Chapter Text
[Three Days Later]
“Wait…you haven’t told him yet?” Itsuka Kendou said to Setsuna with a look of genuine shock on her face. Although the hero known as Battle Fist was now missing her left eye, it did nothing to lessen her ability to show emotion when it mattered. If anything, the teal eyepatch that she was currently wearing made her expression seem even more dramatic.
“No….” Setsuna replied while taking a sip of her fruit smoothie. This was her third one of the sitting, and she still felt like it wasn’t enough to satisfy her cravings.
“Why not?” Reiko looked at the faux-blonde in between bites of her meal. “This isn’t exactly something that you can hide, you know.”
At the moment, the three heroes were sitting in the private booth of a famous Italian restaurant in the heart of the city of Saitama. It had been a while since the trio had a chance to hang out like this on account of their busy schedules. But since all of their husbands were currently away on a high-stakes mission in Hokkaido, it seemed like the perfect time for them to enjoy a day out on the town.
Originally, Ibara was supposed to have joined them as well. But the vine-haired hero couldn’t make it since she was busy working as an instructor for the HPSC’s hero licensing exam this month. And it was pretty much the same deal for the rest of their friends and former classmates.
“Because I’m scared!” Setsuna half-shouted in frustration at the ‘poltergeist’ quirk user’s question. “I just- I don’t know how to explain it, okay! I feel like the moment I tell him everything’s gonna change.”
“Well, it is.” Reiko then said with an unimpressed glare in Setsuna’s direction.
“I know! And that’s the scary part!”
“Are you scared of how he’ll react?” Itsuka felt the need to ask while trying to make sense of what was going on inside of her friend's head.
“No…maybe…I don’t know….”
A full three days had passed since Izuku returned to Japan, and Setsuna had made zero progress in trying to tell her husband the secret she had been keeping for so long. Although there had been a few moments during their time together that probably would’ve been a good time to tell the man the news, the faux-blonde hero always ended up getting cold feet at the last second.
For the life of her, Setsuna had no clue as to why she was being so weird about this whole situation. But every time she tried to tell Izuku what the deal was, her throat would just lock up, and the words would refuse to come out. She knew that it was only a matter of time before she would have to tell him, but that didn’t make things easier by any measure.
“I don’t know what to tell you, Setsuna.” Itsuka then said in an apologetic tone. “This is completely out of my wheelhouse. But honestly, the more you put it off, the worse it’s going to get.”
“Yes, yes, I know.”
Reiko then asked the next question that was on her mind. “How long has it been?”
To be honest, the white-haired woman was glad to finally have an explanation as to why her longtime friend had been acting so weird over the last week or so. Granted, she wasn’t expecting the reason to be so…insane, but at least she now knew what all of the drama was about.
“About a month.” Setsuna replied only a moment before dropping her face down onto the table next to her plate. “Based on what the doctor said, it probably happened the night him and Fubuki left to go on that mission in Europe. But to be honest, we were going at it pretty much the entire week before that.”
‘Yeah…that sounds about right.’ Both Reiko and Itsuka couldn’t help but silently chuckle to themselves. The two heroes were admittedly glad that it was good news, though. After all, things could be a whole lot worse.
“You’re only making it harder on yourself if you keep putting it off. You might as well just come clean and deal with whatever happens next.” The ‘poltergeist’ quirk user then said, trying to sound as responsible as she possibly could at this moment.
Setsuna immediately sent an intense side-eye at Reiko before letting outa dramatic sigh. “Man, you guys are the worst enablers ever, you know that? I thought you two were going to validate my hormone-induced feelings, not try to shame me into being a responsible wife.”
“Sorry, blondie , but you came to the wrong table for something like that.” Itsuka said with a smile. “If you wanted some bad advice, you should’ve asked Takeyama-san instead.”
“Yeah, yeah, whatever…. God, I’m fucking hungry!”
[Feel Good Inc. World Headquarters, Asahikawa, Hokkaido Prefecture, Japan]
Every so often, there were times in Izuku Midoriya’s life that had him wondering if being a hero was truly worth it.
And this is definitely one of those times….
As the green-haired man walked through what was left of the Feel Good Inc. World Headquarters compound, he couldn’t help but wonder how it all came to this.
The last five or so hours had easily been some of the most exhausting in his life. Both mentally and physically.
