***

The first thing Hiromi noticed about the hospital was how quiet it was. You could hear each of their footsteps as they walked. You could hear each breath they took and could even hear the swishing of their clothes. Another thing that was noticeable was how dark it was. Hiromi could barely see a few feet in front of her. It was just complete darkness as far as she could see. She hated every second of it.

You could tell that the hospital had been abandoned for a while. Some of the tiles on the floor were cracked and the wallpaper had tears in it. Trash lay around in the corners of the hallway and in the rooms. If Hiromi hadn't been here for a job then she would have stayed 50 feet away from this place.

"It's really creepy in here, isn't it?" Atsushi seemed to have the same thoughts as Hiromi.

"I think it's refreshing, actually," Dazai commented. Hiromi just shot him a side-eyed look. It was hard to tell if he was actually being serious. Knowing him, it could literally be a joke or something he was actually serious about. The group was led by Dazai and Atsushi while Hiromi and Kunikida hung back. Dazai had his hands stuffed in his pockets while they walked past some broken equipment, "Really gets my blood pumping."

The thrill factor of it was something that a lot of people enjoyed. It was the reason why so many people liked rollercoasters. They liked the feeling of not being in danger, but also not being entirely safe. Hiromi would never understand why people like that kind of stuff and she doubted that she ever would. So many things have happened to make her stay clear of that feeling.

A glare was shot at Dazai by Kunikida. The long-haired man was hunched over with his arms crossed, "You'd better not have eaten another weird mushroom." He reminded Hiromi of those parents that are always on their child's back, constantly lecturing them about what they're doing them... Oh, well, Kunikida and those parents were basically one and the same to her.

"No, he's good," Hiromi responded to his statement. "I have a feeling that we would know if he did." They would definitely know. With how Dazai acted from the mushroom had eaten earlier that day, it would be hard to miss.

The tone of voice Dazai spoke with made it clear that he was only trying to get a rise out of his partner, "You seem a little jumpy, Kunikida."

"Is he afraid of ghosts or something?" Atsushi innocently inquired.

"I- I'm not afraid of ghosts!" The stutter in Kunikida's voice was enough of an answer for them.

It was surprising to think that Kunikida could be scared of anything. Hiromi had always thought of him as fearless, not scared of anything that could be thrown at him. Maybe being off schedule or losing his notebook was a fear of his, but other than that, she thought he wasn't scared of much. It might be more of a fear of the unknown for him. He had his life planned out to the last detail, not knowing must be terrifying to him.

It didn't seem like anyone had any pity for him. Dazai only told him, "Don't fall behind then."

"Haven't you ever seen a horror movie?" Kunikida asked. "The person who goes first is always the first to die!"

As if the universe decided to curse Hiromi, Kunikida's words brought on a flashback...

Hiromi had been young, probably around the age of seven. The little girl was being dragged by her arm to a couch with a TV situated on the floor in front of it. The man who had been holding tightly onto her arm forced her to sit down while he turned the TV on and switched the channels. She knew exactly what was going to happen. They did this every time she didn't listen... And every time she hated it.

The familiar sound of screams filled her ears. She flinched at the noise and brought her knees up to her chest, wrapping her elbows around them. Hiromi buried her face in her knees. A growl could be heard by the man beside her. The next thing she knew, Hiromi could feel a harsh grip on her hair, forcing her to look at the TV. "Watch it!" A horror movie was playing. Hiromi hated horror movies. She hated them for one reason. "If you don't do what we say then you'll be killed just like that."

Tears filled the little girl's eyes as she sniffled. She shook her head, pain twinging on her scalp as her hair was pulled from the motion, "I don't want to be killed. Please don't let me get killed. I don't wanna die." If the girl could see through her tearful eyes, she would have seen the dark smirk on the man's face.

A hand on Hiromi's shoulder brought her out of the flashback. She jumped and almost went to punch whoever touched her until she realized it was only Atsushi. "Sorry!" He exclaimed. He quickly took his hand off of her shoulder. "I didn't mean to scare you. Are you okay?"

