December 9th, Saturday Afternoon, 11:30 AM
The mall was so crowded. When the group stepped in the doors, they all stopped and collectively grimaced at the amount of people–well, Bakugo did more of a snarl and Kaminari wasn't grimacing for the same reason as the others, but same difference. "So, where to first?" Mina asked. She was looking very stylish in a short, black, off-the-shoulders t-shirt dress, with thick strips of dull yellow on the arms and a smaller one along the bottom of the dress. She paired it with black knee-high, high-heeled boots and a dark pink hand bag, and wore a gold necklace.
The rest of them weren't dressed that nicely. Kirishima wore a simple red short-sleeved shirt (how he wasn't frostbitten, Kaminari had no idea), jeans, and those God-forsaken crocks. Bakugo had black jeans and a black shirt with a skull on it–Kaminari wondered how many of those he even had. And Sero wore an orange sweatshirt and jeans. And Kaminari himself wore a white long-sleeved shirt that had a lightbulb and the words "watts up?" on it, with jeans and tennis shoes.
"I say we hit the food court before anything else," Sero volunteered. Mina rolled her eyes, smiling. "Of course you do." "I've got no objections," Kirishima said. "What about you, Bakugo?" "I don't fucking care." "Okay, then!" Kaminari exclaimed. "Food court it is!" He needed a bit of a distraction until he showed up to utterly wreck his day.
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Five full stomachs later, they decided on a plan. Each person would get a chance to go to two shops of their choosing and if they ended up with free time after everyone was done, they'd decide from there who got to choose. Mina went first, choosing a clothing store, then the Bath & Body Works.
Bakugo was glaring so hard at these choices, Kaminari was sure he'd make little kids cry. But, he didn't say anything. Sero was slightly grimacing, but he went along with it. And Kirishima of course was too nice to say anything about being dragged to two girly stores. Kaminari didn't really care–he was glad for the distraction. And Mina sure delivered on the distraction–she talked a mile a minute about all the clothes she tried on, so Kaminari didn't have the time to focus on his issues.
After that, Sero chose to get snacks for the dorms, goof off for when he accidentally taped stuff together (which happened pretty frequently with his homework and textbooks), and Kirishima had to drag him away from the pet store after Sero started looking at a Steatoda grossa–a false black widow. Sero's argument: "They let Koda keep a bunny in his room!" Kirishima's response: "Because that's related to his quirk–and bunnies aren't potentially dangerous to anyone!" To which, Sero pointed out that the #5 top Pro-Hero had a rabbit quirk.
After Sero got finished, it was 1:37 and Kaminari was starting to get antsy. Somehow, he managed to get the last place for choosing where he wanted to go and he somehow doubted he'd be very happy if Kaminari was a couple hours late to their meeting. He was fidgeting as Bakugo got his turn to choose the shops he wanted to go to.
"The second floor?" Kirishima asked. Kaminari immediately tuned back into the conversation. And then realized they were all walking away from him. "Hey, wait up!" He blurted out and ran to catch up. "Spacing out there, man," Sero said teasingly. Kaminari just huffed and continued walking, thinking about how he'd give them the slip on the second floor. Bathroom run? That'd be the easiest. He'd just have to think of a way to stop either Kirishima or Sero from coming with him–the only reason Aizawa Sensei had let them leave without a teacher was the promise that they'd all use the buddy system wherever they went. The perpetually-tired teacher's exact words were: "If I find out any of you went anywhere by yourselves, all of you will be cleaning the dorms for a month, is that understood?"
They all agreed immediately.
But, between pissing Aizawa Sensei off and the electric pile of shit....he'd take a pissed Eraserhead any day. So, ditching the others it would be. He'd just have to pick the opportune moment, probably when Kirishima was too focused on whatever Bakugo was doing. Sero would be the real problem here. He probably wouldn't be interested in wherever Bakugo was going and would turn and talk to Kaminari the entire time so he wouldn't get bored. How in the world would he ditch him?
Turns out, he didn't need to worry. As they passed a jewelry store to the left of them, he suddenly got a bad feeling–even worse than he'd had all day. Then, the skylight shattered as thirteen dark figures dropped in. The civilians around them screamed. Bakugo let out a scathing curse, as Kirishima, Sero, and Mina all tensed and immediately got into fighting positions. Kaminari stood there in utter shock, staring at the dramatic piece of literal shit that just dropped through the goddamn ceiling.
