Ch 34: Grudge Match (2)
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"..."

“…”

Silence.

All of the kids in the park stared at him, their bodies stiffening at the amount of tension in the air. He could almost smell their fear, going by their shaky hands, dilated pupils, and unsteady breathing. It was crystal clear just how inexperienced these kids were, seconds felt as if they slowed down endlessly as he simply rubbed his cheeks from Tomomi's punch.

*Ssss*

Tomomi on the other hand, was sweating.

Or she would be, if her body temperature allowed sweat to form, she would call herself ‘steaming hot’ due to her body very visibly emanating steam. But she was occupied having a glaring contest with the guy who just tried to kill her.

The silence between them grew louder, until...

"Heh"

All of them flinched at the sound, his chuckle—while technically quiet—was the loudest sound since Tomomi's entrance. Their minds finally unfroze and immediately went into sudden panic, trying to not lose their composure while processing just what had happened.

Their constantly changing expression amused him.

[She's still alive? that's a surprise but... not completely unexpected]

Tomomi having a quirk didn't surprise him that much. It was just another thing to put on the pile of ‘improbable’ information he got about her.

Truthfully, he had a hard time actually believing any of the information he gathered about her, due to how seemingly impossible the facts about her appeared to be.

First, her looks took none of Takeshi's traits. She inherited neither his platinum-blonde hair nor his icy blue eyes that bordered on grey. Instead, she had shaggy black hair and coal-colored eyes, a VERY rounded face, and a damn button nose.

BUT it was still possible that she was his child, if not a bit improbable. The most outrageous information about everything was—by far— trying to believe that Mizushima, that Mizushima, The Blonde Demon, had actually married and had a family that he cared about.

Now that was impossible in his book.

All of the above, plus how seemingly flimsy and out of nowhere he got said intel, got him thinking that he set up to kill the wrong kid. Not that he cared about such a thing, it would simply tip the police on him earlier than he wanted. A bit wasteful and annoying but nothing too out of the ordinary for him.

A brief look at her dispelled his thoughts of what-ifs. Her eyes burned with unwavering resolve even after taking a hit that should’ve killed her, Stubborn to even show a bit of hesitation.

[… Yeah, I can see it]

Tomomi for her part was doing in her words, ‘not so good’. She was trying to focus on the problem at hand, but her senses were working against her.

Second Gear, was difficult to get started, somewhat tough to keep it up AND it fucked with her senses to a staggering degree. Simply put, it was a stat multiplier, but also augmented her sense to a crippling degree at the moment.

She wanted to focus and hone her senses in case he moved? Well of course. But did she need to hear her heartbeat ringing in her ears? Feel the sliding drop of blood sliding down her face? The sweat of her body vaporizing due to her own internal heat?

Well, no, not at all. But she did feel all of that and some more, yes, she did, and it was distracting as h-

*Crack*

{Twin Jet Pistol!}

Both of her fists impacted his chest stopping his sudden charge at her friends. He slid for a few meters back while Oka and Himiko who kept staring at where he was before.

A second later they felt the breeze generated by Tomomi, and they both flinched. Both are now very much aware of how close they were to dying.

It was too quick for their eyes.

“Oi you idiot, that was not very kind of you! You owe me an apology” Tomomi yelled while pointing to him, with no shakiness at all.

[Yep, completely composed and confident… definitely not scared!]

The man arched his eyebrow and spoke, “Oh…” He replied, fairly amused “And why would I do that?”

Her eye twitched in annoyance.

[Doesn’t matter, just think about how to beat the shit out of him now that he seems talkative, you supposedly trained to fight…]

“It’s unpolite to not give your name when you already know mine” Tomomi reasoned while keeping herself focused, she needed to buy time for her friends.

The guy just smirked “That’s not how the saying goes” he said while he walked calmly, towards her. Which was frightening, to say the least.

“You’re also not supposed to try to kill kids… and that’s not stopping you” Tomomi pointed out as she also started walking slowly—very, very slowly— towards him.

[Goddammit take a fucking hint and get the hell out of here!!?]