That was when Hiromi took a second to study her surroundings. She was in the abandoned hospital with Kunikida, Dazai, and Atsushi. They had stopped walking, probably realizing that she had been frozen in place. She wasn't there. She wasn't back there. Atsushi had a worried look on his face while Kunikida looked confused. The only one who seemed to understand why she had reacted the way she did was Dazai. He thankfully didn't bring it up. Hiromi nodded in response to Atsushi's question and flashed him a smile, "Oh, yeah! I'm great," The girl made her way to the front of the group. "Let's just go back to looking around."

The four of them moved on like nothing had happened and Hiromi was happy with that. She was dreading the conversation that would no doubt happen if they stayed on the topic. They continued to walk until they eventually ended up at a stairwell. Upon taking a closer look, Hiromi noticed something off about the stairwell.

She wasn't the only one who noticed it, "Look at these footprints..." Atsushi had said. "They're still fresh."

There were footprints but the hospital was supposed to be abandoned. It could have easily been some people who were just wanting to mess around. It wasn't uncommon for people to hang out in abandoned buildings. There was only one set though so what could this person have been doing here?

The answer to Hiromi's question came much quicker than she thought it would. A sudden yell bounced off the walls and filled the group's ears, "Somebody help me!"

All of them looked up from the footprints at the sound of the yell. "You hear that?" Hiromi nodded in response to Atsushi's question. It was hard to miss a scream that loud.

"Down there!" Kunikida gestured to the bottom of the stairs. The group didn't waste a single moment in running down the stairs and toward the direction of the shout. As they got closer, Hiromi was sure that she could hear running water. They eventually ended up at a doorway. Kunikida was the first to run inside with Hiromi running in right behind him. The sight they were met with was a little shocking. There was a tank in the room that was being filled with water. Inside the tank was a woman with long, dark hair who was only wearing her undergarments. She was holding the bars at the top of the tank until her grip loosened and she fell to the bottom. "What is this?!"

A gasp escaped Kunikida at the sight of the woman sinking. He was quick to take out his gun and fire two shots at the glass of the tank. The gunshot caused the glass to shatter which in turn made the water drain out. The group helped the woman out of the tank and she coughed, finally able to breathe.

How long had she been in that tank? It had to have been a while since she clearly lost the strength to hold onto the bars at the top. It was the only thing that kept her from sinking. Kunikida inspected the tank while Atsushi and Dazai were bent down in front of the girl, checking on her. Hiromi stood, just watching the interaction.

"Thank you so much... You saved my life." The woman finally spoke.

Smiling, Hiromi reassured her, "No need to thank us, really. We're just doing our job."

"Still..." The woman insisted. She grasped the coat that Dazai lent her and tugged it closer to her body. It was pretty cold in here and being submerged in water probably didn't help much. "My name is Sasaki Nobuko. I'm a lecturer at one of the Universities in Tokyo."

Atsushi turned to Dazai, "So that would make her victim number twelve, wouldn't it?"

No response was given to him. Hiromi thought the answer was obvious but she was confused. Where were the rest of the victims? Were they already dead and their bodies disposed of? Dazai had a different, but still important, question in mind, "Did you happen to see who it was who abducted you?"

Looking up, the woman, Sasaki she called herself, met Dazai's eyes, "I didn't. I blacked out back at the train station. When I came to, I was drowning in that tank, just as you all came in."

It must have been terrifying. Who wouldn't be scared when they suddenly wake up to find that they're drowning in a tank filled with water? But how did she even hear them? Being underwater made noises muffled. Were their voices echoing this far?

"Dazai, what's your take on the situation?" Kunikida asked.

What none of them expected, but they really should have, was Dazai saying, "I'd say she's sexy as hell."

A sigh of frustration escaped Hiromi's mouth. She hit the back of his head and exclaimed, "This is not the time, Dazai!" The man didn't even look like he regretted it. He literally just hit on the victim they saved.

It wasn't hard to see that Sasaki was flustered by his words. Atsushi just stared at Dazai with a look of surprise. Kunikida placed his hands on his hips, "Not helpful!"

