deku burned you to a crisp," Ochako hissed out, suddenly feeling her neck get sore as she recalled the way it had throttled her.

Tomura huffed. "Brat messed him up good. Getting all your skin cooked off would have killed most people, but I guess the Doc made this one out of sterner stuff. It just wouldn't die. So he fixed him up good as new. Well, better than new, I suppose. Depending on if you like your weapons quiet or not."

The implications there were disturbing. The Nomu were already terrifying. That they could be improved was not something she wanted to think about. Right now, fight or flight were playing havoc with her decision making. Part of her really really wanted to get her hands on Tomura. But the other, her survival instincts, were screaming at her that whatever Hood was, it was out of her weight class.

She hated that the best conclusion she could come to right now, was to run for help. But they needed numbers. The classes and teachers were spread out. She and Katsuki needed to regroup.

"Tsubasa?"

It took Ochako a few seconds to register that the person that had spoken up was Katsuki. The voice was too quiet, too filled with shock and horror to be his. But when she turned to look at him, and saw the state he was in, Ochako felt her stomach drop. "Bakugou?"

"Those wings… I know those wings." Katsuki swallowed the lump in his throat. "Those are Tsubasa's wings, but… but he died." Ochako's eyes went wide as she looked from Katsuki to Hood. "We… I was at his funeral. It was a car crash… They went off the road. His parents were… His grandfather was the only one left… Tsubasa was… Why do you have his wings!"

Katsuki was running out of air. He was wheezing out the words, choking on them as his world was flipped on its head. Ochako grabbed his shoulders and shook him. "Hey! Hey, I need you here!" When that didn't get the immediate effect she wanted, she slapped him across the face. "Bakugou!"

She needed Katsuki's head on straight or they were going to die. Because as much as she hated him, she couldn't just run off and leave him. "Listen. Listen to me. We can worry about how they got your friend's Quirk later. Right now we—"

Hood broke out into a howling belly laugh, and even Tomura was chuckling. "The heroes probably have it figured out, but they didn't tell you kids, huh. What Nomu really are." It really was funny seeing no recognition in either Ochako or Katsuki's eyes. "The Doc's a mad genius, but even he can't just create life from nothing. He's like Frankenstein, he needs parts to build his monsters. Give the Doc a good canvas and he can put together some really nasty pieces of work." Tomura jerked his thumbs towards Hood. "Hospitals and morgues are just thrift store bargain bins." Tomura pulled his hand back and shrugged. "Thank god we live in a country that prefers cremation. No one really bothers to check who or what kind of ash is put in those urns."

It really shouldn't have been a shock to either teen. But the real horror at realizing exactly what Nomu were at that moment was a special kind of cruelty. Because now Katsuki had to deal with two terrible truths. Either his old friend was stolen away from a morgue and his body used as parts for this monster, or he had been kidnapped out from a hospital, and been alive this whole time, having horrors done to him until all that was left was Hood.

Tomura had used Frankenstein as an example of the man responsible for creating the Nomu. Katsuki had seen those old American horror movies. Knew how the madman had cut up and attached different body parts together. And now all he could see was his old friend, still the young fat kid he was when they used to play, on an operating table, body cut up, limbs removed, and his face—eyes wide and his mouth with its jaw cut off—open in a silent terrified scream as that mask was fused in its place.

And Katsuki's face reflected the terror his own imagination inflicted on him. And that's when Hood struck, diving at Katsuki with a gleeful, bloodcurdling, scream. Which Katsuki answered in kind. Screaming without warning or plan, Katsuki began firing off explosion after explosion, sending Ochako spiraling across the ground and making Tomura take a few steps back. Hood intercepted the blasts, but only so he could rip through them and less to protect the League of Villains' leader. The explosions that had thrown Ochako off her feet and out of the way, Hood effortlessly closed the distance through them to get to Katsuki.

Hood laughed as he pushed forward, his tail arching over his body, the spiked end striking out with cracks and crashes. The spiked end tore up the ground and trees, leaving deep gashes with each pass, the prehensile appendage snapping like a steel whip, cracking with each strike as Hood struck at Katsuki from multiple angles and keeping the panicked boy backpedaling even as he struggled to attack.

"HA HA HA! I'M STRONGER! ME ME ME!"

With a flap of his wings, Hood propelled himself. Closing the distance, or jerking to the side. Inching closer towards Katsuki, who was at this point doing more damage to the surrounding forest than to his enemy. His explosions weren't just attacks, but desperate efforts to counter the unexpected speed Hood's wings gave him, launching himself backwards so that he could keep some distance between them.

As Ochako scrambled to pick herself up, she didn't have time to tell off Katsuki for the sudden attack. She only just got her head up, before she was diving back to the ground as a fireball rushed right past where she had been standing, splintering a tree into smoke and sawdust. Hissing as she swatted at the debris on her face, she realized that at least now, with Katsuki dealing with Hood, she could focus on Tomura.

But she couldn't bring herself to face him. Because in the few seconds she watched the fight between Hood and Katsuki, she knew the constant pain-in-her-ass was in trouble. He wasn't fighting. He was flailing around in a panic, exploding everything as he backtracked in a straight line. Ochako knew that his Explosion gave him some incredible mobility along with its destructive power, but Katsuki wasn't using it. He was just making things explode. He wasn't fighting smart, and he always fought smart.

It really drove home just how fucked things were. And despite how much she wanted to rip Tomura apart, Ochako knew that if she turned her back on Katsuki here, he was going to die.

FUCKING! GOD! DAMN IT!

Ochako rushed after the pair, scooping up the closest, heaviest, things she could. "Hey! You're fighting me too!" Ochako chucked the remains of one of the exploded tree trunks towards Hood and hissed as he swiped it away with his tail, shattering the wood into splinters.

Right now, his attention was still focused solely on Katsuki, and she was going to fix that. "You're talking a lot of shit for the guy that Deku left a charred corpse last time! Bakugou at least was able to walk away from his fights with Deku! Can you say the same?!"

Hood stopped his unrelenting advance towards Katsuki. His body tensed before his head whipped around like a cracked whip, tail slapping against the ground. Foam and spittle dripped from between his teeth as he angrily growled out, "That. Didn't count. I wasn't—"

"Your creator is supposed to be a mad genius right? So then why'd he go and make a bitch Nomu like you?!" Ochako could see that Hood was shaking, but more importantly, it looked like Katsuki had regained his balance. Though with the way he was huffing and puffing, he wasn't good to go yet. Better keep his attention then.

"Yeah, the Nomu All Might fought at the USJ was way scarier than your sorry ass!"

"You whore!"

Oh, Hood was getting pissed off.

Good.

Ochako motioned to Hood, then at Katsuki. "Look at you. You still haven't don't shit to him yet, even with that lizard body and that dumb fuck scorpion tail."

Spittle flew from Hood's mouth, smoking as it hit the ground. "Draconic Form and Manticore Tail, not lizard and scorpion!"

Katsuki still looked off to Ochako, so she kept going, pressing any and all the buttons she hoped this fucker had. "You had to get more Quirks duct-taped onto your sorry ass to even be worth a damn. Draconic Form, Manticore Tail. Whatever is letting you not get blasted by Bakugou's Explosion. And I bet you got that pussy-ass Super Regeneration Quirk too! Me, I only need the one Quirk to kick your ass!" She motioned him to step up. "Care to see, fucker?"

Ochako's brilliant plan of holding Hood's attention was golden, up until Hood, seething with hate, began to swell. Huge tumors began to swell under his black skin in his chest, arms and back, tumors that grew until they were larger than beach balls. Ochako and Katsuki, who took the moment to get his head slightly screwed on right, also immediately noticed that the spots where Hood's body was swelling up were facing them.

"Oh—"

"—Fuck!"

Both dove for cover just as the tumors ruptured and large chunks of Hood's body were expelled out at high speed, flesh and bone shooting through the air as shrapnel, tearing through the trees and clearing out the area around him. Hood's mangled body was already putting itself back together as both teens scrambled to their feet. And Ochako realized, as she watched muscle and tendon regrow over brand new bone, that on top of some body exploding Quirk, Hood indeed had Super Regeneration.

"BAKUGOU!" Ochako screamed, "HIT HIM NOW DAMN IT!" She wasn't sure if it would work. But Hood's body was literally ripped apart from its own attack. If there was ever a time to try and get past that defensive Quirk it had, it was now.

Katsuki was breathing rapidly still, his eyes wide. He didn't snap at Ochako for telling him what to do, which was fucking alarming. But at the very least, he had enough wits left to press the sudden opening. Rocketing to close the distance, Katsuki pressed his palms right against Hood's exposed and ruptured outward chest cavity.

But he didn't attack at once. And for one horrifying moment, Ochako had to wonder if he even could.

"Damn it!" Katsuki bit back all the fucked up feelings tearing at him. "DAMN IT TSUBASA!" Point blank, Katsuki fired off a blast without caring about the blowback. The force threw him backwards towards Ochako, who hurried to throw herself to catch him before he ended up colliding with a tree. The pair tumbled across the ground, scuffed up and dirty. But alive.

…Oh my god. It took Ochako a few seconds to figure out what she was feeling. Because her brain couldn't make sense of it. Despite the whole fucked up situation she was in, it was the fact she was feeling Katsuki shivering that was throwing her for a loop. He's fucking shaking. And now that she was close enough and had a chance to get a good look at him, she could see just how messed up he was. His face had no color in it and his eyes were darting around, looking at everything and nothing. If there was ever something to really drive home how messed up things were, this was it.

"Haaa-urk… Haaaa-ggrrgl… Haaa-guk…" Wet, choking, laughs echoed from the billowing smoke where Hood had been. As it cleared, Ochako and Katsuki watched as the remains of Hood's chest began putting itself back together. Katsuki's attack had punched a hole right through his body. Both of them were able to see Tomura walking up towards them through the gaping hole. So the attack had done something, but Hood was healing. Soon, his body was back to normal, along with the rest of him.

