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“I’m sorry, you would like me to do what?”
If Kurogiri had eyebrows, he was sure he would have had them raised. There were times he really missed having a body that wasn’t completely made of mist. Or wait, was that another false memory, and has he not always been this way?
Kurogiri shook his head. The thought was irrelevant, and he returned to dwell gladly on the topic at hand, because, seriously, what?
From across the bars, he could see the barest twitch of the police officer’s lips that betrayed that he knew exactly what he was asking Kurogiri to do, much as he might pretend otherwise. Smug bastard.
“You have been on model behaviour, Mr Kurogiri, and you should not be surprised you’ve been granted temporary bail. There’s been a request at U.A. Academy for your services. You may choose to deny or accept the request. If you would choose to deny the invitation though, you should know that there may not be another opportunity like this for a while, and that your stay here in Tartarus might be for a very, very long time.”
The police officer clasped his hands together in front of him delicately, his face impassive once more. “So. What will it be?”
Well, when he put it that way, Kurogiri supposed he had very little choice. He was tired of being here, and he didn’t even know he could be that way anymore. If ever? It felt like years since he had sat in this damned chair, quirk inhibiting cuffs banded around his chest and restricting his every movement. He felt phantom aches every day around his knees, his arms, his fucking derriere , and he found himself longing for a time when he wasn’t forced to stare at white walls, left alone with his mind, for days or weeks or months on end, before he could deign to even look on another living soul. It left him desperate to have someone to talk to, anything to distract himself from the disturbing turns his thoughts would take. It was no use to dwell on what wasn’t, but it wasn’t as if his brain had an off switch, and prison, unfortunately, gave him plenty of time to fuel his more intrepid imaginations. He should know better. It was no use dwelling on the blank that comprised all his memories before All For One had saved him, before he had been given Tomura Shigaraki to care for.
Tomura Shigaraki. The boy had been his sole purpose, his main reason for being. It stung a little, that Kurogiri heard little to no news of the world outside, so he didn’t know how the boy fared.
Whether he liked it or not, he finally had an opportunity to change that. Kurogiri felt the rise of a sharp, stabbing sensation in him that wasn’t at all unfamiliar; it always seemed to be triggered when he was apart from the boy, a sensation akin to his flesh being ripped open with hot knives, which was a strange analogy in itself, given that he had no flesh, but it was an expression closest to what he was feeling now. He likened it to that of an overprotective mother with her cubs, an insistent agitation that swelled higher and higher, lighting up his nerve endings and sending pain receptors to his brain in overdrive. He bowed his head. He was filled with hopeless longing, he was in agony, and he wanted out.
“I accept,” he said in defeat.
Anything for some sort of relief. He hated feeling this way.
It wasn’t often that they were able to organise out-of-school activities anymore. Now that the class had moved onto their second year, their academic workload had increased almost twofold, and that wasn’t including the intensive physical training they were receiving on top of that. As a result, most of them were too tired or too busy to arrange for more than casual meet-ups, and even that wasn’t often. So, it wasn’t without a few ear-splitting cheers and a huge degree of enthusiasm that the class greeted Aizawa when he announced that they would be going on a class field trip, especially because they could barely remember the last time they had had one. Everyone was practically clamouring for the chance to relax and have a little bit of fun. U.A.’s trips always were.
Under Iida’s firm guidance, two by two they piled onto the familiar school bus. They were only three weeks into the new school year and it was early spring, with a still noticeable chill in the air, so most of the students opted to keep their sweaters and jackets on.
Aizawa-sensei told them that it would be a thirty-minute bus ride, so more than a few settled into their seats to listen to some music. Todoroki opted to take a nap. Sero, meanwhile, had bought a pack of All Might edition UNO playing cards, and he, Kaminari, Ojirou, Hagakure and Asui eventually settled on the floor of the bus to try their best to play through one game. Aoyama, also seated on the floor a little distance away, was taking selfies with his new, improved battle gear shades, one of Hatsume’s newest inventions. On the other end of the bus, Iida was imploring Uraraka to get down from the top of the pole she was clinging to while she floated in an attempt to grab an errant balloon that Mina had somehow snuck onto the bus. Behind her, Tokoyami argued intensely with Dark Shadow who wanted him up in the air too.
