"A forest is an ecosystem characterized by a dense community of trees. Hundreds of definitions of forest are used throughout the world..."
-Wikipedia, "Forest"
There were a few seconds of blessed silence before the screaming inevitably started.
“WHAT THE FUCK?”
“We’re not on Earth?”
“But the idea of any interstellar-capable warp quirk is preposterous!”
“I make gravity my bitch and Todoroki completely ignores thermodynamics but you’re drawing the line at FTL travel?”
Everyone’s gazes snapped to Uraraka, taken aback by the swear.
She blinked in confusion before realization dawned on her face and she blushed. “I grew up around construction workers and I’m under a lot of stress right now, cut me some slack for forgetting to mind my language.”
Before anyone could recover enough to comment on that, Todoroki apparently decided that he wanted people’s bewildered attention instead.
“What if the night sky is an illusion maintained by world governments so they can make money off of people who believe in star signs?”
No one seemed to have a coherent response to that for a solid ten seconds as everyone just stared at him. “I…what?” Uraraka asked, completely befuddled.
Todoroki frowned, confused. “When I asked Fuyumi for advice on building and maintaining friendships she told me that cracking a joke can relieve tension.” His voice was as deadpan as usual, even as his eyebrows furrowed in thought. “And Natsuo once told me that stating something obviously false like that is considered funny.”
“Oh, so are all your conspiracy theories jokes, kero?” Tsu asked. “Like thinking that All Might and Midoriya are rela-”
“I fully stand by my theory that All Might is Midoriya’s father and nothing short of meeting this ‘Midoriya Hisashi’ in person will convince me otherwise.”
Once again conversation stalled, giving way to the ambient noises of the forest. Or it would have if not for Bakugo’s steadily rising volume of growling drowning out those ambient noises, that last comment from Todoroki seeming to gain his ire.
Before he could speak, however, Tokoyami Fumikage was the one to break the silence. “What a mad banquet of darkness.”
For once, Dark Shadow didn’t pipe up in his mind to call him an edgelord, for she was apparently just as perplexed as he was.
Fumikage’s statement seemed to cut through the rising tension, at least, and Bakugo just let off an annoyed sigh. “Alright, we’ll get to Icy-hot apparently not believing in Uncle Hisashi later.” Whirling around, he accusingly pointed a finger at Uraraka. “What the fuck do you mean about not being on Earth?”
Uraraka cringed and looked back up at the sky. “Exactly that,” she said. “There aren’t any constellations I recognize—northern or southern hemisphere—and the Moon is too big. And also doesn’t have the right crater patterns.”
Bakugo growled. “Well how the hell are we gonna get back?”
All at once, the reality of the situation sank in for the group. They were stuck quite possibly light-years from Earth and Kurogiri was nowhere around. Uraraka in particular paled, still desperately looking up at the sky. “I…I don’t know. This wasn’t supposed to happen. Shit.”
Tsu consolingly patted her shoulder. “You couldn’t have known, kero.”
“Yeah, but now we're trapped,” Uraraka emphasized. Her gaze returned to ground level, darting around everyone in the clearing. “We’re trapped on another planet and can’t get back and-” Her eyes landed on the unconscious Midoriya, still floating in the air from her quirk. Particularly, they landed on his arms. “And Deku’s hurt.”
She took a step forward, probably to reach out to him, and immediately her leg gave out. Tsu caught her before she hit the ground. “You are too, kero. You got stabbed, remember?”
Adrenaline’s a helluva drug, ain’t it? Dark Shadow said in Fumikage’s mind. She’s only just feeling the pain from getting stabbed. That blonde bitch better hope we don’t find her, else she’s gonna regret daring to hurt our friend.
Calm yourself, Dark Shadow, Fumikage commanded, wincing as he struggled to keep his quirk in line. Even though they weren’t particularly close to Uraraka, Dark Shadow had been feeling extra protective of the class since Shoji was injured.
At that thought, Fumikage had to focus once more on keeping Dark Shadow contained as he turned to look at Shoji. Todorki had given him his jacket earlier to act as an emergency tourniquet, but they would want to find something better soon. For both his injuries and the others’. “Perhaps we should take stock of our injuries before we continue with anything else,” Fumikage said.
Ida nodded in approval. “I agree! First aid is incredibly important in the field!”
“After that, we find shelter, a source of fresh water, and then we can worry about food,” Bakugo added, before grumbling at the others’ surprised looks. “What, have you extras never been camping before?”
