A Villain's Rise

The Culture Festival

"So how is my favourite test subject doing today?" Deku asked playfully as he opened the door to the room where he kept Overhaul. "P-please. No more" Overhaul pleaded. "Did you stop when Eri said the same thing?" Deku asked in a darker tone. "Besides, I'm not even close to finished with you and your quirk" He stated as he pulled out several empty syringes. "I could do so much with your quirk at my control" Deku said as he began filling the syringes with Overhaul's blood, one by one. "And with you as my subject, I can modify it as much as I like. Just imagine all the possibilities" Deku chuckled as he finished extracting blood. "Anyways, time for your eternal punishment" He said and laid out torturing equipment. "I think we can start with the teeth this time" Deku said with a lowly laughter and grabbed a plier. He slowly walked over to a terrified Overhaul with a crazy grin while letting out an equally crazy laughter. "Open wide" He said quietly right before the room was filled with the screams of Overhaul.

Later that night, Deku and Uraraka met once more in their dream landscape. "Found anything new?" Uraraka asked bluntly. "No" Deku replied. "but there is something I want to aske you about. Well, it's more of a favour than a question" he said. "What is it then?" Uraraka asked. "It's about Eri. You see she..." Deku began, but was cut off when he suddenly disappeared, leaving Uraraka confused. "Did he wake up?" She wondered.

A few seconds later, Deku reappeared in front of her, visibly more tired. "That is the thing I sort of need your help with. Even though Eri has physically recovered from her experiments, and the fact that Overhaul is too injured to ever hurt her again, she still suffers mentally. I'm not a psychologist, but I'm pretty sure she suffers from PTSD. She regularly wakes me up because of her nightmares, like what just happened. I had to redecorate the entire facility because it reminded her of Overhaul's base and we constantly need someone to look over her to make sure she doesn't have another episode" Deku explained. "To put it simply, I need your help so that I can help her" He said

"What do you want me to do?" Uraraka asked sceptically. "All I need is for you to say yes to my request" Deku replied. "Would you allow me to bring Eri to the UA culture festival so that she could have a nice experience for once?" He asked. "What!?" Uraraka exclaimed. "You heard me right. For the sake of Eri's mental health I want to bring her to the UA culture festival to help her leave Overhaul in the past" Deku confirmed. "Have you gotten even crazier since the last time I saw you!? Even if I said yes, you would get caught. You would need an invisibility quirk, everyone in Japan knows who you are!" Uraraka said loudly. "Firstly, no. I can assure you that I'm in no way, more crazy than last time we met. Secondly, you'd be surprised how easy it is to go unnoticed among the public, even without a quirk. Which leads me to..." Deku explained before being interrupted by Uraraka. "Don't tell me you've gotten an invisibility quirk" she said. "Well, kind of. It isn't an invisibility quirk in the traditional way. It allows me to emit a psychic field around myself and the ones I chooses that makes others ignore me. I'll essentially be like a figure in your peripheral vision, someone your mind doesn't consciously pay attention to. Of course it has its limits. If there are few people around me or if I make sudden sounds, stuff like that will draw more attention towards me and the quirk won't be as effective. Intelligence quirks users also seem to be able to look through the psychic field, which is probably something I should look into..." Deku explained, slowly going into a muttering spree.

"Okay I got it" Uraraka said, pulling Deku out of his muttering spree. "Oh I was muttering again, sorry" He apologized with a nervous chuckle. "Don't worry about it" Uraraka assured him. "So anyways, what is your answer? Is it fine for you to know that I'm at the culture festival with Eri?" Deku asked. Uraraka was silent for a moment, considering the choice. "Fine, I'll allow it" She eventually replied. "Thank you!" Deku exclaimed and without thinking embraced Uraraka.

After a few seconds Deku seemed to realise what he was doing and quickly let go of a slightly blushing Uraraka, while letting out an awkward chough. "As I was saying" Uraraka began, breaking the awkward silence "I will allow it, but only you and Eri and don't even try to do anything" she said sternly. "Of course. What makes you think I would do anything?" Deku asked jokingly. "I don't know, maybe because you're a villain" Uraraka replied, playing along with Deku's joke "Me, a villain? Never" Deku said. Uraraka failed to hold back her laughter any longer and very soon, both of them were laughing. That was until they woke up and the dream ended. "Well, it didn't end in the middle of a sentence this time" Deku said to himself as he woke up with a fond smile on his face.