Laura's Hero Academia

Chapter 19: Taskmaster

After a while, it was Laura's and Mezo's turn for the test of courage. When they entered the dark woods, Laura couldn't hold in her excitement.

"Oooo~, this is pretty spooky." Laura giggles softly as she looks up at Mezo, holding his hand.

Mezo nodded in agreement with Laura. "It would be unnerving if it weren't for our heightened senses."

Laura's eyes widened, just realizing that both her and Mezo can hear and smell anyone that will try and scare them. She sighed before pouting, letting go of Mezo's hand to cross her arms.

"Well, I guess this was useless then..." Laura said with disappointment.

Mezo stared at Laura, slowly taking her hand into his own. She looks up at him, her cheeks slightly red from the sudden action he made. He couldn't help but have his eyes locked onto Laura's, the moonlight giving a shiny twinkle in them. He was blushing madly under his mask. If it weren't for the cover, Laura would probably laugh at how stupid he looks.

Or maybe she'll be frightened by my fa—

"Y-You really surprised me there..." Laura said nervously as she turns her face away from Mezo, holding her cheek with her free hand. "You're smoother than you look, huh?"

Laura's eyes looked back at him, making Mezo gulp softly. They both wished they could stay like this for longer. Laura isn't used to this feeling, neither I'd Mezo, but they'll both manage to make this work.

"Hey, Laura?" Mezo asked Laura.

"Yes?" Laura answered, still looking up at him.

"Do you... smell something burning?"

Laura tilted her head at him before she smelled the air. He was right, it did smell like something burning, yet it has a sweet-smelling and mildly pungent. Like a... poisonous gas!

"I smell fire... the forest is on fire!" Mezo said in a shocked and troubling tone.

"I smell gas," Laura replied, she lets go of Mezo's hand. "Let's split up; we need to make sure the other students are safe!"

Mezo nodded in agreement as they both ran in opposite directions of each other.

Laura ran towards the smell of the gas her nose picked up. Could it be a villain attack? But why here? Why now?!

As Laura ran, she heard something flying towards her from behind her. Like a sharp arrow.

Laura unsheathed her claws from her fists as she turned around and swung the adamantium claws in front of herself, watching her claws slice an incoming arrow in pieces. She gets in a fighting stance as she saw an armoured figure wearing a skull-like mask and a white hood. She growls at the figure ferociously.

"Who are you?!" Laura shouted at the man before her.

The man dropped his bow and unsheathed a long sword from his back before he started to speak. "I am Taskmaster, I've been hired to assist the League of Villains' 'Vanguard Action Squad,' but most importantly, capture Laura Kinney as quickly as possible," he points his sword at the girl. "You might have healing properties, but I'd rather not have to harm a child, so you better cooperate and come with me."

"I refuse!" Laura shouted.

"Then you leave me no choice." Taskmaster said in a dead tone, before dashing towards the young Latina.

Taskmaster swings his sword down to Laura, but she quickly blocked the swing with her claws. He then kicked the girl in the stomach, hard enough to make her fly into a tree. Laura groans in pain, looking at Taskmaster as he ran towards her, as he was about to thrust his sword at her, she quickly ducked as the sword instead penetrated the wood of the tree. This gave her the opportunity to slice the steel sword in half. She sheathed her claws on her left fist before uppercutting Taskmaster.

Laura let out a feral roar as she let her claws out again and started slashing at him, cutting his armour up with a barrage of swings.

Laura's last swing was blocked by an energy shield that came out from Taskmaster's wrist. She growled until he struck her head with the face of the energy shield, knocking her down into the ground.

"I was told that you're skilled in acrobatics... I'm not impressed." Taskmaster chuckled softly.

Laura slammed the ground and stood back up, jumping in the air and grabbing Taskmaster by the shoulders and hitting her head into him, causing the skilled fighter to fall to the ground with a crack on his mask as Laura flipped over him, landing on her to feet.

I should really take care of this guy, but I gotta alert Aizawa sensei! Laura thought to herself as she started to run away.

Before Laura could make a run, she screamed in pain, feeling something sharp penetrate through her stomach. She looks down and saw the sharp end of a spear covered in her own blood. She turned around saw Taskmaster on his knees with a harpoon gun. He started reeling her back to him, but she stood her ground. The swiftly used her claws to cut the wire that was connected to the harpoon gun before pulling the spear out of herself. She clenched her teeth in pain as she started running again.

Laura turned her head back to see if Taskmaster was chasing after her. She couldn't find him, but she continued to run. She saw the forest was on fire, she wanted to look for any students caught in the disaster, but she had to find Aizawa sensei! While she ran, she could hear Mandalay, speaking telepathically about being under attack by two villains. But she knows that there's more than just two!

Laura finally made it out of the burning woods and saw the building where the teachers should be with the other students that failed the exams. She saw Mandalay and Tiger. It looked like Mandalay was about to use her telepathy ability.

"M-Mandalay!" Laura shouted to get her attention.

Mandalay turned her attention to Laura's voice as she saw Taskmaster pin Laura down onto the ground.

"Laura!" Mandalay cried out as she was about to run to them until she saw another man with Taskmaster.

It was a tall, slim man wearing a dark yellow overcoat, a black and white mask, as well as a top hat.

"Mr. Compress, use your quirk," Taskmaster ordered.

"Oh, no need to be so serious, Tasky!" Mr. Compress spoke aloud bombastically. "It's not like Mr. Daken gave you a time limit for this girl, but remember that we're here for Bakugou Katsuki and Tokoyami Fumikage."

"And I will help you with them too." Taskmaster said as Mr. Compress uses his quirk on Laura, compressing her into a blue marble. "Now go find the other two, I'll fend off the two pussies."

A/N: Sorry for the long wait! I'm going to make the next chapter soon! Hopefully, it'll be over 2000+ words.