MHA: Horizon(Ope-Ope No Mi)

Chapter 273: (FORMER Pro Hero Ryuko Tsuchikawa)

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CHAPTER START---

CRASH!

The sound of glass shattering has Ryuko looking up from the chopping board.

She wears her usual pair of shorts and a t-shirt, preparing a special meal for when Horizon arrives in Tokyo tonight, only to look up and see Gentle Criminal rolling into the hallway, La Brava tucked under her arms.

Her eyes immediately focus on the laptop in La Brava's arms and more importantly, the camera she had facing Ryuko.

A surge of adrenaline, bolstered by a healthy dose of fear, not for the fact that she's staring down some villains, but fear of the outcome of her presence here being revealed, floods Ryuko's mind and body.

With no hesitation she places her hands on the granite countertop and activates Earth Flow, which launches the countertop directly at the villains.

In the same moment Gentle had thrown La Brava to the side before raising an arm to the projectile.

Blocking it with his forearm, he creates a few layers of elastic air between them to cushion the blow and launch it back toward the kitchen.

Never one to cause unnecessary harm to those who attempt to stop him, in the moment Gentle couldn't afford the few precious seconds to hold back.

Seeing Ryuko's left hand reaching for her phone, the thought of an angry Horizon arriving moments later spurred him to action.

"NO!" he yells while launching the granite countertop at her phone, bounced off his layers of elastic air.

CRASH!

It slams into her phone and the wall, along with her left hand. The bones in her left hand shatter and shrapnel riddles her forearm and causes many cuts across her body.

"Ahh!" Ryuko cries out as she falls back, a small stream of blood flowing down her forehead and covering her left eye as she looks at the villains.

"Sorry miss," Gentle says, looking genuinely surprised at what he just did. "But a maid wasn't in the plan, so if you could just stand down we'll---"

"I'm not a maid!" Ryuko yells as she uses her hand that's on the floor to activate her Quirk.

Suddenly the floor rises up to swallow La Brava and Gentle Criminal, breaking the laptop and camera first as it begins crushing them.

"Gen...tle," La Brava says between desperate gasps, each syllable releases air that the stone won't allow her to reclaim as it constricts her lungs.

"I...need...a boost...my love," Gentle forces out as he sees Ryuko forcing herself to stand.

"NNGH!" La Brava groans as both her and Gently Criminal begin glowing bright pink, clearly showing a transfer of energy from her to him.

He activates his Quirk on himself, making his body elastic to ease the pain and absorb some of the force before suddenly reversing it, sending the stone constricting him flying across the room.

He immediately turns to La Brava and rips apart the stone imprisoning her as she crumples to the floor, struggling to breathe.

"All our training in case we ran into Horizon, yet his maid is the problem," Gentle says.

"14 Minutes," was all La Brava said, snapping him back to his senses.

His eyes widen as he turns around, noticing Ryuko gone.

The moment she recognized his sudden power boost she bolted out of the room, down the hallway and to a security console built into the wall.

"What, but the alarm went off," Ryuko reads the screen, not understanding why the security protocols we're happening yet. "The laptop...she must be a hacker or something," she says while looking back down the hallway toward the kitchen.

Gentle rushes around the corner at that moment, spotting her, bleeding and with her left arm hanging limply at her side, and the moment their eyes met she touched the wall.

EARTH FLOW!

A large section of floor, wall, and ceiling moves toward him like a living landslide, but the man bounces off multiple surfaces and the air itself to move around it, finding himself rocketing back down the hallways after Ryuko.

He gets just a glimpse of blonde hair entering a room at the end of the hallway before it disappears.

"No!" he yells, knowing she likely went for a phone, and that La Brava's program only delays signals being sent by the tower itself.

As he's in mid-air rocketing down the hallway, all sides of it immediately collapses onto him, trying to crush him into paste.

With a twist he creates layers of elastic air like a tunnel guiding him all the way to the end of the hallway where he flips and lands on his feet.

Rushing through the door, still glowing pink thanks to La Brava's Quirk, he barely leans back in time to avoid a blade being swung at his neck.

He loses an inch off the front of his hair before tumbling to the side and standing to look at Ryuko with surprise in his eyes.

"You could have killed me..." he says, looking at the woman who held Scalpel in her one good hand.

He was confused by this, because the public didn't know there were two such swords.

But what concerned him more was the vicious and hateful look in Ryuko's eyes, tempered by fear and sadness, "you were trying to kill me," he mutters the realization as she lunges forward.

Now in Horizon's bedroom Gentle barely dodges slash after slash, some leaving shallow cuts across his outfit and body, but that's to his agility being boosted by his and La Brava's Quirks, they were merely superficial wounds.

Gentle makes the entire floor elastic as he pushes down against it, launching them both into the ceiling.

"Agh!" Ryuko yells as she slams into the ceiling while he makes the spot he hit elastic to soften his impact.

She then falls back to the hardened floor with a thud and a crack, feeling the familiar ache of broken bones through her body, and the new sensation of loose teeth rattling about her mouth.