Izuku shook his head. He had decided to make use of the free time to jot some more notes, which mostly updates on a few Silver Age heroes’ quirks, down in his hero notebook, all of which he planned to upload to his blog once the school day ended. All in all, a regular school trip. Well, apart from the stray balloon.
Until it wasn’t.
The compound Aizawa-sensei was leading them in to might not have been a familiar one to all of his classmates, but Izuku recognised it immediately. The twin-adjoining domes, the signature steel rotating orbit around one of its spiral towers, not to mention the huge logo spelling “Zephyros” in thick, block letters. . . It had belonged to precisely one of the Silver Age heroes he was researching; Apogee, a rescue-oriented space-themed hero belonging to All Might’s generation, who had retired about fifteen years back. The doors still had her agency’s old symbol engraven proudly upon the doors, though not much else remained. Since her death, the agency building had been repurposed into primarily a space exploration facility in accordance with her wishes, with its prized magnetic levitation chamber proving a popular stop for many field trips with junior high and elementary schools as well as, memorably, at one point, serving as specialised training for Japan’s football team, during one of its more. . . experimental phases.
Now the towering dome-like structure seemed to shimmer in the lazy morning light, nearer than Izuku had ever been and larger than life. Izuku found himself close to tears, hardly able to contain himself in excitement as they entered the compound.
Uraraka looked not far off herself. “Deku,” she whispered, clutching his hand a little too tightly, “do you know what this place is?”
Izuku nodded his head vigorously. Oh, he knew. He had always wanted to come here, but the entry fee was expensive if your school wasn’t paying it for you. He swung his head this way and that, trying to take in everything he could. The facility offered multiple moving walkways, crisscrossing across the corridors, but Aizawa led them down briskly anyway, not leaving too much time for sight-seeing. Nevertheless, Izuku’s hands were itching to take out his notebook, and he barely resisted the urge; Uraraka was more shameless, quickly whipping out her phone to snap a few shots. Holographic moving pictures lined the walls, telling a tale of Apogee’s history, interspersed with larger, clear windows that offered a peek into the works going on inside.
Todoroki, on his other side, was eyeing the both of them in concern. “Are you two alright?”
Izuku looked at Uraraka at the same time she swivelled her head to face him, and the both of them giggled. There was a healthy flush on her face, and he knew he probably looked like he was in a similar state, but they really were fine. It was just that. . .
“I can’t believe it, I’m actually here, this used to be Apogee’s hero facility, do you even know how many lives she saved with her amazing quirk?” Izuku burst out, flapping his hands wildly to illustrate. “She revitalised the whole rescue hero industry! That’s to say nothing of how many new laws she lobbied for to improve the populace! It was thanks to her that people now can apply for support protection if their quirks prove too overwhelming for them or could harm them in day-to-day living, she’s so cool. . .”
“She also donated a lot of her agency’s funding to NASA and other scientific discovery projects!” Uraraka added in for once to his rambling with a squeal. “She was one of my primary inspirations to become a hero.”
Izuku nodded fiercely. “She loved the idea of space venture so much that she put it in her will to remake her agency into this,” he gestured around him, vaguely, “to encourage future generations and cultivate their appreciation for space.”
“Mmm,” Iida, silent until now, nodded his assent, pushing his glasses up his nose. “I concur. I do remember my parents reminiscing on how they used to work with her, and they had nothing but praise for her, saying that she upheld the ideals of hero ethics to the fullest and pushed her hardest for equality laws in the country. It’s too bad what happened to her at the end. . .”
The conversation faded away after that as a sombre silence enfolded the group. Izuku bit his lip, looking down. It was true that she had done the hero world a load of good, but in her memoirs, she had written down so many more of her plans that would never come to fruition now. At least, not by her hand.
Thankfully, their sensei broke up the silence with a firm declaration. “Look alive, everyone. We’re here.”
Izuku looked up. It was as he had thought – they were about to enter the zero gravity chamber. Excitement rose up in him once more, eager anticipation for what was to come, and what sort of training they might receive here—
All his thoughts grinded to a halt. In front of him, several of his classmates had stopped to stare in shock at the person before them. Automatically, all of them took on a fighting stance, some of them, Izuku included, stepping forward semi-subconsciously to protect the others.
Before them, standing calmly with his hands unbound, was the warp gate villain they had first encountered at the USJ.
Kurogiri.