"Shit," Ochako swore. "Okay… Okay…" She was trying to find a way to find the bright side. "Okay, his Shock Absorption isn't as strong as the one the other Nomu had… All Might had to punch that one like a million times before it hit its limit. So now… we can…" Ochako trailed off, her own attempts tasting sour in her own mouth.

There was also something else that felt off. Katsuki's explosion had finally damaged him, but the damage wasn't right. She had picked up a thing or two from Izuku, like his eye for detail, and something about what she had seen wasn't right. He was ripped apart but… he didn't look… burned.

Hood growled. "Stop. Comparing that and me." Hissing, Hood stretched himself out, so that he was at full height. "Stupid Nomu's Quirk made him a stupid punching bag. Stupid! Only absorb punches! Worthless, dumb! Shock Absorption dumb! Dumb with heroes that can set you on fire. Dumb with heroes that can fire lasers from their eyes. Dumb dumb dumb!" Hood thrashed around, stomping his feet in a tantrum. "Punching bag Quirk was worthless. Can't punch back." He stopped stomping and alarmed Ochako when he lifted himself up so that all four of his hands had their palms facing her, and a still not all there Katsuki. "But me? I can absorb those heroes' attacks. All of them, even explosions. My Quirk's not Shock Absorption, it's Absorption and Release!"

Ochako's eyes went wide as every instinct she had told her to fucking move. Oh shit! Oh shit shit shit! She floated Katsuki and hauled him up, just as she heard an all too familiar popping and crackling. She jumped to the side, just as Hood's palms unleashed a massive explosive cone that evaporated the spot the pair had just been. Ochako screamed as she and Katsuki were thrown away from the force of the blast. Even if it wasn't a direct hit, the size of the attack made a direct hit not matter.

There's no such thing as a glancing blow from an explosion.

Hood was beside himself, cackling while he lowered himself back down onto all fours while shaking his smoking upper hands. "Ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha! I always wanted to do that! You kept attacking and I kept absorbing and look what I did!"

"You know," Tomura grumbled while digging at his ringing ears, "I wanted him alive right? To see if he'd change his mind before we got out of here."

Hood's head snaked around. "If he's dead then he wasn't worth the offer."

Tomura shrugged. "Fair point, I guess." He then peered into the smoke and darkness. "Is he?" When Hood didn't answer, Tomura smacked its side. "Hey! Talking to you." He frowned when he saw that Hood wasn't looking at him, but out towards the horizon. Then suddenly, he twitched and Tomura gave an alarmed shout when Hood folded in his wing and wrapped his body around him.

"DOWN!"

Hood only had the chance to scream out his warning, just before the night sky was split in two.

---

There's a saying about plans in war. No plan survives first contact with the enemy. The League of Villains had divided, scattered and engaged their targets. And for several minutes, as far as the twin leaders of the attack were concerned, things were going right. There were still steps needed to be taken before a full victory could be achieved but, as far as Lady Nagant and Chimera were concerned, this operation was going fine.

That was until a shaft of liquid light suddenly shot across the sky, and illuminated the whole forest in viridian light.

And deafened everyone as it roared like the furnaces of hell were just stoked.

The light shot out straight, until it slammed into the side of a mountain that encircled the Wild Wild Pussycats' valley. For several seconds the light burned trees to ash and the rocks vaporized from the heat. Lady Nagant, from her sniping point, hissed at the heat that struck her. She was a mile or so away, but she could still feel the hellish heat from where she was. She pivoted her rifle, eye down the scope trying to figure out what the hell was making that light, when suddenly the source of the attack twisted, and that beam was turned, the end of the light now dragged across the mountainside.

It twisted fast, the beam stretching out into a wide cone, but Lady Nagant was already moving, Blackwhip shooting out like tendrils as she swung, scurried and clawed away through the trees as she realized her position was right in the light's path. She was several football pitches away when her spot was incinerated, narrowly avoiding sharing the same fate as the corpse she had traded places with back in Tartarus.

But while she was far enough away to avoid the light, she wasn't far enough to avoid the massive explosion that ripped itself free from the melted out gash along the rock face and obliterated the side of the mountain. Lady Nagant tumbled through debris, smoke and fire as she did everything she could to not get smashed by the house-sized boulders that flew past her.

The beam of light faded, leaving a trail of destruction across a ripped apart mountainside and a cloud of smoke and dust that reached up into the black night sky, a billowing mushroom cloud of horror and destruction which held the horrified attention of heroes and villains alike.

---

Tomura dug himself out of Hood's coiled body to stare at the rising fireball that now blanketed the whole forest in harsh orange and red light. "What. The fuck?"

"Gun lady was in the mountains." Hood kept a close watch on the rising fire. "Gun lady probably dead."

"Where the hell did that blast come from?! Who the hell can do something like that?!" Tomura wanted out of Hood's grip, but he wasn't making much progress. To his annoyance, it seemed like Hood was following his orders to protect him really well.

"It was green." Tomura took a few seconds to let that sink in, before he really started struggling to get free. "You're done. Boss said if things went sideways, you were done." Hood wasn't giving Tomura a chance to argue, as his wings spread out and he made sure Tomura's fingers were held away from his body.

Before Hood could take flight, a sudden rustle and muffled screams pulled his attention back towards the woods, which was falling back into darkness as the fireball faded away. He laughed and screamed into the night, "We'll play again, Bakugou! We'll play and play until you're a bloody paste in the dirt!"

Flapping his wings, Hood rocketed up into the night sky, soaring away and taking a very pissed off Tomura with him.

---

When Ochako couldn't see the two any longer, she finally took her hand off Katsuki's mouth, hissing as his teeth finally stopped being clamped down on her palm. "Don't screa—"

"Tsubasa! Get back here! We aren't—"

Ochako snapped, and with Katsuki still under the effect of her Quirk, threw him against the trunk of the closest tree. The thunk of his body bouncing off would have been cathartic if not for the situation.

And while the throw had gotten him to stop yelling for the moment, Ochako needed him to stay quiet. So she quickly chased after him, reared back her fist, then drove it into his face with a wet crunch. Blood splattered out from Katsuki's nose, droplets of crimson floating in the air, unaffected by gravity like the rest of Katsuki.

The bloody nose fit in perfectly with the battered and bruised boy who still didn't look quite right. He looked like he got into a fight with a collapsing building. He had a hell of a shiner and multiple abrasions that were welling up with red beads of blood.

Ochako was also worse for wear. Clothes charred, hair singed, cuts on her face along with a badly split lip wet with blood, and several blotches of skin were already turning pink from the heat of the explosion. She definitely looked like she had fought that same collapsing burning building.

Both looked like they just got their asses handed to them, because they had. They had lost the fight. Though Ochako wouldn't call what had just happened a fight. That had been a beatdown, which they had been lucky to escape from.

Ochako stepped up and grabbed Katsuki's collar, and pressed his back against the rough bark. "Listen t'ah me you fucking sack of shit. We just got our asses handed to us by something I don't think was even trying. If that Nomu wanted us dead, we would be fucking dead. We just escaped with our lives, so don't you dare let your ego call that thing back."

Katsuki reached up and grabbed Ochako's wrists, squeezing hard as he tried to get her off him. "I wasn't done fighting!"

Ochako ripped a hand back, balled up her fist and was about to punch him again, only for Katsuki to get a hand up and press it right into her chest. Smoke began to escape from his palm where it made contact with the spot stained clothing, a warning that if she tried throwing that punch, she'd get blasted.

"You never even started fighting," Ochako countered. Fist still raised, her face scrunched up from the smoke wafting past her face, blood now dripping down her brow, letting her know one of the bumps on her head was more than just a nasty welt. "The moment Shigaraki goaded you with that Nomu, you weren't fighting. You were flailing around in a panic. You look me in the eye and tell me you're proud of that shitshow back there."

Katsuki's face soured.

"You're messed up. And I'm sorry, I really am, but right now, being a dumbass isn't going to do anyone any good. If that Nomu… that Hood is your friend, then…"

Katsuki spat out some blood from his mouth off to the side, pulling his other hand off Ochako's wrist to wipe away anything that was left. "It was him. Tsubasa."

Ochako's face softened, though she kept her fist ready to drive through Katsuki's skull. "I'm sorry. Honest to god I am. But right now, there's nothing you can do. And if you get yourself killed trying to do something stupid, then there's nothing you'll be able to do later."

Katsuki scowled. "The fuck am I supposed to do later?"

"Fuck if I know Bakugou. But right now, I need you here. Shigaraki and Ho…Tsubasa flew off, but there are still other villains attacking. I…" Ochako hated Katsuki. She hated him, but knew right now, her own feelings didn't matter. "I need you to get your head on straight. You're Deku's rival, right? Well, you can't call yourself that if one of you isn't fighting smart. I need you smart."

Katsuki's eyes narrowed. Ochako was pressing the Deku button, a sure fire way to piss off the other boy. But being pissed off was Katsuki in his natural state. Not this panicked uncontrollable bullshit she'd just seen. How he had been, that would get him killed.

"You saw that light, right? That green light," Ochako pressed on while Katsuki was back to glaring at her. "Deku just blew up a mountain. Deku just did that. The only way he could is if he pumped up his Boric Pyre with One for All. And he wouldn't do that unless he was in trouble."

Katsuki took a second, before he pulled his palm off Ochako's chest, the spot now blackened and with bits of cloth falling away as ash. "That attack came from above us," he said carefully, color slowly returning to his face as he pushed Tsubasa and the horrors connected to him down. "It wasn't anywhere near the fucking path."

"I know."

"He didn't have a game partner either."

"I know."

For maybe the first time since the attack, Katsuki got a good look at Ochako. She was holding herself together by threads. Here she was, blasting him for falling into a panic, and she was one bad thought away from doing it herself. Katsuki knew Ochako was fiercely protective of Izuku. He knew he was also the reason for that, but that was beside the point. Ochako took her role seriously. As Izuku's best friend. As a member of his inner One for All circle, and now with him being her boyfriend, every feeling and instinct she had must be screaming at her to rush to Izuku's aid.

