I roll my eyes and grunt as Himi boots me away, loudly belittling me for the lack of damage I did to Eraserhead. Sheesh. She’s really playing into this. Was she hoping for more blood? I can understand if she’s disappointed about that. The only blood we’ve seen so far are from where bones are poking out of some of the villains Mirko took out. The whole ‘excessive force’ thing kind of goes out the window in this type of situation… Especially since that law is mainly for property damage instead of villain damage. Still, at least they’ll get proper medical attention when they’re arrested!

Which is good, since we weren’t planning to bring any of them back with us. Plus, I’m pretty sure the doctor is busy preparing for Two to wake up soon. It’ll be nice to have another member on the team!

Anyways, moving around with a broken arm is annoying, so I’ll just lay here and watch Eraserhead fight the Nomu. Not much else to do until Kurogiri gets back. Though portaling everyone shouldn’t take that long unless he’s waiting for a cinematic moment to do it. I did give One a bunch of guidelines to go with his role -even if he absolutely hates the costume I made him put on, heh- so it would make sense.

It’s actually pretty relaxing watching and listening to the fight. Eraserhead is managing to keep ahead of the Nomu’s attacks, always managing to dodge just enough that its fists don’t even brush his skin. Seeing how much weaker it is just reinforces my belief that we won’t be coming out of this with a martial victory. But I’m here for a mental victory. Speaking of…

I twist my head to the side and smirk as I see Himi kicking Izumi out of some bushes she was hiding in. I start crawling towards them, careful to stay out of sight as they start talking, Himi pacing around her with a mocking stride so that Izumi is facing my direction. Close enough that I can see her face fall into horror as Himi speaks and reveals my face that she’s wearing..

“There are no secrets from family, sister.”

I smirk, glorying in inflicting her with the same emotion she and Kachan had forced upon me for so long. But it drops as quickly as it appears, because just as quickly Himi flubs her lines! I’ve literally never called Kachan anything other than Kachan! And she just goes and says Bakugou!? Not even Katsuki!? At least then there’d be a chance it could be brushed off!

But nope, as I predicted Izumi catches on immediately and calls her out. Though I’m taken aback by just how angry she seems to be that Himi looks like me. It’s weird. She tries to salvage the ruse, but doesn’t get very far before green energy appears at her neck, choking her words off. I frown, starting to go faster but still staying hidden. Nobody chokes Himi unless we’re doing roleplay!

Still, seeing how quick she is to attack even a person identical to me with no hesitation reaffirms my belief that she doesn’t miss me. Probably just scared that me being back means that there’s a chance her horrible deeds will get revealed. Because I’m positive that Toshinori has done everything he can to keep that information from coming to light. Pizza knows that every news station in Japan would be spamming the story for weeks about the Symbol of Peace and his family being quirkists.

I see Himi twitch when Izumi points out where she went wrong with her acting, and I can’t help but groan thinking of how much she’s going to be studying everything about me later in order to make sure it never happens again. And not in a fun way. More of an obsessive stalker way.

We could still have fun with the stalker way, at least.

But when I’m right behind Himi, I freeze. I listen to Izumi’s rant. The emotions that fill the words spilling from her lips as she shouts her mistakes, her actions. Her regrets. And I feel…

Rage.

I watch as she collapses in a heap, a high pitched keening of fake and worthless apologies filling the air in our small corner of the battlefield. Himi raises her knife. “You should have been a sister. But you can’t change the past. Only accept it when the consequences of your actions come back to you. Goodbye, Izumi” There’s a brief moment of hesitation where Himi sends a glance down at me, and I hold up four fingers.

The second long interaction goes unnoticed by Izumi, who’s closed her eyes as the knife falls to take her life. I stand, ignoring the shouting of Eraserhead as he takes his eyes off the Nomu, a costly mistake as I hear a loud thump that reverberates through the ground. I draw the fake taser gun from my belt and shoot it at Himi, wondering for a moment as she drops to the ground shaking if I accidentally grabbed the real one by mistake. But she’ll be fine even if I did. We’ve done taser tag when we were bored before so I know that she won’t be down long.

