[69: Obligatory Funny Chapter Name That Makes a Pun on the Number "69" That All the Readers of the Fic Will Think Is Funny]
"So, this is the place?" Toga looked around a League of Villains' hideout. According to what Eleanor had told her, her mission was to sabotage this place. That was it. However she chose to sabotage this place was up to her, and her alone. She was doing this mission alone. She thought Twice would join her, but he was away doing something else, another mission given by Eleanor.
Since it was up to her to sabotage this place in some way, she had prepared. At the base, before setting out, she looked around at what equipment they had. Most of it was computers and other tech; some were guns, mainly belonging to Lady Nagant, but the ones that really counted were some small drones she found.
The drones she found belonged to Eleanor. They were mostly there on standby to be used whenever Eleanor needed them. They were equipped with various surveillance tech, but some, most importantly, had weapons. It was something Toga could use. Toga picked up one of the drones, carried it to Eleanor, and asked her if she could use them. Only for Eleanor to freak out a bit. Apparently, the drone Toga picked up had C4 on it. Eleanor told Toga she was lucky that C4 was very stable.
Other than a minor scolding, Eleanor agreed. She even gave her a basic set of instructions and taught her how to use a detonator to blow up the C4 she would use. It was very educational in a way. Though the only thing Toga took away from it was that clicking the detonator made the C4 blow up, she ignored the rest of the technical details.
So, now here she was, in a small League of Villains hideout. Getting in was very easy. All she had to do was a bit of chopping and slicing, drink some blood, and then enter with the identity of some random villain at this hideout. And it really looked like one. The place seemed on the verge of collapse at any moment, from how run-down and damaged it was. Cracks in the walls, random dust and particles floating in the air that seemed inadvisable to breathe in, a weird and off-putting smell, and haphazard patches to fix some of them. This definitely wasn't a hideout meant to be a permanent place. But there were quite a few villains here.
Toga kept walking around. No one here really cared to pay attention to her…or the form she was transformed into. This really was a ragtag group of villains, but…it was fun to blend in like this. It was so exciting, and knowing she was carrying a few pounds of C4 with her made it even more exciting.
Toga walked around, placing C4 around the building. With how much stuff there was around here, it wasn't hard to disguise it. But it was only then that she saw just how much C4 she had brought. It would be too tedious to place it all one by one, so she just threw what was left at a random spot before leaving. The other villains around didn't even bother. They all knew they were only here temporarily before they left, so they didn't really pay much attention to anything.
Once Toga felt satisfied with the C4, she left the building. After walking a safe distance away, or what she felt was a safe distance away, she looked back as her transformation partially came undone. She took out the detonator, fumbled around a bit, and then activated it.
.
.
.
Nothing happened.
"Huh? What's going on?" Toga kept trying to detonate it, poking at it with her fingers. She pointed the detonator at the building like one would a remote at a TV when it wasn't working properly. "Come on." Toga lifted her arms in frustration and let them fall. "Where's the big boom?"
Toga kept trying again and again. She gave up a bit, her arms falling to her sides. She turned around to leave. However…
BOOM
Toga flinched and jumped at the sound of the explosion. She felt the shockwave hit her. Her transformation came undone completely now. She recovered and looked back just in time to see the large plume of smoke rise in the air. Small fires lit the building and those around it.
Toga could hear the groans of some of the villains. Through the fire and smoke, she could see limbs and destroyed chunks of flesh. She could even make out disfigured bodies and faces seared and charred; blood oozing out and flesh ripped from bodies.
"There are some still alive? I could swear there were more bombs! That whole building should be rubble! Well, it'll be rubble at any point now. Not like it'll be left standi—"
BOOM
An even louder explosion rocked the area. The entire building collapsed, crushing any survivors to death. Toga quickly turned around and left as fast as she could.
"Mission accomplished! Yay!"
But she still celebrated.
⁂
Almost immediately, after the fire was put out, a large police presence was at the scene of the explosion. The entire area was cordoned off; bomb disposal squads scoured the entire scene; investigators looked for what evidence they could, and bodies, or what remained of bodies, were carefully recovered.
There were a few heroes nearby as well. Most notably, Aizawa was among them. He looked at the scene and the damage.
'This can't be Eleanor. No way. She wouldn't do something like this. Nothing like what she did with Shie Hassaikai; at least there was an understandable reason for that,' Aizawa thought.
It was plain to everyone who saw Eri and was in the know about Eleanor that she at least had an understandable reason for what she did. And the fact that Eri would occasionally ask for Eleanor put many of them in an uncomfortable position.
"Aizawa, we've found a bit of evidence. From what we can gather, this place is a sort of hideout for the League of Villains," Tsukuachi, leading this investigation, said to Aizawa.
"Anything else?"
"No. That's all we can really gather. Everything else was almost certainly destroyed by whatever blew this place up."
"Is there really not much we can do?"
"Unfortunately not. Unless we could just rewind everything that happened here."
Aizawa turned to Tsukauchi, but at the same time a certain thought came into his mind; he quickly cast it aside. 'No. Absolutely not,' he thought to himself.
"If we take things at face value, I would speculate that this is probably some kind of conflict between villain groups," Tsukauchi said.
"It can't be that simple," Aizawa said.
"Sometimes it is."
⁂
"Eleanor. You can't ignore what Toga did." Lady Nagant, upon knowing what Toga had done, immediately went to find Eleanor.
Eleanor was seated in front of all the monitors, but she wasn't looking at them. She was looking away, rubbing her forehead with her hand. She let out the occasional sigh. If there was a time she felt some kind of stress, this was one of them.
"Yeah, I know, Kaina. She overdid it with the C4. This was my oversight. I'll need to rein her in more and limit what she does."
"You have to. We got lucky this time, but we can't keep getting lucky forever. You know how I feel about her," Lady Nagant said.
"Well…maybe we could, but you're right." Eleanor sighed in slight frustration. "I don't want to go the slippery slope route, but with Toga and her mental state at times…it's possible."
"She is still a villain who has committed many murders, Eleanor. We're not really ones to speak, but at least we know where certain lines and justifications are. You've said villains always get what's coming to them."
"Yeah, I know, Kaina. Toga will be a problem if she continues like this."
A few moments passed in silence before Lady Nagant sat down in front of Eleanor, also letting out a sigh. When she spoke, it didn't have the anger her previous words did. "I, uh, hope I didn't sound too angry. I wasn't targeting it at you; I was targeting it at Toga and what she did. I don't want you to think I'm angry at you."
"It's okay, Kaina, I understand you. You're worried that Toga's actions will compromise our operational security."
"Yeah, I am. Jin doesn't have a problem like this; not as bad as Toga, at least."
Eleanor smiled and patted Lady Nagant on the shoulder, changing the tone and conversation. "Enough about that, Kaina; let's talk about something else. How was your day so far? And don't give me any of that mission stuff. I want to hear about you."
"Well, compared to who is available for a conversation, I'd talk with you whenever."
Eleanor smirked. "Well, I certainly like that."
⁂
(A/N: Yo? Things kind of might be ramping up a bit?)