Fuck. Katsuki was putting together all the pieces now. Izuku was alone. Izuku wasn't on the path where the rest of the class was. Izuku had probably just pushed his Boric Pyre, an extremely self-destructive Quirk he had extremely limited experience with, into full Plus Ultra. All these things added together, did not paint a good picture.

I'm off my game so I'm only getting the picture now. Pink Cheeks probably put this all together the moment she saw the damned light.

"We can't go save your boyfriend's sorry ass if you're going to stand there pretending you're still going to punch me again."

Ochako let out the breath she hadn't realized she had been holding, and finally pulled away. When she tapped her fingers together to let Katsuki drop to the ground, she realized her hands were shaking. "Fuck." She gripped her hands tightly. Because now that she had put their whole attack behind her, her mind had a moment to really start thinking about all the worst case scenarios she hadn't been able to before. She'd seen what happened to Izuku if he went overboard with his fire. And what she had seen minutes ago was way worse than Hosu. "Fuck. We need… Todoroki or…"

Oh god. Everyone else. Himiko. Tsu. They are all out there. And Kouta too. Ochako gripped her hands tighter, recalling that where that light had come from, was awfully close to where she had watched Izuku go after Kouta before.

Katsuki reached up to his nose, and gave it a painful tug, confirming that it wasn't broken. He pressed his thumb on one side and blew out, clearing one nostril, then the other,. "We find that shitty nerd first and then worry about what kind of first aid he'll need."

Ochako froze.

"Right now we know where Deku is, but we need to hurry or he might move before we reach him." Katsuki pointed towards the small hill where the blast had come from. "So we go straight there. We can't worry about finding other people in this forest right now."

Ochako lowered her hands, took a breath, and balled her hands into fists, knuckles cracking. "I think the light came from where Kouta would hide away from us. Deku followed him the other night."

Katsuki clicked his tongue. "Fuck. That explains why he'd be away from everyone else. Of course he ran for the kid after the cat lady started begging him to run for camp like that."

That telepathic message wasn't one you just forget. It hadn't been from a hero telling some bystander to run. That was an aunt screaming for her nephew to get to safety.

Katsuki and Ochako looked at each other. And with small nods, both took off through the woods, towards where the bright light had come from.

---

"Ha! Would you look at that. It was a good idea to come up here after all."

Kouta had been watching the chaos from his hilltop hideout, too stunned to do what his aunt had begged him to do and run. And while he had stood there motionless as a statue, he hadn't realized he wasn't alone anymore. Didn't see the giant, draped in a tattered cloak and wearing a flat bone-white mask. walking towards him until he spoke. His voice was cruel and twisted.

Kouta stumbled back, eyes wide and the intimidating villain kept walking towards him- "Get a good view of the carnage. and something to wet my appetite with." He cracked his knuckles. "We're supposed to be sending a message. Well, nothing does that better than some pipsqueak roadkill."

He took another step, and Kouta fell backwards. He tried to keep moving but his arms and legs had locked up in fear.

He's going to kill me! Aunt Shino! Mom! Dad! Someone please!

The man raised a hand over his head, clenched in a tight fist.

"KOUTA!"

Only to turn just as several large boulders slammed into him like cannonballs, exploding into dust and rock shards, hiding the villain away in a cloud as Izuku landed between the villain and Kouta. He immediately turned to face the terrified boy. "I ran here as fast as I could. We need to get you to the campsite. Come on, I'll carry you and—"

"IT'S YOU!"

The scream gave Izuku just enough warning to turn and throw up a barrier as one of the still intact boulders he had launched was suddenly thrown from the dust cloud. The stone's impact had Izuku's ears ringing. Not that he had any time to worry about that.

As the cloud of dust settled, the villain's tattered cloak was tossed off the side, forgotten as it fell down to the forest floor below. Shards of the villain's mask were next. So as he strode out, Izuku and Kouta got a good look at him.

"No… no not him. Muscular… the monster who…" Kouta's body gave out as he collapsed onto the ground.

Izuku didn't need to hear anything else. He could fill in the gaps.

"Ha ha ha ha ha! I don't believe it. It's really you." Muscular was a large, bulky, muscular man with short, spiky, sandy blond hair and a small black eye. The eye where a large scar went across the left side of his face, was hollow save for a prosthetic ring, where a glass eye should go.

Izuku guessed he must have knocked it out of his head during his surprise attack. That hollow void was unsettling. Like an open window into this villain's soul.

"All the bullshit I had to deal with. All the fucking planning and rules that shit Shigaraki wanted me to follow, but it's all paid off. Midoriya. Oh, I've been waiting for this."

While Izuku's face darkened at the mention of Tomura, he didn't have much time to focus on that due to the ungodly amount of bloodlust emanating from this monster and all the crazy coming from his mouth. He's been waiting? What does that mean?

Izuku was confused, but not so distracted that he didn't know what he should be doing right then and there. He hadn't come up here to fight. He came to rescue Kouta. "Kouta. Get on my back. I'm going to get us—"

Muscle fibers grew out of Muscular's skin, enlarging his right arm, which he drove into the rock face beside him. Flexing, he ripped chunks of rock and hurled it at them. Izuku put his barrier back up as the rocks crashed into it.

Okay, he doesn't want me to leave! Fine!

Reaching back with hand, Izuku kept one holding the barrier, while with the other grabbed Kouta with his Quirk. "This is going to feel weird but don't move around! I'm going to lower you down the side of the mountain!"

Kouta didn't get a chance to agree to anything before he felt his clothes squeeze around him and he was lifted off the ground. Izuku hurried to get Kouta down to the forest floor, but…

"Oh no! I say the kid stays!"

Muscular ripped more stone, but instead of throwing the rubble at Izuku, twisted and then, to Izuku's horror, threw it all towards Kouta. Izuku immediately threw his barrier to intercept the rocks while also yanking Kouta back to the ledge.

But with his barrier now protecting Kouta, and his attention diverted to make sure he was brought back up as quickly and safely as possible, Izuku was an open target.

Muscular launched himself forward and drove his muscle enhanced fist towards Izuku's face. Izuku only just got his arms up, One for All crackling to life, to block the strike with both forearms. The blow sent shockwaves of sharp pain through his arms and the force of the strike sent Izuku sliding backwards, while he desperately dug his shoes in so he wasn't thrown off the side of the ledge. Or worse, collide with Kouta.

When he finally was able to stop himself, he was only inches away from Kouta.

Snarling, Izuku pointed at the villain. "If you want to fight me, then fight me! Leave Kouta out of this!"

"Fuck that. The kid stays." Muscular laughed. "I never said I wanted to fight you." More muscle began to grow over the man's body, bulking himself up until he was almost twice his width. "I joined this shitshow so I could kill you. Fuck all the League of Villains shit. Fuck what Shigaraki or that voice in the TV said. I'm here for one reason and that's to beat you to death!" Muscular smiled through clenched teeth like a deranged madman. "And if you're distracted worrying about the kid, then all the better for me!"

Something dark started bubbling up inside Izuku as he glared hatefully at Muscular. The world around him darkened as he saw less and less of everything else and just the monster in front of him. Every dark thought, every angry whisper from the back of his mind, things Izuku had tried and fought to keep out of his mind, were getting louder and louder. A buzz of bee-wings telling Izuku to let go and finally let someone pay for all the horrors he'd been forced to live through. All the pain. All the suffering. That it would be okay to hurt this monster.

Muscular now towered over Izuku as he slowly closed the gap. "And don't think I'll forget about him and chase after you if you run. You leave, and I'll rip the little shit in half. And wear his little body on my hand like a sock puppe—!"

CRACK!

Izuku screamed as he launched himself and drove his fist into Muscular's face. Digging his heels into the man's collar bone, Izuku grabbed a handful of hair with one hand, anchoring himself to Muscular's head, then pulled his fist back, green sparks dancing over his body, and drove it into Muscular's face again and again and again. Screaming with each punch as he threw himself at the villain in wild abandon.

This wasn't smart. This wasn't brave. This wasn't heroic. This was just Izuku wanting to hurt someone and taking full advantage of the universe giving him someone he could.

CRACK!

CRACK!

Crack!

crack!

Self-preservation kicked in, and violently grabbed ahold of Izuku's arm before he could throw another punch. "HA HA HA!" Izuku was stunned to see Muscular grinning back at him, lip busted, and nose bleeding, but nowhere near as messed up as Izuku had wanted at that moment. "My turn."

Leaping back, Izuku only just avoided the attack, as Muscular smashed his hands together. It didn't produce the shockwave All Might had made when he had done something similar back during Izuku's term finals. But Izuku was sure he would have been turned into pulp all the same.

Muscular lept after Izuku, fists crashing down into the ground as Izuku was forced to keep dodging to avoid getting flattened. It was like fighting a deranged All Might. But unlike his test, Izuku didn't have a partner to help.

"Ahhh!"

Kouta's screams were close. The poor boy was panicked and Izuku realized all his dodging was just letting Muscular get closer to who he was supposed to be protecting.

Not another step back!

Izuku screamed and launched himself straight for Muscular. Shooting through an opening of the villain's wild but wide strikes, Izuku threw haymaker after haymaker into the man's body, pumping more and more of One for All into his fists with each punch.

5%

8%

At 10%, with tiny red lines starting to spread over his skin like cracks in glass, the strike sent a jolt up Izuku's right arm like a hammer hitting his funny bone. Izuku was pushing the limits of what his body could handle. Any more strikes like that, and something was going to break.

Don't let that happen. You've made too many promises to Ocha—

"If that's all you got, then I'm just going to kill the kid now for fun!" Muscular raised his hands, gripping them together to slam them down like a hammer on Izuku. The thin red lines darkened and began to crackle under the skin of Izuku's right arm in response. Muscular swung down just as Izuku screamed, "DETROIT SMASH!"

Izuku saw black as he threw a punch at full power. There was a harsh, searing pain, but Izuku pushed through as he drove his fist into the villain's Quirk-grown muscles. Fibers ripped, tore and exploded out as Muscular was thrown backwards. Izuku clenched his teeth, hissing from the pain shooting up his arm, but at least the skin hadn't been shredded, and the arm wasn't blacked from the impact. Izuku could take some solace that to end the fight and protect Kouta, he'd only had to break his promise a little.