Ida cleared his throat. “Ah, yes, Bakugo is correct. In any case, I am uninjured.”
Dark Shadow forced herself out of Fumikage without warning, but there was only a brief moment of panic before Todoroki lit his left side and she shrank to a manageable level. “Fumi and I are a-okay too!”
“Tch, Icy-hot and I made it out fine, too,” Bakugo said, his expression morphing into a feral grin. “Tooth fucker couldn’t land a single hit on us.” His gaze turned to the other four. “Obviously Deku and Shoji got hurt, but what about you two? You were fighting the knife bitch before we showed up, right?”
“I have a small cut that isn’t bleeding too bad. I can bandage it pretty easily,” Uraraka offered, an arm around Tsu to help her stand. She yawned. “But my main issue is blood loss from the syringe.”
Tsu nodded and opened her mouth, allowing her tongue to spill out of it a bit, revealing a nasty gash on it. “My tongue got cut pretty bad, kero. Not much we can do without gauze, though.”
With that, Shoji finally spoke up. “My own injury isn’t terribly severe,” he said, drawing incredulous stares from everyone as they gazed upon his missing arm. Gesturing with the other five, he removed the bloodied tourniquet to reveal new skin already covering the wound. “This was one of my extra arms; [Dupli-Arms] will have it regenerated within a day. Honestly, I’m most concerned about Midoriya.”
The teen in question was still floating, the remains of his shirt hastily wrapped around his arms in an effort to keep the breaks from getting worse. Based on the state of his right arm, though, that effort was futile. What skin they could see beyond the wrappings was purpled, looking eerily like what had happened to his hand in the Sports Festival, just applied to the entire arm.
Fumikage nodded gravely. “In combating the darkness, he seems to have given up much of his light.”
Edgelord, Dark Shadow commented.
Fumikage ignored her.
“We need something to splint his arms before we move him,” Ida commented.
Without a word, Todoroki stamped his right foot on the ground, generating an appreciable amount of ice. He carefully melted the base of two of the spikes before walking over to where Midoriya was floating, under a meter from Uraraka and Tsu. “Uraraka, float these.”
Uraraka, understanding what Todoroki was getting at, reached out at both of the ice spikes in turn, negating their gravity. Todoroki positioned the spikes next to Midoriya before taking his own shirt off, at which Uraraka blushed and looked away and Tsu let out a surprised croak.
Without any preamble, Todoroki began ripping his shirt apart. “We need something to secure the splint and I can thermoregulate the best of us here,” he explained.
“Ah, good thinking, Todoroki!” Ida praised. “That should last long enough for us to find splints that won’t melt.”
“I can get started looking for a cave or some shit while you take care of that,” Bakugo volunteered.
Uraraka yawned again. “Right, guess we’re following the Bakugo Wilderness Survival Guide,” she said.
“What was that, Round Face?”
Apparently deciding to push their luck, Tsu spoke up next. “You know, kero, I would’ve expected you to have blown something up by now, Bakugo. You’re being oddly calm, kero.”
Bakugo crossed his arms, clearly annoyed. “Oh I’m pissed at you extras for landing us here, but I can prioritize survival for now.” Under his breath, but unintentionally loud enough for Fumikage to hear, he added, “Besides, Auntie Inko would kill me if I let Deku or his shitty friends die on me.”
Dark Shadow broke down laughing in Fumikage’s mind.
“In any case,” Ida said, getting back on track, “Uraraka, could you float someone else? We may be able to search for shelter better at a higher vantage point!”
“Yeah, I’ve-” she was interrupted by another yawn—clearly the events of the evening had left Uraraka exhausted. “I’ve got a bit left in me. I’m just a bit queasy right now.”
Ida frowned. “If you’re unsure-”
“It’s fine,” Uraraka insisted. “Blasty, get over here.”
“Blasty?” Bakugo asked, sounding legitimately offended as he stalked over.
It seemed that the irony was lost on him.
“Too tired to care,” Uraraka retorted. “You can move midair with your explosions, right?”
Bakugo’s offended expression morphed into a grin as Uraraka reached out and removed his gravity. Immediately, even as Uraraka doubled over and tried not to lose her dinner, explosions sprung from his palms and he rocketed into the air.