The long-haired man glanced away when Sasaki turned to look at him, "Hey, I think there might be other people who were trapped in this building as well," Kunikida gasped at this information. "Before I blacked out in the tank," That caught Hiromi's attention immediately. Sasaki said that she passed out at the train station and didn't wake up until they had come in. Now she's saying that she passed out in the tank? Maybe she passed out for a second when she let go of the bar. It could even just be her brain getting the details mixed up because of scared she was. "I was sure I heard voices."

Getting over the embarrassment he felt looking at a near-naked woman, Kunikida finally turned to look at her, "Is that so?"

"There's a good chance it's the other victims." Hiromi was relieved to know that they hadn't been killed already. That doesn't mean that they were out of the clear yet.

This was all it took for the group to start checking all of the rooms for any signs of life. They kicked in the doors if they had to, no stone was going to go unturned. They needed to find the other victims or they were as good as dead. Thankfully, Atsushi seemed to find something because he called out, "Mr. Kunikida!" Kunikida turned to him and Hiromi ran over as well. Atsushi was standing in a doorway at the end of the hall. A blue light illuminated the room he was standing in, "I found them!"

The first one to run in was Kunikida. Just like Atsushi had said, the victims were in fact found. They were all in their underwear like Sasaki was. The only difference was that while Sasaki was placed in a tank, they were placed in a big prison together. The walls were see-through so that they could easily see in.

Once the victims noticed them, two of the men started banging on the walls. They were calling out for help. Kunikida ran up to the prison, "Just hang on!" He tried to help them out, trying to find any keypad or button to let them out.

The urge to use her ability to help was strong. The only problem was that Hiromi had no idea how it would even help. She could use lightning to blast the wall, but what if that just made things worse? Their hesitance and uncertainty about what to do didn't help them out in the slightest. Not even a second later, gas started to be sprayed into the room they were in and in the prison.

It was at this moment that Dazai ran in, "Get back, Atsushi, Hiromi! It's gas!"

The green-haired girl wasted no time in covering her nose and mouth with the collar of her shirt, "This was probably the plan the whole time!"

The next thing Dazai said was directed at Kunikida, "We've gotta get out here!"

Completely ignoring what Dazai said, Kunikida banged on the wall of the prison, "Hey! Do you hear me? Look at me!" The victims inside started to get strangled by the gas.

It wasn't going to be long until the same started to happen to them. It was heartbreaking that they weren't able to help them, but they couldn't die too. Their killer would get away. So Hiromi grabbed Atsushi's arm and started to lead him out of the room, "Come on, let's get out of here already."

By the look on his face, Atsushi looked unsure about leaving them, "But what about Dazai and Mr. Kunikida?"

There was no doubt in her mind that they would be able to make it out okay. She had complete faith in them. Hiromi voiced her thoughts to the weretiger, "They'll be fine!" Hiromi pushed him in front of her and they started running, "Now go!"

***

That night, Hiromi had a nightmare. It was about the same scene that she had witnessed in the hospital. Her just sitting there, watching as the victims died from the poison gas again. When the moment had been unfolding in front of her, in real life not in the dream, she had been acting purely on adrenaline. The emotions she had been feeling weren't processed yet. That's when they decided to appear in her dream in an attempt to have her face them. All it did was give her dark circles under her eyes that she covered up with makeup. She didn't want any questions about it.

When Hiromi had been on her way to work, she passed the newspaper stand. She cast a glance at it before walking past it. Suddenly, she realized that the person in the picture looked familiar. So the girl backtracked and stared at the newspaper. The person in the picture was familiar because it was someone she knew. It was Kunikida. The picture was the moment that the victims had died from the poison gas and it showed Kunikida trying to help them. Hiromi grabbed the newspaper and stared at it, trying to figure out if she was dreaming or not.

