Dragon’s Pride

I stumble out of the dark forest and into the dimmed outskirts of the city. I don’t remember which city it is, but it’s not like that actually matters. Does it? Do different cities have different policies on the homeless?

Well, even if they do, I have bigger problems. Like finding clothes. Not that I’m cold or anything, apparently whatever it is I can do prevents that from happening. But given that I spent who knows how long in a pool of lava, it shouldn’t come as any surprise that all my clothes are gone. Thankfully I can make scales appear anywhere on my body just by thinking about it, so modesty isn’t as big of an issue either.

Still. I’m literally walking around a city at night, scale naked. Just because I’m technically covered doesn’t mean that other people would agree. And I don’t have any money to buy anything to cover myself. I already know that people aren’t nice enough to just give me clothes, so I guess that means… that I have to steal them.

But stealing is against the law! But so is public quirk use, and that never stopped Bakugou… Does the law only apply to adults? That sounds weird, but it would make sense with how everything Bakugou did was laughed off as ‘kids being kids’. Still, stealing is-

DRAGONS STAND ABOVE ALL!

-something that I need to do. Maybe not for survival, or maybe it is? I don’t think I need clothes for survival if I don’t feel the temperature, but I also don’t know how long I can keep my scales up for. I think keeping them on is making me hungry? But I also don’t know how long I was in the lava. I do know that it took half a day to get down the volcano though, so maybe I’m just feeling naturally hungry from not eating for a long time? But I find it hard to believe that the scales don’t cost me something to keep active.

Normally I would have tested them before even leaving the volcano, but I don’t have the luxury to risk overexerting or hurting myself if something doesn’t work like I think it does. Or if it does work like I think it does but I end up not having as good control over it as I think. Or-

I bump into something, blinking as I realize that I’ve been so focused on what I can do now that I wasn’t paying attention to where I was going. As I look around my stomach drops. I’m in an alley, and there’s a group of people surrounding me. I don’t like their eyes, they’re cruel eyes that bear an unsettling familiarity. Though why they’re familiar is something that escapes my memory for now.

The one I bumped into looks down at me, and his eyes are gleaming. “Well, well. Look what we have here! What you doing wandering around at this time of night girlie?”

I swallow, taking a step back while the exact number of people flashes through my head. Seven. “I-I was just heading home.” The lie falls easily from my lips, but I know immediately that they see through it. I don’t know what time it is, but I do know that nobody my age would be out by themselves with the sun down.

The man shakes his head in mock disappointment, taking a step to close the distance I put between us. “Now, now. It’s not good to lie, you know. How ‘bout you be honest?” He grins as he looks into my eyes and I feel a surge of nausea fill my head. “If you do, we’ll give you a surprise.”

I won’t be pushed around anymore.

Hearing those same words said by my father, my blood boils. The nausea vanishes as I pull my lips back in a snarl, the man in front of me taking a step back as his eyes widen in shock. I meet them with my own, taking satisfaction in the way he twitches. I ignore the others who step closer, flashes of their quirks flickering in the corner of my eyes. I speak clearly, pausing between words so they can’t possibly misunderstand. “Fuck. Off.”

The man in front of me swallows, but instead of him speaking I feel someone put their hand on my shoulder. I turn my head so I can glare at them with one narrowed eye, taking in the dirty blonde hair contrasting with a black beard. They give me an easy smile, and I note how the others relax, deactivating their quirks.

“Come on now, there’s no need for that now is there? We’re all friends here!” I let him tug on my shoulder to turn me around, his hand never moving away from me. He crouches down and plants his other hand on my opposite shoulder as his smile grows wider. “How about we start with introductions? My name is Kitanaga Linojika. My quirk is Reassuring Touch, which lets me calm people down when I touch them. The more contact I have, the calmer they are. What’s your quirk?”

I stare at him for a second, one eyebrow rising at the description of his quirk. “Move it or lose it. I won’t say it again.” I speak simply, giving him a chance.

He tilts his head in curiosity, moving his arms so that they start to wrap around me in a hug while his hands trail down. “That sounds like an interesting quirk. What’s it do?”

A brief realization goes through my mind. Their eyes are the same as Bakugou’s. I open my mouth, aware that there’s something different with it. But that just makes what I’m about to do all the easier.

It takes a few moments for him to understand, Linojika just staring blankly for a moment as he moves his arm. It’s only when the blood squirts onto his face that he registers what happened. And then he’s screaming, clutching at his stump with his remaining hand as he falls on his butt. “MY ARM! SHE TOOK MY FUCKING ARM!!!”

The others scramble back in horror, stares alternating between the sobbing and screaming man and me, holding his dripping severed hand by the fingers as my mouth moves. My face is going through different expressions as I chew, the taste being odd, but not bad. And the texture is strangely satisfying. I swallow, feeling the mouthful slide down my throat and into my stomach.

