Chapter 43 - Aftermath

BOOOOOM

Mirio wasn't sure exactly what happened, and when it happened, but it happened nonetheless, and all that was left was to embrace it.

Others may not have been able to see it, but Mirio could see it from start to finish – every single instant of it to boot.

His perception as a hero was already testing the human limits due to his training at UA, but adding the power brought by his new quirk – All Above One, Mirio could see clearer than ever before.

What he didn't manage to see, his mind could logically fill in the gaps.

Mirio saw the moment a profound sadness washed over Sue's pondering expression, and for an instant, the sadness turned to anger, and anger was all it took.

A smidge of anger.

A ripple of transparent energy ripped free from Sue's body like an explosion that had compressed her entire life, and the sound of a profound rage came next.

URGH

All at once, Mirio forced his perception to its limits.

It wasn't really perception, but more along the lines of a combination of things, and it would take all he had to spare.

The instinct to help, and the intense hero training under Sir Nighteye allowed Mirio's mind to work in inconceivable ways - estimating, drawing from experience and predicting.

The world was not slowed... not really, but his mind interpreted things as such.

Being a hero meant having to find a way even when there were none, and a large part of finding a way was to understand your quirk inside and out.

What were your limits?

How to push past those limits?

How can this gift best be applied?

What to phase – yourself, the car, parts of the car, a single person, who was in the most danger, what would Allmight do? What about the momentum? Can I depend on my companions?

The questions, in an instant, were endless.

A lot of aspiring heroes from UA would marvel at All Might's fancy punches, but during their final year at UA, All Might would always give a lesson about how he created his techniques.

As it turned out, it took All Might years and countless practices to master which muscles to tense using his quirk, finding the right angle for a punch to trigger different effects on the environment, and most of all, ensuring that only one person could be hurt – Allmight, himself.

All Might's Quirk was destruction incarnate, but somehow, Allmight found a way to punch the air, punch a tornado into existence, break the sound barrier without making a sound, and create shockwaves that could harm targeted people even with civilians nearby.

Mirio wanted to reach that level of mastery with his quirk, but his quirk was always limited to permeating just himself. That meant with someone in his arms, there was no way for him to permeate, but now, things were different.

Now, he had the power to permeate one other person with himself – a small miracle granted by his unexpected journey across Universes.

So, this situation required a critical eye.

Someone able to make decisions in a split second, and Mirio was one such person. A pulse of energy rippled in the air, and Mirio, Johnny, and Ben were tossed off their feet.

The impact would no doubt be disastrous, and the wall behind them was not as soft as it looked. The energy felt like it didn't just pass through them, but carried them along.

Mirio reached for Johnny in the slow world, barely managing to clutch Johnny's arm with his abnormal reaction speed.

Instantly, Mirio permeated his hand while holding Johnny, allowing the enthusiastic Captain America lookalike to enter the intangible void of nothingness.

The daredevil would probably be scared shitless for some time, but that was better than death.

Using Johnny's weight as leverage, Mirio also managed to tilt his body to the side, placing himself between most of Ben's body and the rapidly approaching wall behind them.

The world resumed speed, and Mirio prepared for the impact to come.

BANG

It was hard.

It was damaging.

And Mirio bled.

Mirio's permeated hand that held Johnny sunk through the wall, ensuring that Johnny was able to travel through the wall, diminishing the impact he would have felt otherwise.

The portion of Mirio's body that remained unpermeated impacted the wall behind, and then received a double impact when Ben's body collided with Mirio's.

The pain was intense, almost crippling.

"ARGH!" Mirio groaned.

He knew a couple of his ribs were cracked under Ben's weight. He had miscalculated something, but miscalculations were expected in moments such as these.

Mirio could guess Ben's weight and the approximate force the man would hit the wall, and just how much of the force his own body would be able to absorb.

But somehow, Ben's impact felt like a meteorite dropped onto Mirio's chest. Ben was heavier than he should have been, but seeing that Ben was alive and well was all the comfort Mirio needed.

Miro carefully pushed Ben to a comfortable position on the ground, and ignoring the pain in his chest, Mirio permeated the rest of his body through the wall at his back.

A split second of nothingness later and Mirio was through the wall, staring at Johnny lying unconscious on a couch. The entire room was on fire.

Mirio quickly scampered around to locate any open gas valves that could have started the fire, but when he found nothing after a minute, he grabbed Johnny from the couch and permeated them both back through the wall.

He placed the unconscious dup right next to each other.

They were unconscious and mostly uninjured, besides some cuts here and there. Next, Mirio dashed to the epicenter of the energy pulse and found Sue passed out from exhaustion.

Her power was beyond what her mind and body could process.

Next came Reed whose back seemed to be broken.

Reed was a couple of inches taller than what Mirio recalled, so he judged his spine could have been broken in several locations, leading to the unnatural lengthening of the Genius's body.