A chuckle sounded from beside her, "Oh, yeah," She looked up to see it was the guy selling the newspaper. "Got that in this morning. Article is blaming the Armed Detective Agency for the deaths that happened," What he said next caused anger to bubble up inside Hiromi, "What can you expect though? Their agency is filled with ability users. Everyone knows they're no good. Trouble follows them around everywhere, might as well be villains-" His words were cut off by a punch being delivered to his nose. He brought his hands up to cover his nose which now had blood pouring out of it. He groaned, "I think you broke my nose!" He looked up to see that she was walking away with the newspaper, "Hey! Missy, you have to pay for that!"

The only thing she did was glance back at him, throw up her middle finger, and shout, "Fuck off!" Before continuing her walk to the Agency. She could tolerate someone talking to her like that, but no one was going to talk to her family like that.

With the only thought in her mind being to get to the Agency, Hiromi had completely forgotten to get herself her usual hot chocolate. Atsushi was the first person to see her enter the Agency. He was sitting at his desk and sent a concerned look at her when seeing how angry she seemed to be, "What's wrong, Hiromi?"

"This," Hiromi threw the newspaper down onto Atsushi's desk. The newspaper was crumpled up from how tightly she had been holding onto it. Kunikida came over to check out what she had given Atsushi. "I was walking here when I saw this at the newspaper stand."

Picking up the newspaper, Atsushi scanned the text and read it out loud for them all to hear, "'Victims of Yokohama's recent serial abductions were located, but all died when a private detective agency of ability users conducted a raid,'" Hiromi took the newspaper back and scanned the rest of what it said. It was exactly as the man she punched had said. People were blaming them for their deaths. "They all... Died." Atsushi's voice was soft like he was still in shock at what happened.

"This must've been the enemy's objective." Kunikida said.

That brought Hiromi back to her original point when they first case got the case, "What did I say about anonymous tips again? Oh, right. They're almost always traps." The girl was filled with so much anger, punching that guy from before didn't even get rid of all of it. Hiromi was just overwhelmed by the emotions that had built up since yesterday.

"You think that they set all of this up... In order to frame the Agency?" Atsushi inquired.

Hiromi nodded furiously, "Definitely. As soon as people see one bad thing about us, they'll completely forget all of the good we did," That's how it worked with anything. You screw up once and that's all it took for people to turn on you, even if it wasn't your fault. "It doesn't help that the article pointed out that the agency is made up of ability users. That just gives people more reason to not trust us."

Ability users were not given as good of a rep as people with quirks. Depending on what type of quirk you had, people had the utmost faith that they could become a good hero one day. It was all they would hear. "With a quirk like that, you could become one of the top pro heroes." People with abilities were always told the opposite. No matter what you're ability was, people didn't trust you. "With an ability, you'll become one of the most dangerous villains." It was enough to make Hiromi want to punch a wall in frustration.

A moment of silence fell among them. None of them were sure what to say at this point and Hiromi kept her mouth shut. She was afraid of saying something that she shouldn't. Her gaze moved and landed on Kunikida who glanced away like he was ashamed, "Despite what Dazai said, maybe it wasn't my time to shine."

"Mr. Kunikida..." Atsushi trailed off, turning towards him.

It was surprising to Hiromi to hear Kunikida say that. It wasn't his fault that the victims died. He tried helping them and there was nothing you could do. Hiromi stared at him with concern, "Kunikida, what happened wasn't your fault. There wasn't really much any of us could do in that situation. There will be some days where you can't save everyone," Kunikida said nothing. It didn't even look like he believed what she was telling him. "You aren't giving yourself enough credit. I mean, you were the one to save Sasaki from drowning."

At the mention of the woman, Kunikida knocked himself out of whatever slump he was in. He took a deep breath, "Where's Ms. Sasaki?"

Now that was a question. Hiromi had no idea. The last time that she had seen the woman had been right before Hiromi headed home. Since arriving, she hadn't seen her. She hadn't seen Dazai either. The only person who knew was Atsushi, "She should be in the infirmary."

The three of them headed to the infirmary. Hiromi thought that they were probably going to check on her and ask if she knew anything else. When they arrived at the infirmary, they found Sasaki sitting on one of the beds. Dazai was there with her and they appeared to be talking about something.

