Chapter Text
What was promised to be a short and quick mission only continued to stretch on as shots echoed in the rain, loud enough that Kai could hear the commotion in muffled booms even as he sat indoors on the staircase to the rooftop, hidden from sight and waiting for his end of the deal.
And so he waited. And waited.
Yet, the battle felt like an eternity. The muted chaos outside never seemed to end.
He could feel the seconds passing away, and he couldn’t help but count in his head, repeating back to 0 once he got to 60 seconds.
It was far too long for his comfort. How irritating it was that Kai did his part for the woman with ease, yet she was flakey and unreliable with clearing her own mission and fulfilling her part.
With every minute passing by, the longer it would take for him to finally get to Pops.
The two had already stalled around for too long. Kai made it loud and clear that Pops was priority as soon as possible, yet, based on the muffled fight continuing on, that Nagant woman clearly wasn’t as effective as he thought.
Everything around him was constantly so, so messy. Everything was imperfect, ever since being trapped in that prison where he was nowhere near Pops.
He could always feel that imbalance physically in his body, feeling like bugs and filth scattered all over what was left of his arms. Something that couldn’t be washed or scrubbed off with medicine, or any direct cure. No matter how much he tried.
Sometimes the phantom pain was unbearable, it was a reminder of how miserably he had lost everything he’d worked for. For the sake of the Hassaikai’s bright future, for Pops’ sake.
And now it was all so pointless to everyone suddenly.
Ever since that day, the day Kai had managed to lose everything and everyone all at once, he could feel all those disgusting insects and bacteria internally crawling through his insides, all around.
It was unbearable. He’d sat there, rotting away in Tartarus, fixating on Pops to clear the infections and shame.
It was the only way anything could be fixed.
With so much filth and disease covering his body and mind, it was the thought of Pops that had distracted Kai enough to bare the hellish cell.
He couldn’t even fathom the idea of Pops passing before Kai had the chance to even be in the same room as him again. Who would he be without his Pops?
Kai loved him so, so much. He truly did.
Pops had loved him back as well. He truly did.
This deal was his only chance. One wrong move and he could lose this one too. Heroes, villains, it was all pointless if the Pops and the Hassaikai as a whole were dead. They were all disgusting.
In the back of his mind, the possible outcome of that Nagant woman losing in the battle from that sickening kid grew stronger and stronger as minutes continued to pass on.
There was no way Kai could tolerate being ditched on. There was a promise. A clear deal in the matter. What was sostraightforward and logical, how was it possible everything could fail?
She wasn’t fighting hard enough to him, like there was a prioritized deal at all.
Kai could either push himself out into the rain and yell some sense into her and remind her of the simple partnership, or, the more challenging approach— take the flight of stairs down the building and cut the deal altogether before waiting too long to find out.
His urge to burst out the door and get Nagant’s attention was incredibly strong, it was outrageous how sloppy she was. He had already stood up at this point, about ready to bodyslam the door in hopes of breaking through and confronting her from outside.
But then he paused.
The more Kai went onto imagine this option continuing, the more he stepped back from the door, and ultimately went back to leaning against the wall in contemplation.
The main issue.
Of course nothing would change, whether he shouted at her outside in the soaking rain or not. It was all pointless, again. All he ever asked was to get to his Pops, that was the only thing he needed, yet the entire world seemed to go against him for wanting the slightest bit of genuine comfort in this hell.
He would attract unwanted attention from that hero complex kid. Kai would get thrown into Tartarus before doing anything, purely out of his impulse to remind that woman of their deal.
And then everything would reset for him. He couldn't go back into that wretched Tartarus, not in a million years.
Kai just needed to see Pops. He needed to. His focus was on nowhere else but that. The most important thing.
So Kai continued to stand still, waiting inside the building staircase. He didn’t push himself out the door to fume on Nagant. And he wasn’t sure if he wanted to go down those flights of stairs, abandoning the deal all together. Nagant clearly didn’t keep her deal by this point.
And then, a hellish explosion erupted from a block or two outside.
Stupid, useless, pointless.
Kai had already been unconvinced, yet this just sealed her failure. Nagant officially broke the only deal, the main shot he had. It was a one in a million chance that the deal ever even came to light, yet she managed to break it in an instant.
Kai wanted to scream at her, be enraged and act in frustration. How could she be so unreliable? He had to get to Pops, he needed to, he had to—
And then, Kai heard further commotion outside the explosion, followed by other voices. Heroes.
Kai had been momentarily outside when Nagant had fired her first shots, he was unaware whether or not the target caught sight of him.
So, Kai was now forced to move down the staircase. He was all on his own, and now he had to somehow find a way to get to Pops without that lifesaving deal his temporary partner managed to break so easily.
Going down the flights of stairs with the leftover stumps Kai had for arms made it a tasking process, as he leaned onto the wall while going step by step.
The irritation his skin and head felt when he contacted the moldy, stained wall to lean on was horrendous, feeling like hell as he could practically feel all the bacteria, dust, and debris scour through him.
At least Tartarus had been clean, now outside touching so many different textures and fabrics, full of different organisms and bugs was more than unbearable.