Dressed in a black vest, tie and dress pants, with a dark gold pinstriped button-up underneath, the most striking thing about him was the golden theater mask, the one that represented tragedy. The exaggerated features were just as terrifying as they'd always been. Kaminari wouldn't be surprised if it gave some of children below nightmares for years to come–god knows it gave him a few. Landing on the statue of All Might below him, he stood on the left shoulder and took a deep bow. "Hello, you pathetic son a'bitches!" He stated. "The League of Villains is making a fucking comeback." He stood up and through the grimacing mask, Kaminari could see a sick smirk on his face. "I know you all missed us."
That would be a hard NO, Kaminari thought, a bit dumbly as he just stood there watching. Nobody missed you guys–at all, man. You're just being a dramatic little shit. I don't even know why I'm surprised about that fact. The dramatic little shit in question brought up his gloved hands and asked, "What do you say we make this a bit more interesting?" He crooked his fingers like he was gesturing for something to come to him. Oh, shit, Kaminari thought, his heart nearly stopping as he realized what he was going to do. He took a quick step backwards, right into Sero. "What the–" he exclaimed, but Kaminari wasn't exactly paying attention to him right then.
"Current Snatch," he said, and the lights in several shops suddenly grew brighter before the lights exploded and glass rained down on the screaming people in them. Bright gold electricity flowed from the shops, right into the villain's outstretched hands. At this point, the civilians had finally realized that standing there during a villain's monologue wasn't exactly smart. They started to run away. "Don't think you're getting away from me that easily–Chaotic Thunder," he snapped his fingers with a flourish. With that, the lightning surrounding him suddenly shot out in random directions. It barely missed a few of the fleeing civilians and hit a few of the goons beneath him instead.
The men screamed and dropped, smoking. Of course, that just made the people scream louder and begin pushing others out of their way to escape. Kaminari felt a burning in his chest, one that warred with his fear and his frustration and irritation. How could you have so many conflicting emotions about one event, damn it? He was frozen–caught between all of the bubbling feelings inside him. He just wanted to scream–at him, at the people, at himself–it didn't really matter at this point who it was. He just wanted to let out these feelings somehow. His fingers were sparking.
His mouth opened, but before he could say anything he'd regret, a certain angry explosive hedgehog interrupted him. "GET LOST, ASSMUNCH!!!!" There was a breeze as four of his classmates jumped past him. Sero had–at some point–yanked off his sweatshirt and used his tape to swing him and Mina down in front of the bolting civilians. And Bakugo and Kirishima–God fucking HELP HIM WITH THESE IMPULSIVE IDIOTS–had jumped right for the now-laughing masked villain.
Whatever had been about to come out of his mouth, which would've probably outed him right then and there, changed to, "GET OUT OF THE WAY, YOU IDIOTS!!!" The villain turned, smirked, and finger-waved at him, then the random bolts of lightning stopped, only for a massive bolt to go shooting out of his finger right for Bakugo and Kirishima. Kaminari tensed, feeling his heart about to beat out of his chest. But Bakugo's reflexes were no joke–right before they were struck, he used an explosion to knock both himself and Kirishima to the left, dodging the bolt by a literal hair.
He barely had enough time to feel a jolt of relief that they were safe, before he realized that he was RIGHT FUCKING BEHIND THEM AND– "OH SHI–!" He yelled right before he got struck by a fucking lightning bolt.
Of course, he was fine. There was just about 2400 watts running through his body, but that nothing compared to the electricity he had in his body on a daily basis. Like with any other electricity, he absorbed it and it became a part of his charge. That still didn't mean he was exactly happy about getting hit–his shirt was literally ON FUCKING FIRE!!!!
He quickly threw it off–thank GOD he was wearing an undershirt–, stomped out the fire, and ran downstairs to join his classmates. Well, he would've, if there hadn't come a cry for help from one of the now-lightless shops while on his way. Against his will almost, he stopped and ran back to the store. Crunching glass beneath his feet, he called out, "Is anybody hurt?!" He could see the faces of a few shoppers, scared and frozen, but he didn't see any injuries. But he might've missed something in the darkness of the shop. Finally, someone called out, "The cashier was standing right below the light when it blew! She's not responding!"
