Arthur POV
We arched across the sky, falling bit by bit.
"Arthur make sure Toru doesn't touch the ground."
BOOM
We landed on the other side of the platform, my legs absorbing most of the impact. The jarring sensation of hitting the ground sent a shock through my system, and suddenly, the fog that had been on my mind was lifted.
Toru was on my shoulders, Sato was in front of me and Shinsho was at my side.
"Arthur, push us to the closest team," Shinsho commanded.
My body didn't move. For the first time since the battle started, I felt like myself again. My gaze moved to Shinsho at my side, then to the rising Sato.
"What did you do to me?" I asked, my voice sharper than I intended.
Toru herself also seemed to perk up at that, her head turning as if she was shaking off confusion. "Anyone else feel like the last twenty-six minutes were hazy?"
Sato also looked at us, his usual cheerful demeanor replaced by bewilderment. "Yeah, it's been the same for me. Like I was watching someone else control my body."
I looked at Shinsho again, pieces clicking together in my mind. His quirk. The way we'd all followed his commands without question. The compulsive need to obey that I'd felt.
"What did you do to us?"
"Tsk, I didn't account on the impact breaking it, damn," Shinsho muttered, his tired eyes avoiding our gazes.
"What did you do."
"The game is still going on, we've fallen to fourth, can we just focus on it," he said, pointing toward the scoreboard.
I looked up. He was right, while we'd been in the air, other teams had been fighting. Team Bakugo was still at 0 points, the one constant, but a few other teams mainly those made from class 1B had been able to steal some headbands.
Still that didn't change what had happened.
I didn't say anything more to Shinsho. Instead, I helped Sato get back into position and went back to my spot on the left.
"No one talk to him for now," I said quietly to Toru and Sato. "I think he can mess with our heads when we respond to him. Shinsho, get in position. We're at a good place right now, we'll stay out of the other teams' way and run down the remainder of the time."
Shinsho's eyes bore into me, anger, disappointment, or frustration. but he took his position on the right side without argument.
The field had become a chaotic battleground. Most teams were converging on Midoriya's group, drawn by the massive point total like moths to a flame. Team Todoroki was closest. Yaoyorozu was creating items on Todoroki's back while he froze everything in their path.
Team Bakugo was being even more aggressive, with Bakugo himself roaring commands as Kirishima and Sero supported him. Explosions echoed across the field as they blasted through other teams' defenses. They were barreling against Team Monoma.
"We need to move," I said to my team. "Standing still makes us an easy target."
But even as I said it, I realized the other teams seemed to be ignoring us.
That was fine by me. I'd learned something about Shinsho that made me not want to work with him anymore, but I wasn't going to sabotage our team's chances because of it. Toru and Sato didn't deserve that.
Except for one of course. Team Tetsutesu.
Vines erupted from the ground, while the ground itself softened they rose to grab Toru's headbands, I burst with my speed pushing us forward, we flew past them. Sato breaking apart with his strong body whatever vines lay in front of us.
"Four minutes left," Present Mic's voice boomed across the stadium.
That's when everything went crazy. All teams rushed at Midoriya.
Team Todoroki was in front.
Kaminari, who was part of Team Todoroki, suddenly discharged a massive burst of electricity. The attack was so large it encompassed multiple teams, mainly those that were behind them.
The only one that didn't was Team Todoroki as Yaoyorozu made an insulating blanket to protect themsleves.
The stunned teams were suddenly encased in ice to their legs, them being stunned had allowed Todoroki to freeze them all.
Then out of nowhere, I heard Iida yell something like reciproco burst, but I tuned that out, instead I stared at one of the frozen teams. Led by Shoda the vicepresident of class 1B.
I made a decision.
"Shinsho, grab onto Sato tight. You too, Toru." I put my hand on Sato's back and prepared for one final sprint. "We're going for one."
I spotted Team Shoda from Class 1-B in the distance. They had accumulated several headbands throughout the battle and were trying to run down the clock.
"Hold on tight," I warned, then burst forward.
The world blurred around us as we covered the distance in seconds. Toru's invisible hands shot out towards Shoda's team who tried to pull away but couldn't.
BAM
We grabbed two more. Pushing us to second place.
"One minute left."
I burst forward once more to the edge of the platform. There we watched the final time tick away, I noticed as Tokoyami was able to steal one of the headbands from Todoroki. Bakugo jumped from his own team as he tried to grab the 10 million headband.
"3!"
"2!"
"1!"
None of the three clashed, instead Bakugo fell to the ground as the timer reached zero.
The entire stadium fell silent for a moment before erupting in cheers. Teams slowly came to a stop, everyone breathing hard and looking around to see where they'd ended up.
I looked up at the scoreboard as the final tallies appeared:
Team 1: Todoroki - 10,000,580 points Team 2: Arthur - 1,795 points
Team 3: Bakugo - 1,255 points Team 4: Midoriya - 820 points
We had made it. Despite everything that had happened, despite the mind control and the complications, we were advancing to the finals.
But none of our team cheered. Instead, I helped Toru down from Satos' shoulders and we all turned to stare at Shinsho.
"That's the end of the second round, the cavalry battle!" Midnight announced from the platform. "In first place, Team Todoroki! In second place, Team Arthur! In third place, Team Bakugo! And in fourth place, Team Midoriya!"
My mind tuned out the celebration. The entire team was staring Shinsho down, and he looked back at us with that same tired expression he always wore. Without a word, he began to walk away from us.
Toru and Sato looked like they wanted to say something, but I stopped them.
"You guys go celebrate," I said quietly. "I'll talk with him."