“Huh.” I remark to my captive audience. “Not bad.” And I bring the still bleeding wrist up to my mouth, taking another thoughtful bite.

I never considered cannibalism before, like most people the thought of it has always been taboo. Then again, there’s such a wide variety of quirks that there’s bound to be a few people who need to consume human flesh, or who would find it palatable to them. But still, that doesn’t take away the stigma humanity has developed over the act of consuming their fellow sapients. Which feeds into a self-perpetuating cycle of hatred and fear towards those with quirks where the user either needs or wants to consume other people, which leads to them becoming villains, which leads to fear and hatred towards them, and on and on.

Which is really just a long-winded explanation for why four of the people who I’m sure had less than good intentions towards me are running away as fast as they can, leaving the injured man, the one I bumped into, and a woman with her hair in loops behind. The man I bumped into scowls.

“Fucking cowards. It’s just some brat, yet they’re acting like the Quirk Merchant is after them!” He looks at the woman who, despite being clearly unsettled by the way I causally finish off the rest of my meal, remains steadfast. “Huupa, keep her restrained. We can still have some fun before selling her off.”

“My arm…” The man on the ground continues to groan and cry, having curled himself into a ball as if to protect what remains of his arm. The woman nods, her hands shaky as she grabs one of her hair loops and tosses it at me. I don’t do anything, just watching disinterestedly as it expands before falling around me, rapidly shrinking to pin my arms to my sides.

The man smirks, walking towards me confidently as he raises his hand. “Not so tough now that you’re stuck huh! You should have just played along, and gotten treated gently. But now I get to do it how I like it, hard and pain- AH!”

I could have listened to him monologue about whatever he was going on about, but now that I’ve eaten I’m starting to feel a bit sleepy. I open my mouth in a yawn, feeling something other than tired noises come out. Blinking my eyes back open, I’m surprised to see the man rolling around on the ground, screaming as he tries to extinguish the green flames engulfing him.

I tilt my head, just watching for a second as I examine the curious feeling it gives me. Not watching the man burn to death, I oddly don’t care about that. No, the feeling I have is about the flames. They feel like… an extension of myself? No, that’s not right. Maybe it’s like when you always carry something with you, and then it feels weird when you don’t have it anymore?

I shake my head, reaching out a hand towards him and hearing a pained gasp come from the woman. I clench my fist, pulling on that feeling, and watch as the flames extinguish themselves. Huh, I think. So scales, teeth, and flames? That’s interesting. I blink as the memory of me leaving the volcano comes back, clearer than I think it should be given that most of my journey to the city is a blur. And I can grow wings. I’m going to be spending a long time learning about my abilities.

It’s faint, but I can hear the now-burned man breathing. For an instant, the thought of finishing the job flashes through my mind, but it’s gone as suddenly as it appears so I shake my head again. I look at the woman, and she stumbles back, tripping over some of the trash scattered around. It doesn’t stop her from crawling backwards, but now it’s me looking down on her instead of her looking down on me. Something about the sight resonates with me, causing a small smile to tug the corners of my lips upwards.

DRAGONS STAND ABOVE ALL!

Yes… I think I like the sight of people cowering in front of me. “S-s-stay aw-away! Don’t c-c-come closer!”

I tilt my head, wondering at her request before realization hits. I guess it would be traumatizing to see a little girl eat your friend’s hand and then light your other friend on fire. Should I be worried that I feel fine about that, or is it just adrenaline like heroes in interviews talk about?

DRAGONS STAND ABOVE ALL!

Hmm. It’s not important right now, and I can think about it later. Meanwhile, I’m still stuck in the same position as earlier. Except now instead of being naked and hungry, I’m naked and tired! But as I watch the woman babble something about turning herself in and changing her ways, I’m struck by inspiration.

They tried to do… something to me. They… tried to fight me?

SPOILS TO THE VICTOR!

I nod, certainty replacing the feeling. The feeling went away while I was walking earlier, but it’s popped up a few times since I’ve encountered these people. I still don’t know what’s up with it, but it definitely feels right. They lost to me, so it’s only right that they should pay for their loss. And I do need money.

So I reach out my hand, ignoring the way the woman whimpers and covers herself with her arms. “Money.” I wait impatiently for her to hand over what she has, watching as she slowly parts her arms to look at me.

She just stays like that for a moment, confusion clouding her eyes. “Huh?”

I sigh, holding back a smile at the way she flinches. “You and your friends lost. So you owe me money. Plus I need to pay for a place to stay and buy some clothes.”

She blinks before slowly lowering her arms. “You-you mean you aren’t going to kill me?”

I tilt my head curiously, wondering where she got that idea from. “No? Why would I do that?”

