Patient Zero

[In a unknown lab]

[A giant base in the middle of the woods]

A woman named Aerith with black thin glasses, long black hair, and orange eyes wearing a lab coat stood near a giant set of computer screens in a dark room, and there were other people in lab coats. On the screens, it showed kidnapped people being injected with red needles, pinned to a bed in an all white room. And once they were all injected with it, they began going crazy, foaming at the mouth and biting at the lab coated people. Those patients were dressed in doctors gowns, and they had red veins popping out of their skin with pitch black eyes.

One person said to Aerith, "Results are becoming more and more tolerable, with a success rate of 85%."

Aerith responds, "Huh? You just said it was 40% yesterday."

"I know I know! But we've been amplifying the dosage of the serum with modified cleaning agents and herbs. Is that..bad?! You just kinda..came at me awkwardly.."

One person said to Aerith, "Results are becoming more and more tolerable, with a success rate of 85%."

Aerith responds, "Huh? You just said it was 40% yesterday."

"I know I know! But we've been amplifying the dosage of the serum with modified cleaning agents and herbs. Is that..bad?! You just kinda..came at me awkwardly.."

"Why the hell would that be bad?! That's good! What about the collars? Are the collars finding success in creating a hive mind linked from them to me?"

"Y-yes. We've ran a few tests on your ring. They'll all act out what you think. Even if it's to kill the Valhalla guild."

"Good work. They're coming. I know those brats are coming. That's what we wanted. Taking them down would lead to taking down the entire Hero Syndicate. My new pets will get rid of Shin's guild first, then every hero involved in the Syndicate. Our goal is to lay the Syndicate to waste. With them in the way, it's impossible to run my business of selling these pets of mine to buyers with money who give a fuck. And with them out of the way, it gives people like me a chance to flourish without limitations or overpowered bastards breathing down our necks. I, Aerith, am the beacon of freedom for all men and women. With the Syndicate out of the way, we will be able to live freely, and people can use their powers to their full potential. That being said…these pets of mine are modified to be 1,000 times stronger and tougher than the average human. There's no way our plan could fail. I have hundreds of these human beasts at my disposal."

"Aerith.."

"I was a failed scientist once…was rejected by even the Syndicate. I was a teenager when I wanted to work with them and show them what I could create, things that could benefit the Hero Syndicate. Since I don't have powers, I could really create some shit. They didn't approve of a force field gun I made, since they said it was too dangerous for the user. It had issues but..it had potential. Which I understood. Then I offered them plasma guns, and they got suspicious of where I got them from. They criticized everything that I threw at them. Every single thing. So then, I gave up on them. I'll show them what I'm made of, and pave a way for my pets to benefit people around the world, making me richer and richer."

Outside of the base, Shin, Kirin, Obi, Remy, Klem, Red, Zenyu, and Tengen were standing outside of it under the night sky, looking at all the lights shining at them.

Tengen said, "So uh..we're just walking through the front doors?"

Shin answered, "Yes. Is there an issue? Are you fearful?"

"Pfft! Me? Fearful?! Do you know who you're talking to? I'm never scared!"

"Okay."

Remy punched her fists together, "This is gonna be a blast!"

Zenyu smiled, "I can't wait! I'm still pumped from earlier too!"

Remy rubbed Zenyu's head, "Since you're so pumped, wanna train after this?"

Zenyu started to slide away slowly, "Um..ya see..I uh.."

Remy put Zenyu in a headlock, "I'M NOT TAKING NO FOR AN ANSWER!"

"ACK! REMY!"

Klem yawned, "Dude, let's just like, get this over with. We waited hours for Toshin and Kaede to give us the heads up to move. My wrists hurt from flipping people all day."

Kirin said to Klem, "Hmph. Sounds like you."

"Hah? You wanna know what sounds like you?"

"What?"

"…."

"You're not saying anything."

"That's the point. You never say anything. Booooring. Making me yawn."

"I don't exist to amuse you."

