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Shimura Nana was having A Day.
First, she’d woken up with her bones aching, a side effect of all the microfractures she’d given herself while getting used to One for All. Second, she’d discovered she was out of painkillers. Third, the convenience store she usually frequented for such matters had been collateral in a villain fight earlier that week, so she’d had to jog to the nearest grocery store (her license level didn’t cover quirk use for personal matters). Fourth, the grocery store didn’t sell her usual brand, so now she was stuck deciding between the grocery store’s generics, of unknown quality, and a slightly more expensive brand she knew would mostly work but tended to make her drowsy. The more expensive and effective brands were a little out of the price range of a person like her.
A person like her being a recently licensed aboveground sidekick who was trying to stay out of the direct spotlight due to the century-plus-year-old supervillain who was currently stalking her due to the origin of one of her two powers.
Yeah, okay. So, there weren’t any other people like her. It was a figure of speech. Who could blame her?
The universe, apparently.
One wall of the grocery store caved in, the force of the blast whipping the scarf off from around Nana’s neck and all thoughts of painkillers from Nana’s mind. One for All pulsed in her fists as she turned to face the threat.
(As always, she wondered, was this it? Had he found her? Was she about to die like Six?)
The threat was underwhelming. The villain standing in the hole was skinny, stressed, and clearly new at the ‘escape’ part of the gig, despite the bulging bag of cash under his left arm. Where had he come from, anyway? The nearest bank was... Ugh. Nana couldn’t be bothered to remember the exact distance. It didn’t matter, anyway.
What mattered was taking the guy down before he got the bright idea to start doing whatever he did to the wall to people. For example, the shoppers who were still standing right next to him.
Was the demolished wall not enough of a hint for these people?
Whatever, they were civilians. Even heroes and policemen froze sometimes.
It would be best to avoid a flashy (and damaging) fight in this scenario, especially given that Nana wasn’t wearing her costume, but a random sweater and some old jeans. She began to maneuver around to the villain’s flank, positioning herself in such a way that there were no civilians behind her. She prepared to strike.
And then, because the universe really had it out for her today, a second villain walked through the hole, this one carrying a crying girl in an elementary school uniform. He also was wearing a truly atrocious pair of shorts. They were some unholy combination between Hawaiian print, stripes, and polka-dots. And the were short. And tight.
The kidnapping only barely beat out those shorts as the worst crime the man was currently committing.
“No one get any ideas, or I’ll kill this brat!” yelled the villain. Their quirk looked like it turned their hands into spikes. Simple, not terribly threatening, but more than enough to kill the kid.
Oh, and now there was another kid, a blonde, peeking around the edge of the hole, glaring at the spike villain.
Okay, from now on, Nana was going to assume that no one had any self preservation, ever.
“I don’t know about this, bro,” said the other villain, shaking.
“Shut up! Hey, you!” he shouted at a cashier. “Where’s Kimiko?”
“She, uh, break room,” said the shaking teen.
The villain snorted. “Come on, she’s got that teleport quirk.” He kicked the back of the other villain’s leg. He stumbled forward.
A number of things happened in quick succession.
First, the blonde kid ran at the spike villain, hitting the backs of his legs.
Second, Nana darted forward, intent on taking out the villains before they could kill the suicidal blonde.
Third, there was a lot of blood.
When Nana said a lot, she meant a lot. As in, a worryingly large amount. As in, anyone who lost that much blood needed a trip to the hospital pronto, and that was if they were an adult.
The wall-blasting villain had evidently realized this, was screaming, and, thankfully, not paying enough attention to anything else to notice Nana coming up alongside him and knocking him across the jaw.
She didn’t have her capture gear with her. She’d have to hope he’d stay out.
Then the spike villain just. Collapsed.
Which is when she realized he was the one bleeding, rather than either of the kids. In fact, the blonde kid, who was utterly covered in blood, was helping to extract the girl from the villain’s rapidly weakening grasp. Which meant that Nana should probably do something.
Yeah, something.
First, make sure the villain wasn’t going to get back up and attack everyone. Oh, jeez. That was a giant chunk out of the guy’s leg, right underneath those awful, awful shorts.
Yeah, he wasn’t going to be moving for a good second. She turned to the kids.
“Are either of you two hurt?” she asked.
“No, ma’am!” said the boy, beaming. Underneath the blood, his teeth gleamed whiter than a toothpaste spokesman’s. The girl shook her head.
“Cool, cool,” said Nana, giving them a grin. “Did you bite him?” she pointed at the villain, winced, and started to take off her sweater. The guy needed a tourniquet.
“Yes!” said the boy. “He’s-- Is he okay?” The smile dropped a little, and he started wringing his hands.
Oh, gosh, he was precious.
“Yeah,” said Nana, brightly, trying to staunch the flow of blood. She could hear sirens in the distance. “He’s fine! People just get a bit dizzy when they, uh, lose this much blood. Why don’t you two go over there, and make sure the police have been called? And an ambulance?”
“Yes, Ms. Hero!” said the boy, saluting again. He practically dragged the girl off, over to the cash registers.
Cute.
The villain did make it into the ambulance. So. Anyway. Time to make sure the trauma wasn’t catching up to the sunshine boy. How old was he, anyway? Five? Ten? Had to be younger than eleven with that uniform, right?
(Simply speaking, Nana was not good at estimating ages.)
She slunk over to listen as the police officer questioned him.
“I just want to make sure you know, Yagi-kun,” said the police officer, who was gently dabbing the child’s blood-covered face with a cloth, “you aren’t in trouble, but we need to know if you used your quirk on that man?”
That was something Nana was curious about, too. After all, the kid had just about bit through the guy’s femoral artery. That took talent. Or a really weird brand of luck.
“Oh, no, sir! I don’t have a quirk!”
The officer stared. “You ran at a villain holding a hostage without a quirk?”
“Emi was crying! I had to help!”
Okay. Nana liked this tiny feral child.
The officer sighed. “Can you tell me your parents’ names? And phone numbers?”
“I don’t have parents, sir! I can give you the number of my foster home, though.” The last sentence was said with significantly less energy than all the ones before, and the boy looked down at the ground, kicking at it lightly.
Heck. If Nana didn’t have All for One after her, she’d adopt right then and there.
But she did.
And her bones still hurt.
Also, she was covered in blood.
Well, quirkless or not, she had no doubt that kid would go far. Maybe she’d see him again, someday.