“That is true… I guess… I should do something about it then…” He spoke leisurely while casting a glance at her friends.

Tomomi was about to kneel and pray for her friend’s successful reincarnation in the next life when they finally decided to snap out of their shock-induced paralysis. She did take note that it was Yoshihama who started dragging her friends out of the splash zone.

[Thank you, Yoshihama, for not being completely useless]

Tomomi stopped a few meters in front of the man, who stood there, towering above her while he was rubbing his chin with his hand.

”Name’s not that important anyway” He shrugged while looking dead in the eye ”Bow-shock, might’ve heard of me, nice to meet you I suppose”

Tomomi barely blocked his fist as it crashed on top of her, with her crossed arms above her head she steadied herself as it continued applying downward pressure, her feet slowly sinking into the ground.

“Please die” Bow-shock said nonchalantly.

“As if I’m going out that easily!!” She yelled while slowly being pushed into the floor. She started pushing even harder against his fist to try and gain some semblance of control.

It did not work.

[F*ck, think brain, think. What did Dad tell you to do in situations like these?... ahh- to wing it? Man, why did he make it a question!!?]

Tomomi’s body was weird, her quirk had permanently changed her properties even her insides, so even getting her to throw punches without her tumbling was already a victory.

It was especially annoying to her because her body seemed to listen to her perfectly on only two occasions. Either when she truly believed that what she was doing was feasible or when she was not thinking that hard about it.

[Stupid quirk, can’t even blame genetics on it!]

“Ugh…”

Bow-shock pressed with even more force making Tomomi already strained her legs tremble even more. With sweat evaporating on her face, she simply gritted her teeth.

[Ahh fuck it, we go a little crazy]

“Well, you’re not doing so goo-”

Bow-shock felt his fist suddenly sink down, crushing her body under his weight faster than he expected. Glancing at her he noticed that she was way smaller than usual.

[Her legs and torso are folded into themselves??? The hell is she a-]

{Spring-}

Tomomi leaned forward and stopped struggling to block with her hands, and all of her ‘folds’ in her legs and torso suddenly got uncompressed at the same time.

{-Bullet}

“Gah-”

She rocketed straight to his chest and headbutted him with enough to send both of them to the other side of the park. Taking a second to get himself up he looks around searching for her.

He had barely had time to center himself before his senses flared, he quickly raised his hand to the left.

{Jet Pistol}

Blocking the fist with his forearm was instinctive, yet he almost cursed as the force behind the hit rattled his bones. He had to admit, that naming her attacks after weapons—no matter how childish—was appropriate.

Her snapped back into place in less than a second before she became a blur once again. She moved like a bullet zig-zagging all over the place. Bow-shock took a deep breath before quickly dodging to the side.

{-Axe}

Her foot slammed into the ground, cracking it, a good reminder of whose child he was facing.

[… Alright then, no mistakes here. Definitely that demon’s brat]

Shave, while a good technique to move short distances fast, WAS still easy to read and follow. By only going in straight lines, even someone as simple-minded as Bow-shock could follow it.

{-Rifle}

He ducked the punch, which whizzed where his head was a moment ago.

[This girl is a bit fearsome, isn’t she?]

Opponents that didn’t even hesitate to fight in the face of unfavorable odds were annoying, but the kind of annoying that would make him smile. A reminder of his younger self, eager to prove to the world that he could change it and immortalize his name.

But life never really cared for such things, one day your leader gets killed by the yakuza due to him being honor-bound to some bullshit contract, then you manage to gather the scraps of said group by underhanded tactics and laying low for years.

Only for all those years of hard work to go the drain because a meandering cop just wouldn’t let a case lay cold. A relentless pursuer that eventually got to him.

Oh, how he could see that same expression of his on her face, those damn eyes full of concentration, so cold and determined to bring him down even while half-trying! And he could see it on her face! The girl was smiling!

The demon AT LEAST tried to remain expressionless while pummeling him, even if the occasional smirk slipped out of his constructed mask.

She moved again, going out of his sight as he looked around to try to see just where she went, before quickly doing a 180.

