~~~~~ Katsuki's POV ~~~~~
I woke up in some dusty old cave that was almost pitch black. I could just barely make out the outline of myself. I was in different clothing again, worse this time. I was garbed in a bunch of gauzes and had some brown, dirty cloths that were stitched together. They felt more like a cape than clothing.
I looked around but there wasn't much to see. Just flat, stone walls and pipes everywhere. For lighting, there was a single, dull bulb shining a blue light.
I stood up and walked out. From what I could see, I was the only one sleeping there.
I walked down a tunnel until I found some light coming from somewhere.
'Wherever this place is, they sure dig a lot of tunnels,' I thought, 'Why?'
I found what I thought was the main part of whatever I was inside. The ceiling went up for miles and there were tunnels going outwards all over the walls. It seemed like they had a floor-based system with connectors all across the middle.
There were people walking all around, most carrying backpacks or equipment.
I felt a tug on the back of my cape thingy.
I turned around but didn't see anyone.
"Hello?" I asked, looking around.
Some guy with pointy red glasses that looked like he glued them on came running over.
"MEISA!!! Come back!!" the man yelled, looking around frantically.
"Hey!" yelled back some fat old man who was marching over to him. "Where do you think you're goin'?"
The glued-on-glasses guy looked scanned the area and found something on the ground, next to me.
"Meisa! What were you doing?" He scooped her up and looked around to find an escape. "We need to get outta here, Mei."
Meisa was an odd looking baby. Her hair had six different tufts of hair, each in a row, separate from the other, and a different color of the rainbow. She looked angry, too.
"Baaaaa," she whined, pointing to me. "Woooo waaa!!"
"You like this kid?" he turned to me. "Well then, come with me!"
He grabbed onto my arm and ran away, easily outrunning that old guy. It was hard to see, but I thought I saw that baby pointing in what direction we ran.
"HEY!! WHERE DO YOU THINK YOU'RE TAKING ME!?"
"Don't worry, kid," he said, winking down at me, "You're safe with us."
"STOP, DAMMIT!!" I struggled, "LET ME GO!!"
"If Mystical Meisa says you're coming with us, you're coming with us," he said, trying to smile back at me.
"Why are there so many dumbasses in these worlds?!?" I yelled. The baby stuck its tongue out at me and pouted.
'WAIT IS THAT BABY REALLY NAKADA??' I realized, 'NO FUCKING WAY!!'
"Nakada?!" I said, wide-eyed. She smirked. It was the most creepy thing I'd ever seen.
"What's your name, kid," the man asked me. "Mine is Kamina, but call me bro."
"WHY-"
"Hey, I know you've only known me for a minute, but do you think you could do me a favor?" He stopped when we were out of sight in a tunnel somewhere. "We're breakin' out of this joint and headin' to the surface!"
He looked at me like I was supposed to react in some way.
"Are we in some underground base or something?" I asked.
He hit the back of my neck. "HEY?! WHATCHA DO THAT FOR?!"
"A kid your age should know basic things about where we are." He looked around. "This is the Jeeha Village. No one here has been to the surface but me. Everyone says it doesn't exist, but my dad took me there when I was a kid."
I sighed. 'I really don't care about whatever these meatheads have to say, but I think I have to play along.'
"Why are you still down here, then?" I asked. He froze.
"Well, uh, I-"
"Nevermind. So what do you want me for anyway?"
His smile returned and his eyes lit up. He pumped a fist. "We're shutting off the electricity and using these flashlights to climb up the wall!!" he yelled, taking out seven small flashlights from his pocket. They were the kind you strap to your head.
"Hey, bro!" three guys yelled as they ran over.
"Good, we're all here. I timed the lights to go off in minutes so let's get ready!" he said, passing out flashlights. He even handed one to Nakada. "We'll be using these pickaxes to climb up the wall." He walked over to a pile of pickaxes and started to hand them out as well. Two per person.
"Is it safe to take a baby on something like this?" I asked.
