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With quiet, practised steps, Honami made her way towards the drop-off point. A small, decorative mask covered the area around her eyes, doing just enough to conceal her identity. She hated wearing it, it made her face itch, but it was a necessary evil. If someone were to spot “Honami” collecting a pallet of food from a known villainous organisation, her cover would be blown, and her only means of contributing to her team’s goals would be destroyed.
Honami wasn’t your average girl. Not anymore at least. Unbeknownst to most, she possessed another identity, one less savoury to the general public. For some time now, “Honami Mochizuki” had been the secret identity of the one and only Tanto Otabe, a member of the villainous team known as Devoted Evil. “Fluffy villains” they were often called, originally a demeaning term to indicate the lack of threat they posed, though later adopted by their leader to show the goodness of their goal. The goal in question? To create a paradise, a utopia even, where no one would have to struggle or suffer ever again. Too often those who worked hard and gave it their all were rewarded with nothing but misery, and Devoted Evil had set out to change that. Not everyone agreed with their motives of course, there was a reason they’d been branded as villains. Some claimed that a paradise without suffering would make people complacent, that people would lose the skills or even the will to support themselves, that it could lead to the very end of society as they knew it. Honami didn’t see why that was such a bad thing. If society required suffering in order to stay intact, then maybe society should collapse after all.
Honami’s role in the team was an odd one, brought about by her unique set of skills. The powers granted to her by their Virtual Singer allowed her to perform the same general feats as the rest of the team, only in a form that was incredibly difficult to utilise in any sort of active scenario. While the others could render people unconscious with a touch, or hypnotise with a song, Honami’s powers relied on her cooking. Depending on the type of emotions she poured into her cooking, the meals she produced could have a variety of effects, from healing and energising, to hypnotising and weakening, to paralysing and poisoning, though she’d yet to make use of that last one. Incredibly versatile, but it also meant that the intended target needed to actually eat the food she’d prepared for the effect to take place, something that was nigh impossible in the midst of a fight. As a result, Honami’s tasks were usually limited to more covert activities, serving dishes as Honami then taking advantage of the chaos as Otabe. Even if the food were to be tested afterwards, not a trace of any foreign substances would be found, clearing Honami of any potential wrongdoing. It was tough work, but she was willing to do it for the sake of her team’s goals.
Besides the difficulty of getting her target to eat the food, the other downside of her powers was that it required a lot of food. She could only cook if she had ingredients to work with, after all. That was a problem of the past, however. While they had made do for a long time with whatever they could steal themselves, or whatever her unwitting victims could provide her, ever since the establishment of the League of Villains, other teams had been more than happy to contribute their spoils in return for Devoted Evil’s cooperation. Their team was rather well established, having been in operation long before many of the villains that now prowled the streets of Tokyo, and they were happy to provide guidance to up and coming teams, in exchange for a little assistance of course. Police were baffled about the uptick in food theft as of late, but since it came from a variety of villains, her secret was still safe.
Today’s drop-off was a special one though. This was no low level villain offering some produce they’d snatched from a grocery store. This was a delivery from the most wanted villains in all of Japan, the Fussy Eaters, founders of the League of Villains. Ironic that a group with a name like that would be found stealing food, but the police still hadn’t worked out what they were doing with it. It didn’t all go to Devoted Evil, of course. They also used it to support other teams in the League, but a large amount did end up in Honami’s hands. Admittedly, she wasn’t sure why they still provided her team with so much support. In the short time they’d been on the scene, they’d swiftly outgrown Devoted Evil’s influence, and by extension their usefulness. If anything, Devoted Evil should be the ones paying them tribute for all the assistance they’d received from the League, and yet the shipments of food still poured in whenever the Fussy Eaters pulled off a successful raid. Honami sometimes liked to believe it was because Instant Boss, leader of the Fussy Eaters, had realised that the villainous Tanto Otabe and her housekeeper Honami Mochizuki were actually the same person, and she was rewarding her for a job well done. That was silly though. Instant Boss’s long white hair may be instantly recognisable, but Honami was significantly more discrete in her secret identity.