Still, as much as he wanted to help Reed, there was nothing he could do for a broken spine. Anything Mirio attempted would make things worse, and that included switching Reed's position even slightly.

Especially not when there were more people to help – people who actually had a chance.

There were at least five staff members in the cafeteria at the time of the energy pulse, and Mirio, with a glance, accounted for four of them.

Each suffered only minor injuries.

A piece of debris shook free from the ceiling, and Mirio leaped forward into a diving position, curling midway into a ball that allowed him to roll across the ground, and extended his hand, catching the debris before it could find its way to an unconscious staff's head.

Mirio tossed the rock away and slumped his body in exhaustion, but he was aware his job was far from done.

Still, it confused him a bit.

The ceiling should have been strong enough to withstand Sue's energy surge since the pulse was only strong enough to knock down anything that wasn't bolted down.

Maybe, shatter a couple of windows as well, but nothing strong enough to affect the ceiling. After ensuring that everyone was okay, Mirio turned around and saw Ben and Johnny already at Sue's side, coaxing the woman awake.

As for Reed, he was also conscious, fiddling with calculations on his tablet, and surprisingly, his spine seemed fine. Reed was sitting perfectly normally.

"You guys okay?" Mirio asked, walking over to the group.

"Yeah, I owe you one," Johnny said, holding a hand out that Mirio quickly shook.

"What… what happened?" Sue asked, rubbing her head as her eyes fluttered open.

"I think you happened, Sue," Reed whispered, showing the simulation of a pulse escaping from Sue's body on the tablet. "You expelled a pulse of some type of energy and it caused this."

"I did this?" Sue blinked a couple of times in disbelief.

"Yeah, and—" Mirio was about to remind Sue that it wasn't her fault since she was entirely unaware that something like this could happen, but he heard incoming footsteps.

"Sue! Sue!" Victor's panicked shouting was heard as the man in question darted out of the hall and into the cafeteria.

Without any decorum, Victor pushed everyone away and embraces Sue.

"Are you okay?" He questioned, grabbing Sue's face while he examined her from head to toe.

"I am fine, Victor," Sue replied weakly, feeling a bit awkward with all the physical contact, especially since Reed was watching them.

But soon, Reed was back to watching the simulation on his tablet, ignoring Sue altogether, but even Mirio, someone new to this relationship thing, could tell Reed felt more than his actions showed.

And if Mirio was aware, so was Sue.

It made her feel guilty, so she brushed Victor's hand off her face, but somewhere deep down, there was a small bit of satisfaction in Sue's heart.

"Good," Victor said, not minding what Sue did since she was never the type for excessive intimacy. "You guys need to get out of here, I will deal with everything."

"You don't have to tell me twice," Johnny replied, already tugging at Mirio's arm to exit the semi-destroyed cafeteria.

"Wait… we need to explain—"

"No," Victor cut off Sue's train of thought "We don't know exactly what happened, and until we know more, it is best we move you guys elsewhere to be examined."

"Four of the five staff are accounted for," Mirio butted in, meeting Victor's eyes. "This section is still structurally sound, and aside from some broken windows, I don't think anything serious should happen… the next room is on fire, and I don't know why… this entire thing seems odd."

"Thank you," Victor said, cutting Mirio off before the hero could continue "I will look into everything… there was four staff in this section, the last member exited before the incident."

"But—"

"There were four staff members," Victor emphasized. "And you all should leave before something happens… I have a lab in New York, perhaps you could—"

"I have equipment ready at my lab," Reed said, expressing the fact that he would like to do things at their own pace.

"You can take the others but Sue—"

"Sue will decide that she wants to stay with her brother," Sue interrupted, not allowing Victor to make decisions on her behalf "Thanks, Reed… Johnny and I will be happy for any help you can give… and that way we will stay away from the media… I am sorry Victor, but all your labs will be under scrutiny for the immediate future."

"Ha!" Ben laughed exaggeratingly, especially when he saw the slight twitch of a vein in Victor's head.

Johnny quickly pulled Sue to the side, holding her around the waist since she was still too exhausted to walk on her own.

"You don't say no to the paycheck, sister," he whispered.

"We should get going," Reed urged, grabbing Mirio and Ben while he avoided the piercing stare of Victor.

Mirio sighed and went along with the motion of being carried away, but midway he stopped and slid free of Reed's arms. Mirio paused and picked a photo from the ground.

The photo was dusty and he couldn't see anything, but it ought to belong to someone, and a hero could not let a lost item remain unfound.

'I wonder who this belongs to,' He thought, but as Ben stopped to pull him along this time, Mirio stuffed the picture into his pocket for later inspection.

A couple of minutes later, Ben and Johnny were arguing over who would drive as everyone else hopped into the van.