Beautiful Disasters- Hawks x OC

Chapter 119

       "A cigarette," Hayato repeated.

        She nodded, "A cigarette and out of the death penalty."

        The blonde cringed slightly at her request. Getting a Tartarus prisoner out of a death penalty? That had never been done before, those were the kinds of people who deserved to be executed. He didn't have much of a choice though. "Understood. Anything else?" he asked.

         "A burger and fries."

         Hayato clenched his jaw, and his eyes hardened at her ridiculous requests. Was she trying to mock him? "Is this a joke to you?" he growled.

         Taniko rolled her eyes. "Calm your tits blondie. I need the calories if I'm gonna resurrect someone, and prison food doesn't cut it."

         Hearing that she had agreed to bring Mariko back, the male relaxed a bit and nodded. "I'll have someone bring something up," he told her.

        She waved him off dismissively. "By the way, you guys didn't burn her right? I can bring back someone who's been turned to a pile of ashes. That's too dead, even for me."

       "She was buried," he told her.

        "Good, nice to know you aren't completely useless. By the way do we have to travel to get to her? You should bring someone along if you have to dig up the body. I'm a scientist, I ain't no ditch digger."

        The blonde rolled his eyes. "You don't need to concern yourself with that."

        She stared at him analytically, wondering why he was making such a displeased expression. This whole thing had seemed strange to her from the start. Whenever she had been interrogated in the past, there were always at least two agents present with her. Why was there only one this time? Then there was the lack of details and short responses, and he was awfully compliant with her. He wanted to get on her good side, but why would he need to do that? The answer she came up with was that he needed her to do this voluntarily, he couldn't force her because this wasn't an official government request. This was illegal. "And if it's illegal, that means he robbed the grave," she thought amusedly. "You know it's a crime to rob a grave," she commented.

         Hayato glared at her, "I don't need you telling me what's considered a crime."

        Taniko giggled, "You're so entertaining, we're gonna have fun today."

        Moments later, another agent knocked on the interrogation room's metal door. Hayato walked over and opened it just enough to grab a brown paper bag of greasy fast food before closing it once more. He set it down in front of her and sat back down.

       "Eat fast, this gets done today."

        "Whatever, s'long as you come through with your end of your deal, or else I can't guarantee this little project of yours stays a secret."

         "You have ten minutes."

          Hayato watched the redheaded woman as she scarfed down her burger and fries, cringing as she moaned uncomfortably loud as she bit into them. After today he was finding it hard to believe that the unrefined woman in front of him was supposed to be a brilliant and evil scientist. "At best she's obnoxious. How did Mineko even deal with her?" he wondered.

        When Taniko finished eating, Hayato escorted her through the facilities winding hallways until they were in a room she was very familiar with- a morgue.

        "Oooh, lunch and dead people? Do you like me that much?" she asked teasingly.

         Hayato said nothing as he gestured to the coffin on the examination table. It had been a pain to bring the entire coffin to the morgue and keeping everyone from seeing it had been near impossible, but he hadn't had another choice. Decomposition had taken its toll on Mariko's body, and moving it independently just hadn't been possible.

        He stood a little ways away, giving Taniko space to work but was still close enough to keep an eye on her. He watched as she shuffled around the lab, grabbing a pair of gloves and surgical mask. She sprayed the inside with a can of air freshener she had found somewhere and tossed an extra mask and the can at him.

        "Trust me you'll need it. The smell's way worse when it's in a closed space," she explained.

       Hayato wordlessly followed her suggestion and put the mask over his nose and mask. It probably wasn't safe to be inhaling all of those chemicals so directly, but he knew it was better than the alternative.

      "Help me lift this thing off," she told him.

       Walking over, the pair removed the coffin lid and set it on the floor. Hayato forced himself not to look at his friend's remains as he made his way back to his corner. He had dug up enough graves and buried enough people to know what they looked like after being in the ground for so long. They basically turned into a pile of goo and that was an image of his friend that he definitely did not want. Though the perfumed mask did help a bit, he still fought the urge to gag at the smell the coffin emitted. His eyes watered slightly and he held his breath for as long as possible.

      No sooner than the coffin lid had been placed on the floor, the redhead had turned around and gone to work. Her hands glowed a vibrant ruby, bathing the room in a dim red light. She hovered her hands over the box as if she were warming them over a fire.

       The room was silent for what seemed like an eternity. Slowly, the scent of death that had permeated the room began to dissipate. Hayato noticed Taniko was looking a bit pale, but she seemed fine otherwise. She didn't stop once- it was a limitation of her quirk, if she stopped using her quirk before a person was resurrected, all of the progress she had made would be lost and she would have to start from square one. Over the years she had built up her endurance so the exhaustion didn't bother her so much. She could resurrect up to three people per day, one was easy.

        After a half-hour, Taniko removed her hands from the coffin, and the red glow that surrounded them vanished. The redhead turned to him, and removed her gloves and her mask, prompting him to do the same. "She'll be asleep for a couple of hours, and have her vitals monitored. I basically just restarted all of her bodily functions, and they might not be totally in sync just yet. I can't bring the same person back multiple times so don't come crawling back to me crying if you let her die again."

        Hayato nodded and called an agent down to escort Taniko back to Tartarus. As they lead her away once more she nodded at him. "Don't forget our little deal!" she exclaimed.

        The blonde said nothing but held her gaze for a moment longer before turning to the coffin. Hesitantly, he peered into it, and nearly cried when he saw the familiar image of his younger sister resting inside, her chest rising and falling steadily. Not quite believing it, he checked her pulse and sure enough, the steady pulse assured him that Mariko really had come back to life.