ii.

At the Point of Ignition

"So we lay in the dark, we've got nothing to say. Just the beating of hearts, like two drums in the grey. I don't know what we're doing, I don't know what we've done. But the fire is coming, so I think we should run." -Daughter

In the cold embrace of Ochako's old friend terror, a multitude of things happened all at once. With a gasping breath, and the almost insurmountable urge to fold in on herself like a collapsible telescope, Ochako's fingers curled over Katsuki's shoulder to yank him into her.

The rush of adrenaline was familiar and welcome, washing away her aches and lightening the edges of her dark-eclipsed vision with a crispness that was almost painful. Her companion's disgruntled sound at her manhandling resounded at the same moment that long, hooked claws dipped into the flesh of the back of her hand like a warm knife through butter.

"What the fuck!" Bakugo barked into her fuzzy hearing, pulse pounding, the sound went in one ear and out the other; muted and indistinct to her brain.

It occurred to her that since the Thing was at his back that Bakugo probably had no idea it was even there, but it was an inconsequential fact.

Ochako crunched a shriek behind her gritty molars, her mouth watered at the effort and it took all of her fragmented control to remember that the creatures claws were sickle-shaped and yanking her hand away would only result in more shredded flesh- it was a very near thing. Instead she pushed forward, Bakugo slamming into her shoulder just as the Thing's claw slipped out from between her tendons and her fingers alighted along its liquid body.

Her quirk flashed to life with a bloated sensation that signaled the outer reaches of her limits. This, like many other things, she chose to ignore.

Bakugo lost his weight in the same moment that a handful of liquid separated from the creatures bulk to splatter and bounce weightlessly against the far wall. Ochako couldn't see it, but her awareness of the mass her quirk was acting upon pinged against her senses like sonar in the dark. One more tally craved deep into her already long list of sensory-overload. Vomit rose in her throat and splashed against the back of her tongue, and it was almost a relief to taste something other than sewage water in her mouth.

The formless creature warbled out a pitch in the upper echelons of a soprano, shrill enough to shatter glass and if Ochako hadn't been so busy trying to scuttle backwards and back onto her bare feet she might have clapped her hands over her already abused ears. Bakugo's hot oiled palms glided across the side of her neck in a motion she didn't have time to think about, and his grunt of discomfort at the waves of sound couldn't be heard be she felt it vibrate through his chest all the same. She almost tumbled over him in her effort to get back on her feet but Bakugo managed to gain purchase somewhere in his weightless drift enough to haul her up by her good arm. Their cluster-fuck of motion, one rapid fire movement after the next, was slick with the exchange of blood and nitroglycerin charged sweat. Bakugo's free hand popped with light, the rapid, exploding bust of sound interrupting the creature's screams and providing just enough red and orange-tinged light for Ochako to get her bearings and bolt for the nearest open path. Her filthy hair swung around her cheeks in an arc as she turned to look in a poor reflex of fear, the split ends stinging her eyes where the motion tangled them with her eyelashes.

The monster grew taller, shadows looming larger than life behind it as it built upon its liquid body and sucked up sewage from the ground like a cresting wave. It's face a horrid grimace of angry, beady, inset eyes and what she thought might be its jaw hung asymmetrically to the side. Visible results of her quirk-charged swipe removing a portion of its face.

Its expression, for it did have one, was downright murderous. Pinning her with intent behind its eyes- but it wasn't her it was looking it. It was Bakugo, just beyond hr shoulder. Incensed and hateful and hungry.

Ochako's scraps of conscience rallied at the sight. It wasn't even a thought she had, just a feeling. As heavy as stone and as solid as a mountain it dropped into her chest with the thud-thud of her heart against the inside of her ribs- and it said no.

You can't have him.

It was the same voice in her cavernous brain that had at one point informed her with cold clarity that a building was going to crush her to death, that it now informed her that there would be no outrunning this creature this time.

Ochako had experienced the height of fear and the lowest point of hopelessness and everything in between since the moment the fevered boy at her back had stepped between her and a demolished sixty-story skyscraper.

It was here, faced with this- whatever it was- this things that seemed determined to swallow her very last reminder of the good in the world in what would be a very bone-shattering and bloody fucking mess that Ochako met the end of her rope.

She had nothing left to give, there was nowhere left to run.

You can't have him.

Her world went full stop and her feet followed suit, sliding to a halt in the mud. In juxtaposition to Ochako's inner world the outer world continued to move as water rushed past her legs to join the bulk of the creature bearing down on them.

