Benign Malovelence

Chapter 10: Struggle to Command

Midoriya wasn't blinking. The pinpricks of purple didn't dart nor dash, frozen on the Nomu. It was impossible to tell what he was thinking, but his little smile and concentrative expression showed the control and darkness... Even if it was brief, Midoriya's eyes were scaring Tsu. She usually was able to go unfazed by something, but the realisation that Midoriya was controlling Nomu was both relieving yet enough to make her have more conflicted misconceptions.

That would mean he stopped the villain, then... she thought. He was able to get into its head, even after what he said...

The Nomu stomped one of its bare and black feet, shaking the ground. Its eyes, on the side of its head, liken to a prey animal's, now loomed at the two other villains. It crouched, as if ready to attack or make a lunge.

Tsu looked back at Midoriya and saw that when the Nomu had made the threatening move, Midoriya had shuddered, showing the strain of the control and the backbite of the blade, seemingly double-edged.

It must be having a toll on him... Tsu deduced.

'Mineta.' she said softly. 'Midoriya has our back. We should go now.'

'Huh?!' Mineta protested, not minding to keep quiet. It wouldn't have mattered either way; the villains knew where they were hiding, and would be using this knowledge to "take away some of All Might's pride". 'How does he have our back?! He's just standing—'

'Go, now.' Midoriya said sternly. He was very good, at hiding the strain. Mineta didn't notice, both Midoriya's reign over the beast nor the difficulty it provided. He didn't say anything else after, only glancing at Tsu to give her a reassuring look.

Tsu didn't need a second warning, picking up Mineta and holding him at a position that didn't risk her cleavage's dignity to Mineta's impurity; she began to head to the entrance of the facility where she would find more classmates as well as some help maybe. She and the other two had heard the two villains, handy and smokey, talking about the latter almost killing 13 and letting one student leave to get help. She was still a little shaken, but still hopped and ribbited away from the villains to let Midoriya deal with the fight at hand, or to be more 'accurate' one could say; let the Nomu hold the head-villains off. After the initial and primary burst of adrenaline and shock had registered, she felt a twinge of worry or pity or both for the noseless classmate...

Back to Midoriya.

Midoriya had stayed hidden, keeping his location hidden and moving away from the original spot as to make sure 'Handy' didn't know where he was. The toll Midoriya was under was more than Tsu had anticipated. He was struggling to stay awake, feeling things in his head and some parts of his body go off or go wrong. The pain in his head was the worst; a headache that given birth to a set of quintuplets of headache-cancer. Aside from the vivid and potentially offensive description, Midoriya was feeling shit with the extensive use of his quirk.

The Nomu had charged at the other two villains, catching them off guard and forcing Smokey to warp himself and the other away. When Handy reappeared, his temper arose and he tried commanding the Nomu to stop or halt. When the command came through, Midoriya felt the tug, like a toy from a sibling snatched. The tug was for the Nomu, having the default of its placid and monotone mind; programmed to specifically receive commands from Handy. The pull was that of a primal nature or instinct, acting like a habit, tempting but preventable by a third party. It was hard, to say even for its basic mind.

Midoriya's stamina, mind and body, was beginning to dip. His body and mind were so closely tied that even the hormones produced, were closely related to, afflicting, causing or interfered with pheromones that triggered hormones within someone else's body. That was one aspect of his quirk and influencing a creature that lacked any thought beside following through with commands given by a certain frequency, or more simply, a person.