Ochako found her breath quickening, her hands forming fists as she held them in front of her a little shakily. Before her was a being she still saw in nightmares sometimes, always accompanied by the unwelcome remembered sensation of that terrible metal collar that she had touched and hurled into the air with all her might. She had had nightmares, of not reaching the villain in time before he reached Iida, of her hands going through the collar the same way it would have gone through the rest of him, of Thirteen’s disintegrated back, a black hole where flesh should’ve been. She felt the blood rushing to her head in response.
What was he doing here? Did Aizawa-sensei know he was there? Why wasn’t he doing anything?
No, Aizawa was turning his back to him, meeting the eyes of his students, meeting hers, and unwillingly, Ochako found herself relaxing, just a little. He practically radiated the sense that nothing was wrong, and after a moment, he held out a hand, palm up. “It’s alright, everyone. He’s here for a reason.”
“Yeah? And what the fuck kind of reason would that be?” Bakugou spat, but stayed where he stood like the rest of them. A faint part of Ochako’s mind noted, Progress, but the rest of her was still reeling.
He was right. What the fuck—?
“He’s not here to hurt any of you. If he even thinks to do so, I will personally ensure that he will not be leaving this compound alive.” Aizawa turned his head to glare at the villain as he spoke, and Ochako felt the rest of the tension leave her body. She trusted Aizawa. If he said it was alright. . .
“The principal asked for him to be brought here today to illustrate a point. In the future, when you become Pros, you may encounter former villains who have been rehabilitated and re-introduced into society as civilians. Take this as an exercise, in very controlled settings, to observe how you would relate to this former villain, and how you may improve in the future.”
“Bullshit! Why would anyone want to associate with him?! He’s a villain who almost killed us!”
Ochako grimaced. Grape Bitch had a point.
Aizawa levelled his patented stare on the boy, causing him to cower a little, but continued, “I promise he will do no harm to you. You may choose to not interact with him at all throughout this exercise if you do not feel comfortable though. He is not the main reason I have brought you all here anyway.”
He gestured to Momo. “Did you bring what I requested?”
Momo nodded, producing packets of round metal somethings out of her backpack. When Ochako looked closer, she realised the reason why they were so familiar – they looked like the ones they all had to put on their bodies for the first round of the Provisional Licensing Exam, which possibly meant. . . No way, Ochako thought.
“Yaoyorozu and Iida will be passing these buttons around. Each of you will take three and place it on any part of your body—“
“Sir!” Iida raised a hand high in the air. “Will this training be similar to the first test we had in the Licensing Exam?”
Aizawa nodded. “Yes—”
“Sir, another question then!” Iida practically yelled, causing Ochako, who was right beside him, to wince. When Aizawa sighed and gestured for him to ask away, he continued, “When you say any part of your body, do you mean. . .?”
“Yes, I do mean any part of your body. There will be no restrictions here.”
Aizawa shuffled, producing something from his own pockets. “The rules are simple: land a hit on all three of the buttons, and you’re out. Yaoyorozu will also be passing three balls to each of you to do so. However, as you will be having this exercise in the zero gravity chamber—”several people squealed at his statement, including Ochako, earning a tired glare at them from their sensei until they quieted down, “—I understand if any of you might like to sit out the exercise.”
He waited a moment, but when no one stepped forward, he continued, “If at any point in the training session any of you feel unwell in the slightest, do not hesitate to raise your hand and I will excuse you. All of you however, are required to wear these bracelets. Uraraka,” he added, snapping her to attention as he lifted a hand so they could better see what he was holding, “you’re probably familiar with these. They work similarly to your arm guards. These are pressure-point cuffs, that will help to negate any sense of nausea you may feel while up in the air. You’re also required to put on those uniforms,” he gestured to the rack of white jumpsuits situated on one corner, “and take off your shoes. You have five minutes.”
“Wait, sir!” This time it was Kirishima who had his hand up in the air. “Umm, if we’re all going to be in zero gravity, will we still be allowed to use our quirks?”
“If you feel it will help you score a point, go ahead,” Aizawa replied.
Deku raised a hand.
“Yes, Midoriya.”
“Mr Aizawa, what will his role be in all of this?” he gestured to the warp gate villain, who had so far remained close-lipped. Ochako had almost forgotten about him until Deku mentioned him.
Aizawa glanced at the villain as well, before returning his gaze back on Deku. As he did, his face started to quirk into a small smile. Ochako reared back a little; why did his smiles always have to be so disturbing?