It must have been something funny since Sasaki had broken out into laughter. They stopped talking when they noticed that Atsushi, Kunikida, and Hiromi had walked into the room. The woman smiled over at them, "Hi! Thank you so much for saving me the other day. If you hadn't all come when you did, I'm sure I wouldn't be sitting here right now."

"Well..." Kunikida trailed off.

"Not to mention, you were very kind in putting me up last night," Sasaki added.

A noise of question came from Kunikida. Hiromi stared at the woman in question, "When did we do that?" She doesn't recall ever doing that. It seemed like Kunikida had no idea what she was talking about either.

Maybe Atsushi did- "Where did you stay exactly?" Atsushi asked. Well, that answered that question.

What horrified the group was when Sasaki shot a glance over at Dazai. Dazai pointed at himself with a wide grin on his face, "My place!"

"What?!" Kunikida and Atsushi were shocked.

There was no way that Hiromi was going to stay to hear what happened. The girl shook her head and spoke, "Uh-uh. Nope," Hiromi turned around and walked out of the room, "I am not sticking around for this. Come find me later when you need me."

And she did actually leave. She went all the way to her desk and sat down in her desk chair. Hiromi sat in silence, only accompanied by her thoughts while she waited for someone to come and talk with her. It took a little while, but Kunikida, Atsushi, and Dazai arrived at where she had been hanging out.

The bandaged man sat down at his desk and started typing away at his computer. This was suspicious to Hiromi. He never did his paperwork... Or any work on his computer. Atsushi seemed to be suspicious too, but that might be because of the fact that Sasaki stayed at Dazai's last night. Dazai didn't even notice their stares, or if he did then he acted like he didn't, "Unfortunately, Ms. Sasaki didn't see who her kidnapper was. She apparently faints often due to a medical condition. That's exactly what happened on the day when she was abducted as well. How she was transported afterward, I'm not sure."

An accusing stare was shot at him by Kunikida. Kunikida had his elbows up on his desk with his hands on top of one another, "You've taken quite a liking to her, haven't you?"

That was something that Hiromi doubted entirely. For as long as she has known Dazai, he had not shown genuine feelings for anyone. It was mostly just him messing around. "I take quite a liking to all women," Dazai responded. "She does seem like the type who'd commit suicide with me if I asked. That's so nice," That was another thing. He was probably just looking for a suicide partner rather than someone to actually love. His statement caused Kunikida to grunt in anger, trying his best not to lash out at him. "What about you then, Kunikida? Is she your type?"

The question made Kunikida glance away, "She's an eye-witness in a murder case. Nothing more."

A smirk found its way to Hiromi's face, "That's not an answer." Kunikida just shot her a glare, trying to intimidate her to shut her up. He had also glanced away when the question was brought up... That's just a telltale sign to Hiromi.

At this point, Dazai had ceased his typing. He gave Kunikida a closed-eyed grin and chuckled, "Well... It figures that you'd say that. Atsushi, Hiromi, you wanna know, right?" Hiromi stared at him in confusion. What was he talking about? Dazai suddenly held up Kunikida's ideals notebook, "What his ideal woman is?"

This caught everyone's attention, but mostly Kunikida's. The man slammed his hands onto his desk loudly. He leaned forward and yelled at Dazai, "When did you swipe that, you bastard?!"

His yelling didn't scare Atsushi and Hiromi away from taking a look at the contents of the notebook. Atsushi grabbed the notebook from Dazai and started flipping through the pages. Hiromi made her way to stand behind Atsushi so she could see as well, "I was always curious about what kind of stuff he kept in here." She knew he kept his schedule, some case details, and some of his "ideals" in there. Other than that, she had no clue.

"He wrote it all down?" Oh, Atsushi. You shouldn't be surprised by this. This is Kunikida's we're talking about.

This wasn't surprising to Dazai either. He had a smug look on his face as he spoke, "Oh, yes! Kunikida's notebook has a comprehensive list of obligations, plans, and ideals recorded in it," Dazai moved toward Atsushi and Hiromi, pointing at a specific page, "Right here, for example..."