Red made a sword form in his hand surrounded by blue flames, and he said, "Mmm. I'm hoping the villain this time is a girl. Maybe I could change her ways. Revert her to the right side, adding her to my harem."

Obi put his hand on Red's shoulder, "You're not THAT lucky."

"I am! I am! I am! Sometimes! I wanna kick some ass too. I always have a good night's sleep when I win fights."

"Sleep good tonight."

"Nevermind I'm sleeping on the couch."

"Aww, why?!"

"Whenever you say that, you must be planning to prank me!"

"Huh? No I'm not. You're crazy."

"SEE?! SEE?! Talking all calm and then BOOM! You STRIKE!"

"I would never do such a thing."

Shin stuck his hand out towards the front of the largely gated science base, and he said, "I'm starting."

Everyone stopped talking, and they turned their attention at Shin.

Darkness began to flow from Shin's hand, and then the large gate in front of them was covered in darkness.

The gate blew up, and metal and steel shattered all over the place.

Dust and wind scattered all over the place, and inside of the base was exposed.

Inside of it, right in the middle, were over 100 innocent people dressed in hospital gowns, wearing steel necklaces around their necks, with their eyes black, and parts of their body insanely large and brimming with power. And standing above them on a tall surface, was Aerith.

Aerith said, "What a pleasant surprise."

Shin replied, "You sanctioned this."

"Well duhhhh! I need you bastards dead! In order for me to be the beacon of freedom!"

"Yeah okay."

Klem asked Shin, "Can I like, kill her now?"

"No."

Red pulled out a large black cube from his pocket, along with his phone.

Obi asked Red, "Um..what are you doing?"

"Need some music playing while we're kicking ass. And that woman there is fucking hot. I need to look hot while fighting and this will look like an edit. You know with the music and stuff."

"I get it, I get it."

Red started to play loud based hip hop music, and he said, "Yes. This is battle appropriate."

Aerith yelled, "You can't win against us! My pets powers far surpass all humans!"

Zenyu replied, "You're a bad lady! You kidnapped these people!"

"So fucking what?! I do what I want! I'm not gonna let a group of BRATS tell me what I can and can't do! Especially not the Hero Syndicate!"

"Rude."

Kirin took her green pearl necklace from around her neck, and she kissed it, thinking, 'Guide me.'

Remy asked Shin, "Plan is..?"

"Render these people unconscious. We're taking them to the Syndicate doctors to get them fixed. They're bodies look tough, so don't go overboard. As for this woman, we beat her."

"Haha, alright!"

Tengen scoffed, "This shits gonna be easy!"

Aerith said, "Don't underestimate me! Kill them!"

All the patients started to dart towards Shin'a squad, screeching like they were zombies or something.

Shin said, "Go."

His squad chuckled, and they darted forward too.

Shin only walked forward with his hands in his pockets.

Watching from afar…was Akira.

He was in his regular form with glasses and all, and he was sitting on a hill with his notepad, watching his brother and the squad down below.

'Zenyu texted me the location of this place. He knew how cool it would be for me to watch them in action up close for the first time. What a friend! Still can't believe I'm friends with Zenyu the Painter. Anyway, let's take notes.'

Akira watched the battle, walking to the right as he jotted things down on his notepad. He wrote down the time interval between attacks from each person, how many steps they take per second, and how often their eyes divert on and off their target.

Even though Akira was fairly skilled at pretty much everything, he felt like he still needed to learn a few things to make himself even more overpowered than he is now.

Akira's eyes were big, writing super fast as his glasses were falling off of his face, he quickly put them back up with one finger.

Inside of the base, Kirin's green pearl necklace pearls had grown to be extremely large, floating in the air and spinning around, and they began to slam into everything, causing chaos and rubble from the base to blast all over the place.

Kirin ran forward, as the pearls around her were protecting her, bashing patients around the area, knocking them out. She then made one of the pearls move in front of her, she placed one finger on it, and pushed it as hard as she could, and the pearl shot forward, smashing into a herd of patients running towards her, rendering them unconscious.

