The underworld of Musutafu had always been a noisy place. Deals made in back alleys, threats shouted in bars, the roar of getaway cars. But in the last two weeks, the underworld had gone quiet.
It was the silence of prey that knew a predator was circling.
Izuku stood atop a water tower in the Hosu district. The night wind whipped his yellow suit, but he didn't feel the cold. The Negative Speed Force kept his internal temperature burning like a furnace.
He tapped the side of his cowl. A police frequency scanner, built into the earpiece, chattered with static.
"Code 10-32. Armed robbery in progress. Fourth Street Bank. Suspects possess mutation quirks. Hostages reported. Requesting backup from Team Idaten."
Izuku's lip curled.
"Idaten," he muttered. "Ingenium's agency. They prioritize evacuation and perimeter control. Average response time: six minutes."
He looked at the digital watch on his wrist.
"I can do it in three seconds."
Red lightning crackled around his boots. The gravel on the roof levitated, caught in the rising updraft of his power.
BOOM.
The water tower shook as he broke the sound barrier, disappearing into a streak of crimson light.
Fourth Street Bank. 10:15 PM.
Inside the bank, chaos reigned.
A villain with skin like concrete, calling himself "Blockbuster," held a massive shotgun to the head of a teller. Three other villains, all wielding crude quirks, paced the lobby. Twenty hostages lay face down on the marble floor, sobbing.
"Shut up!" Blockbuster roared. "Or I'll paint the walls with her!"
Outside, sirens wailed. The flashing red and blue lights washed over the glass doors.
"The heroes are setting up a barricade," one of the lackeys said, peeking through the blinds. "We need a way out!"
"We have leverage!" Blockbuster yelled. "We kill one every five minutes until they give us a chopper!"
He racked the shotgun slide. The sound was loud, mechanical, and terrifying.
Then, the lights went out.
Not just the bank lights. The streetlights outside. The traffic signals. The entire block plunged into darkness as a massive electromagnetic pulse surged through the grid.
"What the hell?" Blockbuster shouted. "Flashlights! Now!"
A sound filled the darkness. A low, vibrating thrum. Vvvvrrrmmmm.
It seemed to come from inside the walls. From the floor. From their own teeth.
"Who's there?!" Blockbuster swung his shotgun wildly.
A pair of glowing red eyes opened in the corner of the lobby.
"You have five seconds," a distorted voice whispered from everywhere at once.
"Fire!" Blockbuster screamed.
He pulled the trigger. The muzzle flash lit up the room for a split second.
In that strobe-light instant, the villains saw him. A yellow demon standing amidst the hostages.
But before the buckshot could leave the barrel, the world turned red.
Izuku moved.
To the hostages, it felt like a sudden gust of wind passed over them.
To Izuku, the room was a still life painting. The buckshot pellets were suspended in the air, inching forward. He walked past them. He plucked the pellets out of the air, one by one.
He walked up to Blockbuster.
"Concrete skin," Izuku analyzed, circling the frozen villain. "High durability. Low mobility. You rely on intimidation."
Izuku placed the handful of shotgun pellets into the barrel of the villain's own gun. Then, he used his thumb to bend the steel barrel backward, curling it like a banana so it pointed directly at Blockbuster's chest.
He moved to the next villain—a man with blades for arms. Izuku vibrated his hand, creating a resonance frequency that shattered the blades like glass.
He moved to the third. He simply tied the man's shoelaces together. Then, he picked up the villain and rotated him 180 degrees.
He returned to his starting position.
Time resumed.
CRACK.
The shotgun fired. But because the barrel was bent, the gun exploded in Blockbuster's hands. The concrete villain screamed as shrapnel—and his own pellets—embedded themselves in his chest armor, knocking him flat on his back.
The bladed villain swung his arms, only to realize his weapons were dust. He stared at his stumps in horror.
The third villain tried to run, tripped over his tied laces, and slammed his face into the marble counter, knocking himself out instantly.
The lobby lights flickered back on, fueled by the residual static charge in the air.
