_
Flying away from the battlefield, Yuta didn't make it to Shizuoka. He barely made it two cities past Tokyo limits before intense drowsiness began washing over him.
Two minutes later, he dropped onto the gravel roof of a nondescript apartment complex in Saitama, thirty five miles north of the battlefield.
His legs gave out the moment his boots touched the grey stone. He didn't even try to find cover; he just slumped against a buzzing HVAC unit, before plopping to the floor on his back.
"Seems that forced Quirk theft took more out of him than I initially thought." Yuta uttered, a lingering chill forming at the thought of that close call he had. The specifics of All For One's warp quirk had long been lost to him besides knowing that he had one and it deferred from Kurogiri's.
Luckily, the worst case hadn't happened. However, the drain that came with his successful resistance wasn't something he could escape from.
Analyzing his body, he came to the conclusion that reaching U.A in this state wasn't ideal. 'Figures.' He thought as he stared up at the sky.
It was a very ordinary sky for a morning that was not ordinary at all. 'Hopefully, my suffering arc is over.' The self mocking thought crossed his mind as he imagined some deranged author cooking up this hellscape of an alternate universe just because he was bored.
With everything that had happened in the last few weeks, Yuta felt there was a very good chance everything that was happening to him now was nothing more than a story being concocted for someone's amusement under the guise of 'Character development.' The thought alone made him chuckle. However ...
BOOM.
The sound of a loud explosion jolted him awake from his numbing stupor. 'Huh?'
The thought had barely formed when another explosion resounded nearby.
Yuta didn't move. He didn't even open his eyes. He just let out a long, ragged sigh that was more of a growl. "You have got to be kidding me," he muttered into the morning air. Below, in the street adjacent to the apartment complex, the sound of tearing metal and glass shattering echoed up the brickwork. With the chaos of the early morning events only recently coming to an end, a group of low-level opportunists had decided that a morning with no police presence was the perfect time to rip the vault out of a local credit union. A plume of oily black smoke drifted past the roof's edge. A woman's scream followed, cut short by the revving of a getaway engine.
Yuta's hand curled into a fist, his fingernails digging into the soot-stained gravel as every instinct in his being was urging him to retire.
'Just let the local heroes handle it.' His brain uttered. 'You're technically still officially dead ... For a few hours at least ...' Another explosion sounded. Closer this time. Along with it came the sound of a support beam groaning.
Yuta groaned a sound of genuine, profound annoyance. He rolled onto his stomach, pushing himself up with arms that felt like wet noodles and looked over the ledge.
In the distance, three villains with minor physical mutations were laughing as they loaded bags into a van, ignoring the civilians cowering behind a flipped car.
For a moment, he couldn't decide whether he was unlucky, or they were the ones who had run out of luck. "Well, I am technically still a dead man,"
Yuta muttered with little energy. ' Sigh! Let's get this over with.' His current state however really didn't have the willpower to expend energy for a grand entrance.
As a result, Yuta simply rolled off the dge of the roof, letting gravity do the work for him.
_
[TOKYO - CENTRAL GENERAL HOSPITAL - 08:15 AM]
The hospital was a fortress. The military had set up a perimeter three blocks out to keep the media drones from hovering over the ICU windows.
The one who suggested it, Tsukauchi Naomasa, looked like a man who had aged ten years in a single night. Rumpled trench coat, loosened tie and dark circles under his eyes. "... All Might is in that ward."
"Thank you." He thanked the staff member as he approached the wing where All Might and Endeavor had been placed. Aizawa Shota, leaning against the wall opposite the ICU doors, didn't move as the detective stopped beside him. Both men stared at the frosted glass of the double doors. Finally, Tsukauchi let out a sigh.
"Well ... Now I understand why Toshinori left the country."
"It was ..." Aizawa paused. Then sighed. "We didn't think this would happen so soon." The decision to leave the country to find Yuta had been a calculated risk. Nezu had run it himself, weighing the pros and cons before deciding on this. The result? This happened.
Before Tsukauchi could respond, the electronic lock on the ICU doors clicked. A senior surgeon stepped out, pulling down his mask. He looked exhausted, but his face undoubtedly carried relief.
"He's stable," the doctor said, glancing between the two men. "The internal hemorrhaging has stopped. Honestly, I've never seen anything like it. It's as if his cellular regeneration was jump-started by a massive external stimulus. He's conscious, though he's in a significant amount of pain."
Tsukauchi didn't wait. He gave Aizawa a brief, somber nod and slipped into the room.
Inside, the "Symbol of Peace" was covered with white bandages, propped up against the pillows.
Compared to his former self, his current frame looked painfully thin.
"Naomasa," Toshinori coughed, a weak smile touching his bloodless lips. "I... I suppose I've caused quite a headache for the precinct."
"You've caused a national emergency, Toshi," Tsukauchi sighed, pulling a chair to the bedside. "But seeing you awake is worth the paperwork. How are you feeling?" Outside, Aizawa turned his gaze back to his phone. Before Tsukauchi arrived, he had been staring at a flickering GPS dot in Saitama for the last ten minutes. The dot on the screen was moving rapidly. It didn't fly toward Mustafu; it moved three blocks south, lingered, and then moved again. Aizawa's brow furrowed. 'What is that kid doing?' He was supposed to head for U.A. Did he want to get discovered by the media? Aizawa checked his watch.
The Hero Commission was temporarily disabled due to All For One's attack on Headquarters. So there was currently no one breathing down their necks for answers. However, the coming public storm was unavoidable. That was assuming no other government entities showed up with ideas of their own.
If Yuta didn't get behind the U.A. barrier soon, the legal "snatch-and-grab" would begin. Aizawa stepped out into the hallway, and hit the speed-dial on his burner phone. The phone rang. Then connected.