The contents that Atsushi had read made him jump back in surprise. His eyes were wide and a noise of shock came out of his mouth. Hiromi was curious about what made him react that way so she read where Dazai had pointed. Her eyes went wide as well when she read what was written, "What is this?"

"You're... You're kidding," Atsushi stuttered. "That's a lot of-"

His sentence was cut off. Kunikida had grabbed the notebook from Atsushi's grasp. Hiromi jumped in surprise when she found that he had been standing behind them intimidatingly. Atsushi shivered when he glanced behind them. Kunikida continued to stare at the two, "You have a problem with it?"

There was a tone in his voice that clearly said to tread lightly. Atsushi spoke with nervousness, "Not at all..." Kunikida shot a glance at Hiromi who quickly shook her head, eyes still wide open. Atsushi continued, "I can understand your vision of an ideal woman, but maybe, um..."

Dazai gave a side-eyed glance at Kunikida, "You shouldn't share that with any actual women."

That was something Hiromi agreed with completely, "They're right. That's a bit... Unrealistic, I guess you could say." Show that to any woman and who knows how many insecurities they were going to get from it.

This was all it took for Kunikida to become annoyed once more, "That's not important right now! We should talk about the abductions!" Kunikida changed the subject. "Have you picked up on anything?"

"Indeed," Dazai said. This caught Kunikida's attention. Dazai suddenly pointed out Kunikida's picture that was in the newspaper, "I have deduced that without a doubt you look very manly in this newspaper photo."

A sigh came from Hiromi, "Of course you would only focus on that."

"You wanna see how manly I look when I punch your lights out?" Kunikida asked him.

The question was ignored by Dazai. The dark-haired man had only turned the newspaper back toward him to study it more. He let out a sigh, "What's regrettable, however... You should've picked sexier glasses," His smile fell. "Here you are in the paper, and those do not photograph well," Dazai took Kunikida's glasses off of the man's face, "They're so plain," This caused Kunikia to shout, 'Hey!' at him. Dazai ignored him once more and put the glasses on himself, "Only someone possessing my unbridled charm could pull off wearing them," He pushed them up his nose and posed with his hand up to his chain, pointer finger and thumb sticking out. "What do you think, Atsushi, Hiromi?"

"Not bad, actually..." Atsushi commented.

Attention was direct to Hiromi as Dazai waited for her reply. Hiromi stared at him for a moment, humming in thought before saying with a shrug, "I don't know. I don't think the rectangle frames suit you."

Turning away from Dazai, Kunikida closed his eyes in exasperation, "They only scream 'con man' to me," Kunikida hummed in question, "Wait a minute..."

Hearing this made the others turn to him, also humming in question. The first one to speak up was Dazai, "Something the matter?"

Kunikida took his glasses back and put them on, "The three of you, let's go."

It was like something had clicked inside him. Hiromi raised an eyebrow at him, "Okay..." She trailed off. Hiromi then asked the question that was on everyone's mind. "But where are we going?"

Glancing back at the three, Kunikida said, "I know who's behind this."

~~~~~~

Hey, guys! I know, it's been a while. A lot of stuff happened in my personal life and it put me in a writing slump. I recently have been trying to write a lot more and this is one of the stories I'm wanting to write more for. I'm starting a job soon and that will take up a lot of my time so I want to write as much as I can. I'll still try to write in my free time when I start working, but it will be harder. I've already decided to go ahead and start writing for the Decay of Angels arc since I just couldn't wait that long. You guys will love reading it.

Also, after I finish writing the Azure Messenger arc, I will be writing the BSD chapters based on the manga. The reason for this is because I write out the scripts of the episodes first using the captions that are provided on where I watch what I'm writing for. I use Crunchyroll to write for BSD and they don't have captions in the dub for some reason (which is stupid because a lot of people require them, me especially since I have issues with paying attention and have a hard time following along with what's being outwardly said and captions help with that.) so I'll be writing the manga instead of the episodes. On the bright side, I prefer writing for manga more since it's easier which means I'll be able to write even more.

Anyway, I hope you guys liked this chapter and I will write to you next time.