It had been several weeks now for Lethe on his own. Without the cult, or Medea, he had gone back to the only life he knew--one on the streets.

The streets were different than before, with Stain sympathizers rioting at times and vandalizing things with "Hero Killer" logo, but it was what it was, and Lethe got by just fine.

Some gangs bothered him when he went into their turf, but he always escaped in time.

Still, without Medea, he'd had a harder time and gotten banged up. Even his quirk couldn't work fast enough to ward off a gang. He usually could only use it on one person, and he couldn't risk people figuring out what it was.

He might not have got on at all if he hadn't made himself useful. Carrying messages, food, any goods you wanted stolen, he could do it. He and Medea had always been expert thieves: she could phase her hand through things, and he could make people forget he was there, unbeatable combination.

So he quickly established himself as a useful person to have around to any rogues around.

Lethe had no scruples about theft. His attitude towards it had always been you do what you have to, and the people would never miss it anyway.

By doing this, he made a few "friends of sorts" and had a network going of odd jobs. It didn't take him more than a couple weeks to set up, much like before, and it kept him moving all over. Harder to trace.

But the Originals didn't come looking for him, that he could tell. Hantai's death had destroyed most of the knowledge of Lethe's existence from the cult, and they were too busy covering for it to care about him. He had made a clean break from it. He might be able to live freely enough for the rest of his life.

But he missed Aya, and he was lonely...and he was distant from anyone. People didn't look highly on homeless punks like him, but his aura was scary enough to keep most ordinary people away from him.

His new allies served as bodyguards from the rest. No sign of the LOV coming after him either. They truly didn't seem to care.

A few days after Stain's death had gone public, he met up with one of his contacts, a kid about his age, Yin, who told him, surprisingly, that he'd seen Stain himself. 

[Yin is one half of Yinyang. It's feminine there. Represents earth, originally Chinese. But it can also mean "shadow/shade". Probably is just his street name.]

"I got away, though," Yin said. "There was this woman...like an angel... She gave me some stuff...look." He showed Lethe what were clearly brand new clothes and toiletries. "Then she pushed me through some kind of warp gate. I was at a school, and a bunch of kids were there. I thought they would beat me up or run me out once I told them about her, but they...didn't."

Lethe recognized Likstar's power but didn't let on. "What did they do?"

"After I told them about her, this older guy--I guess he was a teacher--ran off to go help her, and the others sat me down, gave me food, and asked me to explain who I was... I told them the truth. I didn't know what else to tell them...but they didn't ask me why I was a punk on the street, or if I was in a gang... They just asked if I needed anything, and if I wanted a place to hide out for a bit..."

"Smart, if Stain saw you," Lethe said.

"I guess he didn't, and now he's dead," Yin said. "But I didn't know what to tell them, so I said no. Later that lady came back, and she had cuts, and I think she was in a fight, but...she never explained, said Stain got away. Her and the teacher asked if I wanted a place to live. I thought it was some screwy trick or something, and I said I didn't need help. They gave me cash and let me go."

Lethe shook his head. Those two were idiots. Didn't they know people took advantage of chumps like them...? Not that that many people would bother these days. Only Heroes would probably take any notice, and not often them. Not in these parts. The government didn't pay  much for areas with low tax rates.

[I can thank the new World Heroes MHA movie for providing us with this tidbit. It made perfect sense, too--would explain how the LOV always hides so effectively. Pretty stupid system, if you ask me.]

"I think they might have killed Stain," Yin said.

Lethe knew there was no way that was true, but there was no reason for him to tell Yin that.

"You can't prove it, so what is the use of guessing?" he said flatly.

"I dunno, a lot of people would pay money for a lead like that," Yin said.

Lethe frowned. "Are you going to try to pin this on them? After they helped you like that."

"It was probably a bribe. They're just chumps for thinking that would work," Yin said.