Not only had he spent most of his time getting shot at while trying to avoid getting blown up by a stray explosive or doing his best to keep everyone else from getting injured, he also had to fight off a literal horde of quirkless assassins who were surprisingly good at staying out of his field of vision. The whole thing now feels like it had all been one giant blur. But even so, it did nothing to take away from the pain and soreness he was feeling all over his body.
Everything started a few days ago after Hawks informed Izuku and the others that they finally had a lead on where Derelicta’s main base of operations was located. One of the group’s members had been captured while trying to set up a gas bomb in the middle of Shibuya, only for Kaminari of all people to find her and subdue her in the nick of time. And after a thorough interrogation of the young woman, she finally cracked and revealed where her group’s main base was located.
Needless to say, Izuku was quite shocked to hear what the woman had to say. But he didn’t even get the chance to think about it too much before he and the rest of his crew were being briefed on the emergency mission that they were all tasked with.
It’s still hard for the telekinetic hero to believe that nine agonizing years of investigations and manhunts finally managed to bear fruit after so many failed attempts. But it was even harder for him to believe that such an illustrious group like Derelicta had been hiding in plain sight for so long. And the fact that it took them this long to smoke them out after so many years of searching felt like one giant slap in the face.
“What a fucking day….” Tetsutetsu groaned while looking down at his now-broken right arm that was currently wrapped up in a sling. “I knew we were in for a big fight, but this was just ridiculous.”
“Yeah, no kidding.” Izuku replied with a slight nod. “But we did expect them to put up a lot of resistance. We did lose a lot of good people, though.”
All around the two heroes was a scene of mayhem and destruction as they made their way through the carnage that was once the secret headquarters of Derelicta. Nearly a third of the main building had been demolished in the fighting, and there were so many craters and crumbling walls that it was hard to even know where to start.
The worst part about the whole scene, however, was the numerous bodies of the group's quirkless members that were spread out across the area. Along with the many police officers and special agents who ended up losing their lives on top of that. As far as Izuku could tell, there were at least two hundred of them from what he could see. And those were only the ones that he was able to get eyes on himself. But what really pissed him off was the fact that he knew that this was only a portion of Derelicta’s main fighting force, probably not even half, if he had to take a guess. The rest either fled in all of the confusion or weren’t even here to begin with.
This meant that even after today, there will still be members of the infamous terrorist group that they would have to hunt down and capture before they could do any more harm. Harm, like any of the numerous chemical weapons attacks or assassinations that their group had become famous for over the last eight years. And Izuku already knew that this wasn’t going to be the end of all of the headaches.
Not by a long shot.
‘Prime Minister Nezu is not going to be happy about this.’ Izuku thought to himself as he and Tetsutetsu made their way to the makeshift holding tent where their VIP guest was currently being held.
Before long, the two heroes arrived at their destination. And after greeting the officers responsible for patrolling the area and checking in with the Police Chief, they made their way inside the tent to have a talk with their new guest.
Once inside, they were greeted with quite the sight.
Sitting there, in the middle of the tent, with her arms and legs welded to what Izuku assumed to be part of a wall was Ayame Shimizu, also known as Rogue . The longtime CEO of Feel Good Inc. and the previously mysterious leader of Derelicta. The woman who had somehow managed to run one of the most successful media companies in all of Japan while also pulling the strings behind the single most dangerous group of criminals the country had ever seen since the League of Villains.
Standing at either side of the woman were Izuku’s longtime friends, Yosetsu Awase and Fumikage Tokoyami. Izuku had lost track of their whereabouts in the middle of all the fighting, but he was glad to see that the two of them were alive and one piece. They were clearly a bit scuffed up from all the commotion, but neither looked particularly worse for wear. Well, except for Yosetus’s black eye that he was now sporting.
“Nice of you two to finally show up!” Yosetsu said to Izuku and Tetsutetsu with a grin. “I was starting to get worried.”
“You guys okay?” Izuk asked the ‘weld’ quirk user.
“As well as we can be.” Tokoyami replied.
“Where’s Juzo?” Tetsutetsu then asked. “I haven’t seen him since we got separated on the third floor and my communicator got destroyed.”
“He’s getting checked out in one of the ambulances.” Yosetsu answered. “He got hit with one of those anti-quirk bullets and is getting the antidote for it right now. He should be back in a little bit.”
