Darkest Before Dawn - 108

Chapter 108

[Hina Maeda]

Why?

Why was it that something so bad had to happen when she was at I-Island? She was a hero, sure, but she wasn’t this kind of hero. Furthermore, Kazuki was right there! They were there to have Kazuki make some very useful connections and have him relax in the meantime in a nice entertaining spot.

They weren’t supposed to get in the middle of a villain attack!

At I-Island to boot and they’d apparently hacked the security system of the whole place. This wasn’t a minor attack. This wasn’t some nutjob throwing a tantrum. This wasn’t even some group of outcasts thinking they were above it all. No, this was more.

I-Island couldn’t be attacked by just anyone. Least of all having their whole systems hacked. No, this was far from a normal attack and these were far from normal villains. All Might was right there and they’d basically neutralized him along with everyone else in the room. Nobody could move, considering the whole island was a hostage now.

‘Why, oh why?’ Hina lamented to herself, biting her lip as she tried to think. There had to be something they could do, right? The restraints they’d all been hit with were tight, but she imagined someone with any flavor of strength quirk would be able to break out of them. She didn’t believe they could hold All Might at any rate.

But the hostage situation kind of stopped most of them from trying anything.

So, they could only sit there while the villain made his speech. His thugs moved around, pointing their guns at everyone and anyone, especially those that moved. ‘Thank God Kazuki isn’t resisting or anything,’ she thought, almost sighing.

Still… Whatever these people wanted in I-Island couldn’t be good. So, she had her snakes taking in as much as possible. She looked at everyone she could, keeping track of them through their scents. She tried to hear any conversations, but all she caught was the scared mumblings and whines of the people around the room, some even from heroes.

‘Think, Hina, think,’ she told herself. There was no time for self-pity and resignation on the job. If she couldn’t find a way out herself, then she’d find someone who could. That’s how she found herself checking on her fellow heroes too, trying to see if any of them looked like they had a plan. So far though… nothing. Nothing at all.

That is, until she noticed something going on with All Might. He was talking to someone. Not anyone in the room though, that much was obvious. She couldn’t make out what he was saying, her snakes’ hearing was good and she couldn’t move fast enough to position herself better. She did manage to pick up something with her enhanced sense of smell though and that helped her figure out what was going on. There was someone else somewhere close to there, probably on the balcony above, considering nobody in the room was really all that close to the man, not even the villains.

Alas, by that time, the other people – whoever they were – had already left.

Hina was really hoping they’d be able to solve whatever was going on though. Especially because it looked like the villains were not wasting any time. Shield – one of the leading inventors in I-Island, which didn’t bode well for them – had been taken along with his assistant… somewhere. Whatever that was for couldn’t be good, obviously, but Hina had no way of finding out what it was or what she could do about it.

She knew she was useless in such situations, but she felt extra so with her student right there by her side. She felt… ashamed of her weakness. She was the mentor there. She should have answers, a plan or something to offer Kazuki. And yet, she had nothing.

“Kazuki?” she called, ready to at least offer some reassurances. However, when he didn’t answer, she grew concerned. “Kazuki?” she repeated, holding back the urge to speak louder. She didn’t want to draw attention, or worse, get kicked for no reason. That wouldn’t help anyone.

Her student didn’t reply though and now she was borderline panicking. Why wasn’t he answering? Had the restraints hit him harder for some reason? Had he been injured? Was he alright?

Wiggling closer to him, Hina was far from reassured when she noticed that he was shivering.

Immediately, her snakes snapped in his direction and her senses were assaulted. Kazuki was shivering, sweating and hyperventilating. He was, more importantly, terrified. She could smell that rolling off of him. Normally it wasn’t easy to smell emotions on people, but then and there? There was no way she could mistake that.

And she didn’t understand.

Kazuki was a child, yes, but he was far from a coward. Some fear in that situation would be alright, but this was out of character for him. Hina liked to think she knew her student by then and this was not how she expected him to react to a villain attack. Was his Quirk-

‘His Quirk!’ she realized, paling.