They nodded at me, understanding the gravity of what had happened. As they walked away, I disappeared from my spot, reappearing in front of Shinsho and grabbing him. I dashed away from the stadium, holding his neck carefully so he wouldn't get hurt, and burst through the gates until we were alone in one of the tunnels.
"What did you do to us?" I asked, setting him down.
He didn't even seem disoriented at the fact I had just moved at speeds just below sound, his voice and gaze were as tired as always.
"I made us win."
For the first time in forever, I activated Avalon's barrier. I couldn't risk it happening again.
"You messed with my mind. Their minds."
"So?"
My hands started to shake. "So? SO?!"
Shinsho took a step back at the sudden change in my voice.
"You violated our minds! You made us puppets!" I continued, my voice rising. "Do you have any idea what that feels like? To lose control of your own body, your own thoughts? Minds are sacred? They... they make us who we are. They are a fickle thing, and you played with it."
"Get away from me," he said, his tired eyes meeting mine.
"No."
His eyes widened slightly, and I felt that familiar pressure against my thoughts again.
"You tried to do it again," I murmured, stepping closer to him, which made him step back. "You just tried to control me again."
My grip tightened and I could see fear creep into his tired eyes for the first time.
"You made me draw Excalibur against my classmates!" My voice echoed through the tunnel. "Without my permission! Without my choice! Do you understand what that means?!"
"Excalibur?"
"She's not just a weapon!" I was yelling now, all pretense of calm gone. "She's. You wouldn't understand! But you made me use her against people I shouldn't have!"
Shinsho tried to escape but I stepped closer and made him step back.
"Let me go."
"Why? So you can try to mind control me again?"
"I wouldn't."
"WOULDN'T WHAT?!" The words exploded out of me. "You already did it! For twenty-four minutes you puppeteered three people like we were toys! Like we didn't matter!"
I released him so suddenly he stumbled backward, hitting the wall.
"You have a perfect quirk," he said, but his voice was smaller now. "You are the boy who has it all."
"PERFECT?!" I laughed, but there was no humor in it. "You think this is perfect? You think any of this has been easy? You know what it is to see someone deteriorate bit by bit and do nothing to stop it, no matter bow much you console them, their mind goes, no matter how much you care for them, their mind goes even more."
I stopped, took in a breath, then I slowly unsheathed Excalibur, her sacred light bathing both of us. Shinsho flinched back.
"You know what's perfect, Shinsho? Choice. The ability to decide for yourself what you do with your life, with your body, with your mind. And you took that away from us like it meant nothing."
"What are you going to do?" he asked, and for the first time there was genuine fear in his voice.
"Grab her."
"What?"
"I'm telling you to grab her," I said, holding Excalibur out to him. "Go ahead. Take her."
He didn't move. Instead he looked at me like I'd lost my mind.
"Grab her," I said again, my voice calmer but still intense.
Again he didn't move, his gaze fell to Excalibur, but he stayed where he was.
I had given him a choice, something he hadn't given to Toru or Sato or myself.
I had given him a choice, and he couldn't take it.
I sheathed Excalibur, the tunnel falling back into dim lighting.
"You know why you can't take her?" I asked, my anger finally starting to cool into something colder. "Because deep down, you know what you did was wrong. You know you violated us. Your teammates."
"Teammates? Ha, don't make me laugh."
"YES, TEAMMATES!" The anger flared again. "Sure we don't know each other but I agreed to have you in my team. We were supposed to trust each other! Work together! Instead you, you, you!"
"I wanted us to win,"
"God I hate competitions! Winning isn't an excuse," I stepped closer to him. "It isn't an excuse to steal our agency! By making Toru and Sato and me into things instead of people!"
"It's my quirk," he said weakly.
"IT'S YOUR CHOICE!" I roared. "Quirks don't make choices, people do! You chose to violate our minds! You chose to treat us like objects! You chose to betray the one thing that makes us human!"
Shinsho was pressed against the tunnel wall now, staring at me with wide eyes.
"You could have asked," I said, my voice finally dropping. "You could have used it on our opponents. You could have coordinated with us like a normal person. But instead you decided our consent didn't matter."
I turned away from him, my whole body shaking with residual anger.
"You want to be part of the hero course, right?" I asked without looking back. "Then think about what it means to be a hero. Because heroes don't steal people's choices. They give them. They give them the choice of a better tomorrow."
I took a step toward the exit, then stopped.
"And if you ever, ever try to control my mind again," I said, my voice quiet but carrying absolute conviction, "I will make sure you regret it."
With that, I burst out of the tunnel and back toward the stadium, leaving Shinsho alone in the darkness.
God, I hate anything related to the mind.
God, I hate what he did to us.
God how I wish things could be different.
A/N: Bonus chapter, I actually had a lot of fun writing this chapter, like a lot. I hope some of you noticed the foreshadowing I laid it in pretty thick. Also yeah Arthur obviously didn't like getting mind controlled, in fact he doesn't like anything mind related, like he really, really doesn't like it, especially since Shinsho did it to other people too. Like it was on the level of if someone killed an innocent man in front of him.
He would have gone fucking ballistic, if it went on for much longer. Also yeah Avalon can protect against mental manipulation but only when it's active which it almost never is, cause why would it be. So everyone can now kindly calm the fuck down about mind control lol.
Oh and also stuff like choice is a pretty big deal, it's why he was so distraught when he killed cause he took away the choice from someone else. I'm bringing everything back, it all just fits so well, it's scrumptious.
That's pretty much it. I hope you ladies and gents enjoyed this bonus chapter.
Wait no, not it. The goals for this week are the same as last one. Being in the top 5 or top 3 by the end of the week.
See you guys tomorrow with the usual rate. Thx for reading. Author out.