Gentle lands just in front of her, looking at the battered woman laying on the floor, sword still in hand, and tries to understand what she could possibly be doing here to ruin the plans.

Already knowing Horizon would retaliate far more than they could have predicted due to this unforeseen complication, but they've come too far to quit now.

"A trophy," Gentle says as he reaches down to grab this Scalpel, but pauses for a moment, confused as the sword isn't there. "Wh---AHHHH!" he screams as it pierces his back, barely missing the heart.

Ryuko tilts her head to look up at him, having used all her focus to quietly have the floor swallow the sword and maneuver it to backstab him with it.

All in barely a moment.

Shocked by the intense pain Gentle freezes for a moment, then feels the sword being twisted, breaking bones and tearing his body apart with each motion.

He can't even catch his breath during the immense pain to activate his Quirk, and surely would be unconscious if not for La Brava boosting his body and Quirk to inhuman levels.

EARTH FLOW!

Ryuko places a palm on the floor and orders it to launch him into the ceiling, crushing him against it hard enough for him to break through to the roof.

The upper floors of Horizon Tower rumbles with the impact as this Scalpel clatters to the floor beside Horizon's bed.

On the rooftop, under the afternoon sun, Gently Criminal feels pain like he's never felt before.

His costume was torn up, his face battered, broken and bruised.

There was a 1.5 inch wound through his back and out his chest, only kept from being fatal by La Brava's Quirk and his internals became more elastic.

Forcing himself to get up, he crumples back to the floor, realizing his entirely right leg and foot were crushed in that last attack.

But even through all that pain, he grits his cracked teeth and forces himself to sit up, taking breaths that burn his throat and lunges each second, keeping one thought in his mind.

The only thing that truly mattered, now that he's had such a close call with death to put things into perspective.

"La Brava," he says, forcing himself to get back up and begins walking to the edge of the rooftop.

One floor below him, Ryuko also forces herself to stand, using Scalpel as a walking stick. Keeping her mind focused on all that she will lose if either of these people get away.

If the public learns about her being here.

If anyone learns about her and Horizon.

If any witnesses that can't be trusted should get away...

With that she stumbles out of their bedroom and down the hallway, using her Quirk to clear a path through the wrecked penthouse, easily finding her target.

"Ngh!" Ryuko tries and fails to speak through her shattered jaw and swollen mouth, causing herself to wince as she aims the blade at La Brava.

The much shorter villain was busy looking through any cabinet and drawer she could find for a trophy of sorts, waiting with much trepidation for the fight to be concluded so they could leave.

So its no wonder her eyes got teary when she turned around to see Ryuko pointing the blade at her.

"Gentle..." La Brava mutters, looking scared and confused at how Gentle could have possibly lost. "Gentle!" she screams desperately, getting no response.

Ryuko narrows her eyes at the villain and begins moving forward.

And in a desperate and heartbroken showing, La Brava haplessly rushes the woman, "what did you do to Gentle!" she screams while tears fall from her eyes, running at Ryuko and flailing about.

Ryuko doesn't hesitate to swing the blade, and La Brava feels a numb sensation in her right hand and right eye, followed by an indescribable heat as she screams out, falling back onto her butt.

"AHHHH!" She screams while raising her right wrist, the hand on the floor as she's bleeding out, she could also feel the warm blood and other fluids flowing down the right side of her face, and knew what her sudden lack of vision meant.

Ryuko doesn't hesitate and lunges forward, thrusting down at the woman's chest with the sword, but in that very moment.

CRASH!

Another pane of glass shatters as Gentle breaks back into the penthouse, launching himself at full force and drop kicking Ryuko in the side as she brings the blade down.

The tip of the blade was just inches away before he made contact, launching her into the nearby wall and collapsing the entire concrete wall on impact.

As Ryuko's launched into the other room, he drops to one knee, now finding it becoming harder and harder to breathe as La Brava's Quirk is weakening.

"La Brava my love, I believe that we must leave," he forces out as blood begins trickling down the edge of his mouth. "Our lives will be trophy enough..." he says while reaching down to pick her up.

"But Gentle---"

"No my dear, there will always be another show," he says while holding her at his side and quickly making their way to the window.

As they're leaving, La Brava's body begins losing sensation as a way to cope with the pain, allowing her to raise her left hand, her one remaining hand, and look at her watch.

"But we have 3 more min--- ACH!" her words become thick gargling suddenly.

Two steps from the window Gentle looks down at the love of his life cradled in his arms, and sees a massive katana blade protruding from her chest, through her back.

His mind goes blank for a moment before he looks back, only to see Ryuko sitting up in the pile of rubble, one eyeball shattered and most of her skin bruised or battered, face entirely swollen and chin split in two, looking at him.

At the last moment before she slammed into the wall, she used her Quirk to soften the impact, just barely keeping her in the fight, and in his panic over La Brava, he lost focus of his opponent.

"You---" Gentle's rage-filled outburst is cut short when Ryuko reforms the wall between them, forcing him to make a hard choice.

Either pursue revenge which would take time, or try to save his ally.

Understanding this he immediately took La Brava, sword and all, and leapt out of the window.

END CHAPTER---