She points, and I follow her finger’s direction to the two men on the ground. The burned man’s breathing has become very faint, to the point I can barely hear it. So has the man whose hand I ate, though he at least wrapped the stump up in his shirt, so I don’t think he’ll bleed to death. Probably.

I look back at her, the lack of understanding clear on my face. She seems to think about it for a moment before abandoning the thought and rifling through her pockets, pulling out an assortment of bills and coins that amounts to around ten-thousand yen. I nod in satisfaction before staring at her expectantly again. She swallows.

“W-what? That’s a-all I have!”

I shake my head, ignoring the way she tenses. “The other two haven’t paid.” I blink as a thought strikes me. “Oh, and you should probably call an ambulance for them.” She stares at me for another moment before I frown, then she’s scrambling to the two downed men and practically tearing their pants off in her hurry to get me my money. With theirs added, I now have forty-thousand yen, causing a happy smile to light up my face. I’m skipping as I leave, clutching the bills in one hand as I head out to search for any store still open selling clothes.

This was a productive meeting~!

`~`

Detective Noberai is doing something he was beginning to think he’d never manage to do. He’s interrogating the villain known as Huupa, one of the three current executives in a human trafficking ring. But after listening to the woman recount the events that led to the other two executives ending up in critical condition at a hospital, he can’t help but massage the bridge of his nose while wondering if they started dealing in drugs. And sampled a bad batch.

He takes a deep breath before picking up the paper laying on the table, the words having written themselves thanks to his quirk. Logbook isn’t a powerful quirk, simply turning what happens immediately around him into written words. And it does occasionally have a flair for the dramatic, but it’s very useful for getting an accurate recounting of events.

Not as useful for finding out how true events are, since it won’t write down if something is a lie or not, but it definitely helps when he’s not sure what the person he’s talking to is feeling, or if they try to backtrack on something. What’s giving him a headache is the fact that the entire time, Huupa has been terrified. He sighs heavily, deciding to go back over the event himself in an effort for it to make more sense.

“You’re telling me that you targeted a little girl,” he can’t help the way his lips curl at the statement. This particular trafficking ring is well known among law enforcement as one that focuses on sex trafficking, making their target all the worse. “And she proceeded to,” he looks down at the report, quoting directly, “‘eat Soft’s arm like a fucking kabob, bone and all.’ Then after Qualm told you to restrain her, she lit him on fire.’”

“Breathed fire!” She corrects, eyes darting around the room as if worried that the girl would return to finish the job she started.

The officer rolls his eyes. “Breathed fire on him,” he corrects with a hint of condescension, “but extinguished them before his injuries became fatal.”

She nods jerkily, fingers tapping a nervous rhythm on the table. “She then proceeded to… mug you.”

A strange sound bursts from her lips, though he chooses to think of it as disbelieving laughter, as she nods her head before shaking it. “Y-yeah. But she didn’t? She said we lost, so we owed her money. Like getting loot from enemies in a video game!”

He nods again. “And then, after she left, you called an ambulance for your associates, then the police while demanding a plea deal.”

She makes a so-so gesture with her hand. “Sort of.” She meets his eyes, her next words surprising the detective. “I want a comfy cell in prison. No way am I going back out there with someone like that walking around.”

The officer can’t help but be faintly amused by this career villain wanting to stay in prison… because of a little girl. Yes, she did ‘eat’ someone’s arm and light another on fire, supposedly, but considering the woman’s own history, he can’t help the sense of irony it evokes.

He puts the paper down and interlocks his fingers. “And what, exactly, are you offering for that sort of concession?”

Honestly, he’d normally be calling in psychologists to see if the woman had a mental break or had her memories altered to perceive the individual as a child. But around the same time they’d gone to pick her up, there were a series of frantic phone calls reporting a naked child wandering the streets covered in blood. And then one final one where a convenience store employee reported the then free-of-blood girl buying some clothes before vanishing into the night, despite his attempts at keeping her from leaving until the police arrived.

The station has put out an APB on the child, along with a warning to treat them with caution. He doesn’t think she’d attack law enforcement, but they have no idea what her mental state is. And given the state she left this group in, they can’t afford to take chances if she’s unstable or hostile. It would be best if they could get a hero assigned just in case, but the Underground Hero they usually work with had been pulled into some nation-wide investigation. Along with most of the others.

And there’s absolutely no way he’d be the one to tell the HPSC that they need the help! No, they’ll just have to rely on the more ‘mundane’ people in law enforcement and hope for the best.

Huupa looks at him, and for the first time her eyes are focused, more along the lines of how he’d expect someone as high-profile as her to be. “I’m willing to offer all the information on the Treasure Trinity’s movements and locations, as well as the identities of those who frequent them.”

The detective’s mouth drops. This is definitely not how he expected the night to go.