Kamina looked at me like I was crazy. "Mystical Meisa is the best of us. She can tell where to go, when danger is coming, and how to pull off insane stunts! She can do just about everything we can do, if not better!"
'These guys are really crazy, huh?! It's a baby! It can't even run yet!!' I thought, reluctantly taking my flashlight. 'Well, I mean it is Nakada... so he could be telling the truth...'
The lights went out all around us. 'These tiny flashlights are supposed to be enough?!' I thought, using my hands to keep steady. I put my flashlight on and looked around.
There was yelling and screaming all around us.
"This is our chance, boys!" He grabbed onto all of us. "Let's go!!" He threw us out of our hiding spot and leaped out with us.
"WHAT THE FUCK THIS ISN'T WHAT YOU'RE SUPPOSED TO DO, FUCKTARD!!!"
I dug my pickaxes into the wall, the axes taking a few seconds to hook onto the rock. They made deep streaks in the wall, horrible scratching noises coming from both.
Once I slowed to a stop, I looked around to see where the others were. I heard people noticing us, but I didn't bother to warn Kamina.
Climbing with pickaxes was much more work than it looks. By the time I was back where we were pushed from, my upper body was screaming at me.
It took only five or six minutes for all the lights to come back on. Quickly after that, people began to throw things at us as we climbed.
We had made decent progress, but the plan sucked to begin with so I wasn't really expecting all that much.
The man from before feverishly ran up to meet us at the next platform.
I wasn't paying him all that much attention, but Kamina was spouting some idiotic things about how he would "prove them wrong" and that "the surface does exist".
The man chasing us easily stopped us and had some people take away our flashlights and pickaxes.
Before I zoned out, I remember hearing the man tell Kamina that this was his "last strike" and that he wouldn't tolerate any more of his "shenanigans".
After Kamina left with Nakada, the man looked down at me. I didn't see the three guys from before either, so I guessed they either got chewed out at some point or escaped before getting seen.
The man looked me over and said, "You don't look like anybody I know, but you have the outfit of a digger so I'll guess that's where you ought to be, kid."
'Digger? Do people dig even further down here?'
The man pointed down and to his right, frowning. "Now run along and dig, scum."
"Dig?! Hell no!" I yelled at him. "Where the fuck am I even digging to?! With what?!"
"Who do you think you are, talking back to me!!" he shouted back, punching his open palm. "If you're not gonna make yourself useful, what the hell are ya doin' here?!?"
He grabbed onto the collar of my cape thing and threw me onto the platform below. "Go on, now!! Don't make me monitor you!!"
I scoffed and looked around.
'How do I even get there?' I thought. Where the old fart pointed was a large opening a few levels above the bottom. If I tried, I could see some people chipping off little pieces of the cave walls.
A small crowd of people surrounded me for a moment, all of them mumbling something like "excuse me" or "sorry". I was about to yell more when I recognized their outfits. 'Didn't that old guy say something about how I have a "digger's outfit on"? If they have the same clothing as me, does that make them diggers?'
It was the only lead I had, so I followed them.
I arrived at the digging site fairly quickly, but annoyingly, all those diggers already had drills had pickaxes with them, so I had no idea where to get mine. Eventually, I got irritated with looking and waited until someone put their's down to go somewhere, so I stole it.
Once I had a pickaxe, though, I wasn't sure what to do with it. I found an open spot on the wall and tried to imitate what everyone else was doing, but some annoying fat guy kept yelling at me to do it better.
Not too soon after, some blue haired kid with goggles on came and asked me if it was my first time digging. He caught me a little off guard, so I tried to run away, but that fat dude dragged me back.
He said that if I just want him to leave me alone, he would, but if I wanted, he would help me out. I told him I didn't need help from some snot-nosed kid and went back to work, but soon the fat guy told me to get some tips from that kid or get out.
I spent all day trying to learn some useless skill I'd never use again in my life. Spectacular.