She heard some more coming from behind, and she turned her leg around, and slammed it into the ground, making it rise a little in blocks of dirt.

*Kirin's power - Able to manipulate the power and size of the pearls around her neck, strength, and able to create two green daggers with extreme strength and one ability.*

Akira was watching, saying with a smile, "So damn cool! It's way better up close!"

Akira started to run to the left now to get a better angle.

Inside of the base, Aerith was in the main computer room that she was in before, laughing at the other lab coated people, "This is it, guys. These things will kick those guys asses, and our campaign to freedom will actually begin."

"Um..Aerith.."

"What? What do you wanna tell me? That Shin and his guild are kicking my pets ass? HA! That's literally impossible."

"L-Look at the screen.."

Aerith looked up at the screens in front of her, and it showed Shin's face directly in them, looking straight at the camera with a straight face.

Aerith gasped with a smirk, and she pressed a button on her desk, and said to Shin, "W-What the hell are you looking at? You like camera's or something?"

Shin didn't reply.

Aerith continued, "I KNOW YOU CAN HEAR ME! I DON'T LIKE BEING IGNORED."

Shin responded, "…"

Outside in the main area, Obi was being punched around by patients with overgrown fists, and he laughed as he was hit.

They kicked him around like a soccer ball, and they all pounced on him at once.

Obi said, "Gotcha!"

His skin turned into steel, and it began to burn hot red with steam come out of him.

KATHOOM!

Obi was a ticking time bomb, blasting away all the patients through the base walls, knocking them out.

Obi stood up, and said, "Oops! Was that too much?! I'm sorry! I hope you're not dead! I held back as much as I could!"

*Obi's power - make his skin turn into steel, can become a human bomb*

Red jumped over Obi, and he said, "You having fun Obi?! Look at all these women chasing me!"

Obi answered, "Um…you know they're kinda possessed, right?"

"SHUT UP THEY'RE ATTRACTED TO ME!"

"Yeah, cause they wanna KILL YOU!"

"Kill is such a violent word. Have some tranquility."

"I'm gonna go and collect all the knocked out patients and take them elsewhere to keep them safe."

"Yeah, you do that. Wait! You tryna steal my shine? When these women wake up, they need to see MY face! Knowing I rescued them!"

"Toooo bad! Haha!"

"Obi!"

Patients were leaping at Red, swinging at him with their overgrown sized hands and feet.

Red jumped backwards dodging all of the attacks, saying, "This is just an abomination. How could someone just STEAL someone? Especially some cute girls like you guys. Can you even hear what I'm saying? Or is like, my voice blocked out? This is totally..unacceptable."

Red's eyes turned white, and his face got serious with a malicious look. He slowly moved the blunt side of his sword out in front of the patients, and he dashed past them in less then a second, leaving behind red lines.

Red stood up, saying, "Unacceptable."

The patients were blasted away by the attack, they had been hit in the head by the blunt edge part of Red's sword, so they weren't hurt, but unconscious.

*Red's power - Skilled swordsman, speed, strength.*

Klem was surrounded by some incoming patients, and she said, "You zombies are kinda damn fast. Shit. Okay."

Klem scratched herself to make blood come out, and allowed the blood to drip to the ground.

"Awaken."

Coming from the ground, were four dead ancient power users from many many years ago, but they were grey all over.

Klem instructed them, "Bind."

She was using past deceased power users as her soldiers, and they were all grey, and dressed as samurai.

They began to dash around at fast speeds, slamming the patients heads to the ground with a single blow, knocking them out.

One patient came from the left to throw a large fisted punch, but Klem grabbed their wrist, turned around and performed a backfisted punch against their face, shooting them through a wall.

"You gotta be kidding me, right?" Klem scoffed silently.

*Klem's power - Summoning the dead, in which they have the same abilities they had before they died.*

Remy was inside of one of the labs, running through large rooms with a bunch of equipment inside of it.