Twenty seconds later, more explosions rang out as he descended back onto the ground. “Good news: I found shelter. Bad news: we might be dealing with shitty alien extras.” He pointed into the trees. “There’s a castle a few kilometers that way.”
Uraraka’s eyes seemed to sparkle, even as she fought back her nausea. “First contact,” she whispered in an almost reverent voice.
Dark Shadow’s mental laughter seemed to grow louder. There might be intelligent aliens involved and his first thought is to call them shitty extras?
Truly, Bakugo revels in the dark more than many of us, Fumikage thought back.
I’ve lived in your mind for fifteen years and I still have no idea what you mean by that.
Ida cleared his throat to once again bring everyone’s attention to him. He had helped Todoroki get the ice splints onto Midoriya’s arms and was now cradling their classmate. “Uraraka, if you could cancel your quirk-”
Before Ida could finish, Uraraka had already jammed her hands together. “Release!”
Ida grunted as he was suddenly carrying Midoriya’s full weight and Bakugo stumbled a bit as his weight returned. Midoriya let out an involuntary whimper in his sleep. “As I was saying,” Ida said, “I can carry Midoriya. Tsu, can you keep Uraraka standing?”
Tsu nodded with a ribbit, and Uraraka frowned at needing the assistance. She didn’t complain aloud, though.
“Shoji, stay close to the four of us,” Ida added. “I know your injury isn’t particularly bothersome, but keeping close would still be ideal.”
Shoji nodded.
“Four Eyes has got the right idea,” Bakugo said, and most of the others blinked in surprise at him agreeing with someone else. “I’ll take point and Icy-hot and Birdbrain can watch our flank. We don’t know what lives in these woods.”
“I must protest, Bakugo,” Ida retorted. “Tokoyami and Dark Shadow are effectively two sets of eyes, so it would be most beneficial to have Todoroki in the front with you.”
Bakugo crossed his arms. “Tch, I don’t really care. Just figure it out so we can get moving already.”
In the end, Ida’s suggestion won out. The walk, though, had been relatively peaceful so far, even if Asui Tsuyu’s instincts were constantly screaming at her that something dangerous was watching them. [Frog] didn’t give her any particularly heightened senses, but a frog’s natural position in the food web carried some instincts with it into her quirk. Including the generally good spatial awareness of prey animals.
Still, well over a kilometer into their trek through the forest, and those instincts hadn’t bore fruit yet. It was at the point that Tsu was finally allowing herself to relax a bit, considering that the general chill might be putting her on edge as well. It wasn’t enough to get her to start brumating, but it was still uncomfortable for her. Shivering a bit, she focused on her half-asleep friend.
Ochako was leaning hard on her right shoulder. The brunette’s left arm was wrapped around Tsu’s shoulders, and every step she took was lethargic. Now that the adrenaline had fully worn off, Tsu was honestly a bit amazed that she was still awake; she would’ve expected Ochako to crash hard after losing as much blood as she had. Still, Ochako soldiered on, fueled by sheer will to stay awake.
Every so often, though, her eyes would flutter shut before she jolted awake. After one such jolt, she yawned and spoke. “Hey, Bakugo, how much further’ve we gotta go?”
“Another kilometer or so, probably,” he said with a shrug. “What, you weaklings can’t keep up?”
Ochako grumbled in response and let loose a line of creative cusses under her breath that, frankly, left Tsu with quite a few questions on how she came up with them.
Before she could do much internal debating on whether or not to ask, though, a low growl rumbled out around the group. Immediately, progress stalled and everyone whipped their heads around looking for the source.
Tsu caught sight of it and paled. There, hidden in the trees, was a pair of glowing green eyes. As it got closer, Tsu saw what it was first, her excellent night vision paying off.
It was wolf-shaped, complete with a snarling snout and sharp claws. It stalked forwards, its mouth dripping as it prepared to pounce on its new prey. Taking a very quick glance around, Tsu saw Bakugo, Todoroki, and Tokoyami preparing to fight as three more of the creatures closed in on them. Ochako was wide awake by now, and Ida and Shoji had huddled closer together, looking out into the woods with narrowed eyes. Clearly, just like wolves, these creatures were pack hunters.
Tsu looked back at the creature, this time noting what made it quite unique compared to Earth’s wolves. The most obvious difference was that it was made entirely of wood, seeming to be a cobbled together amalgamation of sticks, branches, and leaves. In place of saliva, sap dripped from its wooden teeth, and rattling noises rang out with every step it took.