Kaminari cursed to himself. "Okay! I'm coming through! If you can, try moving to the back of the shop! If you can't without hurting yourself, just wait and I'll come and get you!" He then carefully made his way through the shop, weaving his way through shattered glass, dropped products, and people. As he passed by a person, he stopped briefly to see if they were okay, helped them up, and motioned them to the back. He eventually got to the cash register. "She's behind there," a terrified woman said, pointing. "Okay," he said, taking a deep breath and carefully maneuvering behind the register.
Activating his quirk, he bent down and used the light produced to see. He barely kept himself from wincing. One side of the girl's head was bleeding from the impact. Bringing his fingers to the side of her neck, he held his breath as he checked her pulse. To his relief, it was still there and didn't seem in any danger of leaving. He gently looked over the head wound, which he saw had glass in it. He couldn't do anything about that and he couldn't put pressure on the wound while it was in there. He went back over to the woman who'd first called out to him, squatted down next to her, and looked her in the eyes.
"Ma'am, I need you to listen carefully," he said quietly, "the cashier's unconscious and the head wound still has glass in it. It doesn't seem to be bleeding too heavily, but she still needs treatment immediately. I need you to call 911, if someone here hasn't already. Afterwards, you need to move everyone back to the changing rooms–so there isn't much chance of you getting further involved in this. Okay?" She swallowed heavily, but nodded. With the light provided by his quirk, he saw her eyes were actually solid purple–irises, pupils, and sclera. "Thank you," she whispered back. "....Who are you though?"
Kaminari blinked, then smiled. "I'm Kaminari Denki, I'm a first year at UA." He shook her hand, then stood up. Most of the people had already moved to the back of the shop, so he relayed what he'd told the woman and told them to move into the changing rooms. One of the men picked up the cashier and gently moved her to the back as well. As they did, Kaminari stood watch. He could hear explosions and shouting coming from downstairs, along with the sounds of lightning striking multiple opponents. He shifted from side to side, trying not to let himself get nervous. If he decided to pop in here...all these people could die.
He was so distracted, he nearly jumped out of his skin when he felt something tugging on his undershirt. He looked down to see a sniffling little boy, about 5 years old, his hands leaving bloody marks on his undershirt. "Mister....I'm scared. Are we going to die?" He asked, looking up at him. Kaminari's heart gave one giant thud as he stared down at the boy. Those eyes...wide, terrified, and somewhat dazed from the tragedy that just befell him...he remembered another boy that that same look. Cloudy golden eyes, unable to comprehend that he'd just lost everything.
No—that was not going to happen here. Not today. He squatted down and put a hand on the boy's white hair, smiling reassuringly at him. "Don't worry, everything's going to be okay. What's your name?" The boy rubbed the tears from his eyes. "A-Asahi." Kaminari kept smiling and ruffled the boy's hair. "Well, Asahi, my name is Stun Gun Hero: Chargebolt. And my friends down there are Red Riot, Pinky, Cellophane, and..." oh shit, Bakugo didn't have a hero name. "We're all going to protect you and everyone else here, okay?" He continued. Sorry for the exclusion, man, but you really need to come up with a better hero name than 'Lord Explosion Murder'.
Asahi looked up at him. "Really?" Kaminari nodded. "Of course! That's what we do, you know?" Even though it's my fault this is happening... He remembered with a inward wince. "Now, go back to the changing rooms. Where's your parents?" Suddenly, the woman with purple eyes came forward. "Asahi, come here!" She whispered frantically. The boy ran over to her. "Momma, he said that we're all going to be okay, cause him and his friends are here to protect us." "Of course, sweetie, that's what heroes do," she said, wrapping her arms around her son. Kaminari started at being called a 'hero'. He wasn't one.....right? Then, looking over at him, the mother mouthed a quick "thank you" and pulled her son away towards the back.
Kaminari smiled as they left, feeling a strange sense of peace. That is, until he heard something crush glass behind him. Whirling around, he saw one of the thugs that had dropped in with that idiot earlier. The man had giant horns and sharp teeth like Kirishima–and was that a forked tail behind him? "I seeeeee youuuuuu," he sang, licking his lips. He took another step in the shop, and Kaminari could practically feel every person there hold their breath, terrified.
