WARNING
THIS CHAPTER INCLUDES VIOLENCE AND DEATH
After being stabbed so many times over the years, Mariko honestly should not have been surprised at the amount of pain that was flooding her body. Mineko was lying dead on top of her, but she had managed to stab the knife right between her ribs, no doubt cutting into her liver. She didn't have time to dwell on the burning sensation she was feeling as she shoved the dead woman off of her, however, they needed to turn her to ash and they only had a few minutes to do it.
She glared at Dabi. "You ignored my orders," she growled.
"I would've killed you if I did that."
"The mission is our priority Dabi. You should've known that. Now we've got four minutes to turn her to ash. She won't be moving any time soon and you can come within four feet of her without dying so turn her to dust so we can get out of here." Mariko winced in pain as she propped herself up against a desk. She had promised Keigo she would be fine, "He's gonna get so pissed when he sees this," she thought, staring at the knife in her chest. She had been stabbed in the liver, an extremely dangerous place to get stabbed. She knew she needed immediate treatment and had a maximum of a half-hour before she died. She couldn't tell Dabi that right now though, he needed to focus on finishing their mission. Besides, they only had about ten minutes before Shiguraki disintegrated the building and then a stab wound would be the least of her worries. Thankfully, the knife was still in her chest, so she wouldn't have to worry about bleeding out right now. What was more concerning was the fact that both her legs were fractured, she wouldn't be able to walk like this much less run.
Mariko stared at the body of Mineko Shimizu as Dabi held his hand out to her. The woman was facing her, her blue eyes glazed over with death, and blood still poured out of the wound on the side of her head. She turned away when Dabi blasted her with fire.
In three and a half minutes, Dabi was done, and when Mariko looked back, all that was left of the corpse was a pile of ash. Mineko was gone, forever.
"It's kind of anticlimactic," Mariko commented, staring at the dust pile. It felt like something was missing.
"Dabi... what happened to the-" She was cut off by a strong force punching her hard in the back. The knife in her chest was dislodged completely and tumbled to the floor as Mariko skid across the laboratory.
Dabi's eyes widened and immediately he readied himself to fight. Already knowing his opponent was invisible, the dark-haired male employed the same strategy as his partner to sense them. He wasn't as trained as Mariko though, and his senses weren't as sharp as hers.
Feeling a gust of air blow through, Dabi set his hand on fire and ducked, throwing a hard punch into his opponent's abdomen. He blasted them with fire and watched as another piece of lab equipment was crushed under their weight. The sound of metal creaking however let him know that the damage from that hit was minimal.
He glanced at Mariko, who seemed to be unconscious and laying on the ground, a small pool of blood now spilling out of her as there was nothing to plug the knife wound she had sustained during her fight with Mineko. He had to be extra careful with his fire now he couldn't try to just burn down the whole room- Mariko would get caught up in it and even though she had expressed that she was just fine with that, Araya had already threatened him that there would be hell to pay if he hurt her.
Dabi dove to the side, just as his opponent ran at him, but an arm yanked him back, and he was thrown harshly into the wall. His head smacked against the concrete with a sickening crack, and he could feel the blood begin to wet his head. His vision swam and he had no idea where the invisible villain was. he could only hear the footsteps that were steadily and slowly getting louder.
Seeing through them, however, he noticed Mariko push herself off the wall, and with a determination, he'd never seen before, charged at the villain. It was reckless, and he sensed her immediately, but that was the point. As soon as the villain grabbed her she activated her quirk and used it to cause all of their cells to die simultaneously. She was dropped immediately, and the villain fell next to her with a loud thud.
Having no doubt that he was dead, Mariko fell to her knees. It had taken every bit of her strength to pull that off, as well as the last of her quirk.
"Dabi, you need to leave," she told him.
"You're out of your fucking mind," he groaned, his head throbbing.
"I can't walk. You can't carry me. The knife is out and I've got a max of 15 minutes assuming I am perfectly still. You've got a bad concussion and a skull fracture. I can't use my quirk anymore, I'm maxed out completely. You've got six minutes to figure a way out of here. Now go." She ordered.
Dabi grunted and pushed himself off the wall. Instead of listening to her words, however, he began dragging her towards the door.
"You stubborn bastard. LISTEN TO ME!" she shouted.
He winced, the loudness making his headache that much worse.
"There's no point in both of us dying, now go."
"Fuck you."
"Someone needs to report my death Dabi," she said quietly this time.
"I can't be MIA. My family can't spend the rest of their lives waiting for someone who's not gonna come back."
He stared at the ground for a second and cursed loudly. There was no way in hell he was going to let her die, but he didn't have the ability to save her either. "I'll be back in 2 minutes. I will turn your ass to ash if you're dead when I come back," he threatened.
Mariko sighed in exasperation but winced as the movement sent a sharp pain through all of her body. "It's useless!" she exclaimed. But he had already ignored her and was stumbling up the stairs.
She bit her lip as she was left deserted. She couldn't use her quirk to determine how her body was doing, but if the pain was any indication, she wasn't doing great. She glanced at her watch- 4 minutes. Dabi wasn't going to make it in time. "Kei," she suddenly realized. If she didn't make it, she would break her promise to Keigo, and that was something she absolutely could not do.
She had absolutely no strength, and her body shook with exertion just trying to push herself onto her knees, but she had to move. She couldn't just wait for Dabi, nor could she wait for him to go get help. They wouldn't send it anyways- it wasn't part of the plan. She had to get to the portal on her own.
"Dabi," she said into her coms unit. She didn't know if his earpiece was damaged or if it could reach so far when they were underground, but they had to try. "Dabi don't come back here. I'm gonna make it out on my own but there's no time. If you can get out yourself. Do it. Going for help was useless they said it from the beginning. Let me know if there's still someone else left but don't come back here." She said. She repeated her orders over and over again until she got a response.
"You're a stubborn ass bitch. I heard ya." Dabi's voice came out. "You better come out though."
Mariko grunted in response and began crawling up the stairs.
It felt like an eternity, and she didn't know if they had already begun the process of destroying the place. She couldn't stop to check her watch but she had to keep going. She had to keep going until she couldn't anymore.