CHAPTER NINE

      The tension in the air was palpable.

      Neither side had made a move yet, but the blue-haired villain, the leader, spoke to the purple mist villain, even though he was being restrained by Bakugo. He was definitely the leader, speaking with an air around him that made him seem more intense.

      "Kurogiri," His voice sounded normal, but his words were anything but. "Our exit and entrance, has been overcome. We're in a pinch."

      Bakugo, out of all the things, smirked. "You careless bastard! You're just what I'd thought you'd be! Only certain parts of you can turn into a warp gate. The fog gate covered your actual body, right? If you were completely made out of mist and physical attacks couldn't touch you, then you wouldn't have said 'that was close'."

      For all his anger, Megumi thought, Bakugo was pretty damn smart.

      The blue haired villain started talking again. "In addition to capturing them, they're almost all uninjured. Kids these days are amazing. They make the League of Villains look bad." He turned to the monstrous-looking villain. "Nomu."

      Megumi tensed up as this Nomu started to pass through the warp gate, slowly emerging out of it. As soon as he did, the gate closed and his arm as well as his leg, which were frozen in Todoroki's ice, shattered away, separating from his body. But the Nomu somehow managed to move.

      "How the hell is he moving when his body is that broken?" Megumi said out loud as she got into a defensive stance.

      With horrified glances, she and the others watched as Nomu regenerated his monstrous limbs, standing up once again. They were, quite frankly, screwed. Whatever this guy was, if his quirk was regeneration, then attacks against him would certainly be useless. This was troublesome and Megumi was finally feeling the first vestiges of fear settle in her mind. But somehow, she managed to steady her mind and get into a battle-ready stance like the rest of her classmates.

      "But first, we need to get our gate back," The blue haired villain continued to speak, his voice sounding amused. "Go, Nomu."

      Nobody could fucking react.

      All seven of them, even All Might, were unable to react as the Nomu jumped towards Bakugo, his fist held in front of him. As he moved, a shockwave erupted, sending them all flying. Megumi struggled to push against it, to stop herself from falling over. She summoned her flames to her legs, using the strength boost to hold herself steady, but against the Nomu's power, it wasn't enough. Clouds of dust surrounded them.

      Once they had faded slightly, Megumi realised that she, her cousin and her fellow classmates had somehow managed to group together. She pulled her boot out of the ground, pulling back her flames. Besides her, Midoriya let out a grunt of pain.

      The dust clouds in front of them faded, revealing Nomu holding down the Kurogiri person, the warp gate and standing in front of the blue-haired leader.

      "Kacchan!" Midoriya yelled with worry. A second later, he turned to his right only to see Bakugo sitting on the ground with a shocked look. "Kacchan?! You dodged? That's amazing!"

      'How the hell did he get here so fast?!' Megumi thought in surprise as she helped Natsume stand up.

      "No, shut up, scum!" Bakugo snapped back.

      "Then, how...?" Kirishima questioned.

      "And that guy was too fast for any of us to even react," Natsume added.

      Suddenly, Todoroki tensed and looked towards the wall where the Nomu had aimed his attack. Everyone followed his gaze. "Then that was," He started to say as the rest of the dust clouds faded, revealing All Might standing and coughing, the sleeves of his shirt torn off.

      He had taken the damn punch. Holy shit. All Might's strength was incredible.

      But then the blue-haired villain started talking some more.

      His words were horrifyingly manipulative; saying heroes and villains both thrived on similar violent acts, but only one was categorized as good while the other was seen as evil. He sounded almost fanatical as he described his anger with the hero society.

      "That's preposterous," All Might suddenly said, interrupting the villain. "Real idealists have a different look in their eyes. You just want to enjoy this yourself, don't you, you liar?"

      "It's three against seven," Todoroki said as they all got ready to fight.

      "Kacchan already exposed the fog's weakness!" Midoriya said.

      "These guys are crazy, but if we back up All Might," Kirishima said, hardening his arms. "We can push them back!"

      "Yeah!" Natsume nodded, turning both his hands and legs into his tiger like limbs. Megumi lit up her hands with her flames, also voicing her agreement.

      "No!" All Might immediately said as he walked forward to stand in front of his students. "Run away."

      "You would have been in trouble if I hadn't done anything earlier, right?" Todoroki said.

      "That was a different story, Young Todoroki. Thanks, " All Might replied as he got into a battle-ready stance. "But it's fine! Just watch as a pro gives it everything he's got."

