A New Woman | OC Teaser

𝐈.𝐍𝐓𝐑𝐎𝐃𝐔𝐂𝐓𝐈𝐎𝐍 ━━━━━━

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￣￣  :hearts:   :hearts:   :hearts:   :hearts:   :hearts:   ￣￣

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A quick OC preview for this month's required prompt. Trigger warning for terrorism and arachnophobia. Cover art by SilverLILII.

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━━━━━━ 𝐒𝐘𝐍𝐎𝐏.𝐒𝐈𝐒 ━━━━━━

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The pro hero Sepulchre's quirk allows her to cause frightening temporary mutations in other beings. A certain terrorist organization wants that power, and they have the means to get it.

➥ 𝐂𝐡𝐚𝐫𝐚𝐜𝐭𝐞𝐫𝐬:

             Yasuka Nejime

             Takashi

➥ 𝐆𝐞𝐧𝐫𝐞: Horror?

➥ 𝐖𝐨𝐫𝐝 𝐂𝐨𝐮𝐧𝐭: 2,171

➥ 𝐂𝐡𝐚𝐫𝐚𝐜𝐭𝐞𝐫 𝐂𝐨𝐮𝐧𝐭: 12,376

"Miss Sepulchre, yes?"

Short strawberry blond hair whipped the woman in the face as she turned to address the voice. A man stood before her in the train station, dressed impeccably. There wasn't a single wrinkle in his crisp black suit, not a single loose strand in his slicked-back black hair. She immediately knew he had approached her for professional business; he wasn't just a fan searching for an autograph.

"Yes, but I'm not currently on duty," she replied. "If you're looking for a collaboration or sponsoring, you should my agency for the greatest efficacy." She instinctively reached for her breast pocket to grab a business card, but he held up a hand to stop her.

"There's no need for that. I simply had a question for you," he explained. His voice was low and monotonous, a little offputting. "You have been a pro hero for several years. What is your opinion about the current state of society and the government, especially its overdependence on protection from individuals? Would you say that pro-heroes' existence removes the expectation for the government to provide basic security and safety to its citizens, thus turning our society into one that reacts to crime rather than prevent it?"

"Uh..." It took a few moments for Sepulchre to untangle the spiel she had just heard. The man stood motionless in front of her, patiently waiting for her to think things through. "Well, I feel like you're fishing for a specific opinion," she joked, hoping to lighten the mood. The man's expression didn't falter at all. "Uh...right, well...pro heroes are government , we are the employees that the government provides for security and safety. As for preventative measures...it's hard to predict a crime. There are several security companies that people can go to if they're interested in more safety options. The most the government can do-"

"Thank you," the man cut her off. Even though his expression and tone did not change, she could tell he did not like her answer. "There's a villain around the corner about to board the train with a bomb."

"What?" Sepulchre asked, stunned. "Why wouldn't you lead with that?" She started in the direction he motioned to.

"I have a precognition quirk that reveals..." the man started explaining, his voice fading from the distance and crowd between them. As she rounded the corner, she paused as she saw a large group of people waiting for the train. Her eyes quickly scanned everybody, searching for somebody behaving nervously, bearing bulky clothing, or carrying a suitcase. She considered calling the man who had warned her to ask what the culprit looked like. She would have no way to find the person quickly enough, especially if they recognized her or caught onto the fact she was investigating the crowd.

As she turned to call out to the man in the suit, she flinched in surprise when she found him directly behind her. "Yasuka Nejime, calm down," he commanded. Immediately, her worry about the bomber disappeared. She looked at the stranger peacefully, waiting for him to say more. "I apologize for the lies. There is no bomber, and my quirk is not one of precognition. Yasuka Nejime, follow me." The only thing Sepulchre could think of was making sure she followed him.

The man turned around and led Sepulchre out of the train station. Once they were on the street, he resumed speaking as they strolled. "I'm not a fan of these cheap tricks. I try to use my quirk as scarcely as possible, but you are simply an asset we can not afford to lose. I am so disappointed in your answer to my previous question. If you shared similar sentiments as me and my associates, we wouldn't have to resort to doing what we are about to do to you." He paused for a moment, and she did too. "You could have kept your mind. My associate will break it. But, I suppose it is deserved, considering you are so eager to lick the government's boots." He resumed his movement.

"Sepulchre!" a high-pitched voice called. The man stopped, turning toward a young girl running up to the pro hero. She was frantically digging in her backpack, grabbing a notebook and a highlighter, and offering it to the woman. "Can I have your autograph?"

There was a moment of awkwardness as Sepulchre completely ignored her. She didn't even acknowledge her presence, her empty gaze trained forward. "Yasuka Nejime, sign the notebook," the man ordered.

