Work Text:
“Chisaki says hi”
His world became bright yellow for a few seconds as his quirk automatically activated out of surprise, then a weird suave smell occurred and it all faded to black.
***
Shouta blinked. He knew he was not in the streets anymore. The smell had been replaced with a stronger one.
*THUD!*
*THUD!*
He couldn’t see a thing, but as he tried to rub his eyes, his hands knocked on something hard. He felt the obstacle with his palms. Wood. But he smelt something more than wood. A smell so strange yet familiar… Petrichor. It was the scent of freshly turned soil, moist and earthy.
*THUD!*
*THUD!*
He could hear muffled voices, one seemed to come from a woman, but he couldn’t understand a word of what was being said.
*THUD!*
*THUD!*
*Cling?*
The regular noises stopped, then the voices departed. He suddenly realized how moist the air was. He moved his arms around him to realize he was surrounded by wooden boards. He was wearing his civil clothes, no weapon, even his pocket knife had been removed from said pocket; no capture bands either.
“I see,” he thought to himself. “Their methods are very efficient and rational.” It was a shame for the knife, though, a gift from his father.
Panicking would be a waste of oxygen. When stuck in a buried coffin, one has to save moves and energy for a fast escape. The gift of years and years of crippling anxiety was that he imagined himself in many situations, including this one, and researched how to escape.
As he expected, the material of the coffin seemed cheap and weak. Even for the Yakuza, it was not easy to just buy premium quality coffins without planning any official funeral with the shop. This one was probably manufactured from scraps. The wood was easily bendable under his hands, toughened by years of practice with the capture bands.
He slowly pulled on this t-shirt's sleeves to slip his arms out of it, then passed it over his head and made a face mask out of it. It would prevent him from inhaling dirt.
Shouta banged the coffin’s lid with his fists and knees, firmly but slowly, on a regular rhythm, so as not to waste oxygen. He could already feel a bit nauseous from the lack of proper air. He listened carefully, but the voices were not coming back. It would be a shame to manage to escape only to stumble upon his kidnappers, half naked and disarmed.
The 5th hit was welcomed with a cracking sound. He kept banging until dirt started pouring from the cracks. He pushed the wood and dirt toward his feet until he made enough room to sit down. From there, the most important thing was not to be disoriented, or he would dig in the wrong direction, to a certain death. He tried to contain his excitement from successfully breaking the lid. He tried to breath despite the shirt, the air felt sticky. He put his hands up and started digging, while his legs pushed upward.
As it was moved recently, the dirt was easy to go through. It was a bit wet, but at least, it didn’t rain that day. Even for him, dirt and water would have been too much.
Finally, the tips of his fingers wiggled freely in the crisp autumn air. Freedom ! He mentally scolded himself “don’t celebrate too soon!” He kept digging, pushing the dirt down, kicking it, as his arms reached for liberty. At last, his head popped out of the ground. He took a huge breath in. Never did the polluted air of suburban Musufatu feel so good.
As he pulled his lower body from the hole, grunting and mumbling, he heard steps approaching. “Not now !” he thought. If the Shie Hassakai goons were still here to check on him, they were going to make him pass out with that weird gas again. He secured his shirt onto his nose again, got up, and activated his quirk to lighten the place and quickly check his surroundings.
This is when Togata Mamoru, 42, cemetery employee, got close enough to see it was not a deer or a boar rummaging, but a man getting out of the ground, bright yellow eyes from hell lighting in the night like those of a cat. Shouta tried to say something reassuring, but from his dry throat and numbed mouth, the only sound that came was a “Mmmwaarrrr ?”.
*THUD!*
The man fainted, but he was breathing. Maybe he had a concussion… Shouta picked the man's pocket for a phone and called Naomasa. Naomasa always knew what to do, and which paperwork to fill.