{Twin Jet Pistol}

IF he were a random schmuck, recognizing the name of the attack would barely help him due to the speed at which her fist was going.

Thankfully he was himself.

His quirk was simple, like many of the previous generation of quirk-users. He simply could cause shockwaves around his body at will, with a simple catch. The longer or stronger he made them, the more recoil they would have.

The amount of stress his limbs experienced because of said power was a cause of many literal headaches, but said recoil could be used on more productive things.

Causing shockwaves on his elbows, his arm shot up and cached two pink fists before they impacted his face. He felt the heat of those arms as he watched his opponent continue to smile, as she stopped planting her feet on the ground.

{Missile!}

Tomomi accelerated towards him at maximum velocity. He quickly pushed her arms downwards to make her aim at his chest rather than his head, as he would definitely not survive that unscathed, but more importantly.

*BAM*

He kneed her directly in her face with as much force as possible.

“Gah-”

He felt his knee not only send his quirk’s shockwaves straight to her skull, he felt her face cave inwards. sending her crashing back down at the same speed as she came.

[That ought to do something]

Tomomi crashed and got smeared onto the floor for several meters as she slowed down, before immediately jumping back up. Her face was worse for wear and bleeding through her nose, but still, she was better than he expected after such a hit.

[Quirk makes her a freak in resistance]

He should’ve figured that something like that would occur when she turned pink and started steaming.

Bow-shock had seen his fair share of weird quirks through his criminal career, but ones that somehow affected their opponents in their entirety—You ‘know including the entirety of their internal organs— were rare.

[And of course, his spawn has some weird ass quirk that somehow counters mine]

Bow-shock crouched lightly before darting off straight to Tomomi’s friends once again. The girl was a wanna-be hero.

A test of her capabilities never hurt anybody important anyway.

 


 

-[A Bit Earlier]-

 

The human senses, as their name implies, are prepared to simply sense information and send it to the brain to process it. Now, when one gets a huge amount of information, they need an equally huge amount of time to process it and take action from there.

Overstimulation can happen when the amount of information that the brain receives gets so massive, that it clogs its capacity to process it. It can result in Decision paralysis, making it impossible to move or make rational decisions of any kind and just letting time run pass by.

Yoshihama was—against what Tomomi would like to say—smart, he did think things through, he just preferred simple solutions over complicated ones.

But that just wasn’t possible with the sheer amount of information he had, too complicated to process quickly.

His instincts told him that if he didn’t move, he was dead, they also told him that his legs were frozen solid in fear, that he was in direct sight of the man in front of him, that he should surrender immediately, that he should cry in fear, that he should steady his breathing, that his legs were about to buckle, that he wasn’t blinking, that he-

“!?”

Bow-shock charged at him…

His power was an advantage, after the first scare, he channeled a bit of it to his eyes, letting him see the man moving at him, giving him a reasonable time to react.

But how was he supposed to just understand the speeds that he and Tomomi were fighting in? and moreover, move in them?

[These two are monsters…]

His first clear thought in a long time.

{Twin Jet Pistols}

Tomomi punched Bow-shock out of their way, throwing him to the side to almost tumble. Bow-shock reacted rapidly as he steadied himself.

And proceeded to just look at her.

Yoshihama, along with his and Tomomi’s friends, were still in a haze. Too overwhelmed and scared over thinking that Tomomi had died.

[I’m I just that weak? … Was she really holding that much back?]

Yoshihama knew he was a speck of dust in the grand scheme of things, he knew that, his family knew that, and Tomomi knew that. But now that he took a peek at the chasm of strength between the two, the reality of the situation hit him.

Tomomi wasn’t boasting her strength like he thought, she was actually hiding it. And that stung his pride. Well, Tomomi never really spoke, well she did, but it was mainly useless stuff. Nothing about her secret to her power or strength in general.

[Did she actually tell me something actually useful?]

The only real time she spoke semi-seriously about strength or how to get stronger was weird to him.