But whenever Kai imagined that instead of all that muck, it was Pops fondly ruffling his hair in pride, strolling together in the gardens with the aroma of spring and dew surrounding the scenery, it was as if the real world folded into itself, the dream replacing the hellish reality.
“Wait for me,” He wanted to say. “I’ll get to you no matter what. I’m so, so sorry.”
He fixated on that sensation for the rest of his way down the floors, the only thing that gave him true comfort even after possibly seeing his fate sealed. He relied on it, it was the closest thing he had.
The sound of multiple footsteps making their way up the staircase a floor beneath Kai broke his temporary trance.
He was so close to leaving the building, currently on the third floor. Seeing the shadows of multiple heroes alike, that target kid had backup.
Kai stumbled into the bathroom, going into one of the stalls as he used his foot to try and close the stall door. He failed, but it would have to do if those heroes still assumed he was near the rooftop.
Sweat trickled down his face, all while he kept his breaths steady and slow.
Previously given that he wasn’t in the lead between his partnership with Nagant, Kai was easily able to slip out of reality and into that solemn dream with Pops’ proud gaze looking down on him, the Hassaikai standing prideful and tall, all while the sniper woman tracked down her target, and the deal strong and assured.
Now that the deal officially broken by Nagant’s capture had managed to get Kai from letting reality pass by like a hazy dream to getting back on his feet, he was forced to be on his own.
The transition between the two phases happened within an hour, from Nagant aiming her first shot at the target to Kai standing frozen in a stall, cautiously listening to every footstep that passed through the third floor he was on.
He could hear multiple shouts as the heroes made their way up, and soon enough, it was quiet again.
Kai pushed the stall door with his foot, and after one last check, pushed the bathroom door with his body weight and quickly got himself back on the staircase down.
Although this would’ve never been the case a year ago, Kai had been heavily dependent on his pure instincts and impulses for the current situation, and so the blatant realization that there would no doubt be a hero situated in the entrance floor came quite late.
There had to be a back door or an emergency exit. With no power, the alarms wouldn’t be triggered. Kai would have to take the risk of continuing down the first floor unnoticed.
He then heard the echoing footsteps make their way down the stairs, as they scoured through every floor in the process.
The confirmation of other heroes and police awaiting him in the main entrance was given as one of the men began to speak up to the heroes still searching the upper floors.
Kai was quirkless, he was disabled, weakened and senseless.
A familiar hero’s voice, familiar as in a voice everyone recognized all through the country, rang from the top floor. Endeavor.
No.
Kai froze in place, stuck in the stairwell between the first and second floors all while the heroes from above and below slowly made their way to him. He couldn’t get caught, not back to that damned prison, not when his Pops still awaited Kai’s apology.
Not when he needed to be with him. He was getting awfully desperate.
Kai retraced his steps as he went up the stairs, this time to the second floor. At this point he couldn’t stop his panting, his whole body felt like it was set aflame with how his heartbeat continued to accelerate by the second.
He shouldn’t be able to get caught this easily, not when he still had so much to do. Kai stumbled into one of the empty rooms and used his leg to shut the door behind him.
He looked down from the windows. To his relief, there was a one-story building right below. No alleyway separating his building and the other, Kai could simply jump down.
His mind was still going on with nothing but pure adrenaline and pressure, so perhaps that was why in that moment, he thought that a 4 meter drop down would be perfectly fine without hands.
Kai didn’t have much time to contemplate making a one story drop when heroes were bound to find him at any second now.
After one or two fails as he desperately attempted to open the window with his foot, the window finally managed to break open with a hard slide up, although causing Kai to painfully fall on his back in the process due to his positioning.
That had only made the stakes higher, with the thin walls and floors making it loud and clear whoever was beneath him was running up to the second floor. Lying down heightened the vibrations in the floors revealed multiple footsteps racing through the building.
Kai got back on his feet after turning to lay on his stomach then balancing himself as he rose up with his legs. It was incredibly difficult and tasking due to the lack of movement in Tartarus, which caused slight irritation from his stumps.
The whole rolling and touching the floor was absolutely agonizing, presumably one of the most disgusting things he’d done out of prison yet. But Kai simply didn’t have the time to even be disgusted, as his mind focused on the next task in mind.
He chose not to dwell on it as he made one final look back at the door he shut. He simply went for that one shot. He thought about Pops and the Hassaikai clan.
Then, he jumped. And heard one, brutal crack in his right leg as he landed in a twist.
Kai couldn’t help but groan out loud at first, but then as realization came over, had to suppress his scream as much as possible as he pressed his face on the cold, hard, wet, filthy, muddy rooftop cement. The rain only made the stench of trashy filth and smoke worse.
But Kai didn’t have time to think about all that, he even wouldn’t bring himself to care if Kai repetitively told himself it was all for Pops’ sake.
With that being his only ongoing fixation to mute out all the damage, dirt, and rain, Kai took a few deep breaths before putting his body weight onto his stumps, feeling the horrific pain of the rooftop’s grimy texture pressing into the bandaged limbs as he used them as support to get his working leg back up.