Once the day was over, that kid was somehow able to detect that we had around ten minutes to get out and get to bed because the lights were going to shut off. He made good time getting us out of there but just left after that. I wasn't even sure where to put my pickaxe, nevermind a non-occupied place to sleep.
I threw my pickaxe somewhere as I was walking around on the bottom, hoping to recognize the cave I woke up in. I didn't.
Soon after, the prick from before who was crazy about the "surface" (I forgot his name) found me and dragged me to his place.
It looked almost identical to the one I woke up in, except there were a lot more strangers just hanging around. And Nakada.
At this point, I was so exhausted, I didn't care whether I was sleeping near her or not, so I just found a private corner and slept. That surface guy kept trying to bother me, but I just flipped him off or ignored him.
~~~~~~~~
I wasn't sure how many hours I'd gotten when someone was shaking me awake. At first, I thought it was an earthquake or something, so I hopped up and looked to get in a less cave-in-able area. But a very strong baby hand came stopping me from running away.
Before I could react, my eyes were closed again.
'Did she bring me back?' I thought.
I opened them as soon as I could, but I was still in some old, musty, cave.
"What did you do?" I asked, looking at her small body. It felt so unnatural to see her so small.
"I changed your appearance," she said. Her voice was low and smooth, the type you'd expect coming from a middle-aged man. I cringed at hearing it for the first time. "You can't be going back looking like you dug for twelve hours."
"I DID!! And why are you so damn creepy in this place??! It's fucking weird!!" I yelled. She jumped like Mario up to my head and clung to my neck, putting her chubby hands on my mouth to quiet me.
"DON'T DO THAT-"
"Don't wake up all the others, dumbo!!" she whisper-shouted.
"Hey-" I began as she crawled up my face until she could sit on my head. "Get down, you freak-!"
I felt my eyes close again as she began to whisper something to herself softly.
"Are you taking me back?!" I asked her, trying to pry her off my head.
I opened my eyes as a tremendous weight crushed me.
"I'M HOME!!!" I yelled, lying on the ground with an old lady on me.
"NAKADA, DON'T YOU DARE LEAVE!! IMMA BURN A HOLE THROUGH-"
"KATSUKI!!" a voice screamed from my side. I heard a 'bang' from that direction and tried to turn to see, but a gust of wind blew past me.
"(Y/N)!!!" I yelled, watching her scratched and bruised body fly in the other direction, crash through the glass of a building across the street. "(Y/N)!!!"
I stumbled around for a few seconds before I could get up, but by that time there were people gathered all around her.
As soon as I was able to run toward her, I felt someone pin me down on the ground.
"WHAT THE FUCK ARE YOU DOING?!" I shouted, struggling to rip through his grip.
'Wait, I have my quirk back!!' I thought, 'I can take this sucker no problem now!!'
I made a big explosion, making whoever was pinning me down fly away.
I didn't care who was trying to apprehend me or why or where Nakada went, I just ran.
I pushed through a crowd of people, trying to get to (Y/n). She was trying to get up as some people with first aid kits were treating her wounds. She had glass stuck in her skin all over, blood spilling out onto the ground below her.
She had one lodged in the skin right under her right eye, so she could only see with her left. She was looking around frantically, though, and trying to tell everyone something.
That icy-hot punk was numbing her skin with his ice and removing the glass shards while other people just seemed to be patching up the cuts and holding her down.
I only noticed I had slowed to a stop when someone grabbed my shoulder from behind, turning me around.
"What happened?! Why did (Y/n) get flung over there?!" Deku demanded. Tears marks stained his cheeks, more tears welling up in the corners of his eyes. "Who was that lady? Where did you go? Where did she-"
"SHUT UP!!" I tore his hand from my shoulder and began to march away. "I don't need this!!"
He ran in front of me and spread out his arms to his sides. "No; don't go!" He had to yell just to be heard over the commotion around (Y/n). "I'm sorry!"
