Umaru was taken to a nearby hospital after the ambulance arrived. The ambulance was just a regular one as only villains starting from rank B and above would need armoured ones with security. Of course, C- rank villains who had influence or were part of any organization also received this treatment but Umaru was just a lucky guy….till now.

The media had somehow got news of the hostage situation and had gathered around the heroes who had rescued the hostage.

“Death Arms, how is the hostage?”

“Was there a confrontation?”

“Why is the villain so badly injured?”

Reporters from various news channels bombarded Death Arms with questions. He was feeling annoyed but he answered a few questions properly. The media were dangerous to a hero’s reputation after all.

…

Meanwhile, the other two heroes, Mr Plastic and Dove had reached the local hospital with Akira.

Dove was standing outside the room where Akira was being treated for his bruises by a nurse. Akira flinched each time a cotton swab made contact with his bruises. Seeing him like that, Dove felt that the villain was heartless.

‘To harm a child like that...he deserved that..’

The Doctor in charge arrived after a while and said, “ Now that the child has been treated, shall we hear what he has to say?”

Dove nods and takes him to the room. The doctor was a middle-aged man who sported a sizable belly but had a sort of face that seemed like the ones seen on friendly people. His small eyes made it look like he always seemed happy.

The doctor sat down on a seat and took a look at the boy. “How are you feeling Akira-Kun?” he asked, calling him by his name.

“I...I am fine..”Akira answered.

“..Okay...Akira-Kun, I know you must be feeling tired now so we will keep it short. We want to know what exactly happened okay?” the doctor asked with a smile.

Akira looked at Dove who nodded with a smile. He took a deep breath and began, “Um...The villain took me to that place..and he dropped me. He started asking me not to shout and said that no one would save me…but I-I told him that the heroes would come to save me…”

Dove felt happy inwardly when she heard his words. She was pleased that he believed in her. Maybe her fan club would start when he tells other children about her…

“..he got angry that I said that so--so he hit me..” he shows the place where he was struck, a dark purple bruise had formed under his pale chest.

“..he tried hitting me again but I touched his hand and..and it b-broke..” tears appeared in Akira’s eyes as he looked down. He felt a noticeable drain as he brought tears to his eyes. He could somehow sense that he could do it only a few times more.

‘Inducing tears counts as indirect damage huh..’

The Doctor gazed in Dove’s direction who nodded and consoled Akira.

“Sorry, Akira-Kun but..we have just a few more questions and after that, I will give you chocolate..” the doctor began again.

Akira brightened up at the word ‘chocolate’

“Really?” he asked with ‘unhidden’ excitement creeping into his voice.

Seeing the Doctor nod, he asked in an embarrassed tone, “Um...Can you give me two chocolates? You see, we don’t get many chocolates in the orphanage so...I wanted to get one for Saya too...Oh, Saya is my friend by the way and she likes chocolate…”

Both the Doctor and Dove’s heart clenched at this sight as they are filled with pity for the boy.

‘How could such an innocent cute kid be this pitiable’ were their thoughts.

“Of course, Akira-Kun...I will give you an entire box of chocolates if you answer my questions okay?”

“Un.”

“Okay, so... tell me what were you thinking of when you made contact with his hand?” the doctor asked.

“I didn’t want his hand to touch me so I wanted to push it away,” Akira answered looking down again.

“I see.” the Doctor started noting it down on his pad.

“Don’t feel sad Akira-Kun, you only defend yourself so what you did was not wrong,” Dove tells Akira trying to reassure him.

“Next, how did you feel when you used your quirk on him?” he continues asking his questions.

“Um...I don’t know..I think I felt scared like I was not in control?” Akira replied with a tilt of his head.

The doctor noted it down and wrote the words ‘involuntary/ instinct reaction’ on his pad. What Akira didn’t know was that he would have been put under further scrutiny if he had replied with the typical ‘I felt warm and then there was a rush’ as it would have made his quirk usage voluntary and not instinctive.

This would have made the doctor conduct further tests to check whether the quirk affected his psyche.

“Alright, next question..how did your body feel physically?”

“I felt really tired. I couldn’t move for a while, the..villain hit me again during that time and then I...tried running. He chased me and I...broke his legs..” Akira said.

‘Ugh..stuttering so much is draining me but I have to see this through till the end’ he thought while inwardly cringing.

Akira was acting timid to make others not see him as a threat. He didn’t want his quirk to be classified as overly powerful as they would try to put restrictions on him or might even monitor him.

Being an orphan meant he pretty much had no backing and the government might just take him in as they did or would do with hawks. His freedom would be severely restricted then and he would have very few ways to get it back.

He had already told Dove and Mr Plastic of how exactly the events had occurred. He intentionally left discrepancies in his story as it was normal for a victim with trauma to forget things.

In fact, this way he could control where they would search for clues. If he hadn’t left any clues and had recited the incident perfectly, they would have been suspicious and with nothing to look for, they would have searched for clues in places Akira hadn’t thought of and it would all come back to bite him.

“Alright Akira-Kun, that's it for now. You answered all questions well and you can come here again if you want to get your quirk tested properly.”

Akira quickly got up and left the room wanting to go back and rest as he was really exhausted.

The nurse gave him a box of chocolates as promised which he immediately ate trying to fight his fatigue.

He was made to stay in the hospital for a day to recover and to make sure he was alright. He leant back against his bed and thought of the events that had occurred.

He was happy to have finally awakened his quirk and while it had not happened in the most favourable condition, he did get to test it unrestricted at least.

He still had many things to test but it was a start. He was curious about his quirk and all the limits and freedom it provided.

His thoughts then drifted to the villain. He had been a good test subject and also served as an outlet to relieve stress but he had still been a threat. Had he acted quicker, he could have defeated him.

His quirk didn’t act instinctively even though it awakened in danger. Well, he didn’t specifically know whether it acted on its own or not and he didn’t want to test it with his life actually in danger with no experience using it too.

He actually wanted to kill the villain initially but he held himself back. The villain’s death would have made the police force get involved and he was not sure if he could deceive them as well, not when people like Naomasa worked with them.

A lie-detecting quirk was something he couldn’t deceive without any idea about how it detected lies.

‘This chocolate was not bad..’ he thought as his eyelids drooped as his fatigue started kicking in.

……

The doctor looked at his pad as he wrote the report for the kid’s quirk.

Quirk description:

User can cause pain to target instinctively when attacked. Seems to tire the user and might have a cooldown period.

Activates instinctively but most probably can be used at will if trained. Needs physical contact with the target to work.

Doesn’t affect the user's mind mentally.

Type: Emitter (Close range)

Rank: B

---------------------------------------

‘An interesting quirk’ he thought as he closed his computer after adding the report to the quirk database.

‘I will have to test it more when he comes for quirk counselling in a few years’

Years later, a group of heroes would find this report during grim times and would bet all their hope on it thinking it to be true.