….
A few hours had passed and the sky over Osaka was starting to lighten at the edges; that grey, pre-dawn wash that made everything look flat and exhausted.
A figure approached through the cordon of emergency vehicles and gathered heroes.
Large and imposing, flames crackling around his shoulders despite the early hour, casting long shadows across the pavement.
Endeavor.
He had been in Hosu sixty minutes ago, three hundred and fifty kilometers away, standing over the carbonized remains of his own Nomu engagement.
The moment the dispatch frequency crackled with the location, Osaka; and the specific student IDs involved, the Number Two Hero hadn't waited for a debit.
He had commandeered a private chopper, and crossed the distance in the fastest time the pilot had ever flown.
Enji Todoroki looked exactly as he had at the Sports Festival, powerful, upright, completely in command, his costume barely singed despite putting down two Nomu less than two hours ago.
His turquoise eyes swept the destroyed facility, the containment vehicles, the scorch marks, the craters, and the sheer scale of structural damage three teenagers and two bioweapons had produced in a single engagement.
His gaze snapped to Higari Maijima, the Excavation Hero, who was overseeing the structural stabilization.
"Maijima." Endeavor's voice carried without him raising it. "I was told U.A. students were involved at this site."
Maijima turned, blinked once at the Number Two Hero standing in front of him at four in the morning in Osaka, and adjusted fast.
"Yes, sir. Three freshmen from Class 1-A were the primary combatants. Izuku Midoriya, Katsuki Bakugo, and..."
Maijima's voice trailed off as he saw the minute tightening of Endeavor's jaw. He finished the name with a quieter, more somber tone. "And Shoto Todoroki."
Endeavor's mantle flared, the flames on his shoulders licking the air with a sudden, jagged hunger. "Where are they now?"
"They've been taken to Osaka General." came the reply. "And the ambulances cleared the site about twenty minutes ago, with the preliminary report listing them as stable, though it was bad, high-output Quirk exhaustion, blunt force trauma, and severe structural damage, and they were in critical condition when they were transported."
Endeavor didn't move, but the temperature around him jumped five degrees.
"And the hostiles?"
"Two specialized units, both neutralized on site." Maijima said, gesturing toward the far end of the facility where hazmat teams were securing what remained of the creatures. "They're being processed now."
Endeavor turned to leave, his boots grinding the scorched concrete. "I'm going to the hospital."
"You should, sir." Maijima called out, stopping the giant in his tracks. "Your son fought like a man tonight, every one of them did, holding their ground when there was nowhere left to fall back to, and they protected civilians who couldn't protect themselves."
Maijima paused, offering what he thought was the highest praise a man like Enji Todoroki could receive. "That's real heroism, sir, and it's not surprising, not with the blood he carries."
Maijima meant it as a compliment, a son reflecting well on his father, the natural order of things.
Endeavor looked at him sharply, standing in the spot where his youngest son had nearly bled out, the compliment stung with a visceral, nameless shame.
He didn't feel pride, but a cold, hollow weight in his chest - a realization that Shoto's heroism was a direct result of being backed into a corner he should never have been in.
He turned to leave, then paused mid step.
"How is Toy–" He caught himself.
"How is Blue Sun?" the question carried the same weight as when he had asked about Shoto Todoroki.
He had fought two of those things alone - there should have been injuries.
"He's physically fine, sir." Maijima replied, checking his tablet. "He gave a quick clinical brief to the local sergeant, verified the threat was neutralized, and then he was gone, launched himself out before the first backup hero could even offer him a med-kit."
Enji Todoroki gave a single, stiff nod.
He didn't say another word, and moved toward the East.
….
The sun was coming up when Endeavor reached Osaka General and the hospital was running at full capacity.
Every hallway had medical staff moving at double speed, the waiting room was full, and the aftermath of five simultaneous attacks across the region had turned the facility into something closer to a field hospital than a civilian medical center.
Izuku Midoriya was in the ICU.
His both arms in casts, his left leg immobilized in a brace that ran from hip to ankle, an IV in his neck because the veins in his arms had collapsed, connected to more machines than seemed reasonable for a single patient.
Heart monitor, oxygen, blood pressure, two separate drip lines.
Katsuki Bakugo was still in surgery.
The damage to his hands - the skin gone, nerves shredded, fine motor structures that a hero with an explosion quirk absolutely could not function without - required microsurgery.
Specialists had been called in, they had been working for hours and would be working for hours more.
Shoto Todoroki was in the recovery ward.