 

“Real strength is not about oneself… is… uhh…” She frowned for a second before nodding to herself “is about standing for something bigger than yourself” Tomomi said as she chewed a hamburger steak from Himiko’s bento.

“And that means?”

“I don’t know what that means”

“…What?”

“Yeah, I know what that means to ’me’, how should I know what the hell ‘you’ even stand for”.

 

But now that didn’t seem to be the case, Tomomi did have the qualification —of being strong as shit— to claim her knowledge as somewhat truthful. She just didn’t tell him about it since she probably wanted to spare his already shaky pride.

He knew for a fact that he would be toasted if Tomomi went all out, but the thought that she didn’t even tell him how toasted he was… he didn’t know what that feeling was, but it was definitely on the spectrum of ‘not very good, would like a refund’.

His thoughts once again cleared, he remembered Tomomi’s advice when she had suddenly pulled a new move, he was pestering about it for a few days until she just spoke to him.

 

“Why don’t I tell you?... well, you see… there are no stupid questions, but there are a lot of stupid answers, gotta learn the difference someday right”

“You didn’t answer shit”

“I did answer, it was just a stupid answer”

 

A quick breeze made him blink and pulled him out of his musings, both he and Tomomi were talking, but then she looked at him, at his friends, at her friends, with complicated emotions behind her eyes.

Determined and shaking.

[Ah, I think I get it a bit]

“Oi let’s get out of here” He grabbed both of Tomomi’s friend by their shoulders and started dragging them away.

“I d-don’t think we can just leave her here!” Himiko said as she looked at the fight, or what little she could watch with her eyes.

“I-It’s against the uhm.. t-the buddy system to leave her alone” Oka replied unsure at first but gained confidence at the end of her sentence.

[I don’t have my real swords, and can’t make any fancy moves either… not like I had any choice in the matter anyway]

Now it was his turn to glare at them, he was already at his limit. And the situation didn’t seem to get better anytime. So he tried to get their attention again.

“Listen we don’t have time to-”

Feeling chills crawl on his back, Yoshihama acted without thinking. He moved his hand in front of him and acted on instinct alone.

{Flashbang}

Oka and Himiko were in front of him facing Bow-shock, ergo, away from the flash. Bow-shock only squinted as he continued to barrel towards them even with limited visibility.

*Snap*

Bow-shock slowed a little thanks to Kawashita’s quirk, who staggered and almost fell, undoubtedly feeling the backlash of using his quirk on a person, even if it barely slowed them down.

Bow-shock simply glared at his friends even harder, Oka and Himiko having already drawn their weapons, as ineffective as they would be against this…

[Holy shit! this is an actual villain-]

“EEP!”

Unsurprisingly, the girlish scream and subsequent thud came from Abura, who fell on his butt as he finally snapped out of his stupor and began backing away by basically crawling backward.

Bow-shock finally stepped up with his hand clawed, the tip of his fingers shimmering ready to gut Himiko, but he immediately found himself slipping forward, and he was too fast to actually stop himself.

{Serpent climb}

{Flesh Carver!!}

Oka and Himiko attacked at the same time, trying to slash the man before he reached them.

Bow-shock immediately opened his palms and stopped himself with the recoil of a shockwave, swiftly backing away, even still he felt both of his arms get slightly cut, especially by the one with the butcher’s knife.

He turned towards them as he pre-

{Jet Whip}

Bow-shock was suddenly aware of the foot currently digging into his liver as he was sent crashing into the brick wall to the side of the park. Tomomi, for her part, appeared in front of Oka.

“Man *huff*… y’all gotta get out of here” she said while panting lightly, she was concentrating on her opponent but she was already wearing thin on her stamina.

Her body wasn’t strong enough yet.

Everyone took a second to consider her words since they were finally able to shake their fear off, adrenaline starting to pump in their veins. They realized that only a minute had passed since the Bow-shock dude appeared and they almost died two times.

Yoshihama looked at his friends, Kawashita already knew he was out of his depth here and nodded at her words, while Abura was almost crying in happiness at the thought of not being pummeled any further.

Oka and Himiko for their part looked unsure but were still reasonable enough.