“Good.” Izuku said with a sigh of relief. He was now more glad than ever that Unohana had managed to develop an antidote for the anti-quirk bullets around five years ago. Even if their effects were temporary, whoever got hit with them would experience lingering side effects for quite a while. But thanks to the antidote, none of that would be a problem for whoever received it.
Izuku still had no clue how his genius friend was able to come up with a cure for the weapons barely a year after they ended up appearing on the streets. But he learned a long time ago to stop questioning the man’s skill when it came to all of that chemical engineering stuff. It was just easier to accept that the guy was a miracle worker and move on.
“Goodness, I wasn’t expecting Skywalker himself to come pay me a visit!” Rogue said in a cheery tone, finally speaking up for the first time since she was captured. “Y’know…I’ve been wanting to meet you face-to-face for quite some time!”
“Is that so?” Izuku asked the woman while maintaining a serious expression on his face.
“It is, you are my favorite hero after all.”
Izuku already knew to watch his words in front of this woman. She may have presented herself as the calm, astute, and diligent CEO of a trillion-yen company, but he knew that she was capable of far more than that. She had to be, considering her position.
“You seem surprisingly calm for someone who’s about to spend the rest of their life in a prison cell.”
“Psht…oh, please.” Rogue smirked and rolled her eyes. “As if that would ever happen. We all know that I’m much too valuable for something like that.”
“You seem pretty confident in that statement. Would you care to share with the rest of the group?” Izuku then asked the woman.
“Don’t need to.”
Tetsutetsu was the next to speak up. “Enough with the games, terrorist ! Just tell us where the rest of your friends ran off to! We already know that you managed to let some of them escape right before we showed up. Don’t make this any harder on yourself. You’re already caught, so what’s the point in delaying the inevitable?”
Rogue gave the ‘steel’ quirk user a creepy smile before responding. “The point is to keep your quirk-wielding assholes on your toes for as long as possible. As long as my followers are out there, none of you evolutionary abominations will be able to sleep soundly at night.”
Izuku did not like the way that the quirkless woman said those words. But the way she spoke did make sense when you take her background into account.
From what the green-haired man knew about the woman, Shimizu’s parents were former members of the now-disbanded cult known as Humarise . A group that believed that their sacred mission was to save humanity from quirks by completely wiping them out from the population. Her family immigrated to Japan not too long after the cult had been basically wiped out. But they apparently made sure to hold on to their beliefs long after leaving that life behind.
Admittedly, it was hard for Izuku not to feel some kind of way about all of this. As a former quirkless individual himself, he could see how easy it would be for anyone to fall under the spell that Rogue preached to her followers. But as a hero, he knew that it was his duty to snuff that kind of ideology out as quickly as possible.
Hundreds of people over the last decade had lost their lives on account of Rogue and her criminal organization. And the fact that the woman used her illegally obtained fortune to spread their message across all of Asia to incite even more violence against quirked individuals over the years was a problem that he simply couldn’t ignore. He was a hero after all, and heroes always did whatever they could to save lives. Even if they could sympathize with those who put the lives of others in danger.
“Anyways, Skywalker…” Rogue then said with a nonchalant shrug. “Since I’ve been captured, I’ve decided that I might as well let you in on a secret that I’ve been keeping all to myself for the last ten years or so. One that I’m sure you’ll be very interested to hear.”
“And what could you possibly have to tell me?” Izuku asked, genuinely curious as to what the woman had to say.
“Probably some bullshit.” Yosetsu scoffed. In his opinion, whatever this crazy woman had to say wasn’t worth it unless she was going to let them know where the rest of her flunkies were.
“I have to agree with Yosetsu-kun, Izuku.” Tokayami added. “Whatever knowledge this woman may hold might be a diversion.”
“Agreed.” Tetsutetsu folded his one good arm over his sling.
Izuku pondered for a moment about what he should do in this situation. But, considering they really had nothing to lose here, he might as well hear the woman out. After all, any information that they could get, no matter how irrelevant, might be helpful in tracking down the remaining Derelicta members later on.
“I’ll humor you, for now.”
“Excellent…. Surely you’ve heard of my collaborator, Nitro , right?”
“I have.” Izuku nodded. “He’s been the one providing you with all of your poison gas bombs and explosives as far back as the Tokyo Skytree incident. We’ve never been able to track down who he is or where he works out of. All we know is that he’s exceptionally good at both making weapons and covering his tracks.”