He wasn’t terrified because of the situation. He was terrified because I-Island was terrified. Every civilian on the island had to be panicking. Hell, even the heroes had to be at least nervous. Hina wouldn’t even be surprised if some of the thoughts the villains had brought were nervous or afraid too. And Kazuki was being bombarded with all that-

“Stop moving!” one of the thugs snarled then, apparently having noticed her student too. When Kazuki didn’t reply or show any signs of having heard him, the man kicked him.

“Hey-!” Hina went to protest, only to be smacked with the back of a gun and sent back to the ground. “Leave him alone,” she growled all the same, not even flinching at the kick that followed. Kazuki needed her, after all. So fuck those guys.

Only, Kazuki had gone slack. From tense, shivering mess to stringless puppet. He was turned so that his face was visible to her now and it was a mask of indifference. ‘He’s channeling his nodes,’ she realized grimly. And that was a good idea to keep his calm, but Hina hated watching Kazuki do that.

It was unnatural and, most of all, it was awful for him. Because no matter how he dressed it, Kazuki was flooding his system with unfiltered bad emotions when he did that. Some emotions might be better than others, but that hardly made it better overall. What was he feeling then and there? Boredom so strong nothing mattered to him? Sadness so deep he wanted to give up on everything?

None of the options that came to her mind was good.

But at least he wasn’t terrified. A small, tiny, almost imperceptible comfort, but a comfort all the same.

[}-o-{]

[Kazuki Endo]

“Kazuki,” Hina called, once more, and this time there was shame, sadness and pity rolling off of her.

And Kazuki felt nothing but boredom.

“I’m fine,” he replied, his voice dull even to his own ears, but whatever. “Anything we can do?” he asked, but he knew the answer to that. If they could have done anything, they would have already. They were stuck there being useless, he supposed.

That sucked.

But at least he probably wasn’t going to get kicked now that he was under control. ‘I wanna do something though…’ he thought absently. The idea of just sitting there and waiting for something to happen… It was really not helping his overwhelmingly bored self at that moment. Slowly though, he let go of that emotion, but the panic was right there, waiting to be felt. So, as he let up with the boredom a little, he added sadness and anger.

He’d have done something similar before, like he had with the emergency back in the early days of his UA education. However, if he’d gone for anger right off the bat, he’d have gotten in trouble, he knew. It wouldn’t have helped anything. That’s why he’d hesitated, and the fear had gotten the better of him for a good few minutes.

Not then though.

With some semblance of focus, he could keep mixing emotions until he was a better functioning human being.

“This sucks,” Kazuki mumbled, moving to a sitting position and looking around. They were still trapped. There was still nothing they could do. Hina was still concerned for him. It was shaping up to be a terrible night, he realized. ‘At least my friends weren’t in here when it happened,’ he thought to himself. Although, them being out there on the island wasn’t very comforting, really. “Anything we can do?”

“I’m trying to see if I can hear anything,” Hina told him and he noticed her snakes moving around, always pointing at the thugs in the room. He left her to it then, especially when the main villain, the one that had given the speech before, came back.

‘What can I do though?’ Kazuki wondered, pursing his lips and going over his skillset to see if there was anything. He couldn’t summon Grimm in the room. That was basically asking for trouble. The same went for his shadow manipulation too, he supposed.

But if he couldn’t summon Grimm and he couldn’t control shadows, what could he do? Nothing? It wasn’t like his sensing would be of any use right then and there, would it? ‘There has to be something though, surely…’ he thought, taking a deep breath in and continuing to ponder.

Kazuki proceeded to go through all his options. Every single Grimm he had in his arsenal – and even some new ones that weren’t – was considered. His eyes darted around, trying to see if there was a spot where he could use a Grimm for something, or maybe something he could wrap in shadows for something. He could try to communicate messages with his shadows, maybe, probably, he supposed, but what would he communicate? None of them could do anything and even if he spoke to them, how’d he even…

“Hina,” he mumbled, making his mentor stiffen for a moment before she turned towards him. “I could try to write messages with my shadows. Can you hear someone whispering across the room?” he asked, looking around to make sure nobody was so much as looking at them. He also put all his acting lessons into looking nervous and scared. They’d be less likely to think he was plotting something that way, he imagined.