Patients were crawling on the walls trying to get to her, and Remy exclaimed, "Gross! How can you guys crawl on walls?! Ew! Ew!"

Remy heard the sounds the patients were making, and her fists began to be surrounded by light.

*Remy's power - Able to turn sound into light, using the light to her advantage to manipulate it for herself to use.*

Remy punched the ground with her fist made of light, and the floor shattered with light swimming around like dolphins in a pool.

"Oh yeah!"

Remy started to dash around the room with light following her, and she was punching and kicking all the patients, but she was still holding back.

Light was traveling all throughout the room, and walls were being punched out, with patients flying all over the place, and Remy yelled, "Don't worry! We'll get you guys fixed!"

Remy then slid to the middle of the floor, and she exclaimed, "I always wanted to try this!"

She smashed her fists together, and a bright light was shot from her body, and it shattered the entire building.

Seconds later, Remy came running out from the rubble, carrying all the unconscious patients that she had knocked out.

She looked forward, and she saw Zenyu had bound some unconscious patients that he had knocked out, binding them with paint rope.

Zenyu gave a thumbs up to Remy, "I did it!"

Remy gave a thumbs up back, "Haha! You never fail to impress, Zenyu the Painter!"

Tengen was on top of a building at the lab, and his soul was hovering over his body in a bright golden form. Tengen was sitting cross crossed, with his eyes closed and back straight.

His soul had patients running up the building that he was on top of, and Tengen scoffed, "Damn zombies!"

Obi yelled up to Tengen, "Oi, Tengen! Don't kill them! Just knock 'em out!"

"Shut up! I'm not a killer!"

"But what about that one time-."

"He deserved it! He was killing everyone! Now leave me alone so I can concentrate!"

Tengen's soul closed his hands together, and then he disappeared.

He was inside all of the minds of the pateints around him at once, and inside their heads, he touched their souls in the head, and it knocked the entire body unconscious.

He finished with them, projecting himself back outside again. He turned and saw one patient dashing at him with great speed.

Tengen thought, 'Too fast! I gotta-.'

Tengen punched the patient in the chest, and the entire building collapsed, and the patient's soul was whacked out of its body.

'Yeah, hit him too damn hard.'

Tengen went to grab the soul of the patient, and then he put it back in the patient's body.

Tengen then turned around and saw his own body falling down along with the building.

'And there's that.'

Tengen started to race to his body, his soul phasing through all the building rubble. He flew downward and reached his hand out towards his body, and once he made contact with it, his soul was back in his body.

Tengen woke up, and said, "Shit!"

He jumped off a piece of rubble, and landed on the ground feet first, sliding back, watching the building fall down and smoke shoot everywhere.

Red walked up beside Tengen, "Good job."

"Hah? Don't tell me that. You tryna be my friend or something?"

"Oooo, hostile there."

"I'm not hostile."

Klem said to Tengen, "You saying you're not hostile is like Kirin saying she's not emo."

Kirin interrupted, "I'm not emo."

"Sure you're not."

Akira, on top of a tree, was sleepy, hanging onto the tree while still excited.

"They're..awesome! I got everything..I needed. Their teamwork..is more interesting to see..in person.'"

Inside of the main lab, Shin was at the doors, and Aerith was yelling at him, "STOP CALLING ME THAT!"

Shin said, "Creep."

"STOP!"

"It stinks in here."

"IT DOES NOT! NOW LEAVE!"

"No."

"I WILL BE THE BEACON OF FREEDOM! Say..you wouldn't hit a defenseless lady, would you? See, I have no powers, and attacking a defenseless lady like me is considered assault."

Aerith started walking up to Shin, saying, "Isn't that right? You should know, since you're the new face of the Hero Syndicate. Before you, it was Gunjo. And he never hit defenseless women. What about you..? Are you any different? How about we cut the bullshit and-."

Shin punched Aerith in the face, making her soar 20 feet to the right, making her head bash through the wall, knocking her out.