“Yes, yes, he is!” Rogue smiled once again. “He’s truly been one of my greatest assets. And we’ve both been able to make a lot of money off of each other for quite a while. But…now that the jig is up, I’m going to give you a freebee and tell you who he is!”
“You can’t be serious?” Tetsutetsu looked at Rogue. “You’re really going to rat out one of your best agents? Just like that?”
“I am!”
“Why?” Tokoyami was he next to speak.
“Because I want to see the look on Skywalker’s face when I tell him!”
‘This bitch is out of her mind.’ Yosetsu thought to himself. He did not like where this was going.
The green-haired hero paused for a moment. He was absolutely certain that whatever Rogue was about to say was going to be a lie. But, curiosity admittedly got the better of him. So, against his better judgment, he decided to hear what the criminal leader had to say.
“Tell us, now.”
“Are you sure?” Rogue then asked him. “The truth might be too much for you to handle.”
“Just start talking.”
“If you say so.” The woman replied before letting out a satisfied sigh. “But don’t say I didn’t warn you.”
The next sentence that came out of Ayame Shimizu’s mouth was enough to turn Izuku Mirdoriya’s world upside down.
[Minazuki Industries Headquarters, Fukuoka, Japan, The Next Morning]
The rise of Minazuki Industries was truly one of the greatest success stories to come out of Japan in the last decade. Possibly even of all time.
In only a few short years, a small-time chemical engineering company previously based in Tokyo quickly became one of the country’s leading innovators. So much so that people from all over the world were practically lining up around the corner just to get a chance to work with them. Thanks to their many amazing breakthroughs in the fields of biofuels, agriculture, medicine, and even cosmetics, the company had firmly cemented itself as a real power player in the world of Japanese economics. One that was always at the forefront of the latest and greatest scientific discoveries.
And their success can be attributed to the mind of one single man….
Sasuke Unohana, a twenty-four-year-old genius whose name was known all across the country, was the brains behind the entire operation. Both literally and metaphorically.
The pink-eyed trillionaire’s rise from a lowly quirkless orphan abandoned by his parents at the age of four to a titan of industry was the stuff of legends. The kind of rags-to-riches story that people ate up and loved to gush over in news columns and documentaries the world over. To many, Sasuke Unohana was both a beacon of inspiration and the envy of others. One who had crafted an image of a man who always made sure to spare no expense to give back to the community that helped him become who he is today.
But to others, like the people who lived in the shadows and reveled in the chaos of the world, he was one of the greatest dangers the island nation of Japan had seen in decades.
‘I can’t believe that I’m really doing this.’ Izuku Midoriya thought to himself as he floated in the air high above the Minazuki Industries headquarters building. A somber look was etched onto his freckled face as he took a moment to watch the sun rise over the horizon.
The pro hero still had no clue what to think about all of this.
After all, how could he?
No matter how much he wanted to deny it, the evidence was as clear as day. Thanks to Rogue’s cursory testimony and the files that she had turned over to the police in the wake of her capture, there was no way that Izuku would be able to refute what he now knew to be true.
He still couldn’t believe it. It was all just too much for him to bear. The idea that one of his oldest friends, his brother-in-law for God’s sake, could be an active participant in one of the worst criminal groups Japan had ever seen was almost unthinkable to him. And it made him seriously start to question the world around him in a way that made him want to vomit.
‘Fuck…’
After a couple of minutes of deep contemplation, Izuku resolved himself to do what he must. Despite his feelings, he was still a hero at the end of the day. One who swore an oath to defend the people, no matter the circumstances. So, with a heavy heart and clouded mind, the green-haired man descended down to the building. All the while, silently hoping that this wasn’t going to be as hard as he expected it to be.
-(o)-
The sterile silence of Minazuki Industries’ top floor was unnatural. The kind of unnaturalness that made your skin crawl out of sheer anxiety and nervousness.
It was too quiet.
Too clean.
Too still.
The floor-to-ceiling windows casted sterile reflections across the polished marble floors of the brutally practical layout of the building. And the Fukuoka skyline glowed faintly in the distance behind the hazy veil of the morning clouds.