Then Muscular landed on his feet.

The muscle villain cackled as he stood up several yards away, running a hand over the shredded muscles over his abs. Ribbons of muscle fibers hung from the point of impact, but to Izuku's growing anger, new fibers were already growing to replace the damaged ones.

"Kid, you really gotta learn not to telegraph your punches." Muscular pulled at the muscles at his waist, and Izuku saw that it looked thicker there than the rest of him. "If I know where you're going to hit, you ain't gonna do shit to me."

More and more fibers began to grow over the rest of him, matching the thickness of what he had used to protect himself. "And if that's the best you got, then you're done."

Muscular's one eye looked down at Izuku's arm. Seeing how the muscles spasmed and Izuku's fist was clenched, he could tell that the punch had hurt Izuku. "Detroit Smash, huh? You think you're All Might? What a joke."

Izuku's mind was racing. He'd thrown everything into that punch and it hadn't brought the man down. His arm wasn't shattered, but he was sure he couldn't throw another one. There was his left arm, but if that didn't work, then how was he supposed to keep fighting? His Psychokinesis wasn't going to be effective here. And Izuku wasn't sure his—

"Why," Kouta cried. "Why you?! Why does it have to be you?!"

Muscular frowned, turning his attention to Kouta. "Hmm?"

"You took Mom and Dad. You took them, wasn't that enough?!" Kouta screamed and Izuku winced. Fate decided to be especially cruel to Kouta. Forcing him to face the monster responsible for destroying his life.

He won't touch Kouta, Izuku swore to himself. He. Won't. Touch him.

Muscular rolled his neck, cracking it. "Kid. I've killed so many people. What makes you think I'd give a shit about your Mom and Dad?"

Izuku felt his breath catch at such a horrible thing to say, while Kouta pointed up at Muscular's face. "They were Water Hose! The news said you got chased off after they did that to you! You don't have an eye because of them!"

Izuku glared and waited for recognition to finally cross Muscular's face. The villain reached up, scratched at the scar on his face. His fingers ran around the prosthetic socket, before he shrugged. "Nope. Doesn't ring a bell."

The truly horrifying thing for Izuku was that he didn't think the man was lying. There was no recollection in his eye. No memory of Kouta's parents' valiant effort to repel him at the cost of their own lives. He could have mocked them. Said something like they had died for nothing since he had escaped. Something. Anything. But to say nothing, to not remember them at all. That felt especially cruel.

Kouta choked on a sob while Izuku seethed, "You—!"

"Oh, save the bullcrap righteous fury crap. You think some dead heroes matter?" He cracked his knuckles, each pop thick and heavy like a hammer on a railroad spike. "Here's what's important." He took a step and pointed at Izuku. "First I'm going to kill you. Then the kid. Then I'll finish what Shigaraki couldn't. I'll find your mom and pop the fat bitch like a water balloon." Muscular's smile widened. "Hey, I'll be reuniting two families. Ain't that a… bitch?"

Something inside Izuku broke. The dark buzzing, and the blackness that had been eating away at him, all burst out. Every dark thought. Every hateful wish. Everything that sat and stewed in the far reaches of Izuku's soul, only so recently simmering because of Tomura, now burst out in a rolling boil. From deep inside him, a dark voice called Izuku to act. Screaming an order that drove Izuku on. An order made of only two words.

BURN HIM!

Every seething breath Izuku took, was a bellow that stoked the fire inside him. Hotter. Hotter. Hotter until tongues of flame flickered with each breath and liquid flame dripped from his mouth. Black smoke exhausted from the side of his mouth and nose like a coal stack. The fire inside Izuku kept building. Anger, rage, hate stoked it hotter. A green glow began building inside his chest, while on top of it, red angry crackles of energy danced across Izuku's skin.

The heat made the air around Izuku shimmer and dance, before more smoke joined what Izuku was breathing into it. His shirt blackened, then ignited, burning orange as it fell off his body, its orange fire soon drowned out by the harsh emerald from Izuku flames.

Muscular eyed Izuku before he recalled something said in one of the boring as shit meetings called by either the gun bitch or the smoking mutt. A warning.

Oh right. He can breathe fire now too… FUCK!

The villain might have a body of mighty muscle, but even he knew that if there's one thing muscle can do, it's burn.

Muscular launched himself right for Izuku, just as the boy opened his mouth, and with the deafening roar of a rocket, let loose a blast that tore apart the ground and mountainside as it was unleashed. A pyre of light and heat.

---

Catching the capture cloth, Chimera yanked Aizawa towards him while he extended a clawed hand to catch the suddenly airborne hero. Midnight gave an alarmed cry as she dove and tackled Aizawa before he could get caught, sending the pair of them rolling on the grass. Creating a split second where Aizawa wasn't looking at the large villain.

Chimera took the opportunity and immediately opened his mouth and unleashed a blast of fire at the pair. Only for the fire to hit a wall of solidified blood as Vlad King acted to defend the two. Aizawa quickly got his eyes back on Chimera and the villain's fire fizzled out.

"Damn, he's good at realizing when you're not looking at him," Midnight said with annoyance.

Aizawa agreed. "He's probably trying to breathe fire all the time. He's got a good way to tell."

Vlad King pulled his blood back in, but noticed that there were pieces of the wall missing, vaporized from the heat. "Smart villains are always a pain… And I can't put another barrier up like that again. I lose too much blood, I'm going to black out."

Since the start of the fight, it had become painfully clear that even after Vlad King had joined them after the initial attack on the building, that the three didn't have the raw power to end things in a quick manner. Chimera's raw strength, even with his Quirk being suppressed, was a huge obstacle. There was also the fact that Midnight couldn't use her own Quirk to put him to sleep, without risking Aizawa and Vlad King's safety. The combo of Chimera's power and their own Quirks not being a set that could naturally sync up, was making this brawl a long, drawn out slog.

There was also the added stress of knowing that the kids, despite being told to stay inside the building, were congregating at the smashed in wall, watching and debating about stepping in to help..The teachers knew they couldn't yell at them to get back, as that would bring the villain's attention to them. Right now, they just had to hope their common sense overrode their heroic senses, which were probably screaming at them to step up and help.

Chimera smirked as he began to advance on the three. Midnight watched him through narrowed eyes. "I hate saying this, but does anyone else feel like this fight is fixed? He's clearly meant to hold us up." Not a pleasant thought to the three, since it meant that there was some plan at work aside from just an attack.

Aizawa grunted. "I still have my knife and a few tools left, but getting in close to use them will be an issue. We need to keep him held so Midnight can knock him out."

"Love to hear how we can do that without either of you two getting put to sleep too."

"We don't. Vlad and I will have to be willing to get hit by your Quirk to end this." Aizawa couldn't look towards the woods, but he could tell things were getting worse. The fire was spreading and there had been several loud explosions and thunderous booms that indicated that some fights were breaking out, despite Mandalay's order to retreat.

"One of us making it out there to help is better than none. Vlad King, I want you to focus on only getting this villain locked up. I'll work on slowing him down so you get an opening to—"

Before Aizawa could finish his plan, all hell broke loose as the night sky was split in two by a beam of green liquid fire, before the mountain it hit erupted into a pillaring hellfire.

The explosion threw everyone to their knees. Vlad King used his blood to anchor Aizawa to the ground, keeping him upright so that he didn't lose sight of Chimera.

It took several seconds, but soon, the beam vanished and the shockwave of the explosion passed. Midnight stared in horror, already guessing who had just done that. "Oh no. No, no, tell me that wasn't…"

"Midoriya," Aizawa grunted with morbid certainty. "Unless the villains have someone that can—"

"The fuck?" Chimera roared as he looked back at the explosion. "Shit."

Vlad King grunted, "That's a no."

Chimera eyed the burning mountainside, before he pivoted and took off running, leaving the three pro heroes to flinch in surprise. He didn't have time to deal with them now as he pulled out the radio bullet Lady Nagant had given him and roared into it, "Nagant! Report!"

The response back was a roar of static.

Something had just gone horribly wrong with the whole operation, and he needed to get a handle on things as soon as possible.

"Fucking crap!"

"Nagant?! What's your status?"

There was another series of loud thuds and more swearing. "My sniping position just got nuked. I had to make a run for it before I got vaporized."

"Injuries?"

"Singed. But in one piece. Fucking boulders almost crushed me… shit."

"The hell happened? Do you have eyes on?"

"Saw the green light, but it was too bright to see what was causing it. I have no clear line of sight now. I'm way off point…" There was some grumbling as Lady Nagant took stock. "It's going to take me some time to find another nest. And I can't promise I'll have a full line of sight from it. Assume no covering fire from this point on."

Not great, but at least things weren't as bad as they could be.

"Chimera. That point of origin for the blast. That's where those two maniacs were headed to get a better view of the forest."

Chimera growled.

"They never reported contact."

Chimera looked towards where the beam had come from. "Shit. Do we have anyone that can reach that location fast?"

"Yeah. I think we got someone that hasn't engaged anyone yet."

---

Itsuka kept her enlarged hands cupped behind her back as Kyouka helped put another of her classmates into her palms, while Momo made another gas mask to slip over their face. Thanks to Itsuka using her hands, she had been able to push the gas back after noticing her classmates starting to pass out. Holding out long enough for Momo and Kyouka to arrive, both already sporting gas masks.

The violent explosion was now starting to fade and the three were trying to decide what their next course of action should be.

"My classmates are still out there," Itsuka pointed out, making it pretty clear what her opinion on the matter was.

Kyouka thumbed the other gas masks she had hanging at her waist. "We have no idea what breathing this stuff will do to a person after they get knocked out. We should try and find anyone we can."

Momo frowned. "We also do not have any idea about the villain that is making the gas or if there are others lying in wait. If we are ambushed while carrying more people… We need to get the people we have to safety first." She paused and glanced at Itsuka. "Unless you know for certain where the rest of your classmates are?"

Itsuka shook her head. "We scattered up and down the path Ragdoll showed us."

It was a hard call.