He took off towards the man, jumping off the counter, and landing on top of him, sending him crashing towards the ground. "No, ya don't!" He snapped back, slamming an electric hand into him. The man convulsed and was knocked out cold in a second. Getting up, he dragged the man out of the shop and went back inside, where everyone had now evacuated to the changing rooms. He checked one last time that everyone was okay, saw one of the women on their phone, speaking with a 911 operator. He stopped to speak again with the purple-eyed woman.
"Mrs....." he started, before realizing he didn't know her name. "Fujita," she said softly. "Mrs. Fujita," he continued, "you'll be safe here. Just wait until the Pros come and get you. As soon as I see one, I'll inform them as to the situation and your location. Okay?" She nodded. "Thank you so much for everything you've done." Asahi waved energetically at him. He seemed to have bounced back very quickly from his scare. "Bye bye, Sparkyman!" Kaminari stopped, then gave a somewhat embarrassed laugh. "Bye bye. And it's Chargebolt, okay?" Mrs. Fujita smiled. "Chargebolt...what a cool hero name."
He said his goodbyes and checked one last time on the cashier, then left the shop, grabbing the still unconscious thug and dragging him down the steps with him. "Sero!" He yelled as he got down there, "tie this guy up too, please!" Sero kicked one guy, then shouted over to him, "And where have you been?! And what happened to your shirt?!" "Don't ask," Kaminari growled as he caught up to him, slamming into another guy with their unconscious buddy–he was going to have a long talk with Bakugo and Kirishima later, damn it. And were those like...praying mantis spikes on the guy's arms...? Yikes.
"I was a bit busy with the people that got caught in on of those shops that had the power sucked out of them–I had one call 911," he said quietly as he stood back to back with Sero. Sero took a deep breath. "Damn it...these guys are more annoying then anything," he gestured with his head as he punched another guy with what he guess was telekinetic abilities–various pieces of glass were flying everywhere and Sero winced as one cut his cheek. "That guy over there has some kind of healing or power-up or some kind of augmenting quirk he's using on the others so they can just keep on getting up. It's making it hard to tie them up–and we can't get over to that guy cause they keep on blocking us."
As he spoke, he took a minute to tie up the now-rousing villain Kaminari had knocked out. "You must've been out of his range when you fought this guy," he mused. He glanced over to the guy who knelt on the ground, eyes closed and hands in the air. "Think you can get over there and fry the shit out of that guy? We'll cover you so you can do it." "Yeah!" Mina chimed in, using what looked like a break-dancing move to kick one guy. Hey, whatever worked, right? Kaminari looked nervously at where he was and where the target was. He could in fact do it–but it'd take using an ability he'd hidden from the others.
He looked to Sero, who was flinging people everywhere and looking so goddamn irritated while doing so. Then to Mina, who was dancing around (somehow still in high heels–how did girls do that?) splashing weak acid, as to not harm people that were legitimately trying to kill her. Then to Bakugo and Kirishima, facing off against that asshole he had brought here–he had put all of them in danger. Then to the asshole himself, who he SWORE was LAUGHING at him.
Oh, fuck that shit. He growled. "Sero, Mina, guard my back for a minute." They both looked at him, but did as he asked. They fought basically back-to-back, with him in the middle. He crouched down and pulled his pants legs up–he did not want any more of his clothes on fire, thank you–and placed his hands on his calves. "Dude, what are you doing?" Sero asked. "Something stupid," he replied. And, yeah, this was definitely stupid. Why was he using a technique–one that might give him the edge when the time came to reveal everything–right in front of his supposed enemies? Why did he help those people, when he wasn't really trying to be a hero? When he didn't believe in the "ideal" heroes society had built up?
He couldn't answer that. But what he could say was that he was sick and tired of holding back, he was absolutely tired of pretending to be an idiot, and he was absolutely done with this asshole's bullshit for one goddamn day. 400 Volts: EMS Pulse! He sent 400 volts of electricity into his muscles, increasing the capability of his fast-twitch muscle fibers. Then, he took off.
