Discord: .gg/t7bHrdRY7Y
pat.reon: Keanu_Eugene (Unlimited chapters ahead)
CHAPTER START---
---6 PM, Thursday, Tokyo...
"So, now can you tell me the specifics?" Ryukyu asks.
She was wearing a white dress with a slit on the left side, a drastic change from her Hero Costume as her usual accessories of the metal dragon claw on her head and dragon-wings headpiece were missing.
Instead she had a small red purse matching the red ribbon around her waist with a length of fabric flowing down her right side.
Sitting across from her Horizon was wearing a more formal version of his Hero Costume, swapping out the standard business suit for a tuxedo that had a few more blue accents along the lining. The jacket was also slightly longer, and notable not as durable as his actual Hero Costume.
His white and blue seemed oddly complimentary to her white and red, even as they sat here in a high-rise lounge discussing their plans for the evening.
Ignoring the murmurs and curious looks the serving staff kept throwing their way. When she first accepted, Ryukyu had resigned herself to the fact that before the night was over all of Japan would believe she was dating their rising star."Yeah we should go over it atleast once, did you read what I sent you?" Horizon asks.
"Mhm, Dr. Kyudai Garaki is having his annual fund raiser and you need me to help you work a case there. A person of interest will be attending and you want me to act as support, but you said I'm not here to fight, so...?"
"Can you even fight in that dress, or will you just be, you know..."
Ryukyu sighs, "no this material doesn't expand with me. It was short notice and I didn't have a dress for this kind of event made to grow with me."
"Well at least reptiles have hidden---" Ryukyu gives him a hard glare, challenging him to stay another word. "Alright whatever, but for the record, always thought it was weird you kept those big tits in dragon form."
"Ugh, sometimes I forget you're sixteen."
"Honestly you should be happy, those things got you into the top 10."
Ryukyu looks a bit sad at hearing that, already aware enough that she doesn't actually do enough to be in the top 10. She's just gotten lucky with a flashy Quirk everyone liked, and pretty privilege helped carry her some of the way as well.
"Can you just tell me what we're doing," she furrows her brow at him. "And if this is just some trick to get me on a date with you, I'll just leave right now."
"As if I have time to waste on such trivial things," Horizon scoffs and takes out a small circular device from his jacket, handing it to her. "Put that in your purse."
"Alright," she does as he says. "A tracker?"
"No, its more like a hacking device. It'll scan every phone within ten feet until it finds the one we're looking for, then give us remote access to it through Nezu's program."
"Alright, and what phone are we looking for?"
"No idea," Horizon says. "I've been following some leads on the League of Villains. I figured they have to be getting funding from somewhere and one of the labs Endeavor raided gave us a lead. Apparently one of the accounts buying equipment for them is also a big donator to the Kyudai Garaki Medical Quirk Research Foundation."
"Wait," Ryukyu tries to wrap her head around it. "So you're telling me, that the same person bankrolling the league, is donating to help build orphanages and hospitals all around Japan? Why would they even do that?"
"Unlikely," Horizon says. "The donation was recent, scarily recent. And the only people invited to this are fellow researches like myself, or people who donated, so..."
"They donated to get a invitation," Ryukyu says. "And since even Pro Heroes don't get invitations, they think it'll be a good time to kidnap the doctor."
"Exactly," Horizon says. "But we'll be there, which means they won't try to kidnap him, and once we're close the device will start scanning phones until we get a match."
"I see," Ryukyu considers everything she just heard, and can't help but ask. "Did you tell Lady Pantu about this?"
"No, I need live bait, she'd just shove Garaki in a bunker until it was over."
'If Garaki dies Pantu loses her best chance at finding a weakness in Horizon,' Ryukyu thinks. 'Wait, what happens if Horizon meets Garaki...if he touches him can he read him somehow and figure out what's going on?
This could be bad, I need to prevent them from talking too long. If Horizon gets a sense something is wrong he won't hesitate to question Garaki and that could be a disaster. And then he'd know that I knew because Garaki saw me at the lab so obvious Garaki knows that I know and---'
Horizon snaps his his fingers to get her out of her own thoughts, startling the woman.
"Huh!"
"You spaced out for a bit there, you ok?"
Ryukyu shakes her head, "yeah, I'm fine. I'm just not used to this kind of situation, Dragon's aren't exactly known for being stealthy after all."
"Well I am, so you're in good hands."
"Right, then I'm in your care, but I have to ask, why me?"
"Why not you?" he asks with no hesitation.
"Well, I'm sure you could get many other Pro Heroes with helpful Quirks to assist you, maybe Ms. Midnight, right?"
"Ugh," Horizon relaxes in his seat. "First of all, Midnight is a bitch, and she hates me."
"Really? That seems like an exaggeration..."
"Oh yeah she hates me. Secondly, the public already thinks you've gotten your claws wrapped around me, so its less explaining on our parts."
"I guessed that part," she says. "Those rumors are annoying but in situations like these they are useful. But even if I can't stand the allegations and hate mail I get from your fans about me seducing a minor---"
"I'm sixteen so it's fi---"
"Don't even," she cuts him off. "But as I was saying, I will admit its quite nice not to be constantly asked on dates every time I team up with male Pro Heroes."
"Is it that bad?"
"I'm sure you have fangirls throwing themselves at you, well its much the same for me, only its the people who I'm supposed to be working beside. Before those rumors I'm sure someone would have asked me to go on a date during the Yakuza Raid. There is a reason my agency only has women, its a safe haven from that nonsense.