Momo looked down both ways of the path, knowing that whatever they decidedm they needed to choose soon. Staying in one place would effectively make them sitting ducks. If a villain found them now, it could be a disaster.

"Is it just me, or is this gas getting thicker?" Kyouka asked worryingly. The other girls glanced around, and confirmed that she was right.

"Yaoyorozu…" Itsuka asked slowly. "Can these masks handle all that gas?"

"I'm… uncertain. The mask is based on a highly rated manufacturer… but even the highest rated filters aren't perfect." That bit of knowledge was grim. "We also don't know if the gas only affects us if we breathe it. Skin contact, prolonged skin contact, may have ill effects on us too."

Momo peered at the thickening smog. It was getting harder and harder to even see the path more than a few yards out. "If we move off the path, we may end up getting lost. Assuming we would be able to find anyone as things are. And if the fog gets much thicker we might lose the path altogether even if we try to stick to it," Momo finished.

Kyouka tapped her jacks. "I could try and listen for people, but… if they're unconscious…"

"It's ultimately your call, Kendou. You are a class representative, while I'm only a vice representative. You hold seniority here," Momo declared. "These are also your classmates and friends we are talking about. Jirou and I will follow your decision."

Itsuka nodded, knowing time was running out for whatever decision she made.

But as they waited for her to make her decision, none of them noticed the long figure walking through the woods towards them, the thick clouds of gas swirling around his body as he made the poisonous cloud thicker, his gas mask hiding the annoyed expression as his search for the one person he actually wanted to find continued to come up empty-handed. But, his hand clutched the grip of his pistol, at least he found some dumb heroes he could take his frustrations out on.

---

Everyone had been thrown to the ground when the explosion lit the sky. While some gawked in shock, and others worked to get their classmates back on their feet, Mei had pulled out a small handheld screen, her face becoming more and more worried as data started popping up on it.

"Hatsume, we need to keep moving!" Hitoshi barked as he grabbed her and started hauling her to her feet. "Worry about your babies later!"

"Midoriya's body temperature just spiked," Mei snapped, thrusting the screen into his face. "Look! Look at these readings."

Hitoshi paused while he tried to make sense of all the techno data getting shoved into his face. "That's… huh?"

"Temperature spikes. Theta and beta brain waves are all over the place. His Quirk factor just shot through the roof."

"Wait, so that was Midoriya just now?!" Mashiro asked in alarm while the rest of the group looked back at the resulting destruction in shock.

"He must… is he fighting a villain?"

"But Mandalay told us all to run, right?" Tooru asked.

Tsuyu looked towards where the beam had come from. "If Izuku was cornered. Or protecting someone…kero…"

"Or looking for an excuse to get in a fight," Minoru added. Though he quickly moved to get out of Tsuyu's line of sight as she shot him a particularly unhappy look. "Hey! I'm not wrong, you know!"

Shouto took a step that would have taken him off the path back to the campsite, but Tenya reached out and put a firm hand on his shoulder. "This isn't like the other times. We were given direct instructions."

Mezou looked at Tenya, hard. "You're serious?"

Tenya returned the glare in equal measure. "We have to rely on the experience of our teachers and the heroes here. They made it clear they wanted all of us to retreat back to camp."

"It's not just Midoriya that's out there. All of 1-B were hiding in the woods for the game. The first few groups already went in."

Tsuyu croaked unhappily. "Which is why they want us to get back to camp. The more of us in one place, the easier it'll be to protect us. If we're all spread out…" Her hands were clenched at her sides, while her whole body was visibly shaking.

"H-hey. Uraraka was with Bakugou. You heard those other explosions, right? I'm sure whoever was unlucky enough to run into them is already done," Minoru tried to reassure her. "And Toga is… well, she's probably the last person anyone wants to run into in some dark woods."

"Kouda has a whole forest of animals too to sic on the villains if they run into anyone," Tooru added.

Mei crossed her arms. "I'm not a hero student. I can just go, you know."

Tenya turned and made it clear what they were going to do. "As class representative, I am going to make sure we follow Mandalay's instructions. We are going back to camp and we are not going to make the situation more chaotic for the heroes and teachers. Understood?"

Tenya made sure he made eye contact with everyone. His gaze lingered longer on those from his close group of friends, not looking away until he got some form of acknowledgment from them. "Okay. We keep heading for—"

"Flesh?"

Everyone froze when a new voice cut through their conversation. Hollow and cold, it creeped out from the shadows of the woods. The kids only just turned their heads, before a spiderweb of white blades shot out, right for them.

---

"Fuck fuck fuck!" Himiko knew she should be limiting her breathing, but her rage was making it almost impossible.

Himiko spotted purple whiffs of gas lingering in the air, hovering over the ground like a blanket. The moment she saw that, she whirled and started tearing at Kouji's large shirt, taking a chunk off and wrapping it around the startled boy's mouth and nose as fast as she could. "Don't breathe the gas!" She had another strip of cloth cut that she hurried to wrap over her own face right after his.

"Toga?"

"Shhh! Don't talk. Don't breathe…" She stomped the ground. "FUCK!"

Kouji had thought for sure he had seen Himiko at her worst right after that green fire had ripped through the sky. It was shocking to see he had been wrong. He could tell before, worry had driven Himiko into swearing before she pressed on.

This? This was rage.

Himiko's fingernails dug into her palms. She was practically frothing at the mouth. Her one yellow eye seemed to glow in the darkness as she looked out, scanning the woods. Then she pointed. Kouji looked and saw what looked like a babbling fountain of dense purple smog frothing through the trees.

It was impossible to tell how far the source of this poisonous smog was. But it seemed like Himiko had a direction for them to move in.

"How long can you hold your breath, Kouji?" Himiko wasn't looking at him. Her attention was laser focused now.

Kouji doubted she wanted to hear about how his practice at camp helped him scream longer and louder, and that he was sure it had helped him suck in more air. So, he nervously answered, "Long enough."

Himiko nodded. "We're running straight. If you think you're going to have to breathe, climb." Himiko motioned to the trees. "This stuff is like mustard gas. It's heavier than air. Go high for clear… less poisonous air. You'll still pass out, so make sure you're not in a spot you'll fall. But it should help you not suffocate."

Kouji wanted to ask how she knew that, but there wasn't time. She had taken her deep breath, trying to do it in a spot that didn't have the whiffs, and was running in a dead sprint. Kouji did the same, and hurried after her, already feeling like his lungs were going to pop.

---

Izuku's Boric Pyre ripped everything apart as he fired it, the force of the fire going off like a rocket, ripping and tearing at the rock and ground.

Muscular leapt into the mountainside and dug in before he propelled himself at Izuku. Reaching out, he smashed his hands against the side of Izuku's face, but almost all the force was gone. The blast had slowed him down, and the fire had burned away layers and layers of muscle. The right side of his body was shredded and blackened.

But he'd gotten his hands on Izuku's face, turning Izuku's head to the side, and pushing that beam of light away from himself and making it drag across the mountains behind him. He heard the explosions, but he couldn't care less at the moment. The damned fire was charing away his body. Layers and layers of muscle were getting eaten away. He knew he had to get Izuku to stop, of he was going to die.

The problem was, with his muscles getting destroyed, so was his strength. And just pushing Izuku's face away was all he could manage.

Izuku, meanwhile, snarled and tried to force his head back. He just needed to turn a little and then—

KID! THE KID!

It was the voice of a panicked mother, desperately trying to get his attention. And for the briefest moment, with his head pushed to the side, Izuku got a chance to glance behind himself.

There was Kouta, curled up in a ball.

Oh god.

Everything receded. The black mist clouding Izuku's mind vanished and he snapped his mouth shut, cutting his Quirk off.

Muscular stumbled backwards while Izuku fell to his knees, hacking and coughing as the blowback of what he had just done to his body bashed him over the head. His chest was burned, red and blistered, and the ground felt uneven and moving. Izuku tried to breathe. The first few gasps just had more fire. It took him multiple tries just to get his lungs to stop producing fire, then smoke.

Izuku crawled on hands and knees towards Kouta, voice raspy and dry as he called for him, "Ko-kouta. Kouta, I'm sorry, I didn't mean…"

Izuku cursed himself. He'd let himself give into the taunts, and now he'd gone and left Kouta terrified. He came here to save him, not scare him.

"I'm sorry," Izuku reached out, but it was getting harder and harder to move. And worse yet, a nagging fear ate at him. His body heated up when he used Boric Pyre too much. After what he'd just done, could he even hold onto Kouta to pull him away?

I messed up.

The heat from his own body was making him dizzy. The edges of his vision were blacking out. Pretty soon, Izuku was sure he'd black out from a heat stroke.

But before that happened, a blast of cold slapped him in the face. Eye suddenly snapped open, Izuku realized his face was dripping wet. The water was steaming off, but then more was sprayed onto him. Water, a constant hose, was getting sprayed over his body, cooling him off and making the world come back into clarity.

"Win." Izuku's head snapped up, and saw that Kouta was sitting up, looking at him while he kept hitting him with water. "He's hurt. Win. Please, just beat him. Please, I just…" Kouta wept, crying and sobbing while he worked to help Izuku. "Beat him. Please."

Slowly, as the world came into focus, Izuku made his way up from one knee. His body was still steaming as the water evaporated off his skin while he worked himself up to his feet. When he was standing, Kouta finally lowered his hands. The water from his palms slowed to a trickle, but he had done enough. Izuku was plenty cooled off now. In body and mind.

"It'll be okay," Izuku said as gently as he could, reaching down to lay a hand on Kouta's head. "I'm here."

Kouta sniffed. "That's… that's All Might's line."

Izuku nodded. "It's a good line."

Turning, Izuku found Muscular was still in the process of regrowing his layers of muscles. But it was a botch job. Blackened threads were woven into everything. Everything on his right side looked pale. Even the new muscle was growing in wrong. Cooked. His right arm and hand were the worst. The muscle looked fragile.

"You can punch him, right?" Kouta then looked at Izuku's right arm and hand. Both were starting to swell. Izuku was pretty sure something was broken. Not a major fracture, but he had hurt himself.

Again.