Regardless of their reason for supplying her with food, the Fussy Eaters had recently pulled off another heist in spectacular fashion, apparently having fended off the country’s top heroes in order to make off with almost an entire warehouse’s worth of food. As such, while much of the more processed food or ready made meals were being dealt out to some of the members of the League who were worse off and needed the extra food, a huge pallet of fresh produce was on its way to Honami, ready to be used in Devoted Evil’s next devilish scheme. It was a good thing Death Vegetable was some sort of master inventor, that pallet jack he’d lent her made these huge deliveries feel practically weightless, and it folded up to almost nothing too. For someone who seemed so unnerving during a confrontation, he was actually a pretty nice guy. It was always good when he had enough free time to spare a moment for a chat during these deliveries.
Honami stopped dead in her tracks as the drop-off point came into view. It seemed there would be no friendly chat today.
“Oh. Of course it’s you.”
Standing next to a large pallet practically overflowing with food was not the intimidatingly tall Death Vegetable, but rather a girl Honami’s age. She was dressed in all black with an elaborate black mask covering her eyes, though her messy jet-black hair was left completely uncovered. The mask did little to hide her identity from Honami though. Not because of any sort identity sharing policy the League had, because they didn’t have one, they weren’t as brazen as the Hero Alliance in that regard. No, it was her voice. Her voice was one Honami would be hard pressed to forget. As she was now though, she was known as Bread Eater, a member of the Fussy Eaters known for her cold demeanour and lack of mercy to those who would oppose them.
“W-Where’s Death Vegetable?” Honami mumbled, unable to keep the stutter out of her voice. Why was Bread Eater here? Death Vegetable was always the one who delivered the food, always happy to be part of the process of getting rid of any vegetables from the League’s food stores. His drone was here, hovering just above the pallet, why wasn’t he here? Why was she here in his place?
For a moment, Bread Eater said nothing, her glare growing a little more intense as she took a bite from the yakisoba bun held in her hand. Honami did her best to not react. “He’s busy right now. Something about another robot project or whatever. I’m handling the delivery today.”
“Ah, I see.” Unfortunate. That was the problem with dealing with the Fussy Eaters. As the leader of the team and the League, Instant Boss was far too busy to handle day-to-day affairs like this, and their Virtual Singer barely seemed to exist most of the time. If Death Vegetable was busy, that meant dealing with the one person Honami didn’t wish to deal with. Still, she had a reputation to uphold, regardless of who was the one making the delivery. “Thank you for the delivery, we appreciate you and your team’s efforts. If you have some time, would you like to stick around? I could make something for you as thanks.” A bit stiff and formal, but still fundamentally the same thing she often said to Death Vegetable. She’d learned quite a few vegetable-free dishes to work around his preferences. She may not really be comfortable around Bread Eater, but she could at least try and serve her something a little more nutritious than those yakisoba buns she always seemed to carry around with her these days.
The bun stopped halfway towards Bread Eater’s mouth before she could take another bite. Her glare didn’t seem as intense as it was a second ago, but not for the right reasons. “Do you think I’m stupid?” she asked, her tone as flat as ever. It felt like there was supposed to be malice there, but she found Honami’s offer so ridiculous that she couldn’t even take it seriously. “I know how your powers work.”
“Th-That’s not why I offered!” Honami blurted out. She should have known how it would look. Death Vegetable was a little hesitant to trust her initially as well, given her powers involved her cooking, but she was ultimately able to win his trust. Bread Eater though, Bread Eater had no reason to trust her. “I just wanted to show my appreciation for your team’s-”
Bread Eater cut her off. “I’m already fighting for your freedom, what more do you want?”