Classic street logic, Lethe thought. Some he might have used himself, but he owed the DJs big time for stopping the LOV from killing him and Medea... Would it be right to just let Yin sell them out?

Yin had no idea what he was getting into here, either.

"Did you mention this to anyone but me yet?" he asked.

"No, not yet," Yin said. "You've got people, right? Know anybody who'd be interested in this info?"

"No, I don't," Lethe said. He could have found someone, but that was beside the point. "And I don't sell people out to be killed. Not my style. I don't want to be on someone's list."

"But there's better money in that than just petty stealing," Yin said.

"You know, it seems to me they helped you before you saw Stain. Don't you find that odd?" Lethe said. "Why would you want to sell them out? You could get more out of that. A pair of suckers like that."

"Oh, come on, there's always a catch with people like that," Yin said. "Nothing is free."

Lethe shook his head... Yin sounded just like him before the LOV job... When had he even stopped thinking this way?..

He thought of Medea and her earnest plea with him to turn his back on the cult... If only he was the kind of person who could have done the right thing effortlessly, instead of always being a coward.

Yin was different, just a streetwise, cocky, punk kid trying to survive and, by now, too hard bitten to believe in people being unselfishly kind to him.

Lethe saw through it, in a way he hadn't in the past. Seeing real cruelty and insanity in the cult, and the way the DJs and their Hero friends and Medea had stood against it, he could no longer find street ways either impressive, or intimidating. They were just...out of touch.

"You don't know anything about people like that," he said incautiously, "but if  you want to use your info smartly, I'll find a buyer. Give me a week or two."

"Fine," Yin said. "Establishing a network again, huh? Gotta admit, after you and your sister disappeared, I thought you finally got caught by the fuzz. Where were you anyway?"

Lethe gave him a warning look.

"Right, right, you answer no questions," Yin said. "I guess Medea's gone too... Too bad, she was talented. Did she go straight?"

"You could say that," Lethe said flatly. "We went our separate ways. I don't want to talk about it."

"Rough." Yin had a note of sympathy in his tone. "I used to envy you, in a way. After the Villains killed my family, I didn't have anyone. I thought a sibling would have made it easier to survive...but now I think it's just one more thing to lose out here. She was a bit soft, huh? Well, you don't need her."

"Don't get sentimental on me," Lethe said.

"I would never," Yin frowned. "Just saying, shake that s--- off. Anyway, get me a contact, I'll split the profit with you, same as always."

And he would probably lie about it too, as usual, Lethe thought. But that was Yin. There were plenty like him out there. You just had to learn to get around them.

Medea had always been so furious when someone cheated them. Lethe understood it was the name of the game. Maybe he should have seen this split over morals coming a long time ago. Even Yin knew it--she was softer, for all her anger and mean remarks. Her bark was worse than her bite, except when she was triggered...which had, apparently, been his fault more than hers. Still hard to believe that.

He would often try to tell himself it wasn't, but the undeniable evidence would come back to haunt him.

He did not, in fact, try to find a contact for Yin. That had just been to buy himself time. He made plans to move cities and then arranged to meet Yin somewhere no one would see him take his memory. It wouldn't be much, just a little.

It might also be useful to know what had happened for himself. 

Yin didn't know Lethe's quirk, though of course rumors had abounded that it was something real freaky, but no one ever got far enough to ask for it. Medea either burned them, or Lethe would scare them off.

[Image by Onerose, original template by original creator.]

When he did meet Yin, it was a bit later than they'd at first planned. Yin ran into some trouble and had to lie low for a few days. But finally they met up in an old convenience store that was abandoned after the nomu attack... Lethe felt kind of guilty about that now. He'd pushed it aside before.

Though going through Ujiko's memory had been more punishment than anything else...he'd done his best to forget about that and release them later.

Should he have held onto them longer? Maybe he could have warned Medea. Things were kind of fuzzy now about what had made them so horrifying, but he knew it was bad and had to do with AFO and Shigaraki.

"So, who wants to know?" Yin asked, when Lethe arrived.