The gravity girl let go of Bakugo's hand after jerking him around in an unrefined motion to sail him behind her. His loud, grating protests fell on completely deaf ears. She felt more than heard the moment he was released back to the sewer floor, a twisting lurch in her gut that spotted white behind her blind eyes and wasted even more of her precious hydration in the form of god's forbid even more vomit in her mouth.

"-chako!" Katsuki's voice choked shrill enough to pierce the fog, followed by a thud and a splash behind her, but it was too late for words, Ochako wasn't listening. She wasn't capable of listening anymore.

It was too late to think, too late to run, to hide or scream for help. Ochako knew nothing but move, fight, protect.

It was too late for heroism, but it wasn't for survival.

Ochako's fingers spread apart hard enough to pop her knuckles and limit the reach of her tendons, her finger pads swiped against the dark and all she felt was the wet, hot, and volatile mass of whatever-the-fuck.

Her arms sunk into the bulk of their would-be attacker's liquid body, forward, forward, harder she pushed, more, more, make it stop- make it stop forever-

It slopped over her skin, putrid and jello-like as it sucked her into it.

Ravenous, a wild, senseless beast as it turned its full attention toward sucking her into its body like a starved animal. It's haunting, shrill screams rattled her teeth.

She gagged on its smell, she gagged on her quirk even as she swung weightless fitfulls of its liquid body in as many directions as she could. Her teeth clacked together in wide, open-mouthed bites of liquid monster as it filled her mouth and nose and stung its way into her eyes.

Ochako's flesh hissed where it touched her, itching and burning like she'd plunged her arms into a mound of hissing fire ants.

She was still screaming, but only Bakugo would remember it, and even then it was questionable as he bled out on the ground behind her.

The liquid, fire-ant monster shredded its claws through her uniform and probably the surface of her back, swinging wildly in its panic when her fingers closed around a pulsing thump-thump inside its body.

It was soft against her palms, soft and mildly warm, thumping away like a little rabbit in her hands.

Thump-thump-thump.

The world held its breath.

Ochako kept gasping for more.

The drive for survival is a powerful thing.

Her fingers curled around the soft pulse, nails piercing crescents with a carefulness that was out of place in the moment, and she squeezed with blind purpose until the white noise of shrill cries ceased and the liquid body surrounding her started a slow, mucky descent towards the ground.

Her quirk twisted her insides as it flipped on and off and back on again, perhaps some visceral reaction as her hands held tighter still, jaw bone clenched together so tight pressure started to build in her sinuses.

The creature's nails raked down her back, an almost gentle touch as its liquid flesh seared away at hers. It lost cohesion, dropping away from her arms in thick, heavy chunks to splash into the putrid water on the ground.

And still she kept squeezing.

She didn't stop even as it fell apart around her, the once beating organ still in her hands.

She didn't let go of it even as she backed up, her entire being a chasm of ugly absolutes.

No sounds, no pain, no thoughts, no life.

Voided. Blinking felt to her like sleep between milliseconds, an eternity spent in the dark.

Her hands found the shallow breath of her classmate in the dark, puffing little ghosts over her skin. He was wet and burning and horrifically silent in the wake of her call to action.

They were finally, utterly out of time.

Ochako's quirk snapped to life in her chest so tight and painful there was a stretch of memory that followed that remained a complete blank.

And still Ochako managed to drag Katsuki's weightless body behind her. One foot in front of the other. Again, one foot, slowly, the other. Carefully, over and over. Step, by agonizing step.

Still she kept walking, it was all she could remember how to do.

Forever it felt like, minutes, hours, days. Ochako slept only in her daydreams- and it was, suddenly, at some point or another- day.

Warmth skittered over her filthy skin and all she could manage was another step.

Maybe just one more.

Just beyond that tree, dappled with light and casting shivering shadows across the leaf-strewn ground.

Just past that crest, one more step, just one more.

Katsuki's weightless body draped bonelessly across her back, her bare feet sliding against grass.

Ochako took a single, solitary moment to realize she held a heart in her hand.

It was a sort of saturated red-purple, fleshy, and almost bag-like. Covered in little puncture holes and trailing shredded tubes from its core.

It looked very human.

Ochako let it slide her palm to slop wetly into a soft pile of cloves at her feet.

She blinked at it, mute, tired, uncomprehending.

Ochako kept walking.

AN: So sorry for the long wait, I really hope you guys like this chapter. I managed to squeeze it out between all my accelerated class work and my full time job. Please leave me a review and let me know what you think, only two chapters left now!

If you are interested, please feel free to look me up on Tumblr: KannaKyomu You can leave me asks and I do my best to post my pending updates and notes there.