Running right through the villains, he weaved his way past them. He felt a few of them attempt to grab him, but they were too slow. In only 13 seconds, he tackled the unsuspecting villain and before he had a chance to retaliate or even really get what was going on, he punched him in the face. And he was out for the count.
Still clenching the man's shirt collar, Kaminari looked up, into the amber eyes of the masked villain and sent a cheeky, pointed finger wave. He couldn't help but smirk as he practically saw smoke coming out of his ears. He really wanted to flip him off as well, but decided that might be taking it a bit too far.
"DIE, YOU DEADSHIT MOTHERFUCKER!!!!" Bakugo screamed as he finally got an explosion to connect with the villain while he was distracted. Kaminari tensed up, his heart suddenly in his throat. He barely stopped himself from shouting his name–before he jumped out of the smoke, pissed and cursing Bakugo's ass to hell. Then, Kirishima literally body slammed him out of nowhere. Kaminari couldn't help but wince as he went flying in the other direction. He had to have gotten some broken bones from that.
He came back up snarling, reaching out to electrocute the shit out of Kirishima. But, then the calvary finally decided to arrive–though Kaminari was very irritated with how long it took them. Over an hour. What the fucking hell, man?
"FREEZE, VILLAIN!!!" One of the Pros yelled. "WE ARE HERE TO TAKE YOU IN!!!" The lightning then stopped–Kaminari breathed a sigh of relief as it did–and was shot in a straight line towards the heroes behind them. And the villain turn tail and ran. As he did, Kaminari saw him look at him expectantly. That little shit... Kaminari scowled. "I got him!" He yelled out loud as he chased him, gritting his teeth.
"Kaminari, wait!!!" He heard Kirishima yell behind him. But he ignored him and continued on, racing through the mall towards what he guessed was the Hot Topic.
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He was going to slap him. He was going to slap that dramatic piece of shit right across his fucking face. Aizawa Sensei was going to kill him and it was all his fault.
There was also the little fact that his thespian ass caused a lot more trouble than was necessary and Kaminari would be the one that had to deal with the fallout of that–of course–but he honestly should expect that by now. He was never good at owning up to his own mistakes.
Irony struck once more as Kaminari heard a high-pitched scream as he caught up with the villain. Two girls, one with giant, beautiful butterfly wings, cowered as a bolt of electricity shot towards them. Without even thinking, Kaminari jumped in front of them, absorbing it into himself.
His brain somewhat rattled from the extra electricity, he felt he couldn't be completely blamed for then turning to the girls and saying, "Hey, beautiful ladies, you're not hurt, are you?" The girl with the butterfly wings giggled, while the other one rolled her eyes with a smile on her face.
Then, his brain caught up with the situation at hand. "You need to go, now," he urged desperately. "Go find the Pros." They nodded and quickly ran off. Kaminari breathed a sigh of relief as he watched them go. A sensation of pins and needles had started in his legs and he knew he didn't have much time before the drawback of his quirk hit him.
Now where was–
Slow clapping came from behind him and he froze. He could practically feel the sarcasm from that single sound. Turning, he faced the asshole who had decided to absolutely ruin his day.
"Well, well, well," he sneered. "Look who's playing the hero."
Kaminari took a deep breath. "Was this honestly necessary?" He asked, caught in between annoyance and terror. "Do you even know how much trouble you've caused me?"
The villain snorted irreverently and reached up to pull off his mask.
The face revealed was like a dark, inverted reflection of his own–black hair with a bright gold streak of lightning on the right side, dark amber eyes, and a twisted smirk.
The villain Typhoeus, Quirk: Conductor. He can draw any electricity in his immediately vicinity towards him and redirect it towards his enemies.
Real name: Arashigami Susanoo.
Kaminari's older brother.
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FINALLY!!!!! CHAPTER 4 IS FINALLY FINISHED!!!! HALLELUJAH!!!!
Y'all, this chapter kicked my butt. Writer's block galore. But, I hope you enjoy it!
Tell me how y'all feel about Susanoo. I've been really looking forward to properly introducing his character.
Also, the first person to catch the reference I made to a superhero in our world (y'all know what I mean) in this chapter, will get a sneak peek at the next chapter (once I start writing it 😝)!