"I do," Lethe said, activating his quirk.

Yin's expression went blank.

So many times doing this for the Originals...Lethe had gotten good...but the memory of it, the looks on their faces before he began...still haunted him. If only he could erase his own more, but his were always so clear.

He found what he wanted easily though. It was at the forefront of Yin's mind, naturally.

Lethe often got emotions with the memories, though he couldn't steal those, but they were linked.

[Scientifically true.]

There wasn't much of use. He recognized a few UA kids, Monama even, but Yin hadn't seen any of the fight with Stain, so Lethe didn't even know his sister had been there. All he needed to suppress was the school and the DJs. It was a shame. Their kindness would be forgotten...

Tentatively, he decided to leave the first part, before Stain had appeared. It was the least he could do.

He sighed. Medea would not approve of him doing this...but they didn't need more people hunting them down, and if them, her too, maybe. He still had to look out for her as best as he could from afar. They were family.

He moved back from Yin, who began to come out of it, confused.

"Why was I here?"

"You needed a job, idiot," Lethe lied smoothly. "I have one for you." He'd made sure to line one up.

"Oh...oh, right, of course," Yin said. "Stupid me. So what do you got?"

"What I need," a new voice spoke.

They turned oddly.

A girl about their age was in the doorway of the store. She'd opened it without them hearing a thing.

She was wearing all black, hair in a bun, and holding a file that looked sharp enough to stab someone with.

[Moto with coffee image design by Onerose]

A Villain, maybe? She didn't look like a Hero or citizen.

"Who the h--- are you?" Yin said, standing.

The girl threw the file, and it went through his collar and stuck him into the wall.

He looked wide eyed.

"Sorry, hon, but I can't really have you eavesdrop on this, and you're not the one I want." The girl looked at Lethe intently.

Lethe backed up. "I don't know you. So we have nothing to talk about."

"I have a job for you, Lethe," the girl said. "Interested? Here's a hint--it involves your sister."

Lethe blinked "My... Who are you?"

"Name's Kali." The girl stuck out her hand, but she looked more like she might break his hand rather than shake it. "You don't need to know my full name, but I know yours. Yuma Sumai."

[Sumai means Residence, house, residency. It's kind of  a reference to Lethe's Mind palace quirk. Interestingly, Le is also a way to say house, so his code name may be a sort of pun also. Medea's name, Aya, means color, so her full name would mean colorful house, or house of color, or color residency. Which could be seen as either a reference to her quirk's coloring things, or her purple fire burning down her house. The second is kind of dark though.]

No one had ever discovered Lethe's real name before. Only Aya knew it...

"Huh?" Yin said.

"Hold your tongue, or I'll cut it out," Kali said to him harshly.

Yin was cowed. This girl was scary as he--.

Lethe was scared now too. "Who are you, for real?" he said.

"Right now I'm a recruiting agent." Kali tilted her head lazily. "Boss put me on vacation. But I'm tasked to find you. And trust me, you'll want to hear this. Don't worry about your little friend there. I'll spare him. We could use him...as long as you fix it so he remembers nothing about this. But for now, this will do." She walked up to Yin and chopped him in the neck. He was KO-ed.

"Have a seat, Sumai." Kali gestured back to the floor. "This is going to take a while."

Lethe didn't dare run.

* * *

https://youtu.be/zEZRKgFIkxc

After Kali told Lethe what her "master" wanted, Lethe was shaking his head.

"I've sworn off doing dirty work," he said. 

"You've seen the light?" Kali was filing her nails using the same file she'd almost impaled Yin with.

"I won't go that far. I just am over it," Lethe said. "I promised to leave that life if I was spared, and I owe it to my sister to let her live her life now... I'm not a good person, but if she wants to be, I am not going to stop her. I won't do this, though. I have decided to have a limit. And it's not worth the hellish memories I have to carry."