Ah, her motivations for villainy. Honami remembered being quite surprised when she learned that the publicly advertised motivation behind the Fussy Eaters was only a fraction of their true goals. While the elimination of all but their favourite foods wasn’t an outright lie, limiting it to just that meant any hero that tried to stand against them would find themselves utterly humiliated at the hands of a team that sounded like the villain of a children’s cartoon. In truth, their goal was much broader, “freedom”. What “freedom” actually meant was different to everyone, but that allowed Instant Boss to get almost any villain to cooperate with her as needed. It had never been made particularly clear exactly what sort of freedom Bread Eater was seeking though. Beyond the smokescreen of only wanting to eat her favourite food, Honami couldn’t think of any sort of freedom that Bread Eater needed that would make her turn to the side of villainy.
Of course, that assumed it was her freedom she was fighting for. It had gone unspoken until just now, but there was a mutual understanding between Honami, Bread Eater, and another junior member of the League. They knew Bread Eater was doing this for them, or rather because of them, because their own struggles for freedom had hurt her. She wanted to ensure no one would have to struggle like they did, so that no one would hurt like she did. But even as she fought for the freedom of people like them, it was clear she still hadn’t forgiven them for how they’d struggled, how they’d hurt her. Her heart had long been closed off, and it wouldn’t so easily be reopened.
“I was just trying to be polite,” Honami stated, although it came out as more of a whimper. Her gaze drifted down towards her feet, unable to stand being subjected to Bread Eater’s glare any longer. She deserved this, she knew she did, but that didn’t make it hurt any less.
“Hmph, whatever.” A scuffling of feet and the crinkling of a food wrapper was enough to raise Honami’s eyes again, finding Bread Eater with her back to her, taking another bite of her yakisoba bun. “I’ll be going then.” With her her free hand, she pulled the grappling hook from her belt and pointed it up at the drone that had presumably carried her and the food over here.
Was this really how it was going to be? Their friendship would just forever remain in pieces, unable to so much as hold a conversation with one another? When her team first joined the League, Honami had hope that maybe, away from the prying eyes of society, things could perhaps go back to the way they were, but Bread Eater clearly thought otherwise. She clearly understood that they’d only hurt her because they too were hurting, but it didn’t seem to matter to her. Was this just how it ended?
Honami had to try. It was her fault things had ended up like this, it was no one else’s responsibility to fix it. She wouldn’t be able to mend a friendship so easily, but if they could at least have a conversation without glaring at each other, then maybe those brighter days weren’t as far away as they seemed. “Um,” she mumbled, catching Bread Eater’s attention. The black-clad villain paused, her arm lowering just a little. If nothing else, at least she was interested in hearing her out rather than just leaving. “Did you, um, hear that Saki became a hero?”
Saki, the last missing piece of the puzzle. The first to go, though the only one to not leave of her own volition. Confined to a hospital bed for years, only recently released. When Honami caught a glimpse of her at school, she thought for sure that Bread Eater would be making a move to recruit her. After all, who would desire freedom more than someone who’d spent her entire life deprived of it? Unfortunately, someone else sank their claws into her first. It didn’t take a genius to figure out who the new member of HopeHope♡Heart with the blonde and pink pigtails was supposed to be.
Slowly but surely, Bread Eater’s arm lowered back to her side. For just a moment, Honami thought perhaps she didn’t know yet, that they could have a conversation and discuss what to do about this information, that they could potentially find some common ground. Any hope she had for that fled the moment Bread Eater turned her head, her glare filled with nothing but malice. It took every bit of courage Honami had to not turn and run immediately.
“Did you seriously just ask me that?” Bread Eater asked, slowly turning to face Honami. “You of all people?”
“I… I just-” Honami stuttered, her gaze flicking downwards as Bread Eater took a step towards her.
“When was the last time you even spoke to Saki?” Another step. The closer she got, the more intense her glare seemed to become. If looks could kill, Honami would have been a goner a long time ago. It was a good thing Bread Eater didn’t have any vision-based superpowers.