The hostages looked up. The villains were decimated. Standing in the center of the room, vibrating so hard he was a blur, was the Yellow Phantom.
Blockbuster groaned, trying to stand. "You... you're a villain! You can't do this!"
Izuku walked over. He placed a boot on Blockbuster's chest.
"I'm not a hero," Izuku agreed, his voice vibrating the glass of the teller windows. "Heroes arrest you. They give you a trial. They let you go to prison where you get three meals a day."
Izuku leaned down, the red lightning arcing from his cowl to the villain's face.
"I am the consequence."
He vibrated his foot. A sickening crack echoed through the silent bank. Blockbuster howled as his ribs gave way.
"Stay down."
The glass doors shattered inward.
"FREEZE!"
Kamui Woods swung in, landing in a crouch, branches extending. Behind him, Death Arms and a squad of riot police rushed in.
They stopped dead.
They saw the carnage. They saw the terrified hostages unharmed. And they saw Zoom standing over the broken body of the leader.
"You again," Kamui Woods shouted, extending his wooden arm. "Lacquered Chain Prison!"
Wood shot forward, aiming to wrap Izuku up.
Izuku didn't dodge. He vibrated his molecules. The wood passed straight through his body as if he were a hologram.
Kamui Woods stumbled, his attack hitting the wall behind the speedster. "He phased?!"
Izuku turned slowly to face the heroes.
"You're late, Kamui," Izuku mocked. "The hostages were crying for three minutes. I resolved the situation in zero-point-four seconds."
"You used excessive force!" Death Arms yelled, stepping forward. "That man needs a hospital!"
"He was going to execute a woman," Izuku pointed out, gesturing to the sobbing teller. "I prioritized the innocent. You prioritize the procedure."
"Surrender!" Kamui Woods yelled. "We have you surrounded!"
Izuku laughed. It was a dry, hacking sound.
"Surrounded?"
He raised his arms. The red lightning flared, blindingly bright. The pressure in the room dropped, ears popping.
"I'm not trapped in here with you. You're just too slow to realize I've already left."
ZOOM.
A sonic boom shattered the remaining windows. Papers flew into the air like confetti. The heroes shielded their eyes from the dust.
When they looked back, the spot where Zoom had stood was empty.
On the chest of the unconscious Blockbuster, a piece of paper had been pinned.
Kamui Woods walked over and picked it up. It was a page torn from a notebook. Hero Analysis for the Future.
On it, a crudely drawn diagram of Kamui Woods' weakness—fire and rapid vibration—was sketched in red ink. Beneath it, a single sentence was scrawled:
You leave too many openings.
Kamui crushed the paper in his hand. "Damn it!"
A Rooftop, Three Blocks Away.
Izuku leaned against a ventilation unit, watching the flashing lights below. He peeled off his cowl, letting the night air hit his sweaty face. His hair was a mess, sticking up in green tufts.
He took a bite of a high-calorie energy bar, chewing mechanically.
He felt... hollow.
He had saved them. The hostages were going home to their families. The villains were off the streets. It was objectively a good deed.
But he didn't feel like a savior. He felt like a machine that had completed a task.
"Izuku?"
He froze. He spun around, vibrating his face instinctively, but stopped when he realized he wasn't wearing the mask.
Standing near the fire escape was a stray cat. It meowed, staring at him with yellow eyes.
Izuku let out a breath he didn't know he was holding. He slumped against the metal box.
"Just a cat," he whispered. "Just a cat."
He looked at his hands. They were shaking. Not from the speed, but from the violence. He had enjoyed breaking Blockbuster's ribs. He had felt a surge of dopamine when the man screamed.
That was the corruption. That was the Negative Speed Force eating away at his empathy, replacing it with arrogance and cruelty.
"I have to control it," Izuku told the cat. "I have to use it, not let it use me."
He pulled the cowl back on. The red eyes ignited.
The Sports Festival was close. He had to be sharper. colder.
He looked out at the city.
"I'm cleaning up your mess, All Might," the Reverse-Flash whispered. "One broken bone at a time."
He vanished into the night, leaving the cat to hiss at the lightning trail he left behind.