After much wobbling and going back and forth, he finally balanced his stance with his left leg, and used all his strength and eagerness to limp with his broken right leg to the staircase leading down.
The metal door that separated Kai on the rooftop and the indoor staircase was like an insult to the face.
He leaned forward, used his left limb to push down the doorknob, and went inside with the cost of unbearable phantom pain overwhelming his entire left half of his body.
Once Kai was fully indoors, he closed the metal door shut behind him with his right limb and crumbled against the wall in pure exhaustion.
All that muted, numbing pain from before fully registered into his brain once his adrenaline ran out, and it took every inch of strength to not scream or even groan as loud as possible.
He began to uncontrollably shake from the amount of damage he caused in his body, and his broken leg only continued to swell faster.
The stumps of his arms, which were never treated properly with care from the beginning, continued to throb throughout ever since he applied pressure on the scarring to get back up from jumping down.
And on top of everything, his drenched clothing soaked in rain and stained in mud made everything unbelievably uncomfortable, he could feel rashes and bumps on his back the more Kai leaned against the walls of the staircase.
But it was all for the sake of seeing Pops again, he had to repeatedly tell himself, to remind himself.
And with that, the pain and all the outside elements that enclosed Kai disappeared into that fond memory of that warm and clean house, to the day he first met Pops.
Ironically, Kai was in a similar state of mind— going numb at everything and everyone around him when he was found as a kid living in the streets.
He remembered how that one summer all alone as a child was nothing but hell for him, stuck in grime and sweaty filth for months as he tried to sleep in the alleyways and ignore anyone that passed by.
He remembered how Pops and the Hassaikai had taken him in and raised him as their own. He was about 10 when he met Pops yet it felt like he’d known him forever.
It was only right to repay him and bring the Hassaikai back to its former glory for everything Pops did for Kai.
Instead he’d done the opposite, the Hassaikai in shambles and the boss on his deathbed. It would take years to truly show the amount of regret and shame Kai had to Pops for even an ounce of his forgiveness.
That Eri girl was far out of his reach, but if that was the only way to wake him back up, then for hell he would use all his might to make it happen, to utilize that power properly instead of letting it go to waste like all the bastards stuck with that contagious hero complex insisted on.
For now, with everyone finally out of his sight, Kai rested his head back on the cold walls, closed his eyes, and let himself rot in that crumbled position for the rest of the night.
His limbs felt as if someone were scratching at the wounds, reopening scars, and he still chose to close his eyes.
His mud stained shirt began to itch at his skin, the fabric feeling like silk on fire, all the filthy odors and muck encircling him like a tight blanket, and he still chose to close his eyes.
He already struggled to move and manage on his own (he still refused to fully take in the shock and awareness of missing limbs) and now he could barely limp around with a freshly broken bone, and he still chose to close his eyes.
It didn’t matter, for tonight.
He would decide on what to do tomoroww, he would get to Pops, hell, Kai would get to him himself, since everyone else was so fucking unreliable and useless at completing the deal at hand, so unreliable at repaying back.
He will find a way back to Pops. If that was the only thing that kept his heart beating on, then nothing would be stopping Kai from reaching that memory, that dream, Pops, again.
Never again.
——————————————
The other inmates stampeded out the prison halls as they yelled, thrashed, and outlandishly unleashed their quirks. It was absolute chaos, some of the prisoners themselves could hardly move out with all the commotion and fighting.
Hari followed along with the crowd, as he ran towards the exit as fast as he could.
He was one of the few unfortunate individuals with a quirk that channeled through his hair, so currently having a buzz cut was the equivalent of being quirkless in his case. That just meant he would have to work with what he got as he passed through multiple security rooms and long halls.
It would take at least a year or two for his arrows to grow back again. So Hari checked every room where guards had been situated. He immediately put on one of the protective vests over his prison attire, and considered switching to disguise as a guard entirely, but ultimately decided no and moved on.
Finally, after enough snooping, he managed to find a gun with more than half of the bullets locked and loaded. Hari reloaded the gun and went back to follow the other inmates.
Many of the others were absolutely ecstatic for the opportunity at hand, as the moment they got outside, everyone scattered into their own groups, fought right away on the spot, or snuck off on their own. Hari was mostly ignored, maybe one or two passing gave him a quick glance at his gun.
The prison Hari was in wasn’t like Tartarus, a much smaller facility, so he naturally hoped he could find at least two more Hassaikai members, yet not one in sight. The heroes split the Yakuza clan as far out as they could, all sent out to different prisons.
But one thing Hari knew for sure was that Kai was locked up in Tartarus. Tartarus was likely free as well with the unusual lack of heroes or security. He stood in one spot, trying to think of all the different ways him and Kai could possibly meet without connection.
He sighed. It was impossible.
Hari heard nothing about Kai, the last he’d seen him was all the way back in the Hassaikai facilities, before they split up.
Was Kai even able to get out? Were his hands constantly bound together in metal? Was he trapped?
Despite nothing to work with, Hari still clutched his gun and walked down, towards the city swarming with crime.