“You’ll see,” was all he said, and left it at that.
Ochako exchanged a look with her friends. Their sensei was being cryptic, and wasn’t that promising?
She chose to put it out of her mind for now as she headed to the rack to put on her own uniform. There was a Battle Royale about to take place, and she held the high ground. Given the nature of her quirk, she had had a lot more practice in zero gravity than the rest of her classmates.
Ochako allowed a smile to overtake her own face. Oh ho ho, this was going to be great, she could tell.
As Hagakure had expected, it was utter chaos. From the time Aizawa had blown the whistle, it was everyone out for themselves, and quickly the class had seen potential leaders of the battle emerge. Ochako was definitely one of them, but Hagakure wasn’t surprised to see Bakugou wasn’t doing too badly for himself, considering he had his explosions to propel himself in the air. It was still a terrible way of getting around, but that was better than nothing.
Hagakure loved it. She hadn’t been able to wipe the smile off her face since they’d entered the chamber and she’d found her feet leaving the white padded floor, unable to come down. Ochako had used her quirk on her before, of course, but that seemed like a breather compared to this. Just the slightest exertion of force and she was whizzing across the chamber, colliding with the padded walls. It was amazing, how free it made her feel. And the best part? They had a whole thirty minutes to play.
She wasn’t the only one. Mina was screeching as Sero did an improvised throw and yeeted her toward the ceiling. Kaminari was trying to bust out improv dance moves, Ojirou mimicking him and trying to perform a simple kata. Aizawa had given them about two minutes before the exercise started, to get a feel for things, and Hagakure spent that time simply savouring the experience. None of her limbs were moving like she told them to; even the slightest movement sent her wheeling. It was a bit like being in the pool and floating toward the surface, only there was no water; like when you were on the edge of a precipice, the weightlessness induced when a rollercoaster was at its peak and about to drop, just without the heart-stopping feeling in your chest. It was utterly incredible.
She, along with most of the others, were still just getting the hang of moving around in zero gravity, much less attacking others in said situation, so once the exercise had actually started, she hadn’t exactly been in any rush to out anyone. Between her classmates though, things tended to get competitive really quick, and Hagakure was just as eager to succeed as the rest of them.
They had all really improved over the past year, all of them on more even ground now that they had had a year to train. It was no longer possible to tell who the winner would be in any given exercise; right now besides Ochako, Sero and Tsuyu were doing pretty well for themselves too, using their quirks to swing themselves (and others) around. Unfortunately for a few of her classmates, their quirks were pretty much useless in the situation i.e. Kaminari, but the biggest surprise of all, for Hagakure at least, was Tokoyami. Over the past year, he had readily built himself up, they all knew that, but his ability to envelop himself in Dark Shadow completely and move around that way meant he was pretty much untouchable. It never failed to amaze her every time.
It wasn’t going to stop her from winning the exercise, of course. She was usually a quick study when it came to the non-academic side of things, and she already had a solid advantage in her own right. Her internships with Ectoplasm had taught her a few things; one of them was harnessing and honing her latent light refractory abilities. That meant that even as she put on the standard jumpsuit that everyone else wore, she was subtly manipulating the strands of light around her so that as soon as the whistle had blown, she was fully invisible.
No one would see her coming, and that was how she was going to make her mark. Twenty students in one modestly sized chamber meant there was juuust enough room to manoeuvre around without bumping into anyone. It was incredibly difficult, but somehow Hagakure was managing, keeping near to the walls which thankfully provided a few sparse handholds.
For a few long minutes, she simply observed her classmates, until she could reasonably ascertain that no one was looking for her. Another perk of being invisible when there were nineteen of your classmates trying to take each other out, melee style, was that they tended to forget what they couldn’t see.
It meant that as she maneuvered carefully to Ojirou’s side, she saw Mina sneaking up on Aoyama doing the same, only to be suddenly swallowed up by awfully familiar purple mist, and then deposited a second later right on top of a charging Todoroki. (Charging was perhaps too generous a word, though.) Unable to stop herself from letting out a scream, the whole class had eventually also cottoned on to the portals appearing every-freaking-where, when the purple mist had come for Kirishima next, and then Satou, and then Momo and Jirou, sending them all over the zero-gravity chamber. . . limbs completely intact, bodies unharmed.