For a tense moment, everything was silent.
And then all hell broke loose as the wolves pounced.
Immediately, Tsu shoved Ochako into Shoji’s arms as she jumped, the wolf’s jaws clamping shut where she had been mere moments before. While she was in the air, she heard an explosion from Bakugo and the crackling of Todoroki’s fire, along with what she hoped was Dark Shadow slamming the fourth wolf into the ground.
But Tsu didn’t have time to look as she fell back down to the ground, one leg extended to kick the wolf directly in the back. She heard snapping as the strike connected and her leg went cleanly through the wolf, throwing off her predictions as she found herself suddenly riding the creature with her left leg while her right was embedded in its back. Reacting quickly, though, Tsu shot her tongue out at the creature’s head, wincing as it aggravated the knife wound. It proved to be worth it however, more snapping sounds signifying the creature’s decapitation—her tongue packed enough force behind it for the blunt trauma to the back of the wolf’s head to separate it from the body.
Tsu braced her left leg against the ground as the wolf’s legs collapsed, looking around as she wrenched her right leg from the creature’s body. True to her thoughts, Dark Shadow had completely pulverized the wolf that had been behind them, while Bakugo’s had been reduced to sticks and spread everywhere and a pile of ash was all that was left of Todoroki’s wolf. With her leg freed, Tsu made her way back to her injured classmates, once again helping Ochako stay upright.
Bakugo laughed, and in Tsu’s opinion it sounded rather deranged. “Hell yeah! No shitty wolf is standing up to the future number one!”
“I will admit,” Tokoyami said as Dark Shadow retreated inside of him, “that was rather anticlimactic.”
Shoji shot him a glare. “Well, now you’ve jinxed it.”
“I doubt that superstition will come into play,” Ida mentioned. “After all, it seems unlikely that-”
Ochako cut him off. “Hey, is it the exhaustion talking, or are the sticks floating for you guys too?”
True enough, many of the sticks that had been strewn around them from Bakugo’s explosions were floating with a green glow. Collectively, they shot off into the woods behind them, before beginning to coalesce into another, larger wolf. Panicked, Tsu quickly looked back to where she’d dealt with her own wolf, and her eyes widened as she saw that it had reformed as well. Still snarling, still dripping sap, and importantly, still ready to pounce.
And she didn’t have time to dodge this time.
All Tsu could do was shove Ochako to the ground to get her out of the way, but her positioning dragged Tsu down with her. Panicking, Tsu thrust her left arm out to try and do something, and screamed in pain when the wolf bit down on it.
Thankfully, whatever this was wasn’t strong enough to break bone and the bite missed her arteries, but that didn’t make it hurt any less. Reflexively lashing out, she scored a kick to one of the wolf’s legs and punched it directly in the snout with her other arm, but both failed to get it to let go.
What did get it to relinquish its hold on her arm was the veritable swarm of arms that came from Shoji. He grunted as two of his extended hands found purchase on the wolf’s snout, wrenching it open and freeing Tsu. Simultaneously, a third hand punched straight into the wolf’s neck, decapitating it once again.
He didn’t stop there, though. His duplicated arms continued across the wolf’s torso, ripping it stick from stick. Unfortunately, that just gave the giant wolf behind them more material, but Tsu had stopped paying attention to that as she clamped down on the wound with her right hand to try and stem the bleeding.
Ochako was at her side in an instant, frantically trying to rip off a piece of her T-shirt to wrap around Tsu’s arm. “Shit,” she swore as her fingers slipped and she failed to get the right purchase to actually rip the fabric.
Thankfully, she wouldn’t need to, as once Shoji was done with the wolf he reached over to put pressure on the wound. “Uraraka,” he said, “if you float her and yourself I can carry both of you and keep pressure on the bite.”
A determined look came over Ochako’s face as she nodded. She went green as she negated both her and Tsu’s gravity, but managed to keep it in—apparently the nausea training at camp had paid off.
As soon as they were secure, with Shoji keeping pressure on the wound with two of his arms and carrying Tsu with the third on that side of his body, Ochako shouted. “Tsu’s injured! We need to move now!”
Bakugo, predictably, instead charged directly at the newly formed giant wolf, and Tsu could clearly see him fly towards it as she looked over Shoji’s shoulder. “I’m not backing down from a fight!”
