The clank of a glace impacting on the table before me echoed throughout the halls of the base. Four of my fingers, tightly gripping on the neck of the U.A student, unfortunate enough to find herself outside our headquarters. These were the circumstances with which we were met.

I had no primary intentions of killing this child. Not unless it came to that, of course. We may be classified as villains, but we're not heartless barbaric monsters. For the most part...

A U.A child crying in the cold, outside in the void of night raised plenty of questions. I started by asking a few off the top of my head.

"How did you find our base?" I started coldly.

I felt her trembling under my words and touch. I suppose it would be frightening to be faced with a situation parallel to this. To be met with a man who had helped in the murder of three of her classmates, this is only the appropriate expression.

"I didn't know it was your hideout, I swear!" She said, voice fluttering and breaking every so often.

I glared towards Kurogiri, nodding slightly to the child. Understanding what I had been attempting to say he walked towards the back counter.

"What are you going to do?" The child asked me frantically.

I remained silent as my comrade turned to face us, holding a sharpened kitchen knife. She started screaming and wailing once she saw the knife. Her crying had only intensified as Kurogiri walked closer to her.

After a few minutes, Kurogiri stood in front of her, holding a glass with water and freshly cut lemons. He cleared his throat and started to talk calmly to the frightened child.

"Lemon water helps to detoxify the liver and improves functioning. Shigaraki seemed to think your voice was strained as you spoke."

As he handed the glass to the child, I released my hand from her neck. She looked back at me shocked before cautiously taking the water. She looked hesitant to drink it, so I spoke up from the seat next to hers.

"It's not poisoned..." My voice came across as raspy and annoyed; although, those were not my intended outcomes.

With a look of concealed terror, she uttered a quiet 'thank you', and drank it. It was difficult to decide whether or not to release my hand from her neck.

She could very well escape and alert the heroes of our location.

Or she could just straight up kill us, right here and now.

I pushed those thoughts out of my mind as I reminded myself of Kurogiri's incredible reflexes. If anything like that were to happen, Kurogiri would definitely be alert.

"Now, care to explain what a U.A student was doing in a back alleyway crying in the middle of the night?" I asked her, still a little defensive.

"I'm sorry, I got lost..." She sniffled before taking another sip of her water and wiping her eyes.

I suppose it makes sense. Something must have happened at school, she ran away from the situation, wound up here, and let it out in the alleyway. The hero society is far too careless with children.

This could serve to be a useful situation.

"And why were you crying?"

She stiffened up and looked down. When I had met Yagi, I had to deal with stuff like this all the time. That alone gave me enough knowledge to know not to press on a sensitive topic. I left it be and turned to Kurogiri, striking a conversation as if the child weren't even here.

"Such a shame the kid's not here, I'm sure he would break the ice..."

The child next to me perked up as I spoke but didn't ask any questions.

"Yes, did he ever give us the date of his return? I don't recall him speaking of one before his abrupt exit." Kurogiri replied, trying to not elaborate further and risk leaking important information.

We spoke of video games and other random topics in that vicinity, earning a few side-glances from the pink-skinned girl sitting to my right. Eventually, boring from the topic, Kurogiri turned on the T.V.

Flipping through channels, we came across a re-run of the Sports Festival. The program had almost finished, so the only thing running was the careless speech that the blonde-haired brat was declaring on live television. I scoffed as she lied through her teeth about Izuku being her 'best friend'.

"Oh, bullshit!" I yelled at the T.V in a fit of rage.

Remembering the child was still in the room I quickly whipped my head to take in her expression. She glared at the screen as the brat smiled sweetly to the crowd of awe-stricken Festivalgoers.

"Yeah, bullshit's right." The child beside me spoke, anger seeping into her voice as she finished her drink.

The bar suddenly went quiet, the only sound being the cheers of the crowd from the T.V in the background. Kurogiri and I both stood shocked at her words, as she started to speak again.

"Everyone thinks she's so great, but they don't know the truth..." She paused, sighing as tears gathered in her eyes."She's nothing but a liar, and a bully."

The room was silent. The only noises were the sounds of my constant pacing and the sound of the Maxwell 16. I had been waiting impatiently with the NPA's forensic scientist, Kato Akihiko, for the past two and a half hours. Separating the DNA from a nucleus and other debris apparently takes a lot of time.

Although I technically wasn't obliged to stay and wait for the results, I had an uneasy feeling ever since I had opened the briefcase. It was disturbing.

While waiting for the results of the DNA extraction process, Kato decided to start to evaluate the disturbing case and write his forensic report. He had explained that this was indeed thoroughly thought out.

The separation lines seemed to be strategically measured to fit perfectly. The bag seemed to also be in an area that many people would wander into, so it was as if the killer had wanted someone to find the bagged corpse. Only solidifying my theory that this was a statement as well as a warning.