"Like I care, nerd!!" I snapped, trying to push him to the side. He didn't budge. "What - the - hell!"
"Please! If you leave now, it'll look like you shot her back like that! That's why the detective tried to stop you, he thought you did that!"
"I'm sick of this shit!!" I held up my hand and began to make threatening explosions in it. "Get outta my way, Deku, or I'll fry you to a crisp!!" He frowned and stood his ground.
"I'm not letting you leave, Kacchan!"
I felt my blood boil as my explosions get bigger. "You think you're hot stuff, Deku, don't you?!" I felt my nails dig deeper into my palm. "DON'T TEST ME, LOSER!! YOU DON'T EV-"
"KATSUKI!!" (Y/n) cried. I jerked my head to the side and saw her, bandaged all over, running toward me. "Katsuki, are you okay?! I saw some lady get ready to hit you, but then she saw me and ran away! With that much wind coming from her running away, I can't imagine what she punches could be like!!"
I ran over to meet her partway. "What are you doing - you're minced all over, why are you moving at all?! Do you want to die?!?!" She cracked a smile and got out her phone.
She held up her text messages with her grandmother and said, "No worries, help's coming. I'll be good as new soon enough!"
Icy-hot came running over and grabbed her arm. "You have to rest, your body's gone through a lot of trauma!" He pulled her down to the ground and she apologized to him.
"Hey, who do you think you are, fucktard?!" I rejoined, pulling (Y/n) by her hand back to her feet, "She ran all the way here, she can handle herself."
He stood up and scowled at me. "What's your problem? I was just trying to help her."
She smiled nervously and put her hands up in a calming motion. "Hey, we should probably try to explain everything to the detective. He might get the wrong idea..."
We didn't break eye-contact.
"(Y/n), are you okay?" Deku asked, rushing over to (Y/n). He took her hand and began to lead her away. "Come on, you need to lay down somewhere-"
I grabbed her free hand and tugged her back. "She's fine!! She doesn't need your help!!"
She choked out a laugh and looked at icy-hot. Deku was still holding onto her hand but wasn't trying to pull her away.
"Kacchan, she needs to rest. Let her go," Deku said, looking at me with resolve.
"What makes you think you know what she needs?! You don't know anything about her, Deku!"
"Hey, guys, it's probably not a good idea to fight like this," she said, still nervously smiling and laughing. "You know, right now would be a good time for all of us to chill out for a minute."
"Let her go," Deku said, ignoring her. I glared at him.
"Stop it, you two are acting like kids," icy-hot said as he attended to one her wounds. "If you want to do what's best for her, let her decide for herself-"
"SHUT UP, asshole!!" I yelled. She crinkled her nose at the noise. I pulled her away and stood in between her and them. "You don't know anything!!"
"Bakugo, this is getting out of hand-"
"Shut up!! What do you know?!?"
"Katsuki," (Y/n) said, standing in front of me, "Stop! It's alright, you don't need to worry!" I could see her eyes getting misty, but she was smiling. "Just worry about yourself, you're really stressed." I could feel my heart begin to slow down. "What happened to you? Did someone attack you?" I could see my own vision begin to blur from water.
I saw Deku and that icy-hot guy - that was now a male nurse apparently - talking quietly to each other, watching (Y/n).
"Where did you go? Izuku said he saw you just vanish into thin air, but you were only gone for a minute. And then there's that lady who might have been trying to kidnap you or hurt you or maybe she had a personal vendetta against you and was in-"
"Bye!" I yelled. She was so wrapped up in wondering what happened she didn't notice when I began to walk away.
"Wait! We need to talk to the detective!" she yelled from behind me.
"They'll have plenty of eye-witness accounts, they don't need mine!" I yelled back. I just wanted to get out of there, though. I was already exhausted mentally and physically, now I was exhausted emotionally, too.
She didn't run after me like she usually did. She just sat down somewhere and bid her time until her grandmother arrived. I didn't mine though. I guessed she was exhausted too.