Shin said, "Too hard."

Shin walked to Aerith's body, and when he looked through the hole in the wall, he spotted Akira.

Akira was half asleep on the tree, still trying to write down things, even drawing items he thought he could create with his wraps.

"And then this..can go with that..I could create..that.."

At the bottom of the tree, Shin asked Akira, "What are you doing here?"

Akira gasped, and he fell out of the tree. He stood up pointing at Shin, "D-Don't scare me like that..Shin.."

"What are you doing here? And how did you find this place?"

"Um…I was fighting a villain and we ended up here," Akira lied.

"Lies. You're going home."

"No, wait-."

Shin tapped Akira's forehead with some darkness, and Akira went to sleep, and Shin caught him before he hit the ground.

They had crows surround them, and they vanished.

Kirin was Standing.

[Akira's house]

[Akira's room]

Shin laid Akira in the bed, and then left him there. Standing at the threshold of the door, we're Yuu and Yamato.

Yuu asked Shin, "Is he okay?"

Shin nodded, "He'll be fine. He's been wandering."

Yamato responded, "He's so ecstatic about being a hero..it's making him sneak out to go all over the place. I feel like this is our fault."

Shin answered, "It's not. Putting a leash on Akira will just drive him crazy. He'll be even more anxious to do what he wants, which won't help in the slightest."

Yuu stated, "He's been like this ever since he was a child. I think..letting him become a hero..would be.."

"Talk to him. But not about the hero stuff. Just hang out with him. He's appreciate it. But I just came from a mission to drop Akira off, so I have to head out fast. I'll see you guys later."

Shin hugged the both of them, and Yuu and Yamato answered, "Thanks son, and be safe out there."

"I will."

Shin was covered in crows, then he disappeared.

Yuu and Yamato watched Akira sleep, and Yuu walked up to him. Yuu kissed Akira in his forehead, whispering, "Love you, son."

Yamato watched Yuu, and he started to remember the brutal things Yuu had done when she was a mercenary. But looking at her now, seeing her in this way, affected him.

'Hm. Me and Yuu were never taught how to raise a child. Only taught how to raise our weapons to people. Me and her are still fairly new to this, especially with dealing with a kid like Akira. It'll be fine. I guess. I hope. I don't know. We'll do our best.'

(Hours later)

NEWS BROADCAST: "Just hours ago, The Valhalla hero guild within the Hero Syndicate had infiltrated a science base and rescued all the victims who were kidnapped in broad daylight. They laid waste to the place, setting all the equipment on fire, destroying everything. A woman that called herself Aerith, was apprehended in the matter. She once had scored the highest scores in all of her classes, all throughout college as well. She was the one behind all of the kidnappings, she was pulling the strings, and she was turning civilians into these mutant-like beings…"

[The next day]

[Hajimari High school]

Akira came in late, he opened the door to the classroom, and everyone looked at him.

Akira looked sleepy, and he apologized to Sensei Ultra.

"Sorry…I'm late."

"Did you not get any sleep at all?"

"I slept..way too good. Shin knocked me out."

"Ahhh, that explains it. Don't be late again. Go sit, you're just in time for the pop quiz."

Akira nodded, and he kept his head down, not looking at anyone.

He sat down in his seat, and he immediately checked his phone, going to the Hero website.

He saw nothing but headlines of Shin's guild saving those people from the lab, defeating Aerith.

Akira thought, 'Aw. I thought there would be headlines of me and Zenyu on here after what happened at school yesterday afternoon. WHYYYY ISN'T IT UP THERE?! THAT'S SO DUMB!'

Akira kicked his desk, and everyone looked at him.

Akira said nervously, "S-Sorry! There was a bug."

Ultra replied, "Don't go spazzing out over there. Scaring the shit-crap outta me."

The classroom laughed, and Tengen said, "Only nerds kick their desks! HAAAAAAHA!"

Kirin said to Tengen, "Only idiots named Tengen are concerned about people they don't like."