"My master is pretty good with power. He might be able to alleviate your side effects a bit," Kali said. "He's done wonders for my quirk already. The precision and application of it are so much better." She looked evil when she said that.

Lethe hated her already, and he had just met her. She reminded him of Toga, if Toga was actually competent enough to threaten you the right way and didn't act happy all the time. 

"I guest those filthy worldlings have really infected all of you," Kali suddenly spoke in an oddly venomous tone, like it personally offended her.

Worldlings?

Lethe scowled. "Did you work for the Originals?"

Kali smirked. "Hmm, oh, very clever. They said you were sharp enough. Actually, I'm the one who offed Hantai."

She said that with zero shame, zero hesitance.

Lethe gulped. "You...killed him? But they said it was organ failure."

"Uh huh," Kali said.

Silence.

"If I could do that, just imagine what I could do to Medea..." Kali said.

"I would never let you harm her," Lethe said, standing.

Kali didn't even get up. "Even if you could stop me, Master already knows where she is. We're leaving her alone for now...and only for now. We'd like both of you, but she's become...narrow-minded. And the Heroes would notice if she was off, too. But no one will notice you. If you're too stupid to care about our offer, then I don't mind threatening you. This is not really up for debate. Either you do as we want, or we'll get Medea, and it will be painful. Much worse than anything the weaklings in the Originals would think of."

"Wait...you say that like you're not one," Lethe said.

"I'm not one like Hantai," Kali said. "Hantai was just a perv with a title and an army. I assure you, Sumai, don't let my age fool you--I am far, far more of a threat than he could ever dream of being." 

Her eyes looked even darker there.

She scare the s--- out of Lethe, and she had yet to do more than KO-someone in way most Heroes could have.

Forget her age, she would have scared anyone. 

"You're...crazy," he said.

"No, I'm just leagues ahead of you," Kali said. "Come on, Lethe. You have such a rare gift in your possession. Why use it for such small things? Is it more important to hold on to your new, weak values that you barely even believe yourself? Or to protect your sister?"

Lethe...was still just a kid, really...

He knew this was a slippery slope...but...he was scared.... What choice did he have?

"You aren't giving me a choice," he said bitterly, "but...I'm warning you, my quirk isn't so easy to control, and it's not gonna be how you want, I bet...and they'll know it was me. They'll catch you, and every person they take on goes down."

"Those are all just big fish in a small pond." Kali stood up. "Trust me, they haven't even imagined their real foe yet. And we're keeping it that way. Don't even think of trying to warn them. And we'll know if you do. We have eyes everywhere, even eyes at UA. You can run, Lethe, but you can't hide. Someone will pick you up tomorrow to move you to your new location. I'm glad you decided to cooperate. I thought I might have to demonstrate how I killed Hantai with your little friend here." She eyed Yin disdainfully. "But we may have use for him, so it's just as well."

"You may have coerced me," Lethe said, "but I hate you. I will do what you're forcing me to do, but don't think I'll volunteer to do any more than that, you b----. And they will take you out, just wait."

Kali turned and kicked him so hard he almost threw up. He fell on his back.

"Curb that tongue of yours if you want to keep it. You don't need to talk to do your job, just remember that," Kali said dangerously. "I'm playing nice, but I find this sort of work boring, and I'd just love it if you gave me an excuse to have a little fun with it."

Lethe coughed and didn't get up. He just looked at her with hatred--but defeat.

"Too bad." Kali left without seeming to be an more disturbed than that.

Lethe moaned. "What have I done..."

[You know, every time I write a scene with Kali in it, I feel sickened. I hate her.

She's quite the worst female character I have ever come up with...

And yet she's small compared to what's coming in the finale of this story... I don't  think you're all ready. I sure as heck know I'm not, but it's getting so close now.

Aiming for less than 280 chapters here, so it'll be fast.

Buckle up.]                        

And just for fun after how dark that was (we read Yin as having a New York accent btw):

https://youtu.be/bJfUfKUg7hY