“Wh- Just the other day!” Honami plead, unable to keep the fear and desperation out of her voice. That had been a difficult day. One of the few times she actually aided her team in combat, even if only to distract the heroes and take hits for other members of the team. And of course, it had to be HopeHope♡Heart that came to the rescue. While the three in the League all implicitly knew who each other were, it seemed Saki hadn’t figured it out yet. Having to lie to her face, having to play part of the dastardly villain to her righteous hero as if they hadn’t been friends only a couple of years ago, had hurt immensely, dwarfed only by the moment she met “Bread Eater” for the first time. “My team-”
Bread Eater cut her off with another step forward, refusing to hear any more. “I said Saki! Not Smile Heart!” Honami didn’t have a response to that. While she had fought against and interacted with Saki’s hero alter ego, at school she’d been avoiding her like the plague, desperate to avoid confronting the pain that she’d caused. Bread Eater took another step. “And for that matter, when was the last time you spoke to Shiho?!” She’d interacted a little with “Codename C” when CBNEL came asking for advice, but at school Shiho remained alone, and Honami allowed her to. Another step. “Or Ichika?!”
Bread Eater was right in Honami’s face now. She wanted to avert her gaze, to look anywhere but those piercing eyes that felt like they’d tear her to shreds if she gave them a chance, but there was nowhere else to look. She had nothing to say. She wanted to tell Bread Eater that it wasn’t that simple, that she was scared of what would happen if she tried to reach out again, that this was the only way until her team achieved their goals. But none of that mattered. None of that would change Bread Eater’s mind. If it would, then it would have ages ago. And so, she remained silent, taking Bread Eater’s judgement like a criminal on trial.
Still staring directly into Honami’s eyes, Bread Eater raised her yakisoba bun to her face and pushed what remained of it into her mouth, just barely pulling her finger out of the way in time before she chomped down with enough force that Honami was sure it was supposed to be sending a message. She said nothing, either having said all she needed to, or waiting for Honami to respond, as she slowly chewed through her meal, keeping eye contact all the while. It was only after she swallowed and still hadn’t received an answer to her questions that she finally said anything. “Hmph, you haven’t changed at all.”
That broke Honami’s heart all over again. No matter how much she wanted to reconnect, no matter how many times she’d tried to do things for Bread Eater or her team, no matter how much it hurt every time Bread Eater glared at her, in Bread Eater’s eyes, she was still the same coward who’d abandoned her friends to save herself. The worst part though? She wasn’t even wrong.
But coward or not, Honami finally found her voice as Bread Eater turned her back and pointed her grappling hook at the drone again. “Ichika, wait!”
It was too late. Bread Eater fired the grappling hook, and the moment it latched on, the drone took off with her in tow. Honami ran up to the spot the drone had left from, but stopped short of actually following it. Her team lacked any sort of gadgets for air travel. Instead, she just stood their and watched as her former friend drifted away, becoming nothing but a small black speck in the sky. Honami was alone again, just as she’d always been.
With a heavy sigh, she collapsed forward, her arms and head resting upon the mountain of food that had been delivered to her. Why? Why did things have to be like this? Why did she have to be such a coward? Even as Tanto Otabe, she still worked in the back, carefully conducting operations out of sight where she wouldn’t have to deal with any judgemental stares. Even as a major villain terrorising the city, she was still nothing more than a snivelling weakling who couldn’t stand up to conflict. So long as that truth remained, she would forever be alone.
“It’ll be okay,” she whispered to herself, her breath shaky. “It’ll all be okay. None of this will matter when we create a paradise.” Once her team succeeded in their goals, she’d never have to worry about pain or suffering again. The bullies that had frightened her so would be gone for good, there would be no fear remaining to hold her back. She would be free again. Free to be with the people she belonged with. Free to be at peace and do whatever she desired.
She just had to keep telling herself that, and maybe it would come true.