Prologue
The streets were incredibly busy… as per usual. Tamaki watched as various street vendors offered food to his mentor, Fatgum, while they patrolled. Why did the streets always have to be so crowded? It was extremely overwhelming. All the chattering felt like it had completely enveloped him, trapping him in a state of constant anxiety as the voices seemed to wrap around his brain. Even though he tried to block them all out, the outcome was always the same. Not even imagining them all as potato people seemed to helped him.
“Do we really have to be patrolling during the busiest time of the evening?” he asked, though he already knew the answer to this question.
“If we don’t patrol when there are people around, then what’s the point?” Fatgum said before eating the takoyaki he had just acquired. “This is how we provide hope to the people in this city. But don’t worry. Sooner or later you’re going to find this a whole lot easier, just you wait! We’ve just got to work on that social anxiety of yours and you’ll be good as gold!”
Tamaki hung his head and pulled down on the hood to cover his face. He swore Fatgum had taken embarrassing him in public like this as a new hobby. “You have such high hopes for me. Sooner or later--”
“Hold on a second. Do you see that?”
He hesitantly lifted his hood and looked around, shifting his gaze to look up at Fatgum a few moments later. “See what?”
Fatgum furrowed his brows. He had stopped walking. “Just up ahead. It looks like someone is trying to push themselves through the crowd.”
Tamaki tried standing a little taller to try and see what Fatgum was talking about. It was easier for his mentor to spot, being the behemoth of a giant that he was, but after a brief scan of the people ahead of them, he could just make out the scene that he was talking about.
It took a few moments, but eventually they spotted the person that had been previously pushing her way through the crowd of people (who appeared as though they couldn’t care less, almost as if it were a usual occurrence to them - or perhaps they were drunk). A young woman, appearing to look around his own age (though perhaps a little bit older), was breathing quickly and shallowly. Her chocolate brown hair, dry with messy sections of white that mostly framed the right side of her face, was messy, adding to the disheveled look of her outfit. Her tanned skin looked pale, streaked with dirt, and visible scars could be seen across the bridge of her nose and upper right corner of her lip, and scales were scattered across the sides of her face.
She was dressed in a dirty, sky gray romper that was form fitting, torn along the hem of the shirt, around the neckline and sleeves, and was completely barefoot. Patches of what looked to be water danced along her skin, jumping to wherever someone bumped into her as if creating a barrier. Her eyes – one blue with dark lashes and the other a shade of sea green with white lashes – were frantically scanning her surroundings, and the longer he looked, he noticed that they almost had a cloudy look to them. The last thing that he noticed had been the metal shackles that were fastened around her wrists, extending to completely cover her hands. The shackles were attached by a simple chain short enough to prevent most movements, and what appeared to be some sort of metal necklace was around her neck.
What had happened to this girl?
Just as Fatgum had started towards her, the girl’s eyes landed on them. Without any hesitation, she ran over to them, eyes wide and fearful.
“Please- I don’t know what’s happened to me,” she rushed, her words spilling out all at once. “I- I think I escaped. But they’re right behind me. Please! They’ve gotta be–”
Fatgum held his hands out placatingly. “Just slow down a sec. Who is after y--”
She suddenly turned to Tamaki, holding up her shackled hands clasped together as she pleaded. “You’re heroes, aren’t you? You have to- Please do something! I don’t- I don’t know where I am! I don’t know what’s happened to me, but I know it’s been years. I was just- The living room. I was there one second doing my hair before Papa Might stopped by and then--” She took a step closer to him, grabbing hold of the straps to his purple vest with trembling hands. “Aizawa! Please. You have to get my father, Aizawa! He’s- He’s gotta be so worried!”
“’Papa Mi--” His eyes widened. “Wait. You’re father is Mr. Aizawa? Who--”
Fatgum looked like he had seen a ghost, frozen with shock. “You’re Scylla Aizawa?” he asked in near disbelief. “You can’t be serious. Are you really–”
The girl, allegedly named Scylla, nodded, tears pooling in the corners of her eyes. “Please,” she begged, shaky voice barely above a whisper. “I don’t- Everything is so hazy one moment and clearer the next. I can’t- You can’t let them take me again. You’re pros. You can- You can help me. You can help them. Please, I have to get back to my father. Please--”
A sharp, high pitched whistle rang out over the crowd of unassuming people, and Scylla grimaced, letting go of him and reaching up to the metal necklace as she seemed to have been pulled back. As she yelped, some unknown force yanked her back towards the entrance of a dark alley way. The whole situation was so bizarre that it took them several moments before they shook themselves out of their baffled state and raced after her. Even the alley was unusually empty.
“Suneater, come on! Scylla, stop! We can help you!” Fatgum called after her. “Just come back here!”
But it was to no avail. She didn’t stop until she was finally standing in front of someone cloaked in the shadows, hardly visible. She began to beg the person to let her go, repeatedly saying that she didn’t want to go back as tears rolled down her cheeks. She was trembling.
“Stop! Let her go!” Fatgum shouted, putting as much authority as he could into the order.
Tamaki took a defensive stance. “You have no right to take that young woman!”
“Right or not…” the eerie voice of the mystery person started slowly, revealing themselves to be a woman. The sound was chilling to the bone, and Tamaki nearly took a step back out of fear alone. “She belongs to us. Our token monster has an arena to return to, and I’m not getting paid to watch her.”
Token monster? Tamaki stiffened. What kind of person would refer to anyone as a “token monster”?
Clearly Scylla wasn’t a fan of the nickname. Her eyes seemed to glow brighter, her hair starting to sway in non-existent wind as her breathing quickened in anger.
“Oh, now don’t do that,” the figure purred. A thin, pale hand lifted from the shadows, metal jewelry slipped over her hails to look like claws, holding some small, strange black box in the palm of her hand. She flipped a switch on the side, and an eerie, alluring melody started playing, filling the alley.
Tamaki watched in horror as all the fight seemed to vanish instantly from Scylla. She straightened, hands dropping as her eyes clouded over. Her face became expressionless, though a few stray tears gradually rolled down her cheeks before racing to the ground. How could the device completely take away her free will, yet have no effect on him or Fatgum? Could it have been the result of this mystery woman’s quirk?
“What’ve you done to her?” Fatgum demanded. He went to take a step forward, and was immediately stopped by dozens of metal scraps that had been littered around the alley. They sharpened until all ends were razor sharp, glistening in the moonlight. Every shard surrounded him and Tamaki, covering every possible exit.
“You so much as take one more step, if you even think about standing up against me, then I will not hesitate to use these against you. And I will warn you now: my aim has been, and will always be flawless,” the mystery woman threatened, her voice low and leaving no room to doubt her warning. She flicked another switch, adding a second layer of music over the original tune. Scylla, like some puppet, started singing softly with it - a beautiful, mythical sound. It was almost as if angels had begun singing. “I will take my token monster with me, and you will stay here. Do I make myself clear?”
After a few moments of simply listening, the thought occurred to Tamaki that maybe he could try and use his quirk to knock the strange device out of the woman’s hand. But… he didn’t want to. What was the point anyway? He didn’t have to use his quirk at that moment. Besides, the woman had said that they were supposed to let her leave with Scylla. He didn’t want to offend her by disobeying a direct order. Not to mention he just didn’t see a need to use his quirk just then.
What was so bad in just… letting them go?