{Shave}

A single whisper, before they could even answer Tomomi was already shooting off towards him. Their eyes followed on a delay.

*Boom*

Bow-shock and Tomomi clashed in the middle of the park with enough force to send them both a few paces back. Both of them dashed at each other immediately as they began exchanging multiple hits.

Oka and Himiko frowned, each hit sounded like it hurt. Bow-shock shockwaves were loud, not like Tomomi’s was any better, her hits had a certain ‘oomph’ to them, like seeing someone belly flop at the pool from a high altitude.

You just knew it hurt.

Himiko immediately turned towards Yoshihama’s group who were still aghast at their decision “Kawashita!”

“Yes ma’am!”

“Be useful and see if you can find ANY authority that’s close by, preferably heroes on patrol duty” She barked out, she didn’t dignify him with another look before looking at Yoshihama.

She didn’t hesitate and tossed him her cell phone, which he cached with confusion painted on his face. Kawashita already running back from where they came.

“Call her dad, if anyone gets here before the heroes it’s him” She said firmly “He’s a big shot in the police, he would know what to do… probably a daughter-con as well” She whispered the last part.

Oka was on guard and ready to attack, she was sure bow-shock, had heard Himiko, so he would at least try to end Tomomi in the next few minutes.

“Abura” Himiko said as she eyed Abura, who was quietly sneaking away.

“Yes!” Abura shot up, ready to run away from this situation even without orders.

“You’re staying here” she said flatly.

“What!!! Hell nah I’m out this bitch” All of this was above his nonexistent pay grade and he wasn’t going to risk everything just like that. He turned around and started running.

Or he would if Yoshihama hadn’t grabbed the collar of his shirt as he ran past him.

“Ah traitor!” Abura whined again, though he didn’t try to make a real effort to get out.

“Shut up and stop moving, I’m trying to make a call” Yoshihama said as he scrolled up in the contacts.

Abura let out a final struggle before whining “Why ME anyways!?”

“You’ve got a useful quirk” Oka said flatly.

“CURSE YOU GENETICS!!”

*BAM*

They heard Bow-shock bash Tomomi’s arms away from him and immediately walk up to her while she was stunned, he stomped her knee inward to break it completely.

Tomomi flinched, forgetting that she was made of rubber for a second, before quickly uppercutting him, almost tripping herself up since her knee was still being stepped on, crushed in the ground.

Bow-shock didn’t even flinch at her punch, before socking Tomomi straight in the head with a shock-powered fist, stretching her body back a few meters, before it snapped back to its original position like a punching bag.

[Resilient Brat…]

*BAM*

“…Ugh”

He punched her once again with a stronger shockwave, Tomomi spat out blood as her head and body stretched farther back. He once again concentrated his quirk even further as went for another punch.

But his arm stopped midway. His eyes went wide for a second as he noticed steel wires wrapping tightly around his biceps. Turning his head quickly Himiko and Yoshihama held onto them for dear life.

{Jet Bell!}

Tomomi headbutted him away from her, finally freeing her leg from being flattened, and threw a barrage of punches towards him. She connected on his sides and finally managed to block some of his punches.

Bow-shock for his part was getting pissed off about the whole situation, the rubber girl was complete garbage at fighting at the start, but she was starting to get the hang of things.

She barely flinched at each punch she received even with the recoil of his quirk; she was starting to throw curves and bounces on her punches instead of being a normal person. Even worse, he was starting to get the feeling that she was simply not going back down.

[I officially hate his whole damn bloodline]

{Jet Riffle}

Bow-shock let himself get hit, dampening the drilling into him with liberal use of his quirk, before grabbing Tomomi’s arm yanking her forward, and kicking her in the gut.

{Lobotomy}

He slammed both of his palms on Tomomi’s head, crushing it between them and channeling two different shockwaves that crashed into each other inside her head, and kicked her far away from him before she could do anything more.

Normally that attack would kill anyone he used on— by making their head explode in gross chunks of gore— But that didn’t happen, her head was still very much on her shoulders.

Not that it mattered at the moment.

