Controlee

88. Under the Knife, I Surrendered

Based on a number of comments I've seen, a lot of you are really going to enjoy the end of this chapter.

I'll be impressed if anyone can tell me what song this chapter title is a lyric of (hopefully it's a line from only one song or this could end badly).

Rule 60: If all they do is cause you pain, don't bother with them, they're not worth your time.

"Go back to that bench you were sitting at."

Otsuka looked at the wall and remembered the lessons she'd had with her work studies mentor (the one who was still missing, and she'd let it happen, and now really wasn't the time to think about that). The wall Shigaraki had his hand against, it was load bearing. All he had to do was put one finger down, and the ceiling would come down. Otsuka didn't know how many people it would hurt.

She wanted to run. She wanted to stay standing at least. Instead, she walked back to that bench and took a seat again. Shigaraki followed, fingers and thumb trailing across the wall all the way. She wouldn't be able to slip a shield between his hand and the wall. Even if she did manage that and started running, there was no telling what he'd do in retaliation, she'd have no way to stop him once she was out of here.

All she'd wanted was time to herself, and now she was involved in a villain situation. Such was life, she supposed. Her life, anyway.

"What's your deal then?" he asked as she tried not to shift on the bench. The cushions suddenly felt a whole lot less comfortable than they had before. "Are they charging you with illegal quirk use or something?"

It would've been so easy to just nod. She wouldn't have to say a word, just nod her head. Except there was always the chance that he knew the truth and was using this like some test to prove she was honest, or maybe he'd disintegrate the wall more for every lie she told or- "My birth parents are trying to get custody of me."

He gave a short hum, something low in his throat that sounded too much like it was scratching on something. "Tragic backstory unlocked. You're fighting it legally?" His chin rose, eyes pointed firmly down at her.

She frowned, breathing through her anxiety. He'd made the question sound like an accusation. She wasn't sure what she was being accused of. "How else would we fight it?" Custody battles were a legal thing, their whole existence was literally only put down in law so of course she was going to fight it legally.

His sigh bordered on a growl of disgust and her brain caught up enough to realise he meant violence. He expected her to fight with violence. "You're just an OP NPC." A what? "So much power, but not enough programming behind you to make a decent brain. If you want to be a player, you have to use what you've got to get what you want."

Funny. That was exactly what she'd been programmed not to do. And she liked to think it wasn't just the programming, she liked to think that she wasn't the kind of person to let power go to her head even without the training she'd gone through for eight years. "No."

"Come on," he groaned, sounding more and more like a child as he chattered, "there's got to be something that pisses you off. Even NPC's are programmed with likes and dislikes. Unless you're just a background graphic." See, aside from the acronym, all of those words were words she understood, but she was missing just enough context to have trouble understanding him.

"I'm human," she said, focusing on the one bit she understood perfectly, "of course I get angry sometimes."

"And you're angry now?"

Of course she was angry. Her parents were trying to take custody of her when she'd rather be anywhere away from them. She was still handling the fallout of someone she'd trusted filling her chock full of utter bullshit. And now she was chatting with a villain rather than going back to the room where she might actually get some of her life sorted out so she could stop being constantly stressed enough to cry! "Yes."