But hearing about the oh-so great and powerful Horizon claiming me has most of them scared to even talk to me. Its actually quite refreshing to have people treating me like a actual dragon for a change, worried about upsetting me instead of constantly trying to seduce me...too bad its because they're more scared of angering you that they're scared of me."
"Well I'm glad you get some use out of it, because it annoys me. Anytime I talk to a girl its always 'aren't you dating Ryukyu...' which makes me sound like I'm up to no good."
Ryukyu does her best shocked expression, "how devious, you, my beloved Horizon, cheating on me," she dramatically clutches her heart. "How will I ever recover from such devastating heartbreak. This heartbreak knows no bounds..."
Horizon chuckles, "alright Shakespeare settle down."
Ryukyu chuckles along with him, "I actually did quite like going to see plays, another thing being a celebrity has ruined."
"At least you can still show up online, I can't even do that," Horizon says. "Pantu won't let me go a certain distance from Tokyo and Musutafu without permission, and I can't even post where I am outside of either of those because it makes the crime rates spike."
"All the power in the world, and you're locked in a cage. At least its a big cage."
"No such thing as a big cage when you can warp," Horizon says.
"Mhm. But you know, you never explained why exactly you wanted me here, aside from using what the media believes to our advantage."
"Well, I narrowed down the list of suspects, and...you're their type."
Ryukyu looks disgusted by his words, "so at the end of it all, I am just a piece of meat to you."
"To them," Horizon clarifies. "But when we've got them tied up you can get some hits in to make up for it."
"That won't be necessary, seeing them arrested will be plenty."
"That won't be for a while unless they actually make us act tonight," Horizon says. "For now just getting into their phone is enough. The sooner I get my hands on Kurogiri the better."
"The thought of leaving criminals like that free makes my blood crawl, this is one of the reasons I prefer to just simply brawl with villains. Running investigations means you have to sit by while knowing heinous things are happening, but you have to leave them be until the boss shows himself. I just can't do that."
"That's the problem with Pro Heroes, too many of them only care about dressing like idiots and solving the obvious issues rather than look into the darker side of this world."
"I suppose I'm guilty of that as well."
"Yeah, but at least you admit it and know why, most are just oblivious to how much they care about the glory that comes with fighting villains in the streets. Plus you're actually effective at the path you chose."
"Well, its good to know you tolerate me for what I can do instead of my 'cool Quirk' or some nonsense like that."
"Well," Horizon shrugs. "You being sexy and having cool Quirk certainly doesn't hurt, even if you aren't a real dragon."
Ryukyu grits her teeth and grumbles out, "I am a real dragon."
"Whatever Kyukyu."
Ryukyu sighs, "you're the worst. And shouldn't we be leaving about now, the event has already begun."
"Mhm, time for the red carpet, I can have us there in one warp," Horizon says as he gets up, extending a hand to help her up.
She gracefully takes his hand and gets up, but he doesn't let do, so she simply keeps holding on as well.
"One warp? But the event is at least 30km away, and I thought your limit was 10km," she absentmindedly says, then tries to explain why she'd know that. "I heard you could warp around most of UA easily in the news and that's about its size right?"
Not enough of a lie for him to notice, if he was actually paying such close attention to her.
"Awe, you've been paying such close attention to me, maybe you're more into me than I thought," and Ryukyu is thankful that his arrogance blinded him to the possibility of what she and Pantu discussed. "But my limit was 10km, when I was 12---"
SHAMBLES!
They suddenly appear on a rooftop overlooking the entrance to the gala, which was flanked on either side of the walkway by the media excitedly taking pictures of every attending politician and socialite.
36km away.
Ryukyu's eyes go wide, knowing Horizon's slashes were seemingly only limited by the same range as his warping. Suddenly gaining a new sense of fear for standing against him.
He feels her grip onto his hand and holds her gently in return, "sorry, guess I should have warned you."
"Right, sorry," she lets go of his hand.
But she was oblivious to the inner workings of his Quirk, of his Room.
He raises his hand and summons the metal throwing card they warped with back into his hand, placed earlier this evening at this very spot.
Prepared in advance.
As was the Room he made, carefully placed so the lounge and this spot were at the edges of it, making the 36km diameter appear normal for him to warp across, when in most cases he only warps the diameter of his Room.
All for the sake of convenience for him and his date, but unbeknownst to him, this information would get back to Pantu within a day.
And they would simply assume his casual range is at least 36km. But that level of power was a few months away for him.
"That still amazes me," Ryukyu says as the look down to the crowds. "You can simply choose to be somewhere else, if you have something to swap places with, right?"
"Something like that, but needing to swap with something is...well, training wheels on a bike. Eventually I can simply be anywhere I want. And for certain places, I already can be."
"I've seen it, sometimes you warp about near your tower and people get it on video, you don't swap with anything. Its like you become the wind."
Horizon chuckles at the description she gives. "To me, space is just another road, spend enough time on it and eventually you'll be able to walk certain stretches blindfolded."
"I guess that sort of makes sense, well not really. But that's the point, right? Mystery Class: Quirks beyond human comprehension."
"Yeah, and eventually, I'll be able to do anything."
"Eventually, but right now, you're the god that can't even fly," she suppresses a chuckle while looking up at him.
Horizon just gives an annoyed sigh, "you people will never let me live that down huh, even the 'Dragon' that can't breath fire..."
"He---" he cuts off her response by reaching down and scooping her up in his arms in a bridal carry.
Her arms immediate wrap around his neck, almost feeling the muscles below his tuxedo and body glove trying to break free. "What are you doing?" she asks with a light red hue on her cheeks.
"Making an entrance, lets give the media something to talk about tomorrow."
SHAMBLES!
END CHAPTER---