He turned towards his uninvited guest, smiling for a second as he saw their horrified faces.

“You lot don’t have any self-preservation instincts in you do you?” He didn’t wait for an answer before dashing at them at full speed.

{Scale’s so-}

His hand blurred as he channeled shockwaves into Oka’s sword mid-attack, making vibrate so hard that it exploded into smithereens, leaving a defenseless Oka with jittery hands.

Bow-shock turned to Himiko, who was already throwing knives at him.

[Now that’s how it should go]

A strong wave repelled all of the knives away from his body, he grabbed the steel wire that was sneaking between his legs and tugged her forward, throwing a fist at her.

Himiko barely had time to process what was happening as she dislocated an arm, but she slipped and started falling backwards, making him miss her by an inch. Yet the shockwave still reached her.

“AGh…”

The steel wire snapped as she was sent crashing down. Bow-shock didn’t spare a glance at her as he looked dead in the eye at Yoshihama and Oka who was still trying to get her hands to jitter less.

“You still doing this?” He asked, looking at Abura who was still very much not on board with the idea.

“What do you think?” Yoshihama practically hissed and Oka simply glared at him.

{Equinox}

The ball of light that hit Bow-shock wasn’t strong, at all. But it did push him away thanks to the frictionless ground. He raised an eyebrow in amusement.

They flinched.

Yoshihama was breathing heavily already; he had used up all of the power he had for today and he was still stretching a bit too far. Oka was still fearful, but he was definitely eyeing him with determination.

He noticed that she sometimes seemed to look past him.

So, he looked behind him, only to be surprised by bruised and battered Tomomi, struggling to stand up while she looked at him. Hatred was apparent from her steady gaze.

“You’re a bit too resilient…” He coldly spoke as he walked towards her.

“That’s what I’m about, rubber and all” she pointed at him as she yelled at him at the top of her lungs, almost toppling over.

Her mouth was spilling copious amounts of blood, but the atmosphere suddenly got a lot colder. He simply smirked as she formed a fist and pulled her fist back.

{Jet-}

He saw her lose focus on her eyes as she tumbled forwards, he still didn’t get his eyes off her. He no longer underestimated her resilience and wanted to see what she cou-

{-Pistol!}

A pink fist almost caved his ribs inwards, spitting up a bit of blood and falling backward, he caught ‘Tomomi’ dissolve into the earlier Himiko, who fell flat on her face.

She had passed out.

[F*ck]

The real Tomomi’s gripped his arm and coiled around it. She was bleeding even more than her fake, but her eyes were resolute.

{Missile!}

Shockwaves rocked his elbows and feet with extreme force, making his bone creak at the extreme pressure he subjected them but he was just fast enough to catch her by the throat and slammed her into the ground.

“GHhh…”

She coughed spit and blood as she struggled to breathe, he started strangling her on the spot and smiled.

Until he noticed that between Tomomi’s cough, there was a clear grin, her other arm was stretched, and immediately snapped back towards her.

{-Bullet}

A clean headshot catapulted him off her, who coughed as she jumped back up, and without holding anything back screamed.

{JET-}

Her arm shot off and smashed into him, slamming him into the wall, and without a second look, she did it again, and again, AND AGAIN.

She started punching so hard he started digging into the wall.

{-GATTLING}

Her arms started moving so fast it seemed she had multiple of them. Her fingers dulled as they impacted flesh, bone, and concrete alike, snapping back and shooting back multiple times a second. She was burning even harder, not giving a care about her injuries continuing for even longer and screaming into the air until her arms could no longer move.

She panted and panted for air. And fell on her back, and her quickly skin lost its pink color as her breath and heartbeat hitched for a second before it became somewhat normal.

Bow-shock lost consciousness during her attack. Even trying to dampen the effects with his quirk didn’t face her fist. His body gave up during Tomomi’s relentless onslaught.

And Tomomi smiled.

She had actually managed to save her friends.

[I might not be completely useless at this…]

 


 

“You know that was reckless of you, you should have just run away from him or contacted the authorities if you were in that much danger” he sternly scolded the girl who was resting on a stretcher.