The building was completely empty; not a soul could be seen anywhere. Normally, the place would be buzzing with employees and interns scurrying about as they tried to get their work done for the day. But right now, it was a complete ghost town.
‘He must’ve told everyone to stay home today.’ Izuku assumed as he made his way down the main corridor en route to the building’s executive suite. ‘Which means that he’s expecting me. I can’t be too shocked by that. Sasuke was always good at staying one step ahead of everyone else.’
In no time at all, the green-haired hero had reached his destination.
As Izuku Midoriya stood in the center of the hall just outside the executive suite, the weight of his mission pressed down on him harder than the damage from his recent battle in Hokkaido. He was currently operating on barely three hours of sleep, and his hero suit still bore the scars of yesterday’s battle. Torn seams, scorch marks, and dried blood that wasn't all his. His green eyes, usually so full of hope and conviction, now flickered with conflict.
The man looked up as the doors to the private office slid open with a hiss.
And there, sitting behind his massive steel, granite, and glass desk, was Sasuke Unohana himself.
The man of the hour.
Perfectly dressed, as always, in a slate-grey suit and thin black tie. The man was practically a poster boy for modern excellence. His shoulder-length black hair was combed neatly back, and his neon pink eyes, once filled with shared ambition and late-night laughter, now gleamed with something harder. Something…unclear.
“I was wondering when you’d show up, Izuku.” Sasuke said calmly while gesturing to the sleek, glass table in front of him. “Have a seat. Or…are we skipping the pleasantries today?”
Izuku didn’t sit. Instead, he stepped forward, slow and heavy. “You’ve been supplying Derelicta. You’re Nitro .”
Sasuke didn’t flinch, not that Izuku would’ve expected him to. “You get right to it, don’t you?”
“Don’t act like this is just another corporate conversation, Sasuke.” The hero’s voice cracked on the last word, and he hated himself for it. “They killed innocent people. They nearly wiped out an entire village in Okinawa just last month. Families. Children. Innocent people!”
“I’m aware.” Sasuke said. “I read the reports.”
“You made those reports possible!” Izuku snapped, his fists clenched. “Your tech, your chemicals, those bombs. None of that would’ve been possible without you!”
For a moment, there was nothing but the distant hum of the city and the low thrum of security drones in the walls. They both knew that Izuku could crush them to bits without a second thought if he wanted to. But their presence did nothing to calm the already tense atmosphere.
Then Sasuke exhaled before speaking again. “You’re right, man. You’re absolutely right. And I’m not going to insult your intelligence by pretending that it’s not true. But in my defense, I did what I did to help create a better world.”
“A better world?!” Izuku’s voice rose. “By partnering with terrorists?!”
“ Don’t lump me in with the rest of those losers. I like to think I’m far more civilized than they are. Derelctica were just a means to an end. An asset that I was able to utilize in order to achieve my ultimate goals. And based on what I’ve been able to build here, I’d say that they served their purpose pretty well. Come on, man, do you know how many lives I’ve been able to help with all the work I’ve done over the last eight years?”
Sasuke then folded his hands behind his back as he turned toward the window.
“Minazuki Industries has been able to accomplish so many wonderful things since we first opened our doors. Fossil fuels are now completely obsolete thanks to us. Farming is now possible in the Sahara Desert thanks to the fertilizers that we were able to create. Our skin care products are the best in the business. And food insecurity in Australia is basically a thing of the past. All without the use of a single quirk along the way. Hell, do you know how many scholarships and research grants we’ve been able to give out just this year alone?”
“You’re working with murderers, Sasuke!”
“I know.” Sasuke said, turning back to face him. “And I’m glad that you and your friends were finally able to cut the head off that annoying snake. Rogue has always been a thorn in my side that I’ve never been able to get rid of. Well…until now, that is.”
Izuku took a step forward, his power vibrating faintly in the air around him as various objects across the office began to shake. The table creaked. A paperweight floated off the surface. “Don’t try to twist this. Don’t pretend you’re the visionary and I’m the fool. You knew what they were. And you kept helping them despite all the lives they’ve taken. Do you know how many people have been permanently disfigured thanks to those chemical bombs you supplied to Rogue and her group of crusaders?”
Sasuke didn’t blink. “Vision requires sacrifice. I thought you, of all people, would be able to understand that.”
Izuku stopped. And for a moment, he saw it all.