As I dug deeper into my thoughts, occasionally glancing at my friend's report, a single clicking sound filled the room.

The sample is ready.

"I once thought of her as my best friend..." I started.

The two villains seemed to be on the edges of their seats, hanging on my every word. I had felt like I had no one to talk to. I didn't want people to know about what I had done, but these people knew what it was like. They knew what it was like to be called murderers. Of course, they actually were murderers, but then again, I guess so am I.

No matter how much I wanted to change that fact, I couldn't. I killed two people. It was my fault. I didn't want people to see me like that. I didn't want people to know about what I had done, but it's obvious that they knew.

Izumi had made it clear that everyone knew. That they all knew I was a murder. I didn't realize I was crying until I tasted the now familiar taste of saltwater on my lips. Wiping away the waterfalls that cascaded down my cheeks, I continued.

"I had found out that she had lied to everyone. She had told us that her brother had died because of three villains, but I had found out the truth. I had discovered that she killed her brother..."

The two villains next to me watched my expressions closely. I had felt a connection to the two. They weren't bad people; they just did some bad things. Maybe it's because I was the same as them, or maybe it's because I didn't have anyone to talk to, but I felt like I could trust them.

"I confronted her about it, and she said I was just as bad as she were. She told me that I was a murderer and that everyone else had thought the same." I explained, starting to sob. "So, I ran. As fast as I could without looking back. I don't know how I'll ever face her again... I don't know how I'll face any of them again..."

I started to bawl my eyes out. It felt like a huge weight had just been lifted off of my shoulders as I spoke. I had been holding in my guilt about the two people I had killed for so long, I forgot how it felt to feel ok.

I felt someone pat my back as I cried. Looking to my left, I saw the blue-haired man looking at me with empathy.

"It's ok, kid. Just let it all out." He spoke.

I could tell he was trying really hard to console me. He was surprisingly good at it. Maybe the kid he mentioned earlier was like me. Maybe they had been through the same thing as me.

"Hey, guys! You'll never guess what happened to that brat at school... to...day..." I heard a familiar voice speaking from the right as the door opened.

I looked to the source of the sound as my eyes widened. I couldn't believe my eyes. There before me, stood one of my classmates. I looked behind me and then back to my friend, standing in the doorway with my mouth agape.

"I-I..." I could barely form those words as my classmate stood, staring at me in confusion, taking note of my tear-stained face.

"Mina,"

"I... I have to go..." My voice cut off that of my friend's as I stood up and started to bolt out of the bar.

I could hear the voices of the villains debating what they would do, but I wasn't listening. All I could do was run.

How could my own classmate be a part of that now-infamous villain group?

I couldn't understand anything. This world is full of evil. The corruption is so deafening I don't know if I can take it anymore.

I was running for an eternity or so it felt, before finally arriving at my house. I rushed through the doors, ignoring the questioning looks from my parents and made my way to my room. As I entered, I immediately bolted into my bathroom, grabbing the blades I had stashed away.

I slashed and slashed as I tried desperately to rid myself of this terrible and corrupted world. Blood pooled from my arms as I cut through my paper-like skin, severing arteries and veins in the process.

"Honey, is everything ok in there?"

The voices of my parents tore me from my dazed state as I thought of losing them. It took everything I had in me not to scream in pain. Not to open the door and ask for help as I rapidly bled out.

I felt my oxygen depleting as I struggled to see straight. Straining to stand I tried to respond to my parents as lively as possible.

"Yeah! I'm fine, just really needed to go to the bathroom!" I laughed

"Ok honey, just let us know if you need anything..."

I do need something... I need to tell you both...

That I'm sorry...

It had been three days since the sample had been ready for cross-referencing. Analyzing and cross-referencing DNA can take up to seventy-two hours, so I had to wait a while before I could find out who had been murdered.

I was waiting in the lab as Kato retrieved the data and results. He had also run a fingerprint scan and was going to look through the results with me.

The sounds of shoes clicking on the floor of the crime lab alerted me of my friend's presence. I looked up expectantly as he walked to his computer. Before speaking, he typed some information into his report. Turning to face me, he started.

"The victim was a man named Iida Tensei, or as he was more formally known, Ingenium." He spoke while handing me a headshot of the hero and a copy of the test results.

I was shocked, to say the least. I had helped him in a case once in the past, so it was shocking to be told someone once so full of life was murdered in one of the most brutal ways I could imagine.

"The results of the prints pulled from the briefcase and corpse had shown two different sets of people at least, had touched the victim and case in the past ninety-six hours. Of course, the prints had deteriorated over time; however, we did get a partial match of the two sets of prints."

My eyes widened as he showed me the result. Although it had only been a partial match, it made the most sense.

Our prime subject as of late...

Is the Hero Killer, Stain...