What the fuck was happening?
Everyone floated in a shocked, still sort of silence. They all looked back to their sensei, who slowly, carefully, gave them a thumb’s up.
That was when she realised, this, this was the real game. It was going to be even better than she thought. Her smile lit up her face anew.
Kurogiri examined the proceedings quietly, his hands clasped behind his back as he waited beside the Pro Hero in the viewing room. He found himself uneasy around the other man, restless like a bug had gotten under his skin, but he had long perfected the art of resisting the urge to fidget and he wrestled the feeling under control now, though it had never been harder. He found himself sneaking glances at him regardless.
Surely he saw the ridiculousness of this whole situation. Kurogiri, whether he wanted to acknowledge it or not, was not a former villain, he still was one. He was not someone Eraserhead should trust, and yet the hero stood beside him without a word, just silently observing the absolute anarchy that was taking place in the chamber. There was no other word to describe it – some students were not even fighting, just bouncing around the chamber, against the walls and onto each other. Eraserhead hadn’t explicitly opposed to team ups, and as far as he could see, there were at least a couple being formed.
And then there were students like that one with the explosive quirk, using his explosions to jetpack himself around with a permanent moue of disdain and objectively too much shouting that spoke of how overly serious he took himself. Bakugou, his brain reminded him. The brat who had in some indirect way led to Kurogiri’s capture; he’d heard all about it from those gloating insufferable heroes when they’d tried to interrogate him during his first few months at Tartarus. Thankfully, those visits had largely stopped; he hoped they’d finally understood that he would never give in. It wasn’t so much a matter of choice; he was literally unable to. That was how the good Doctor had made him.
Kurogiri snapped out of his meandering vein of thoughts—he had to stop those, they were no help to him at all in his situation—when Eraserhead shifted at last. “You may begin now,” he informed Kurogiri.
Kurogiri found himself bewildered at how he had found himself in this situation— how exactly would his involvement be beneficial for these children except to relive their probable trauma, anyway?—but complied.
His first target was the pink-skinned girl with horns spouting out of her hair. He had memorised the layout of the chamber, not that that was too difficult of a task, and with a practiced sweep of a hand, she had winked out of the physical world, reappearing on top of the student with the ice and fire quirk, the collision softened greatly by the zero gravity in effect but resulting in a satisfying clash of bodies nevertheless.
The girl’s scream had drawn the attention of those nearest to her, as well as those near the boy she had fallen on; as he had expected, half of the class was tense, expecting an attack of sorts. Well, they would be able to see him clearly here in the viewing station, as well as they could see their sensei beside him, Kurogiri thought, who must be communicating some form of reassurance to his students by now; this would be the scariest Kurogiri could get.
(An erstwhile memory stirred in his mind; for a second, he saw, shimmering and clear, a vision of a young boy sitting on top of his desk, his bright blonde hair softened by the gentle rays of sun. He was saying something, his mouth moving to form the words, but though Kurogiri concentrated, he couldn’t hear him. What are you saying?
The next second, the memory faded. He tried to hold on to it, but it slipped through his fingers like sand.
What was that?)
Kurogiri shook his head to clear it. He activated his quirk again; two more boys disappeared, deposited on opposite ends of the room. He targeted a group next; first, two girls, then the girl with the zero gravity quirk who was being converged on by three of her classmates. On Eraserhead’s nod, he opened five more static portals in haphazard places one by one; the chamber ensured that the students would be able to see his warp gates at a distance, while simultaneously being unable to stop themselves from tumbling into them.
There were smiles on their faces. Kurogiri turned away.
(A bright voice asking, “If you fell from a building, would your clouds catch you, or would you bounce off it?”
More voices, “We should try that on a swing,” “You should be more careful,” a cute boy with shoulder-length black hair flashing a hesitant smile, a strange swell of pride in his chest—
Laughter, the world tinted orange and so fucking bright —)
Eventually more screams loud enough to be heard from the viewing room filtered through the haze that had taken over his mind and reached Kurogiri’s ears, but they weren’t composed solely of terror anymore. Kurogiri blinked. No, he was sure excitement was included in the mix. More and more students were abandoning their task completely, just surrendering themselves to what had essentially become a space playground. Only with Kurogiri as the enabler.