The family dinners, the shared victories, the time Sasuke helped him study for his college final after a rescue mission in Chiba. The best man's speech at Izuku’s wedding. The smiles on the Tokage sisters' faces. The twins, Kanao and Kanae, when Sasuke had gifted them their own house after graduating from high school early.
“...You’re not the man I knew….” Izuku said quietly.
“Maybe I never was….” Sasuke answered.
Something in Izuku's chest cracked.
He raised a hand, palm glowing faintly with green energy. “Sasuke Unohana, you are under arrest! For the crimes of manslaughter, conspiracy, treason, fraud, illegal weapons manufacturing, illegal weapons distribution, and aiding in acts of domestic terrorism!”
Sasuke just smirked.
“You still don’t get it, do you?” The quikless man’s voice began to distort.
Izuku blinked.
Then, without warning, Sasuke’s body rippled.
It began in his fingers, which melted and warped like heated wax. Then, the skin on the quirkless genius’s face began to run like water. The bones then liquefied. And the very clothing that he was wearing turned to brown slime right before his eyes. Within seconds, the figure collapsed into a puddle of synthetic gel on the marble floor.
Izuku froze.
He knew exactly what this was.
They were never able to confirm Twice’s death after all of the fighting. And Hawks always suspected that the man had been able to get away in the middle of the chaos that was Tomura Shigaraki’s and Mirio Togata’s famous battle in the heart of Tokoyo all those years ago. There were flimsy reports of him being spotted in China around three years ago, but to think that Jin Bubigawara was still supplying clones to people like this was nothing short of shocking.
“Shit!”
Before Izuku even had a chance to say anything, a nearby holo-projector lit up on the near side of the large desk. Sasuke’s face then appeared in the projection, this time grainy and pre-recorded. His voice was calm, almost tired. And it looked like he hadn’t gotten any sleep in days.
“Hello, Izuku. If you’re seeing this, then my little diversion worked. I guess all that money I spent tracking down Bubigawara and Himura was worth it, huh? Sorry to say this, but I’m already gone, Izuku. And it’s very unlikely that you’re going to find me anytime soon.”
Izuku stepped back, rage rising by the second. His hands trembled as he looked at the face of his friend staring back at him.
“I know you’re angry.” The hologram continued. “And you should be. I never wanted to lie to you, man. But this is just how it has to be.”
Izuku felt like bringing the entire building down around him. But the green-haired hero restrained himself just enough to listen to the rest of the pre-recorded message.
“You’ve always been too sentimental, Izuku. Too desperate to believe in the people you love. That’s your biggest weakness. You want everyone to be good. But not all of us are. And not all of us can be.”
The projecting then gave a slow, mocking bow.
“Tell Nanao I’m sorry, okay? I never wanted to hurt her like this. She deserves someone far better than me. And I hope that she’ll be able to move on from this quickly. Goodbye, Izuku. I hope you live a long and happy life.”
The hologram crackled one final time before flickering out.
Izuku stood motionless in the silence that followed, unsure of what to feel or what to do.
The air was still. The city below pulsed, unaware of the small apocalypse unraveling on the top floor of Minazuki Industries.
The man’s hands trembled at his sides, the glow of his telekinesis flickering like a dying light.
He had come here to face a man. A friend. A brother.
But he had only found a ghost in a suit.
Izuku closed his eyes.
Not all enemies wore masks. Some wore old smiles. Some held your shoulder at weddings. Some promised they’d never forget who you were, even as they betrayed everything you thought they stood for.
He turned from the puddle and walked toward the exit, each footstep echoing louder than the last.
The wasn’t over.
And now it was personal.
“I just…I just can’t believe this is really happening….” Nanao Unohana’s shaky voice echoed across the living room of her lavish mansion as the woman appeared to be on the verge of a mental breakdown.
The day after Izuku’s unfortunate confrontation with Unohana’s clone in the Minazuki Industries Headquarters building was shaping up to be one of the worst that both he and Setsuna had to experience in quite a while. Amidst all of the chaos that was going on, the hero couple had even more personal problems that they needed to deal with. Problems that hit a bit too close to home for any sane person to know how to properly deal with.
Right now, the duo was currently in Nanao’s and Sasuke’s exquisite three-story mansion that was tucked away on the outskirts of Fukuoka city. They had just given the bad news to Nanao barely a few minutes ago, and from the looks of it, the green-haired woman wasn’t taking it well. Then again, it wasn’t like they were expecting her to in the first place.