His lung had been patched, his ribs set and stabilized, his core temperature brought back to normal.
Koji Koda was physically untouched.
Yet, the hospital's trauma team was with him anyway. He had spent hours bound and gagged in a dark room while his friends were dismantled outside his door to save him.
….
Endeavor sat in the waiting room.
The chair was too small for him, his knees were practically at his chest, and the plastic armrests creaked under his forearms.
His flames were out, the way they had been in the U.A. hospital hallway - and without them he looked like what he was.
A large, exhausted man in a singed hero costume, sitting alone in a hospital at dawn.
His own fight in Hosu had been intense.
One Nomu, a populated district, civilians to protect, collateral to minimize and then the helicopter.
Then the drive from the helipad, he had been running on adrenaline and fury for hours, and now that he was sitting still.
Now that he knew Shoto was out of surgery and breathing and alive, the crash was hitting him all at once.
He leaned forward, put his elbows on his knees and stared at the floor.
….
Meanwhile, four hundred kilometers to the east, Dabi had reached the U.A.
He didn't land so much as arrive.
The faculty residences were visible from two kilometers out - or what was left of them.
Even from altitude, even at the speed he was moving, Dabi could see the damage.
The shattered exterior wall of his apartment, the craters in the courtyard, the uprooted zelkova trees, all of it lit by emergency lights still strobing across that corner of campus, washing the scene in pulsing red and white.
He killed his thrust at the last possible microsecond. A violent burst of blue flame acted as a retro-rocket, scorching the stone beneath him into glass before he hit the courtyard. The impact carved a fresh crater into a surface already ravaged by battle.
Dabi straightened slowly. He stood a moment in the settling dust, his frame rigid. The [Total Concentration] rhythm was a ragged, whistling hiss in his chest.
He had redlined his lungs for hundreds of kilometers, and now the friction heat was bleeding off his shoulders in thick, roiling steam. His civilian jacket hung in charred ribbons.
Dabi's hands hung at his sides, fingers curling and uncurling as the air around them began to heat, not fire yet, but the moment before ignition.
He didn't take the stairs and went up in a single, blurring leap, catching the edge of the shattered balcony and vaulting over. His boots hit the living room floor with a crunch of safety glass.
The apartment was destroyed, he had known it would be from what Shota Aizawa told him, but seeing it was different, and what stood before him now had teeth.
Eri's shoes were still by the door, lined up neatly, small white straps buckled just the way she had learned, dusted with plaster but untouched, while three feet away the floor was gouged down to the subfloor by claws.
The fridge still held the crayon drawings, Rumi sketched with oversized rabbit ears and a smile too wide, hanging by a single magnet with the corner torn where debris had grazed it. The bedroom door was gone, ripped from its hinges, and through the doorway the mattress lay split in three clean lines, stuffing spilling out.
Eri's bed, where she slept, where he would sit at the edge and rest a hand on her head until she drifted back to sleep.
Something moved in the hallway.
Dabi's head snapped toward it, his hands rising as blue fire gathered in his palms, his senses screaming–
"It's me." Vlad King stepped into view with both hands raised, palms out. "It's just me, Kan, so don't burn the rest of the building down, Dabi."
Dabi's fire did not go out, it stayed in his palms, flickering and casting blue light across the wrecked hallway.
"Where is Eri?"
It was a demand stripped of all humanity.
"In the Recovery Girl's office." Vlad said, keeping his gaze fixed on Dabi's hands as if one wrong word might set something off. "And as Aizawa mentioned in the call, Eri is completely unharmed."
"What about Rumi?"
"She's there too, with the Recovery Girl." Vlad added, steady but careful. "She took some heavy hits, but–"
Dabi was already moving, past Vlad King, through the hallway, toward the door, his steps leaving faint scorch marks along the floorboards.
"Dabi… Hold on, just–" Vlad King turned after him. "All five hostiles are in custody, and a villain named Nine is–"
The front door hissed shut and Vlad King found himself explaining the tactical situation to empty space.
He stood there for a moment, taking in the wreckage, then glanced down at the scorched floor.
"Yeah, sure." he muttered to no one. "I will just stay here and guard the wrecked apartment on my own, no problem."
.
….
[To be continued…]
★─────⇌•★•⇋─────★
Author Note:
Visit Patreon to instantly access +1 chapter for free, available for Free Members as well. For additional content please do support me and gain access to +12 more chapters.
-->patreon.com/WrightBrothers