      It was time. Megumi felt her flames overflowing from her wrists, surrounding them as protection. As All Might went for the Nomu, the blue-haired villain rushed towards the students. The moment the number 1's fist clashed with the monstrous looking villain, a shockwave erupted once more, creating massive gusts of wind.

      Megumi stumbled to the ground as the force of the winds increased, watching with awe and slight fear as All Might punched Nomu fiercely, landing multiple hits in succession. This was exactly why he was the number 1 hero, the Symbol of Peace. His strength was unmatched and the way he fought was intense, but also inspirational.

      This was All Might's true strength.

      He was fearless. Megumi didn't have to look at the others; she knew they all had similar expressions on their faces. 'Sorry Dad,' she thought. 'After today, I think All Might's become my favorite hero.'

       With one final punch, All Might launched the Nomu into the atmosphere, sending him flying through USJ's roof.

      "His strength is insane," Megumi said with awe.

      Kirishima nodded in agreement. "It's like straight out of a comic book."

      "What insane power," Bakugo admitted gruffly. "Does this mean he rushed at him so fast that he couldn't regenerate?"

      But there was no time to celebrate. Two villains still remained; the leader and the warp gate. They had to be captured. All Might turned towards them, grinning his usual smile as smoke surrounded him. "I'm sure we'd all like to end this as soon as possible."

      "What's wrong?" All Might taunted. "You're not coming? You said you'd 'clear' this or something, right? Come and get me if you can."

      "As expected," Todoroki suddenly said. "It looks like there is no need for us to fight."

      "All Might's got it all handled," Megumi added, still feeling awed at the pro hero's strength.

      Kirishima called out to Midoriya, who was staring at All Might and the blue-haired leader in a daze. "Midoriya! We should get out of here now! It'll be worse if we end up getting taken hostage instead!"

      "Midoriya, come on!" Natsume said, beckoning the green-haired boy to come over. But he continued to stare over at All Might.

      "Well, what's wrong?" All Might taunted the villains again, stepping a little more forward.

      The blue-haired leader suddenly looked agitated, sounding angry as he madly scratched at his neck. The action itself made Megumi shiver with disgust. Besides the fact that he was a villain, there was something really wrong with this guy, but she could not put a finger on it. He acted like a kid.

      "Tomura Shigaraki," The purple mist villain, Kurogiri if she remembered correctly, said. "Please calm yourself. Looking carefully, I see that he was definitely weakened from the damage caused by Nomu's attacks. Besides, the kids appear to be frozen in fear. We still have underlings who can be used."

      At that Megumi's attention snapped towards the villains, earlier knocked down by Eraserhead and later All Might, who were slowly getting up from the ground.

      "Shit," Megumi cursed as she turned towards them, ready to launch her flames.

      "All Might will do something about the main bad guys," Kirishima stated as he looked at the villains. "Let's go help the others!"

      "Yeah!" Natsume nodded, getting into a battle ready position.

      Todoroki turned towards Midoriya, who apparently, wasn't paying attention to the conversation that was happening between his classmates. Then before any of them had the chance to react, both villains launched an attack at All Might.

      But the more surprising thing happened right after.

      Midoriya, of all the people, jumped into the air, launching himself between the dark purple villain and the leader and All Might. He looked ready to fight, but his legs looked strange, almost as though they were broken. What he was even doing?

      The next few moments happened so quickly that it took Megumi many moments to process them. As the leader pushed his hand through the warp gate, aiming for Midoriya, a bullet came out of nowhere, hitting him in his arm and causing his blood to spill to the ground. Another bullet came and shot the villain's leader again.

      Megumi, Natsume, Bakugo, Kirishima and Todoroki...all of them turned towards the direction where the gunshot had come from.

      "Is that Snipe?" Megumi said out loud, sighing in relief at the appearance of the other teachers...the pro heroes, that is. It was good. They were safe now

      Everything passed in a blur after that.

      But, in a way, Megumi was glad. She didn't really want to remember how she almost cried in relief as she hugged Uraraka tightly or how she accidentally stumbled into Natsume as they went over to Sero and Sato as they helped Eraserhead into a stretcher to be carried away by the medical staff.

      Police and the medical staff were gathered right outside. And the medical staff were checking over every student, making sure they were doing okay.

