The next attack occurs on the stairs leading to the second floor, with a single mage cat shooting down at them. Without a change in expression, Todoroki shoots more spikes along the wall leading to it, but it dodges behind the wall to avoid them. Clicking his tongue in irritation, he picks up his steps, hoping to reach the top of the stairs before it can get too far away. But before he can something pink charges down the stairs at him.
Nearly taking a step back in surprise, Todoroki's mind immediately assumes the shape coming at him is Mina. So instead of spikes, he freezes them. But locked in the ice in front of him is instead a brawler cat with splotches of pink in its body.
"That's odd. All of her other cats are completely blue." Peering closely at it, Shoji watches as the pink swirls around inside the cat's body. He looks at his partner. "Should we destroy it?"
Todoroki shrugs. "It's trapped in the ice, so there shouldn't be any harm in leaving it here. Besides, I'd either have to melt the ice to get to it, or focus on making an ice spike sharp enough to pierce it. Both of which would take too long."
It makes sense so Shoji doesn't argue, but as they walk away he can't help looking back as an ominous feeling builds in his chest.
Deciding that some information is better than none, he morphs his dupliarms into enough ears to hear what's happening on this floor. Unfortunately the cold is making the transformations a bit harder than usual.
Listening closely, he tries to detect if any more of Catia's cats are on the floor. But other than his and Todoroki's footsteps, there's only a strange sizzling coming from behind them. A look back just shows him the ice block with a brawler cat trapped inside. Though... his eyes narrow. Was that the position it was in before?
But before he can bring it up with Todoroki, a pink paw with extended claws lunges towards his face. Jumping back in surprise, he just barely manages to dodge the surprise attack but a pink energy ball strikes his chest instead. Ahead of them, a mage cat with the same unusual pinkness steps into view. Though unlike the first cat, the pinkness is focused on the hands of the two cats.
While Todoroki impales the mage cat with ice spikes, Shoji swings at the brawler cat who crosses its arms in a block. It shoots back through the doorway it ambushed him from, but remains relatively unharmed. That's when he starts to feel the burning and he realizes what the pink in the cats are.
"The cats have acid in their bodies!" His eyes widening, he turns away from the cat in the room to look back the way they came. There he sees the cat Todoroki entombed nearly free of the ice. But it's never a good idea to take your eyes off the enemy in front of you.
The brawler cat lunges forward, acidic claws ready to do some serious damage to him. Only for Shoji to backhand it into the frame with three arms, having grown a set of eyes to keep an eye on it while he checked behind him. The damage proves to be too much for the cat as it rapidly starts disappearing into motes of light. Before it can completely vanish though, it decides to be petty.
It moves all the acid into its left arm and uses its right claws to cut it off, a task made easier due to the fact that it's fading fast. It throws the acid filled limb at Shoji, the middle claw extended. Before it can reach him though, Todoroki finally returns and shoots out an ice wall to block it. He follows up by shooting a veritable wall of spikes at the now free brawler behind them, rendering its freedom all too brief.
Breathing heavily, Shoji glares at his 'partner'. "Why did it take you so long to get back!? We're supposed to be a team but you decided to rush off ahead on your own!"
Todoroki blinks at the anger in Shoji's voice before his expression drops a bit. "I got ambushed by four more of the cats. Two of each."
Shoji's taken aback by this, and he takes a closer look at him. There are some pieces torn out of the ice part of his costume, and parts of the right side are missing. Looking towards the stairs leading to the next floor, he sees broken chunks of ice as well as spikes embedded into the walls, floor, and even the ceiling.
Sighing, he apologizes. "Sorry, I just didn't expect to get hurt so much." He stops as he makes a realization. "Wait, you got attacked by four?"
He nods. "Yeah, it seems like they're working in teams of two."
"But I got attacked by a brawler and a mage, plus the one back at the stairwell that we took care of." Another nod. "So... what happened to the extra mage?"
He gets his answer when a pink energy ball bigger than the ones before strikes the film between his arms.Unlike the others though, this one doesn't dissipate after it hits him. Instead it explodes into a little explosion of light, taking the chunk of his body with it as he screams.
Todoroki responds as soon as he sees the light hit him and fills the room next to them with ice, eliminating the mage cat without a shadow of a doubt. Turning back to his partner, his eyes widen seeing the hole between his arms.
Immediately he uses his ice to seal the wound, preventing any more blood loss. He lets out a shaky breath as the ice scattered on his right side crackles at the motion, causing him to frown. I've used way more ice than I expected. The drawbacks are starting to affect me. We're going to need to end this quickly.
"Are you ok to continue, or should we get the medical bots to take you to Recovery Girl?"
Shoji shakes his head, his teeth chattering as he replies. "I-I can c-continue. It w-w-will regenerate on its o-o-own in a b-b-bit." Todoroki nods his head.
"We'll need to be more cautious. I think that there's six cats left, given we've dealt with eleven so far."
Another nod is the signal for them to start moving again. Now prepared, Todoroki is ready for the next ambush. Except that it doesn't come. Instead they reach the third floor and see a mage cat and a brawler cat facing them, but they don't move away from the door they're standing in front of.
Putting up a wall, the two share a look before shrugging. Deciding to show Todoroki his strength, Shoji motions for him to let him handle them. Though doubtful given the condition he's in, Todoroki nods. Reeling back his left arms, Shoji punches forward as hard as he can, breaking and launching the ice forward, much to Todoroki's surprise.
Exchanging glances, the cats seem to let out sighs before letting themselves get hit by the ice, the mage dissipating instantly while the brawler follows shortly after.
The two heroes limp to the door and cautiously take a peek inside. There they see only the bomb, covered in a thin sheet of ice. Todoroki tries to go in and end the match, only to be held back by Shoji.
"Careful. We still haven't seen Catia or Mina around. Not to mention that there should be three more cats as well."
Though he agrees, Todoroki can't help but point out that it doesn't matter. "Even if that's the case, the bomb is right in front of us. As long as we can touch it, it doesn't matter where they're at. We win."
Looking through the doorway once again, Shoji sends in one of his arms with an eye on it to take a look around. Not seeing anything, he sighs. "Ok, but we still need to be careful.We have no idea what kind of tricks they might have come up with."
Nodding, Todoroki and Shoji step into the room. Looking around and not seeing anything, they take slow, measured steps towards their objective. Todoroki pauses in front of it before taking one last look around. Not seeing anything, he raises his hand to reach out to the bomb.
Only to jump back as two bright pink balls of light slam into the bomb in front of them, much to their confusion. But when part of the bomb vanishes, they don't see the paper mache' insides like they expected. Instead a flood of quasi-clear liquid flows out, hitting Todoroki in the chest and Shoji in the legs.
They stumble backwards from the force, then the itching starts. They scratch, but it quickly develops into burning, and they panic. Todoroki freezes them, hoping that will get rid of the problem, and luckily for them it does.
That's when they feel something wrap around their chests. Looking down, they see that they've been caught in the match's capture tape.
All Might's voice echoes through the speakers as Catia smirks at them. "THE VILLAINS WIN!"
AN: patreon.com/Nartleb2Yo! USJ poll is ending next week over on my patreon, so join if you want to influence the story!