“I… might,” she replied and while her expression belied none of it, he could hear the thoughtfulness in her voice. There was also the fact that he could feel… Well, not none but almost no fear in her. “If they whisper close to the ground and I focus all my snakes and lie them down on the ground…” he heard her mutter as she tilted her head.

“Lie down?”

“Snake jaws can pick up ground vibrations and transmit them to their ears… so, yeah, lying down helps,” she explained and he blinked at her. Snakes heard through their jaws? That was… wild. Interesting, for sure, but also kind of… odd.

Not that he was complaining.

If it helped, it helped.

“So, we’re playing information hub, huh? I can do that,” Hina told him and he felt some of her nerves and fear ebb away. He wondered if she felt the same as he did at that moment. Having something to do certainly helped push away all the uncertainty.

Maybe what they were doing would be worth nothing, but at least they were doing something. It was better than sitting there, feeling useless. At least this way they had a chance to do something. However, first, they needed to actually pull off what they were saying, which was easier said than done.

“So, can you write messages?” Hina asked and… Well, that was the question, wasn’t it?

With a deep breath in, Kazuki concentrated on his negativity and his shadow. He needed to be careful. He couldn’t just expand it without a care. He needed to do so in a way that the grunts wouldn’t notice and that was tricky. How do you make a shadow behave strangely without it being noticed, especially when these people were probably looking for odd things?

‘By making it so small they can’t see it,’ he decided. That was his best bet, at least. So, with the plan in mind, he narrowed the controlled shadow, then narrowed it more and then more. Once it was thin as a needle, he started extending it. It was a slow process, in order not to let it widen, but he managed. ‘Has to be smaller, thinner,’ he thought, growing nervous the more he extended it.

It was noticeable, after all.

So, once he made it as thin as a hair, he started once more, slowly, ever so slowly…

Taking a deep breath in, he paused when he reached a hero some distance away. Even they hadn’t noticed, so now it was a matter of writing a message that they could see but the terrorists – whoever the fuck they were – couldn’t. Easier said than done, but he made a few tests making sure he could just vanish the shadows without getting rid of the shade probe that he’d sent all the way there. Considering how difficult it was to concentrate and make that happen, he wasn’t eager to have to start from zero.

With that reassurance, Kazuki started shaping the shadows in a simple message.

‘This message comes from heroes,’ he wrote first of all. There was a chance that they wouldn’t believe him, of course, but he imagined it’d be even more suspicious if he just started asking them if they had a plan out of nowhere. So, he waited until they noticed, then he felt the suspicion, the nerves, the fear, the anger. However, he just waited for an answer from Hina.

They said nothing though. Instead, they started looking around the room. And eventually their eyes landed on Kazuki, who was staring right at them. The doubt flashed through their emotions and he gave a slight nod before looking down at the floor in front of them. There, he started writing again.

‘My mentor can hear you if you whisper against the ground,’ was his next message. Long, but he needed to get as much information across as possible. If he left out any part of it, they might screw themselves over. Unfortunately, he had to delete the message halfway through two times because of the terrorists, but he finally got it all across eventually.

“They are asking if we have a plan,” Hina whispered and he grinned bitterly. It was more of a grimace, really. Because no, they did not have a plan. They were trying to see if anyone else had one, really. “Tell them that we’re communicating with everyone, to see if anyone has a plan. For now… stand by,” his mentor told him and he nodded. That was a lot to write but- “You can paraphrase and shorten it, just saying.”

Thank God for that.

So, that’s exactly what he did. The hero he’d been writing to gave their own grimace and nodded. Evidently, they’d been hoping for more. Kazuki really didn’t see why they’d expected more from them. What did they look like, All Might?

Speaking of… Kazuki grimaced. As if the panic of an island wasn’t bad enough, part of the reason for his breakdown was that All Might was right there. And he was very clearly struggling to keep up appearances, but his injury was killing him. Which meant that it was killing Kazuki, so that was extra shitty. Alas, they’d have to deal with it. Not like the guy could let go of his form without everything going to shit.