“We’re here for you, onee-chan.” Setsuna said softly while patting her sister on the back. “And we’ll be here for as long as you need us to be.”
To be honest, Setsuna wasn’t sure if their presence alone would be enough to console the woman at this time. Hell, she herself was still reeling from the news that her husband told her. After all, what exactly was she even supposed to do in a situation like this? Her brother-in-law, a man whom she had known for almost a decade, was just revealed to be the main co-conspirator of one of the worst criminal organizations in all of Japan. And that wasn’t exactly the kind of thing that could be easily brushed off.
Nanao, who now had a steady stream of tears leaking out of her eyes, spoke as if she hadn’t heard the words her sister just said to her. “Oh my God… is that why he never wanted to have kids? Is this why he’s been putting it off for so long? Always dodging the questions whenever I brought it up? Because he’s been a member of those anti-Quirk psychos?”
To say that Nanao Unohana’s world had flipped upside down would be putting it mildly.
“All this time, and I never suspected a thing. I can’t believe that I’ve never realized it. It all makes so much sense now! He’s been acting strange for a while, ever since the news of that Derelicta girl getting captured.”
Despite the fact that there was no real way for her to have seen something like this coming, that did nothing to ease the woman’s grief. The man she had built a life with, the man whom she had devoted so much of her time and affection to, was just revealed to be possibly one of the worst criminals their country had ever seen. And there was nothing she could do about it besides sit here and cry to herself as she tried to think about what all of this means.
Nothing made sense anymore as far as Nanao Unohana was concerned. Her world had been completely shattered. And there was nothing that she could do about it.
It all seemed like one sick joke to her.
The woman, who had made a career out of being a respected therapist for both children and quirkless people, was completely unaware of the fact that her own husband had been colluding with a syndicate of quirkless terrorists for God knows how long. It was as if the universe itself was doing its best to humiliate her.
“Oh, God…he’s really gone…. I’m never going to see him again, am I? Oh my God…my husband’s a fucking terrorist ! The man I love is fucking monster ! I don’t…what am I even supposed to do…?”
This went on for the better part of an hour before Nanao finally ended up crying herself to sleep in the middle of the living room. And as much as she wanted to be there for her sister, Setsuna herself was at a total loss about what she should even do right now. Nanao may have been an award-winning therapist, but even she doubted that any amount of therapy would be enough to help her sister get through the absolute trial that she was surely about to experience in the coming days.
“My parents are going to be here in a few hours.” Setsuna said to Izuku after sitting on the counter in the middle of the mansion’s massive kitchen. “But I think it’s best if I stay here with Nanao for a while. At least until she calms down a bit. I don’t want her to be alone in case she tries anything… drastic .”
“Good call.” Izuku replied with a somber expression on his face. “I was actually going to suggest the same thing.”
“What about you?” The faux-blonde then asked him. “How are you holding up?”
Izuku paused for a moment as he tried to find the right words to express what he was currently feeling. “I’ll survive.”
“You sure?”
“No.” The green-haired man replied briskly. As much as he wanted some time to himself to think, he knew that there were bigger fish to fry. “But how I feel isn’t important right now. Your sister is who we need to focus on.”
Setsuna knew that her husband’s response was complete bullshit, but she decided to just let him have it for the time being. “Just let me know if there’s anything you need to get off your chest. You know I’m always here for you, right?”
“Of course, I do!” Izuku said just before pulling the woman in for a hug.
One of the worst things about all of this was the fact that Setsuna now had even more reason not to tell Izuku about the secret that she was still hiding from him. The timing was just too bad to even think about it.
It was actually pretty funny, in some weird, messed-up way. Just when she had finally worked up the courage to tell the man what she wanted him to know, she ended up getting blindsided with all of this horrific information. And now, she doubted that she would get the chance to tell him anytime soon, considering all of the drama she and the rest of her family were about to go through. It was as if the universe itself was making her second-guess herself. Something that was a rarity for the hero known as Lizardy .
‘I guess I’ll just have to tell him later….’ Setsuna said to herself while embracing the warmth of Izuku’s body against hers.
Hopefully, she would get the chance to finally come clean before it was too late. After all, it was only a matter of time before he would find out anyway.