"Maybe," Izuku answered slowly. His mind was working overtime. "What I need is to get that muscle off him."

"Fire?"

Izuku coughed out some smoke.

"Then what?"

Izuku looked down at his arm, and focused. His Psychokinesis glowed to life around himself, but around his right arm, it was brighter. Then, joining the glow, were green electric sparks. "PK Brace," Izuku said with a tired grin. "Thanks to all the training with your aunt and the other Wild Wild Pussycats, I can use my Quirk techniques all at the same time. This'll keep my arm from getting worse while I finish this."

Moving his arm around, Izuku noted that this wasn't something he'd be able to do for a long time. Maybe a minute. It took a lot of concentration. Still, he wasn't planning on using his arm to punch. This was just to keep things from getting worse. No punching with his right until he saw a doctor.

"When'd you come up with that?"

"Just now." Izuku offered a smile.

Keep smiling. Smiling is important.

Muscular growled in anger as he turned his attention towards Izuku.

Izuku just glared back.

"Kouta, I have a plan. It might get scary, but I promise. I'll get you out of this."

There were several feelings of doubt when Izuku mentioned he had a plan.

I have the start of a plan.

That's called a concept.

Muscular roared, "I'm going to kill you!"

Izuku got ready for the next round. "You keep saying that, but you keep not killing me."

"RHAAAAAHHHH!"

Muscular charged just as Izuku did. The monster's movements didn't feel slower, but Izuku saw that the strong violent movements were tearing at his own body.

Izuku ducked under a flying punch, closing into Muscular's body. Izuku doubted that even with the big guy as messed up as he was, he could beat him in a punching match. Even if he tried to brace his left arm to reduce the damage, the risk was too great. The muscles just offered up too great a defense. And Izuku couldn't risk taking himself out of the fight, even if it meant winning over Muscular.

After I get Kouta to safety, I still have to go find Ochako!

So, once again able to get inside Muscular's swing, Izuku shot his left hand out.

"Weak! Weak weak wea—"

Riiiiiiiiip!

Izuku buried his hand and fingers into the mess of fiber, and after getting a good grip, pulled. And with 5% of One for All, began ripping a layer of muscle off of Muscular's body.

"Wha?! St-stop!"

Muscular abandoned his punch and began grasping at Izuku. But with the fibers ripped, Izuku scurried around Muscular, keeping close to the oversized villain and away from his hands, while at the same time, digging both hands into the villain's Quirk flesh, pushing his fingers between the fibers and pulling when his hands were filled, ripping and tearing at Muscular's body.

Doubt this would have worked if he hadn't been burned. Izuku grunted to himself while he ducked a wild swipe. But with half his body cooked, and charred, it's like digging into some spaghetti.

The muscle fibers were the wet squishy noodles and the meat sauce… was more meat sauce.

Izuku decided he didn't want to think about what was actually oozing from between the muscles. It was thick, dark and viscous.

"No no no! My body! You're ruining it!" Muscular's scream of alarm came out panicked as Izuku kept at it, ducking and dodging as best he could and all the while ripping at the villain.

If Muscular tried to leap back, Izuku kept up with him step for step, always making sure he was as close as possible. The huge muscles Muscular covered himself in meant he wasn't the most flexible. But again, if not for the burns, Izuku would have never been fast enough to take advantage of this small detail.

Keep ripping. Keep digging. Gotta expose skin!

"The hell kind of hero fights like this!? You freak!"

This was the part of the plan that was a crapshoot. Inwardly, Izuku admitted he probably couldn't throw a punch to take advantage of the damage to the ripped muscles and the opening he was trying to make, not without potentially taking himself out of any fights coming afterwards.

At least not in a single strike.

Gotta bank on 'death by a thousand cuts.'

He could hear her, again saying this wasn't a plan. Well, a concept was better than what he was doing earlier.

If not for Kouta, I'd have passed out from the heat.

"ENOUGH!" Muscular screamed in rage as he suddenly swung both his arms out, like he was getting ready to give a poor granny the tightest bear hug. And to Izuku's shock, that wasn't far off.

For a split second, the muscles around his body loosened. And Izuku thought perhaps his plan had worked better than he had planned. Then Muscular rushed forward, and those fibers engulfed Izuku, tightening around his body at the same time Muscular swung his arms in. Adding the pressure. Constricting and squeezing. As a mass of writing flesh, Muscular drove Izuku into the mountainside, cratering the rock and pressing into Izuku, making sure he couldn't move.

Muscular worked his head through the solid mass of flesh his Quirk made, so that he could look Izuku in the eye as he crushed the life out of him. "All you've done is make sure I kill you slowly to shit! I'll squeeze the air out of you, then your life!" Izuku pumped One for All throughout his body, trying to flex against the mass squeezing him. "Did you think this would work?! Even if you got through my muscles, you're not strong enough to hurt me!"

The crater cracked and grew as Muscular kept pressing. Rubble fell and bounced off Izuku's head. He glanced up, then looked Muscular in his one beady eye. "Maybe. But you know what? I don't think I have to be the one to hit you!"

Izuku refocused his Psychokinesis. Instead of focusing on his own body, he reached out with it. First…

"Eek!" Kouta squeaked as he was suddenly pulled backwards, away from the fight. Once he was many, many yards away, Izuku flashed Muscular his most deranged smile. Just as the whole mountainside behind and above him lit up like a green flashbulb.

Muscular snapped his head up, eye going wide. "Wha—?!"

"Rocky. Mountain. Smash," Izuku, nose bleeding, spelled out with grim glee.

There was an ungodly crack. Followed by another. Then more. Then, in one dramatic moment, the whole mountainside shattered, and the glow instantly faded.

Izuku's attack was a giant rockslide. And as Muscular let go of Izuku in a panic as he wrapped himself up, Izuku soon became the single glowing light in a sea of rock, stone and dirt.

---

"G-give me your hand!" Kouta called out between coughs. The dust was still thick from the aftermath. He had been pulled well clear by Izuku, but after the rocks had settled, he had hurried over to the pile, hoping to find Izuku was alright.

He got half his wish.

Izuku was lying under a small debris pile, having escaped the worst of things with One for All and Psychokinesis.

Izuku took the offered hand, and let Kouta pull. Vaguely, he was reminded of the time he and Hitoshi had found Tenya. Trapped under some rubble.

Pulled out, Izuku let his Quirk fade with a long sigh, and the barrier holding up the stones around him faded, making the last few rocks come crashing down.

Standing up, Izuku had to steady himself. Starting the rockslide had been hard enough. Keeping himself from getting crushed was the other two thirds of the problem. His head hurt, and his nose was definitely bleeding. A lot.

He just really hoped the dizziness was just from getting his bell rung a little.

"You dropped a mountain on him…" Kouta said in awe. "Is… is he…"

Izuku frowned and pointed. "No."

Even weakened, the man had been crazy strong. Even without muscles protecting his head, he'd taken multiple hard One for All strikes to the face. Granted, maybe only at 10%, but that still said a lot.

Izuku banked on this being enough to stop the man. But not to kill.

So it made sense to see Muscular's form sticking out of the larger stones, buried up to his chest and out like a light.

Kouta frowned when he saw the unconscious villain. He stormed up, picking up stones as he went and threw them. "Take that! Take that and that!"

Kouta was climbing up to him, with Izuku hurrying after. "Kouta, stop!"

Kouta grabbed for a larger stone the size of his head, trying to pick it up, but Izuku pulled him away. "I'm sorry, but you can't."

"He deserves to be… he should be…" Kouta's tears started up again while Izuku wrapped his arms around the boy.

"I'm sorry. I'm so sorry Kouta." Izuku held him. Giving what little comfort he could. Maybe there weren't any words. Maybe he should be pulling him up and running for the camp site. But in this brief moment. It felt more important to just let Kouta know he wasn't alone. That he had someon—

"Uhhhh." The groan startled Izuku and made Kouta wince back in horror. "Yooooouuuhhh…." Muscular's form twitched, his body a mess of splattered muscles, both arms broken badly, looking more like mangled pasta than a person's limbs, more of that nasty ooze dripping from between the fibers.

Holy shit he's still up?

Damn! Kid, get the little one and get out of there!

Izuku started to pick Kouta up, agreeing with the ghosts in his head it was time to leave. Muscular might still be conscious, but there was no way he was a threat now. He had come up here for a reason and it was time to—

Muscular started writhing against the stones, their jagged edges digging into flesh, tearing it as more dark ooze spilled out. "Yoouuuhhh ruuuined…"

Izuku froze as Muscular's head twitched, and his face turned to face him. His one good eye was glazed over, not focused on anything. But the empty socket, the black void into the man's head, that was looking right at Izuku.

"You… ruined it!" Muscular's right arm twisted and, to Izuku's horror, shot out, arm whipping out like a tendril of flesh. Izuku threw Kouta back, away from danger, while moving his body to get between him and the sudden attack. The fleshy mass ensnared Izuku's right arm, wrapping it up from wrist to shoulder.

Then with a sickening crack, wrenched.

Izuku bit back a scream of agony as his right arm was shattered, the bone crushed and broken in multiple places. Both forearm and upper arm bones were rendered into pieces. Izuku, in desperation, pulled to try and free himself, but the pain sucked the strength out of him. Eyes blurry from the pain, he now had an up close look at what was seeping through Muscular's muscle fibers. It wasn't dark ooze. Night hid its true color.

It was a dark green sludge.

Then, his left arm whipped up to the air, over Izuku. "YOU RUINED IT!" Muscular screamed. Or at least, the sound came from Muscular's mouth. But it was not his voice. Izuku turned and saw more and more of that green sludge drooling out of Muscular's eye socket, before a bright yellow glaring eye plopped out like a rotten egg yoke. "YOU RUINED MY PERFECT NEW BODY!"

Izuku gawked in shock as he recognized the monster that had him in their grasp. The villain that Izuku had faced at the start of his heroic journey. The sludge villain!?

The moment Izuku realized who he had been fighting this whole time, the second tendril, raised above Izuku's head, came down with a crack. A tendril of flesh, muscle, sludge and bone shards cracked like a whip, and sliced down through Izuku's face.