That got Kazuki thinking, because All Might’s situation was a secret and for a reason. So, if things went on for much longer, then what were they supposed to do? Let it get out? That’d be terrible. However, what else could they do?

He didn’t know if any of the heroes around had a Quirk that could help with that, but even if they did, they wouldn’t know what to do or why. As far as he knew, Kazuki and All Might himself were the only ones that knew about that. So, it kind of fell on Kazuki, didn’t it?

‘Just my luck,’ he thought, taking a deep breath in as if that’d help with the crippling pain in his chest.

What could he do about that though? It was something he pondered as he continued sending messages to everyone he could. He had enough on his plate as it was, he felt, and yet life seemed determined to test his limits. Because of course there was more.

Eventually, they started forming a system. Hina couldn’t hear everyone, after all, so one of the other heroes came up with the idea of making some random noise, hitting a table, coughing and other things like that. Didn’t even need to be that loud, just loud enough for Hina to pick up on it and be able to focus on them.

Unfortunately, that was about the only good thing that came out of all the communicating they managed. That and the fact that every hero in the room was now a little more at ease and looking for solutions as a group. None of them had any answers though, because… What could they realistically do when the entire island was a hostage? Any mess they made and the terrorists could start killing people.

At least Kazuki had, through all that time, come up with an idea to cover for All Might. He could explode his shadows everywhere, cover every light, every person and every thing. That way, All Might could depower without risk of his identity being revealed. It was kind of risky, of course. Not only would that definitely cause a reaction from their captors, but his shadows were very easily disturbed. He’d lost three shadow probes just to terrorists stepping on them. Furthermore, he wasn’t even sure if he could pull it off.

However, it was the only thing he had.

“Kazuki,” Hina called at some point and he perked up. Had someone come up with- Before he could finish the rather optimistic thought though, he saw that his mentor was looking at the villain that seemed to be coordinating everything, not at him, and she was feeling decidedly not good. “The other students… the villains found them.”

“Fuck,” he hissed under his breath.

[}-o-{]

[Chikuchi Togeike]

Their surroundings were beautiful.

She also imagined that Kazuki would love them. Entire island-like structures, with different levels and paths, all covered almost entirely by plants. The only exceptions were long, simple but still aesthetically pleasing paths and lakes and fountains. Chikuchi was already making a mental note to tell Kazuki about the place, actually, because it seemed like the kind of place he’d love, with all his nature and zen-like inclinations for hobbies.

Alas, they kind of needed to survive the villain attack that was going on.

Which… really sucked.

She could complain at some other point though, because right then and there, they needed to deal with the situation. A General course student, Chikuchi might be, but she hadn’t trained her ass off to get that promotion to the Hero course only to freeze or be terrified at the first show of real danger. She’d been given opportunities, help and support and now it was time for her to show that it hadn’t all been for nothing, evidently.

Still, she took some heart in the fact that the actual hero students around her looked as terrified as she was trying to convince herself she wasn’t.

Nobody said a word, all of them hunched over and hiding behind some plants. Distantly, they all could hear the two villains that had come out of the elevator. The only one that could probably actually hear them, however, was Jiro. Chikuchi hoped that she’d tell them if something worth knowing was-

“They are looking for us,” the girl whispered to them and… Yeah, she could have expected that, really. It was another thing to be told as much though, because… Because that meant they couldn’t hide forever. The villains likely knew they were there, and that meant that no matter how much they prayed, they wouldn’t just go away.

‘What do we do now?’ Chikuchi thought, glancing at the people around. There was Neito and her, then Kazuki’s other friend group, then Midoriya, Ida and some blonde she didn’t know. She spoke English though, so Chikuchi was guessing she wasn’t someone she should know… Then again, Tsunotori existed, so maybe she could be wrong. Ultimately though, what could they do? There were heroes from all over the world on the island. Surely some of them could do something, right? Surely it wasn’t all riding on them, right?

Yet, Chikuchi couldn’t afford to not believe so. Because if it was, and she just gave up, then it was all on her, wasn’t it? No, she needed to put some of that training she’d gotten through into practice. She needed to use some of that knowledge she’d worked to cram into her brain through the year. UA had helped and her friends had supported her, and now Chikuchi felt like she should have something to show for it.