"WHO'S SIDE ARE YOU ON?!"

"…"

Ultra stood up with a pack of papers in her hand, and she said, "Alright that's enough. Too early for all of..that. I was having a great dream last night, then I woke up. So I'm kinda pissy right now. But, let's get this over with."

Ultra started to hand out pop quiz papers, saying, "Don't start it yet until I say I do. Disobey me and I'll sling you through the wall. And then I'll send you to the librarian."

Akira got his paper, and he read over what it was. It had a bunch of math problems on the first page, and had science related questions on the next page.

'Easy!'

Ultra said to the class, "You can begin. I'll be grading them after lunch."

[Lunch time]

(Hours later)

All the students were rushing through the hallways, with some of them talking about what happened yesterday night.

"The Valhalla guild is the best!"

"They saved all those people in under 5 minutes I heard!"

"I wanna join so fucking bad!"

"You gotta be top tier to join Shin's guild, especially being a part of the main team with him."

Akira was walking down the hallway alone, looking through the hero website some more. Scrolling and scrolling to see if the event with him and Zenyu was popping up.

'I can't find it! It's not here! Computer monitor people came to LIFE! That should be all over the news!'

Akira then got a text from Yuu.

The text read: "Come outside."

Akira texted back : "Hm? Okay. Coming out right now."

Akira walked out the school doors, and Yuu and Yamato were standing near a black car, waiting for him.

Akira said, "Mom? Dad? What are you two..doing here?"

Yamato said, "We heard you can leave during lunch, so you're gonna have lunch with us."

Yuu nodded with a grin.

Akira squinted his eyes, "Hmmm. How do you know I don't have friends to go eat with?"

Yuu asked, "Do you?"

Akira replied, "…T-that doesn't matter. Let's go!"

Akira ran to the car, and got in the backseat.

Some students recognized Yuu and Yamato, saying:

"Aren't they those famous mercenaries from a couple years back? Yuu and Yamato?"

"Guns for hire. They were deadly."

"That explains why Shin is so strong."

"Yuu and Yamato are so badass, you should've heard of the things they did where they were younger."

Minutes later, Yamato was driving down the road, with Yuu in the passenger seat, and Akira looking out the window.

He saw people jogging, walking their dogs, hero's patrolling the streets along with some cops, people working their daily jobs, traffic people controlling the flow of traffic in the middle of the street, school students walking on the sidewalks, billboards of heroes posing, food trucks and paperboys, firefighters, news reports interviewing nearby heroes or driving around in their news vans, and many other things going on.

Akira asked his parents, "Where are we going to eat?"

Yuu responded, "Hm? Oh that's right. Shit. We didn't even think about where we were gonna eat."

Yamato replied to Yuu, "YOU SAID YOU HAD A PLACE IN MIND!"

"EXCUSE ME, I FORGOT!"

"HAHHHH?"

"THAT'S RIGHT YOU OAF!"

"BASTARD!"

Yuu turned around to Akira with a loving smile, saying sweetly, "What place did you have in mind, sweetums?"

Akira answered, "Wow. Um, actually anywhere that serves rice cakes is fine."

"IT'S SETTLED! YA HEAR THAT, YAMATO?!"

Yamato scoffed, "I'M NOT DEAF!"

"YOU ACT LIKE IT!"

"NO I DON'T!"

Akira chuckled silently, laughing at his parents.

'Now I see why they got married. They compete with each other like crazy.'

As they continued to drive, standing on a nearby rooftop, was Ukine and Ichiro.

Ichiro said, "Props to you for not attacking the school."

Ukine answers, "I'm not that cold hearted. I will not get any other people involved. Now leave, I don't want you following me."

"But I wanna watch! You might need backup.."

"I don't need backup. Leave. Go to your mother. I am aware of the kid's abilities, and his parents. I still won't lose."

"Father.."

"Go."

"A-Alright."

Ichiro left, and Ukine followed Yuu and Yamato's car.