__
"Hello?"
"Akutami. Are you at U.A?"
"No" Yuta admitted, looking at the distant skyline. "I ran out of gas in Saitama. Just... taking five."
There was a long pause on the other end. The sound of a blinker clicking.
"I'm heading back to U.A. to brief the faculty. I'm passing through your sector now. Wait and I'll call you when I get there."
"Sensei?"
"You heard me. There's no point in you wasting the last of your energy flying across three prefectures. Media will probably be waiting to intercept you."
"I'm sorry ... What?"
"Don't think much of it. Sit tight. I'll come to you." The call ended. 'Well, that happened.' Yuta thought while sitting on a water tower.
Down below the commercial building, a giant quirk user on a rampage five minutes ago was now sprawled down on the earth, completely unresponsive.
This was the third one this morning.
He had used the last of his mental focus to tie the giant villain with a thick industrial chain he had found at a construction site nearby.
The local Saitama police had arrived ten minutes ago. Securing the gigantified villain with an Iron Maiden while keeping their distance, hands hovering near their holsters. He has thought they would approach him to take him in for questioning, statements, or maybe under an arrest for breaching of Quirk laws at his age.
Surprisingly or not, they didn't. No doubt, it would probably make morning news.
_
Tokyo – 08:00 AM
The sun rose over the biggest tragedy that had ever hit Japan since the dawn of The Era of the Symbol Of Peace.
From the ruined streets of Kamino ward, to the giant cratered wasteland in Eastern Tokyo.
The smoke columns thinning out as the fires that started them had long since died out. Craters where buildings had been.
Streets that weren't streets. The HPSC building a gap in the skyline where a twelve-story structure had stood the previous morning.
Four news helicopters circled the skies, having multiplied during the night as networks scrambled assets toward what every producer in Japan understood was the story of the decade.
Fujiwara Sae had been replaced sometime around six twenty-five by a senior anchor who had been driven from his home in Setagaya.
"We are receiving confirmation from the National Police Agency," He said, his voice particularly grave. "All For One, identified as the leader of the League of Villains and the individual responsible for tonight's coordinated attacks, has been confirmed deceased at the scene in eastern Tokyo."
The anchor's voice wavered for a fraction of a second.
"The casualty reports are... still being tallied. Preliminary figures from the Kamino Ward evacuation zones are staggering and the physical damage is estimated in the billions, but the focus of the world remains fixed on the final broadcast from the eastern crater. The images captured by our aerial teams at dawn show the 'Symbol of Peace' being evacuated to an undisclosed medical facility."
The feed cut to a high-resolution still from the earlier broadcast: All Might, skeletal and bloodied, his raised to signify victory. But the camera didn't stay on him. It panned to the side, zooming in on the youth standing in the dust.
"We are also receiving confirmation of the identity of the individual seen alongside All Might during the final engagement. The individual has been confirmed as Akutami Yuta, a first-year student at UA High School who was listed among the victims of the Yamanote Line tragedy. The circumstances of his survival and his presence at tonight's incident are not yet known. UA High School has not issued a statement. The Hero Public Safety Commission is not currently in a position to issue statements and while the National Police Agency has confirmed the death of All For One at the scene in eastern Tokyo, questions remain about the full scope of tonight's events and the future of hero oversight in Japan. For more on the institutional response, we go now to our correspondent outside UA High School. Tanaka-san, what is the situation there?"
The feed cut.
The reporter standing outside UA's main gate was a young woman named Tanaka Reiko who had been dispatched from the Musutafu bureau at five thirty in the morning and had been standing in the same spot for nearly four hours.
Behind her, the UA gate was closed, the barrier wall stretched in both directions.
"Thank you, Matsumoto-san. The situation here outside UA High School remains quiet, though the gathered press presence has grown considerably in the last hour as confirmation of student involvement in tonight's events has spread."
The camera panned briefly to show the press pack. Thirty, perhaps forty journalists and camera operators clustered on the pavement outside the gate, their equipment pointed at a wall that was not giving them anything.
"UA High School has issued no statement as of this broadcast. Calls to the school's administrative office have gone unanswered. The Hero Public Safety Commission, which would normally be the appropriate body to address questions of student involvement in hero activities, is not currently in a position to respond."
Tanaka paused, pressing her earpiece.
"We are being told that Principal Nezu of UA High School may be preparing to address the press directly. We will bring you that development as it—"
The gate opened. Not fully, but rather, a personnel door set into the main gate structure, small and unremarkable, the kind of door that existed at every institution and never got used for anything worth photographing.
Nezu stepped through it.
He was exactly as he always appeared. Small and precisely groomed. If not for the situation, perhaps a cup of steamed tea would be seen in one of his paws.
The press pack surged toward him immediately, microphones extending as reporters scrambled to have their questions answered.
"Good morning," Nezu said pleasantly. "I appreciate your patience and your commitment to keeping the public informed during what has been an extraordinary night for Japan."
"I will be issuing a formal statement from UA High School regarding tonight's events within the next few hours. I ask that you bear with us a little longer as we ensure our information is complete and accurate before making it public."
A reporter near the front raised her hand. "Principal Nezu, can you confirm that Akutami Yuta, listed as deceased following the Yamanote Line tragedy, was present at tonight's incident?"
"I can confirm that UA High School is aware of the reports and is currently in the process of verifying all relevant information," Nezu said, with a warm smile. "I understand the urgency. I ask for a little more patience."
"Is he alive?"
"As I said, we are verifying—"
"Principal Nezu, the NPA has confirmed All For One's death. Can UA comment on the role its students played in—"
"Within the hour," Nezu said pleasantly. "I promise you it will be worth the wait."
He did not move from his position at the gate, seemingly waiting for something.