“So, second-in-command, what are you going to do?” a voice in the corner of her mind that sounded like Kazuki asked her, not mocking but encouraging, just like during their training sessions. Thus, she took a deep breath in and relaxed her shoulders, like she’d seen him do on occasion. Straining her ears, she tried to keep track of the grumbling and the steps from the villains. And all the while she looked at the people around her and wondered what they could do.

They couldn’t stay there, both because they would be found out and because they needed to keep going if they were to go through with their current plan.

‘So, we need to confront the villains, don’t we?’ Chikuchi thought, a knot forming in her throat at the mere idea. How crazy had she gotten if that was the best idea she could come up with? Or was the situation really that bad? ‘We can confront them, but that might waste more time than we can afford. What option is there though? Splitting up? That’s a terrible idea, but…’

But it might be their only option.

Glancing to the side, Chikuchi saw Neito was rather calm all of a sudden. His eyes had focused and she could see his raised hand as he flexed his fingers. That was a sign that he was itching to use his Quirk, to copy someone. He was readying for a fight. Glancing at the others, everyone looked… fairly terrified, all things considered, but then again, so was Chikuchi, admittedly. Todoroki looked just like Neito though.

‘Todoroki is strong, so would be Neito with his Quirk,’ she thought. They were more or less their best bet against unknown opponents. Unless they were absurdly unlucky, then they should be able to at least hold the villains back. Still, there were two villains, as far as Chikuchi knew, so having only two people fight them was… not ideal.

There was Midoriya, who had likely only gotten stronger since the Sports Festival. Kirishima was a decent fighter too. However, Chikuchi knew what she had to do. She was just being a coward. ‘Has to be me,’ she told herself, grimacing.

After all, she was only useful insofar as there was water around or something similar enough that she could use her Quirk on. There were entire ponds, fountains and even a lake in that area. There was no guarantee whatsoever that there’d be more sources of water later on for her to use. So…

‘It’s show time,’ she thought, reaching to the side and tapping Neito. The boy jumped slightly, startled, before turning towards her with wide eyes. She just locked eyes with him and offered him her hand. It took him only a second to figure out what she was saying.

“Todoroki,” she whispered, softly, getting the other boy's attention. “We’re going in, you with us?”

“What?” Yaoyorozu said, but they needed to get going.

“We need to do something. They aren’t going to just leave. So, Neito, Todoroki and I will fight them here while you keep going. Neito and Todoroki are strong and I’m likely going to be at my strongest here with all the water,” she explained, keeping her voice as low as possible, but the more she spoke, the more nervous she got.

“Got it,” Todoroki replied, not a care at all for his volume. Then again, he also proceeded to stand up too, getting out of their hiding spot. Neito and Chikuchi quickly followed, which was good, because the others were reaching for them. “You all have to go,” Todoroki added, ignoring Neito when the other boy tapped him and instead focusing on using his Quirk to push everyone up in an ice pillar.

Taking a last breath in as she heard the villains exclaim some insult at them, Chikuchi steeled her nerves.

And distantly, she heard Kazuki’s voice in her mind once more.

“Lights off,” she mumbled, and Neito to her side grinned while she raised her hand and shot water spikes at the transforming villain.

[} Chapter End {]

Hey guys! How’s it going?

Everyone’s having a fun time, huh? Such a good place for a vacation, I-Island… These kids just can’t have nice things, I guess. Granted, I know it’s a lot to ask of a shonen to not have issues pop up every other day, but the strive for action kind of ends up becoming ridiculous, honestly. Hell, even the arcs that are supposed to be “calm” have shit happening in them, like the School Festival.

… No idea where that rant came in. I guess my frustration with Two Heroes and the lost potential has me in a complaining mood.

Anyway, I hope you guys enjoyed the chapter.

Discord Link: discord.gg/UTDransjJZ

Random Question: At what time did you wake up today? I woke up around… seven-ish? In the morning, that is. I don’t remember. I’m not a person for a few hours after waking up, admittedly.

See you.