---

For several heartbeats, Chitose was practically a frozen statue, body still, breath held and mind blank, so unprepared for what had just happened that she just couldn't comprehend it. Had Inko just attacked her?

The punch had happened so fast, so unexpectedly, that it was still taking her several moments to figure out how she should be reacting. Finally, after what felt like recovering from a hard crash and reboot of herself, Chitose's instincts drove her to the most obvious reaction. Rage. How dare someone lay their hands on her. How dare they, how dare she. With just a twitch, she'd use her Landmine and splatter Inko's body parts all over the—

I'm not hit.

Cutting through the fog of her own outrage, the cunning, calculating part of her mind quickly put the breaks on any immediate reaction.

If she'd punched me with that… My face would be what's splattered over the restaurant's walls.

Chitose blinked, and then with a shift of her head, confirmed that Inko's punch hadn't hit her, but was thrown wide. Inko's fist was floating right next to her head. Close. Oh, very close, but she hadn't actually hit her. But to anyone, it sure would have looked like she'd just thrown a punch intent of knocking her head clean off her shoulders.

But she hadn't? What is… Chitose refocused on Inko, who up until a second ago, she was all but sure she had eating out of the palm of her hand. Who after throwing that mock punch, wasn't even looking at her.

Chitose looked at this woman as her head was twitching in small little jerks, so that her eyes could scan the room around her. She watched this woman quickly and with intent take in everything around her, while she counted softly under her breath. Chitose doubted Inko meant to whisper the numbers out loud, maybe just a subconscious move to help keep track of her count, but after a moment, she stopped counting. It was at that moment that Inko's eyes also had a flash of recognition, like she didn't need to count as she observed her surroundings anymore.

Chitose glanced, and saw that the room was frozen and quiet. Every diner, every waiter, every busboy, everyone in the room was frozen. Swinging doors were stuck open as staff froze in them, and in the other rooms, in the kitchen, the cooks and chefs had all just stopped, stuck between the shock of what had just happened, and from the contradicting orders they all had; their normal orders to defend her should she come under attack as a leader of the Meta Liberation Army, and the ones she had told everyone the moment after Inko had called her and she had set this whole thing up.

Do. Not. Interfere.

A lot of things were going on at the same time. Orders and instincts and all sorts of other things. And it was all happening in just a few important moments. Whoever made the next move, would decide what everyone else did next.

"Oh my, that was a nasty little thing. That mosquito looked like it was about to land right on your neck." Inko slowly pulled her fist back, smiling bashfully as she returned to her seat and examined her hand. "Ah, looks like I missed, but hopefully it'll be too scary to come back." Inko rubbed her palm with her other hand's thumb. "I'd hate it if something got to your neck before me."

Eyes all shifted towards Chitose.

"Mosquito?" Chitose echoed numbly.

While Chitose tried to get that to fit into everything that had just happened, Inko was calling on her experiences with being in really, really shitty situations to not panic. If she was feeling catty, she'd be thanking Sytsevich for kidnapping her, because she learned to keep her cool from that whole horrible thing.

It's everyone. The whole restaurant.

It didn't seem possible, but there was no confusing what she had seen. Inko had thrown that punch, because while everyone was ignoring the flirting, violence wasn't something anyone was probably prepared for. So Inko punched, and immediately looked to see how people reacted. And what she saw told her everything. Somehow, this woman had filled the restaurant with her own people. Not just a few diners, but everyone was working for her. Was here because of her. And the sheer scale of that, the scale of the power, the authority Chitose must have to pull off such an impossible thing, made a pit form in Inko's stomach, though Nenshouki kept it from showing on Inko's face. She kept herself calm and unfazed.

I think… the scale of this is bigger than I thought it was.

"Uh huh."

But… then… What does this mean? Hisashi is trying to recruit influential people into a new MLA… but to pull off something like this. This feels like it would need to be an established organization. Surrounding himself with powerful people is one thing, but I can't believe that anyone can just pull this off. This would need something established, grown and spread out. This would need time to spread to regular people.

Inko was grateful to her past. Nenshouki kept her calm, but also gave her many different experiences to pull from to help her start to come to an answer.

"It feels like we're up against the Abegawa Tenchu Kai again."

…Hisashi isn't the driving force, Inko realized. There just wasn't any way he could be. Even if he was trying to do what Inko had suspected, even if he had started on day one when he began working at Detnerat, it still wouldn't have been enough time. I came at this the wrong way. But then, what does this mean?

Inko didn't have to wait to get her answer, as suddenly, Chitose started laughing. Wild and almost manic, she threw her head back and laughed. The act was so different, so out of character from anything Inko had seen, that even with her past self, she was taken aback and thrown off balance, really just sitting there and wondering what in the hell was going on.

"Oh, oh, you beautiful woman." Chitose covered her mouth to try to stifle the laughter, but wasn't doing that great a job. "You just, ha ha ha, oh, you are just too much." Her palms smacked the table as she leaned in, eyes wide with unhinged joy. "I heard what Hisashi said about you, read what the old HPSC president wrote about you, but to see a glimpse of it first hand, to see the woman that liberated a whole island in Destro's name, with only a handful of followers to start, through her sheer will and raw unblinking violence." Chitose's breath was starting to steam. "Oh, you are so much more than I could have ever dreamed. Of course. Of course you'd figure it out." Chitose looked her over, a new kind of hunger in her eyes mixed in with the old. "Just trying to figure out when you did. So exciting."

Then, while Inko absorbed the fucking bomb just dropped in her lap, Chitose leaned back, and while she got herself back under control, picked up a spoon, and gently tapped it against her crystal glass, making a very noticeable bell sound that rang out in the room. A very obvious signal for her people to pay attention. "Back to your places, everyone. I did give you all very strict orders not to interfere with our dinner. If you're all gawking, I doubt my wonderful guest will be able to enjoy the remainder of our time together."

It took a few seconds, and a few of the occupants gave each other nervous glances, but soon the normal murmur and calm one would expect of a fancy restaurant returned. While some of Chitose's people might not have been completely comfortable just going back to how they were, it was clear no one was brave or dumb enough to speak against her. Nenshouki pointed that out to Inko while the former leader of Bespin's Meta Liberation Army began to weigh her options.

Because there was a lot to unpack. Unfortunately, Inko didn't feel like she had the time to just sit and try to think this through. She didn't have time to really digest that this woman knew exactly who she was, and that apparently Hisashi was out there talking about her and their time on Bespin. There just wasn't time. So Inko reverted to form, and made sure it was Nenshouki who got her out of this.

"You sure you want your men all spread out?" Inko's voice was low, a dangerous growl mixed into it. "If you knew half as much as you think you know about me, your men would be standing right next to this table. I promise you, none of them will be able to reach you if I decide to reach across this table and rip out your throat."

Nenshouki had a simple solution to problems. She was not subtle.

But the way Chitose reacted was off for Inko. The threat didn't seem to ward the woman off, instead she looked more excited. There were no thoughts of self-preservation. So either she was completely insane, or she had a trump card.

Both?

"Oh, Hisashi didn't do you any justice. That fire in your eyes, oh I knew I saw something when your family ate with us, but now, to see it unleashed. This is absolutely wonderful." Chitose then casually picked up a small sugarcube from one of the dessert trays for the drinks, and rolled it between her fingers before casually tossing it away. With a small crack, it popped like a firecracker before it hit the ground. "My Meta Ability is called Landmine. It works on people too. All it takes is a little touch." She waited to see recognition cross Inko's face, and it did. But, there was no fear. In fact, it just made her expression harder. This was a woman that had stared death in the eye, and she wasn't going to blink.

Chitose also knew that it was entirely possible Inko might just strike her again before she could trigger her Quirk. She was alarmingly fast for someone that had supposedly become nothing more than a soft-spoken housewife. There was also the issue that her Quirk wasn't infinite; the explosive effects didn't last forever and would fade if given enough time. A long conversation would be enough. Also, the explosions themselves weren't that big. Bigger objects made bigger booms, but even if she exploded the table between them to give her space to use it on Inko, that might not be enough to slow her down.

But honestly, all these issues and worries didn't truly matter to her. She was just too taken in the moment to really care about the potential danger she was in. "I just have to ask. I'm just so curious," Chitose was done with the pretenses, and was letting all her twisted nature hang out openly. "What was it like to take your first life? That moment when you took your first step in becoming the woman who would send shivers down the government's spines."

Inko regarded Chitose evenly. "He actually told you about Sytsevich?"

Chitose snickered. "Oh no. Not that fool. I mean after that. When you raided those yakuza drug houses. When you set their homes on fire and waited for them to come running out screaming, right into your rifle. What was it like, to take hold of that power?" The look that crossed Inko's face, the darkness that flashed across her eyes, reminded Chitose of the looks Re-Destro could have. In fact, the similarities were as alarming as they were exciting. "Hmm, yes. Yes, it's so obvious now. You are so much more than you let on. No simple housewife has eyes like that. Hisashi undersold you. Of that I'm certain now."

Hisashi has been talking about us. To her. Inko now had new pieces to the puzzle, and the picture that was coming together was alarming. If Hisashi was pulling the shots in any way, he might have tried to downplay Inko's role to make himself seem more important. But the way Chitose spoke, it sounded more like Hisashi was reporting about Inko. "You're part of the Meta Liberation Army." Chitose smiled. Inko motioned to the people, about to say she was in charge but stopped.

Hisashi has been reporting. Working towards making himself bigger in this organization. He's reporting to other, more powerful people. He's not trying to restart our Meta Liberation Army, he found another cell! Inko thought back to the dinner. The way Hisashi acted whenever the other guests spoke. The way he seemed to revere his boss. Which wasn't new. Whenever Rikiya was brought up by him, it really was in a tone that was almost in reverence.

"Fuck, we got the answers."

"You, Koukuu, Tomoyasu and Ri—"

Inko was cut off as Chitose held up a finger, playfully acting like she was chiding a child. "Ah, ah, ah. I can overlook you speaking about Trumpet and Skeptic with their first names. But tread carefully when you speak of our leader Re-Destro. He, you will speak with respect."