Looking at the aftermath of the fight, one might assume that an altercation between multiple heroes and villains happened in one of the not more desolate parks of this prefecture.

Well, they would be somewhat off, since it was caused by a mere twelve-year-old and a mediocre villain.

“What do you think I did? He came to kill me and my friends!! Was I supposed to just lay down and die so as to not break the law?” She grumbled and hissed as the nurses cleaned her injuries.

By witness accounts, she should be very dead, but apparently got off with only minor trauma on most of her body, which isn’t ideal or minor but was not that bad considering the risks.

[If one goes by the file, this amount of damage shouldn’t have happened, it’s probably outdated at this point]

The police officer sighed; it was just one of those days where quirks just acted as a way to put more paperwork on his table. Moreover, the HPSC was probably getting involved with someone like her going around.

“That’s not what I was talking about I was-”

The girl suddenly snapped her eyes towards the street. He did as well as a police car parked near them.

[Reinforcements are rather quick today, they’re nice to hav-Why is Mizushima HERE?]

His brain froze for a solid second before he stood up and saluted “Sir! We were just abo-” Takeshi walked past him without even looking at him.

He definitely didn't grit his teeth at this.

Mizushima walked towards her and simply stared at her for a few seconds before he spoke.

“Was it necessary for you to do… this?” His voice was even and calm, the usual coldness that characterized him.

[I mean she did screw up, but getting scolded by you is bad, even on the nicest of days…]

Even the nurses were glaring at him when he was not looking of course.

“Yeah… he was out for my blood and almost killed my friends, can’t just let him do that, even if it’s technically not ‘abiding by the laws’…” She spoke a bit reservedly but she looked very much mad at the villain who was being cuffed at the moment.

Mizushima simply sighed and… patted her head

“It’s alright then, but try to not get yourself killed, I was worried” he smiled a bit as he ruffled her dirty hair.

“OK, but it wasn’t my fault!! And stop messing my hair DAD!!” she said as she looked at him with a hidden smile

The silence after that revelation spoke volumes, suddenly this whole affair got a lot more complicated.

[At least he will be the one to get the paperwork done, I'm fucking taking a day off after this]

“Your mom will tear you apart though”

“WHA- DAD! You NEED to help me with that!”

“Sorry, I prefer to not be strike zone” he said with a chuckle before he whispered in her ear “But you are injured, you probably will get off easy this time around if you leverage that”

Tomomi nodded but flinched as she was very sore still.

“Oh, you are kind of evil aren’t you?” she said as he was looking at her more closely, trying to see if the nurses bandaged everything in the correct way.

It was mostly for his peace of mind.

“Yeah, that’s why I gotta ask why were you ‘sparring’ using your quirks before you got into this mess” He asked as circled her, his face not showing much emotion.

“Uhh… I’m going to be a teenager, my whole schtick is limit testing the law while I can?” She half answered, he just shrugged and Tomomi sighed in relief.

She flinched again; her arms were killing her.

“Well what done it’s done, anything else you got to say, injuries and the like?”

“I’m so hungry I want to throw up” Tomomi said without hesitation

“Right” he nodded in understanding, food was important for recovery.

“Oh, and I think I’m going to pass out…” Takeshi raised an eyebrow but quickly moved to catch her daughter as she fell forward.

The nurses quickly checked on her and confirmed that she passed out due to exhaustion.

Takeshi once again sighed, he was going to have nightmares about this for months. Parenting definitely sucked a lot of his admittedly very little emotional battery.

But seeing her still breathing did make it worth it at the end of the day.

Now to see how to explain this to Aiko without caching a stray in the process.

 

This chapter kicked my ass, like, on several occasions. it was written on 3 different occasions which is why it might seem a bit disjointed but it kinda needed to get out of my draft sometime this year...

So I guess it's here! anyways life kinda sucks at the moment but it is getting better, stay safe everyone!!! I won't make promises of this getting consistent updates but it is like in the plans that I haven't written down so as to not make them real responsibility

 

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