Cubicity

Chapter 47: Heart of Japan

Tooru adjusted the tripod with hesitation. Today's recording was going to be rough. After setting a timer on her satellite phone Hagakure got into position in front of it and took a deep breath and lightly slapped her cheeks a few times. Then she heard a click.

"Hey guys, it's me again. Uh, you could say a lot's happened since the last recording."

A moment of pause.

"We finally got our big break we were looking for but it ended up being a dud in the end. It's been really eating away at Izuku."

The thought of how much it was affecting her boyfriend caused Tooru to lose track of what to say but she quickly shook it off and continued.

"I guess I should provide some context first. Hawks had already warned Izuku prior to us leaving that All For One or Shigaraki wasn't in the condition to forcefully steal One For All yet and might send villains to capture Izuku alive. Last night one of them attacked, Lady Nagant, who apparently was a former hero gone rogue and was Hawks' predecessor at the Hero Public Safety Commission. Izuku defeated her and Hawks was able to get a location from her but she had been rigged by All For One to explode upon failing her mission. Lady Nagant is alive but is in critical condition at the moment."

Hagakure recalled seeing the assassin being carted away just as she and Prime arrived on the scene. She thought she was seeing a charred corpse at first until told otherwise.

"The location given was Haibori Forest. Izuku and a bunch of pros went there some hours later but it was decoy set to explode. They all made it out okay but it was a dead end. So yeah, morale isn't the best at the moment but I figured I would let you all know. We'll work hard so the next message I give has some progress!"

Tooru then walked over and turned off the recording before letting out a long sigh. Well, that was blunt and short, she thought to herself. This was the third recording she had sent back to U.A. with the plan Mei had developed. Hagakure had winged the last two and they turned out fine in her view, there was a lot to talk about. But today? She couldn't bring herself to really get into the meat of things and talk about anything else.

The door then opened, revealing Hatsume. "You finished? I stopped hearing voices inside."

Tooru took her phone off the tripod and handed it to her friend before saying, "Yeah it's done."

"That was fast."

"I only went over the last day, that's all I can do right now."

"Oh, uh sorry..."

Hagakure put a hand on Hatsume's shoulder and said, "No need to apologize, I'm just being a downer at the moment." Shen then asked, "So what's all that racket I'm hearing outside?"

Mei then dragged her friend outside the room as she explained, "Oh Midoriya-kun is using Baby Prime to train!"

They were inside another warehouse, this one was a lot larger than the previous few they had stayed at. Tooru was still surprised how quickly her boyfriend and new mechanical friend were zipping back and forth throughout the building, avoiding the supports. Suddenly a burst came from Izuku and struck Prime on the right arm, who only laughed.

"Come on boy, that was way weaker than before," the bot shouted.

Midoriya stopped and grunted. "I didn't use it with One For All that time. Ran out of juice."

Prime rolled over and asked, "Over already?"

"I already told you this exercise was just to try out Fa Jin a bit more before we go out on patrol," Izuku explained while readjusting his gloves.