…

"…Re-Destro?"

…

Inko didn't react outwardly, but inside a burning fire was starting to rage. "I'm guessing that the name isn't just for show. Or a title."

"Re-Destro is a direct descendant of our glorious movements founder. Through Destro, our people lived and continued on. And when our leader took his rightful spot at the head, we have grown stronger." Chitsoe spoke with something Inko could only describe as religious reverence. But if the Meta Liberation Army had survived since its original leader had killed himself, and had existed in the shadows, then that could maybe explain some of the crap Chitose had pulled. But Inko wasn't focused on that.

Instead, Hisashi has been trying to bring Izuku into a fucking cult?! Whatever this MLA was, it was very different from the one Inko had run.

Does this have anything to do with Hisashi suddenly trying not to act like a piece of shit to us? Was it to get to Izuku?

And then Inko remembered Deika City. The place Hisashi was staying. Where he kept talking about bringing Izuku. The way the people there also revered Rikiya.

…A whole city…

This was big. This whole thing was insanely big. Inko had answers, and the smart thing to do would be to figure out how to get the fuck out of the restraunt right then and their with them.

But as Inko looked across the table at the woman in front of her, it started to dawn on her that the opportunity she had planned to try and take advantage of, was still there. In fact, it was more important now more than ever to make sure that she leaves here with a very strong connection with Chitose. She was her way into whatever this mess was. A source of information about this other MLA cell. That wasn't something she could just give up.

"She's fascinated with me."

That's a huge understatement. Now it makes sense why she was coming on so strong. Apparently I'm just the kind of woman that scratches all her itches. If she wanted to recruit me…

"…She didn't have to try and flirt with me."

Okay. Okay fuck, okay.

"Breathe."

I am breathing. Oh god this really is like being James Bond.

Inko's expression softened, but she kept the Nenshouki edges as she reached over the table, and took Chitose's hand into her own. A move that showed she wasn't afraid of the woman's Quirk, and also that the flirting game was very much still on. "So if everyone else at that dinner had a codename, and are at the top of the organization," Inko inwardly smiled when Chitose's fingers closed around hers, "I assume you have one too. I can't believe you set this all up while being just a simple lieutenant."

Chitose looked ready to combust with excitement. She took Inko's hand and lifted it up so she could lean down and kiss it. "My name is Curious. It's a pleasure to meet you, Inko."

"You certainly know how to make a woman feel wanted. Even Hisashi hasn't pulled out these kinds of stops on our best days."

"This is my initiative." Chitose reached out and cupped Inko's cheek. Her smile widened when Inko didn't flinch or pull away from her touch. "I'm here because I want you. My curiosity about you just won't let me leave you alone."

Inko had a feeling that what Chitose wanted was more than just what the flirting and heavy handed sexual need implied. But she was pretty sure she couldn't just ask about that. Not yet anyway. This wasn't going to be a single time thing. She was going to need to work Chitose, to get what she needed. So Inko leaned in as Chitose pulled her. Bringing their faces closer together.

In for a penny…

"…In for a pounding."

"I'm looking forward to feeling just how much you want me. I bet the hotel we'll be staying in will make it an unforgettable night," Inko's voice dripped with intent and Chitose shuddered, her breath hot on her face as they got closer. "I just hope we'll get to be alone there."

"No one will be there to hear you scream."

Ruby coated lips came close to dark lavender, their breaths tickling each other's noses.

Crash!

But a sudden sound of broken glass jerked the pair to a stop. Chitose was about to rip into the stupid fool that had decided now of all times to be clumsy, but as she turned, she saw that all her men were back to stunned, defensive postures. Inko noticed it too, and that they were all looking up towards the restaurant's ceiling. Inko looked, and her blood went cold. A dark black cloud was swirling into a dark void above everyone's heads. Briefly, two yellow eyes glanced around the room, before they faded and only the black warp gate remained.

Inko had heard her son describe the attacks he had lived through. How the villains had someone with a warp or portal Quirk. She had heard Ochako describe it as a black void. She also knew the villain's name, thanks to the news reports talking about how Tomura had escaped after he had decayed her throat.

"Kurogiri," she hissed. She was back to how she was at the mall, murderous intent radiating from her being. This was the woman that had gone to war with the yakuza and won, and that was now a mother, and was willing to do whatever she needed to do to protect her son, regardless of anything else. This villain was one of the monsters that was responsible for her son being hurt. So, he was one of many Nenshouki would kill given the chance.

One of the diners began to approach the pair. "Ma'am, we need—" He didn't get to finish as the black portal began to shift, and someone floated out. A tall man in an expensive black suit, whose face was hidden by a black, domed mask that settled around his neck and shoulders. From the portal, came a distinct hospital smell, sanitizers and disinfectants, hidden by flowery perfumes that mixed and made a person's nose burn. This man floated above everyone with the air of a king who had descended down to tower over the common folk.

The guard looked at Chitose, but she gave him a look. No action. Though this was more due to their leader's stanuch rule that no member was to take any action that could lead to suspicion of the MLA's existence.

Chitose looked up at the man. "If you're looking to rob us, I'm sure I speak for everyone when I say we'll gladly hand over any valuables you want."

"Ha." The man made a small chuckle. "Amusing. You think I'm a common burglar?"

Inko flinched as her eyes went wide. No. No no no no no that couldn't have been. It had been years. But that was a voice that Inko could never forget. Even distorted by the mask, she recognized it. But All Might said… All Might said he was…

Chitose shrugged. "I am afraid I don't tend to keep up with the new villains. The portal makes me think you're League of Villains, but I don't think I've heard of someone with your description in the news."

"You're supposed to be dead," Inko whispered.

Though in the silent room, everyone heard her. Chitose looked at her, an eyebrow raised. "You know him?"

"Ah, she does indeed. We met many, many years ago. She helped me retrieve some lost property stolen from me."

"All for One." The name chilled Inko to her core.

"Hello Midoriya. It is so good to see you again."

And suddenly the whole room changed. Chitose's calm and almost dismissive demeanor changed into something close to panic. Around her, her guards all drew weapons, guns or other support items, from their coats or hand bags. A sparkle of light surrounded Chitose's hand as a large rectangle box of metal covered it. At the end were multiple cube protrusions, which she pointed at All for One as she lifted her arm at him. Others in the room activated their Quirks. Fangs, claws and raw elements bared in the face of this sudden threat.

Not that any of this really mattered.

The room was filled with people just about ready to crap themselves in fear. No one had recognized him. There were descriptions of the man, but none had ever mentioned him wearing such a strange black device.

And Chitose had just called him a burglar.

Slowly, All for One lowered himself to the floor. The whole time, his attention never wavered off of Inko. When his shoes clicked softly on the floor, he addressed her with a small respectful bow, an arm crossed over his chest. "Midoriya, I'm afraid I must offer my most sincere apologies. About Young Tomura, and for what you are about to experience."

Inko's mind was racing. She couldn't breathe. The floor felt like it was suddenly going to collapse under her. Everything was happening too fast. It was all too—

Then when Midoriya blood is thinned by half, the demon will come back to take the calf.

Pemphredo's voice echoed in Inko's ears, just as All for One took a step towards her.

Authors Notes:

I have been sitting on this twist on Muscular since day one when I started putting an outline together for this story. Having it be the sludge villain (Hedoro Viran) show up as a member of the Vanguard Action Squad has been a long time coming. Readers might recall that in some of the LoV cuts, that Chimera mentioned some nut jobs. That was Muscular, Moonfish and finally Sludgy himself. There's a lot of how's and when's I'm sure you all want to know. Buuuut that's for the next chapter.

Speaking of sitting on ideas, Tsubasa is back. Y'all remember after Hosu City, how Kurogiri said he recovered the Winged Nomu Izuku burned to a crisp. And it wasn't dead and the good doctor was impressed it wasn't dead? Well here you go. Tsubasa is Hood and he's going to be the bane of Katsuki's existence. Always felt Katsuki needed his own personal antagonist. And it being someone he had a huge effect on as a kid if going to be a fun knife to twist. In case you're curious about his Quirks, here is the full list, along with a sketch by Karystma who does all the cover art, which you can find in the TV Tropes page.

Wings: Grows large dragon-like wings on users' back. Originally red, then pale yellow. Now as a High End, they are black. Wings grow on Hood's back and along the dragon body.

Absorption and Release: This Quirk allows the user to absorb emitter attacks and send them back, but it still takes damage from the initial attack.

Burn Immunity: Prevents the user from suffering burns when exposed to heat, fire and electricity. Does not prevent other effects of sustained heat exposure such as dehydration, heat exhaustion and heatstroke.

Draconic Form: Body of the user has aspects of a dragon. Tail, claws, elongated body and acid breath weapon.

Super Regeneration: the ability to regenerate any sort of injuries on the user's body, such as missing limbs, at incredible speeds.

Rupture: Detonates the users body, letting them expel parts of themselves as pieces of high speed shrapnel.

Manticore Tail: Gives the user a long prehensile tail that ends with a multi barbed stinger.

And then there was Inko. Who is also dealing with her past catching up to her. Here she is, dealing with discovering that her dumb fuck husband found himself a new MLA cell to join while at the same time, going through her "Oh this bitch is crazy. Does that make her hotter?" phase and now All for One just stepped out into the open. Surely nothing bad is about to happen with the villain that up until now has gone out of his way not to be seen by the public.

Sorry for the long wait with this one. Work got busy and I just didn't have as much time as I'd have liked to work on things. I could have split it up, but I had a very specific ending in mind with the double cliffhanger that I wanted to keep.

If you're at all interested in the inspiration for Izuku's big fire breath attack. Go watch Godzilla's atomic breath scene from Minus One, and Hollow Ichigo's cero in the Hell movie.

Man, hitting this milestone was huge for me. But this was only the first half of the villain assault on the summer camp. Still got all of part two left. I can't wait for you all to see what's going to lead into the cluster fuck that Kamino will become.

A huge shout out to my beta reader WereTech

As always, comments reviews and critiques are always welcome!