Not for the first time, Kurogiri wondered how his life had come to this. (Children, these were fucking children and he was giving them fun.) He had had one job, once upon a time, which he had fulfilled to the best of his ability. (He had moulded a monster.) Even if he hadn’t been able to protect his ward at the end, he thought he had performed admirably. With dignity. (He’d been stripped of it, more like, stop it stop shut up—)
That dignity of his was being torn to shreds right now, and yet, Kurogiri refused, categorically refused, to think of his young ward at this time. He would escape, and he would return to him, but until then, to think of Tomura was to bring nothing but pain upon himself. Still, he wasn’t able to turn off his thoughts completely, although he could silence the strange nagging voice in the back of his mind at least. The Doctor had warned him about that; Kurogiri was not one to be easily distracted though.
It did bring an idea of his to mind. When his ward had been younger, Kurogiri’s portals had been something of a revelation to him. Kurogiri would use his quirk to transport the wayward child into the tub when it was time for his bath, and onto the bed when it was bedtime. Furthermore, even children needed some sun, and while they were constantly on the move, Kurogiri had had to make time in his schedule to let the child have a chance to stretch his legs. One memorable time, that had been at an empty playground. He remembered it even now, the way his ward had cheered in the lazy afternoon sun, going up and down a moderately-sized slide. Up and down, up and down.
It had been a rare burst of inspiration for Kurogiri, and certainly one of his prouder moments, when he had spontaneously opened two portals, one at the top and the other at the bottom of the slide, right when his ward had been riding down, and he had been instantly placed in a never-ending freefall.
Perhaps he could apply that here. Kurogiri shrugged, battling down a small amount of distaste; by the end of this session, at least, these students would never look at his quirk the same way twice. He might as well make the most of it.
It would only serve to his purposes anyway.
(You owe it to them, pal. It’s the least you can do.)
Okay, it was official, Aizawa was the best fucking sensei that they ever had and after this, Mina was totally doubling down on getting Aizawa thirty two balloons for his birthday, because this, this. Was. Insane.
All of a sudden all the portals had, like, vanished, only to reappear in a weird, reconfigured way, at least two near every corner of the walls, with a handful scattered near the ceiling and others near the floor. Kaminari had decided to try it out first—and had been stuck in an endless, if slow, meandering loop as each warp gate, perfectly aligned, transported him from one corner to the next.
“Holy shit,” Kirishima had exclaimed, before nudging Bakugou and whispering something in his ear. Strangely enough, Bakugou’s face had turned a little red as they engaged in a mini-argument; it was rather adorable, if Mina would say so herself, but then the next moment, she understood why. With a little bit of struggle and his face for once, red enough to rival a tomato’s, Bakugou managed to make it so that he was actually carrying Kirishima on his back, then with a grumbled, “Outta my way, extras!”, using his hands to steer them towards the nearest portal at a rapidly increasing velocity until he was zooming through the portals. Up and down, around and around.
It was one thing for Bakugou to have already gotten in control enough to be able to use his quirk in zero gravity without crashing; it was quite another to create for himself a virtual slide.
Her classmates watched in awe and envy and relative silence until Ochako plaintively whined, “Todoroki, pleaaase?”
That was when all hell broke loose.
Thirty minutes was not nearly enough, not for the way the battle had devolved into an impromptu space slide situation. (Bakugou had not been kind enough to offer piggybacks for anyone else, at least not at first. But seeing Todoroki willingly letting Uraraka climb on him and Midoriya offering a ride of his own had easily changed his mind, and Ashido and Kaminari had gleefully accepted. It was a huge mess, considering Asui had shot her tongue through the portals as she glided, causing the other riders to trip.) Still, as gravity came back to them, slowly, and twenty disgruntled students got adjusted to having to walk again, Aizawa had to conclude that it wasn’t too bad for a first taste. As future heroes, they would have to be prepared to work in all sorts of extreme environments, courtesy of whatever villains’ quirks at work. That was all there was to it.
It certainly wasn’t because he’d seen the weariness lining more than one face as almost every student elected to stay in the dorms over the weekends to catch up on their assignments, or overheard a few murmured conversations about cancelled plans. And if seeing his kids board the bus back to U.A. with big smiles and raucous laughter, drew a small smile on his face, well, there was no one to know.
He had a reputation to uphold, after all. And, as he left the compound, a thoughtful look on his face, it seemed, a villain to rehabilitate.