He got up near the wolf’s head and unleashed a massive explosion, sending sticks everywhere. Said sticks just as quickly launched themselves back into the wolf, and the only thing that saved Bakugo from literally having his head bitten off was Dark Shadow springing out to grab him and pull him back.
“You owe me and Fumi one,” she said.
“Todoroki!” Tokoyami called out as he ran back to the group, Bakugo still in Dark Shadow’s grasp.
Todoroki stepped forward and unleashed a giant column of flame from his left side, almost completely enveloping the wolf. For a moment, they waited with bated breath, hoping that this would be enough to kill the creature for good.
Panting slightly, Todoroki let up on the flame, only to reveal that the wolf had coated itself in sap, which, while it was smoking slightly, had prevented it from burning to a crisp. Even those parts of it which had burnt away were quickly reforming, dragging random sticks from around the forest and even ripping a live branch off of a tree.
“Its sap must be fire retardant,” Todoroki noted. Switching strategies, he planted his right foot securely on the ground and recreated his Sports Festival fight against Sero.
In an instant, a massive glacier had sprung into existence, trapping the wolf inside. Tsu shivered, even with Shoji’s body warmth there to help, and there was a flicker of flame from Todoroki’s left side as he warmed himself up after that attack.
“I don’t know if that’ll hold it,” he said. “Like Uraraka said, we need to move now.”
The ice cracked, and everyone agreed. Except for Bakugo, but he was outvoted and even he wasn’t so blinded by his ego to throw his life away over this.
They’d gotten a bit over a hundred meters away when they heard the glacier shatter, and the wolf let out a bone-chilling howl. Bakugo growled as he whirled around. “Four Eyes, Arms, you’ve got our wounded. Make a run for it while the rest of us hold it off. We’ll catch up later.”
“I cannot justify simply leaving you all agai-”
“Ida, I love you like a brother, but if you don’t get to that damn castle before Deku’s splints melt I will throw you into the sun!”
Ida seemed to have a mental debate with himself at Ochako’s declaration, but he quickly relented. He and Shoji gave Bakugo, Todoroki, and Tokoyami a parting nod before turning around and revving [Engine].
The next five minutes were a blur for Tsu as she barely fought off unconsciousness, both from exhaustion and the fact that her left arm was still in a lot of pain. Occasionally, they would hear an explosion rock the forest, or hear Dark Shadow’s bestial roar, or see the tips of Todoroki’s ice attacks.
Before long, though, they broke out of the trees and into a giant clearing, and Tsu grinned as she looked in front of them and saw the castle they were gunning for. Granted, it didn’t look inhabited. Many of the towers were collapsed and several walls had caved in, but the stone structure was still shelter.
Unfortunately, it was on the other side of a chasm.
“Damn,” Shoji said. “Uraraka, you awake?”
Ochako shot him a death glare. “I’m barely holding it together as is, I can’t float all of us across.”
“Todoroki should be able to make us a bridge!” Ida mentioned.
“Great, kero, we need one of the ones we left behind,” Tsu deadpanned.
Ida frowned, looking down at Midoriya in his arms. “Shoji, could you-”
“I can’t carry him, too,” Shoji said. “All five of my working arms are occupied.”
Ida grumbled. “I suppose we have to wait, then.”
As if fate was toying with them (and with the day they’d had, Tsu couldn’t really rule that out), a haggard-looking Todoroki, Bakugo, and Tokoyami stumbled out of the trees. Bakugo immediately fixed the group with a glare. “The fuck are you extras standing around for?”
“Todoroki! Bridge!” Ochako shouted, at this point seemingly giving up on using enough energy to form complete sentences.
At least Todoroki seemed like he got what he needed to do, as he ran up to the chasm’s edge and stomped down his right foot, connecting the two cliffs with an ice bridge. Ida, Shoji, and their passengers were the first to cross, followed by Tokoyami, then Bakugo, and finally Todoroki. Just as he made it to the opposite cliff, the wolf charged out of the trees towards them.
At this point, the thing was massive and barely even looked like a wolf anymore. It seemed to have an entire tree—albeit a small one—for one of its legs, even. Its howl rattled everyone there down to their very bones, and it charged forward, right for the bridge that Todoroki had made.
Acting quickly, Todoroki slammed his left hand down onto their side of the bridge, rapidly melting through it and weakening the ice. The wolf only made it a quarter of the way across before the bridge shattered underneath it, and it made one last yelp before it plunged into the foggy depths below.