Izumi opens her eyes and sees me standing where Himi just was, and I can’t do anything but chuckle at how utterly absurd it is that I decided against letting Himi splatter her blood across the ground. I might have done it, if she had kept her mouth shut. But with everything she said? That she’s somehow convinced herself that she was better than she was?

She deserves to suffer.

I scratch at a cheek after removing my mask, trying to cover up how much I want to murder her by acting shy. “Heh. Um, yeah. A lot of stuff has happened. But I’ll explain later. For now, it looks like Eraserhead needs help.”

I turn away before she can say anything, and I don’t look back as I charge towards the Nomu. If I do, I might just kill her now. Still, I can’t help but toss some mocking words over my shoulder at her. They urge her to follow me, which is good. The closer she is, the more dramatic it will be. And with how she’s deluded herself into thinking she cares…

Oh, this will be fun~.

When I’m nearly to the Nomu I see Izumi’s quirk manifest around its joints, restricting its movement. I can admit that it’s an impressive new trick, practically as effective as a full-body bind but utilizing far less energy. Actually it might be more effective since it can’t put out as much force around them as it’s arms or legs.

Thanks to that it’s not hard at all to pull out the metal in its brain. All For One decides to put on a bit of a show by having it howl for a few seconds before it stiffens and slowly falls backwards. An imitation of many movies where the villain has a ‘defeat me’ switch or button or whatever. Kind of like Power Rangers used to be, before the entire line got canceled for how it essentially showed quirkless people being able to take on quirked individuals with the help of support items.

Someone didn’t like that, and poof! A centuries old storyverse, gone.

While I crouch to check on Eraserhead -noting that the side of his face that was slammed into the ground is bleeding a lot but he’s otherwise fine (by my definition)- Shigaraki rants, leaning heavily into his gamer speak for his insults. I’m pretty sure that he’s actually mad and not just acting, since seeing the creation meant to take down All Might defeated twice has to be rough. Not to mention the fact it was a birthday present from All For One…

I wish I could say I’m surprised when Kachan tries to kill me the moment he sees me, but that would be a lie. It is a bit surprising that Izumi pulls me out of the way, but then again she’s deluded herself into thinking she cares about me. Hopefully it will make the punishment sO MuCH SweEteR!

She turns to me, letting her lips twitch into a fragile, wobbly smile. “We’ll figure things out. I… It’s good to see you again.”

She doesn’t care. She doesn’t care! SHE DOESN’T CARE! ShE DOesN’T CaRe!!

I don’t let my thoughts show, just saying…something. I’m not sure what it is, but it doesn’t matter. My head is hurting, something that I haven’t felt since I jumped. I haven’t felt any pain since I jumped, but somehow Izumi has still found a way to hurt me!

It hurts so much that I barely notice that the Nomu has torn a hole in my chest because I’ve fallen. And Izumi’s holding me. I take in what’s going on around us with blurry eyes, seeing that she’s encased us in a solid dome of her energy, completely shut off from the outside. Normally I’d be all about analyzing it, since it’s not how her quirk should work. Solid constructs aren’t a part of telekinesis. Her quirk is basically a manipulation type of power, not a creation type.

But the pain… At least I’ll be dying soon. That should fix whatever is wrong with me. While I wait I let myself ramble, trying to keep my attention enough that I don’t accidentally reveal anything but otherwise letting my mouth have free reign. Except for my last words. Those I force out with meaning.

“Don’t *gasp* trust *wheeze* In-ko…”

I let darkness claim me, Receptionist peering at me over her glasses. She doesn’t speak for a moment, just studying me. When she does speak, she says something completely unexpected.

“Why are you crying?”

I wipe at my eyes, surprised at feeling them wet, giving her a dry and strained chuckle. “I…I don’t know. It’s… I don’t know.”

Her raised eyebrow shows she doesn’t understand, but that’s ok.

Neither do I.