      Natsume was looking around, in the crowds of officers, as though searching for someone. "Where's...she should be here..."

      "Are you looking for your mom?" Megumi questioned. At Natsume's nod, she added. "She must be somewhere around here. Why don't you ask one of the police officers?"

      Natsume's mom, her aunt, Nao Tachibana was a detective in the police. She was pretty well-known in her own way and would be here in all probability. They just had to look for her. The students were gathered in a crowd, talking amongst themselves.

      Behind Megumi, Hagakure was talking to Ojiro.

      "Where were you, Hagakure-san?" Ojiro asked.

     "The landslide zone," Hagakure said, and Megumi almost slipped on her own feet. "Both Todoroki-kun and Megumi-chan were both super strong. I was surprised!"

      'Shit, what if I had accidentally hit her?' Megumi thought. 'And I didn't even realise she was there. She must have been hiding behind the trees or something.

      "I don't think Mom's here," Natsume said as he looked at her. "I think she's probably back at the station, working on another case probably."

      "But she would have come running," Megumi pointed out. Her aunt was just as protective as her dad; there was no way in hell she wouldn't be here.

      "I bet ya, she's already started preparing for the interrogation of all these villains," Natsume pointed towards the groups of villains that were being led to the prison buses by the police officers. "That's why she's not here. And I also bet that she's probably spammed my phone with a thousand texts and so has your dad with you."

      "Oh, you think Red Flame picks up his phone when he is on patrol. Nope. He doesn't. Not at all."

      "How much do you want to bet that he is waiting for you to come home?"

      "I'm not betting anything with you." She pushed her cousin towards the detective Tsuyu and the others were talking to. "Now, go ask that detective about your mom."

      Natsume grabbed onto her arm and started dragging her along. Kirishima met them midway, asking why they weren't walking back to the bus, but the sibling-duo said they had to ask the police something. They stopped in front of the detective, letting out a coughing sound to grab his attention.

      "Umm, Detective, can I ask you something?" Natsume asked, suddenly sounding a little too shy.

      "What's wrong?" The detective's voice was kind. "Why haven't you two gone with your class?"

      "My mom, um," Natsume said. "Nao Tachibana. She's a detective too. Is she at the station? Is she okay?"

      "You are Tachibana-san's son?" The detective said in surprise. A flash of recognition passed his face. "Ahh, you must be Natsume. I'm Tsukauchi, your mother's colleague. She mentioned you were going to U.A. I should have checked with you beforehand; apologies about that. Your mother was worried about you but she was preparing the paperwork for all the interrogations we have to start. She said she wanted to come, but couldn't. So, she's waiting for a call from you."

      "Thank you so much, Tsukauchi-san," Natsume bowed a little. Megumi tugged on his hand, offering him a knowing smile.

      "See, Aunt Nao is at the station," She said as she tugged him along towards the bus where the last of their classmates had already boarded. "We'll call her at school. Now, let's get to the bus before our class representative yells at us for being late."

      The day was already over and Megumi and the other students of 1-A had already faced the strongest and most difficult challenge of their lives. Things were going to be different after today; after all, never had a first year hero class of U.A. had experienced a fight against actual villains within a few days of their starting the hero course.

      Her sixth sense was buzzing. And she knew, she just knew at the bottom of her heart that everything was about to change drastically, to an unknown extent.

      And that would begin with a certain event. 

And with that, we come to the end of part one! Part two (that will take place during season 2) will start by the next week; I want to get some prewriting done for that because a part of Megumi's development will happen during the Sports Festival and I want to get a head start on that. But anyways, this chapter was pretty fun to write and I feel like my skills in writing action have slowly improved and hopefully, the fight scenes in the sports festival will be written better. I hope you all enjoyed reading this chapter. Let me know your thoughts in the comments!

ON A MORE IMPORTANT NOTE

Yesterday, a devastating explosion took place in the ports of Beirut which is Lebanon's capital. My heart goes out to all those affected by this tragedy. I will be linking two carrds below which contain important information regarding how you can help, plus they also have information regarding the ongoing economic and political crisis in Lebanon. Through twitter, I've learnt that petitions won't do anything good, so if you can, please donate to credible organisations that directly help out the people affected.

https://lebanoncrisis.carrd.co/

https://helplebanon.carrd.co/

Also, if you can, please download the Lebanese Red Cross app from the app store and donate money. Even the smallest amount will help