Ten seconds later, they heard a massive crashing and shattering sound as thousands of sticks, branches, and even a few entire trunks hit the ground and the wolf creature was claimed by the forest’s night.
After a tense moment to see if the thing would reform again and somehow climb the side to kill them, everyone finally relaxed. It wasn’t getting back up.
“Well,” Tsu noted, “that was terrifying, kero.”
“Heh, wolf shit couldn’t hold a candle to me!” Bakugo said, his bravado instantly returning now that they weren’t in a life-or-death situation.
Choosing to ignore him, the rest of them turned to the castle. “Well, I suppose for now we should set up camp for the night in there,” Ida said. “We’ll need a makeshift infirmary for Midoriya, Uraraka, and Tsu.”
“‘M fine,” Ochako sleepily complained, having her second adrenaline crash in the same night. “Just tired.”
Shoji nodded at him regardless. “Tomorrow, we should try and find a river. Todoroki can boil any water we collect to get rid of bacteria.”
Ochako suddenly found a bit more wakefulness. “Shit. We’re on another planet. We don’t have any immunity to their diseases and I don’t wanna go out like the Martians did in War of the Worlds.”
Todoroki carefully considered that. “I will be extra sure to boil any water we find before it’s drunk.”
“When the light arrives to chase away the darkness, we shall further our quest,” Tokoyami said. “For now, we rest.”
Dark Shadow rolled her eyes as well as a shadow demon could at his theatrics.
Carefully, the group stepped into the castle through one of the broken walls. Had Tsu been more awake, she would have taken the time to admire the stonework and the iconography adorning many of the walls, but right now she was just about ready to collapse and sleep for a week.
Thirty minutes later, with her wound bandaged and laying on what was left of some sort of tapestry, however, her thoughts turned in a direction that sent Tsu sitting bolt upright.
“We weren’t the only ones in that portal, kero.”
Tokoyami, who had agreed to take the first watch—who knew what creatures might be lurking around in the castle—looked back at her with wide eyes. A grimace formed around his beak as Dark Shadow popped out to vocalize the question they all had.
“Where the hell is the League?”
“Where the hell are we, Kurogiri?”
“I am unaware of our current location, Dabi.”
“Yeah, well, your coordinates for the bar opened to the middle of the fucking ocean, so we better figure it out quick.”
“Gentlemen, please, I am certain we can resolve this civilly.”
“Shut the fuck up, Compress.”
“Oh, what if we’re in the Sahara! We’re in another universe, moron.”
Toga Himiko giggled to herself as her companions shouted at each other. Sure, it was weird that whatever Ochako-chan had done had sent Kurogiri to this desert, but today was still great! She got to meet Tsu-chan and Ochako-chan and Izuku-kun and all of them had such pretty blood. She shivered at the thought of finally breaking open the syringe she had of Ochako-chan’s blood and getting to taste it.
Currently, they had just come upon a city. Despite it being nighttime, there was still a bunch of hustle and bustle in the local marketplace, but based on the number of stalls it was probably much busier during the day. Himiko bounced on the balls of her feet as she got a good look at the inhabitants.
Huh, that was a lot of heteromorphs. And a lot of them were similar to each other, maybe there was a family reunion going on? Idly, Himiko was wondering how they’d look covered in blood when a thought crossed her mind. Most heteromorph families still had distinct members, and there were only three or so different species involved!
Hmm, maybe Twice’s alternate universe idea was spot-on.
Suddenly, Himiko gasped as she caught sight of an anthropomorphic cat. He had mostly brown fur with some white accents, along with a shock of purple fur between his ears, but what caught Himiko’s attention was his coat. Particularly the color. It was a beautiful blood red, and she wondered how his blood would taste.
He was wandering between stalls, chatting up the people running them, when his green eyes centered on the group of humans. “Hey, everyone!” Himiko gleefully shouted, snapping the rest of their attention to her and interrupting the latest argument between Dabi and Compress. “The cat’s coming to talk to us!”
Dabi rolled his eyes. “Yeah, but wherever here is, I don't think they speak Japanese.”
A deep chuckle from the approaching figure cut off any retort. “Well, I’d hope that harmony magic keeps the translations running!” The cat grinned. “I can’t say I’ve ever seen any of your species before, though. The name’s Capper.” He bowed extravagantly, and Himiko swore she could feel Compress judging a fellow showman. “Welcome to Klugetown. What can I do you for?”