Sepulchre methodically and robotically grabbed the highlighter, smoothly swiping her signature across its cover. The girl smiled clumsily, taking the highlighter before absconding, eager to tell her mom about the weirdly cold interaction she just had with one of her role models.

"Yasuka Nejime, follow me," the man said, and they continued their walk. "I'll explain more about everything when we're in a less...public area."

As they approached the street, a car pulled up. The man opened the back door. "Yasuka Nejime, sit." Sepulchre moved into the car, sitting down in the enger back seat. The man then walked around the car to sit next to her. As the car pulled off the curb, he introduced himself properly. "My name is Takashi. My quirk allows me to hold a charm over an individual, forcing them to follow my instructions as long as I say their full name, which I'm sure you would have been able to figure out when you gained lucidity, which I won't allow for a while. I am a member of Kurokaze, as is Hotaka here." He motions to their driver.

"Since I know you haven't heard of Kurokaze, I'll give you a quick rundown. We are a fledgling group with big goals. We seek an anarchic end to the Japanese government. We are currently gathering as many assets as possible, and we plan on unleashing everything we have all at once when we're ready in hopes of a quick, clean sweep. The government will be in shambles before they even hear of our existence. I am bringing you to one of our bases, on the coast. Once you're there, our goals and opinions will be engraved on your mind, and you will be indoctrinated as a member charged with feeding us intel from the PHSC while using your quirk to help create weapons for us.

"You have no need to fear. The process of rewriting your brain isn't painful. Or, if it is painful, you won't it when you regain consciousness. My colleague, Kyoshiro, we're lucky to have him. Our two quirks combined allow us to recruit anybody we want. He can mess with memories, which is why I'm telling you everything, even things you shouldn't know. He'll erase this memory, and fill your memories with a more natural origin of why you ed us, accompanied by memories that will make you agree with our opinions. Like I said, painless. You won't even anything being out of the ordinary. So...I suppose I've spoken enough. Yasuka Nejime, sleep. You will awaken a new woman."

*            . • .     • .                 • .    • °. •.    •     . •    . • . ✦• . • .      • . • .               •.     . • . • .    •                  ★               . • . ★     . ° . •          . • .       • *.     •         *            . •★     . ° . •          . • .

Yasuka took a deep breath, nerves overtaking her. She had practiced for endless nights, and she knew everything would go exactly as they had planned. The only reason she was nervous was because this was the first test drive of one of her weapons. Takashi had informed her that while Kurokaze was not yet ready to topple the government, it was important to make sure their methods were reliable. She hadn't complained, it meant she would have a chance to use her quirk in ways the PHSC would never allow her to. She could see herself reach her full potential.

She held up her briefcase in front of her, undoing the latches and prying it open. Her specimen moved quickly. A spider with too many legs scuttered from the case, dropping to the ground. It was so small that nobody even noticed it. She closed the briefcase, taking another deep breath. In theory, she wouldn't need to be here to fully activate the mutations she had started in the spider. But she needed to be around in case things didn't go as planned, and she could revert it back to normal.

She glanced into the reflection of the bank's window. She was unrecognizable. Sepulchre couldn't be present during this time, or else she'd be labeled as the primary witness in the investigation. So, Yasuka was in disguise. She would disappear once things started settling down, just a citizen escaping from a quirk-based attack. She shifted her weight to look more natural and urged her mutation quirk to speed up in the spider.

She didn't know where it was at first. It had probably fled to one of the walls. She immediately knew its location when she heard a frightened yelp. She glanced over along with a few other curious individuals. Most people did a double-take at the growing spot on the wall. A ripple of confusion quickly spread, only drawing more attention to the phenomenon. The spider was growing larger and larger on the wall, its dozens of legs growing faster than its body, creating a spindly mess of legs only growing longer and thicker.

"What the hell is that?" somebody yelled.

"Kill it!" somebody else demanded.

A man near the spider, now about the size of a hand, pulled his shoe off his foot and moved to try and smash the creature. A cluster of limbs moved in his way, causing him to panic and back up. "Did it just stop me from attacking?" he asked. He glanced over at a woman, grabbing her hand and pulling her out of the building. "That thing isn't natural."

It needed to grow faster. With great focus, Yasuka doubled its growing speed. More people started panicking, fleeing the bank before it became dangerous. Others — the curious and the foolish — stayed behind, recording on their phones or just watching in awe. Soon, the spider was as large as the wall and needed to move to have enough space to keep expanding. It started moving, panicked by its enormous size. Poor thing didn't know what was happening.

It was too big and too dumb to move in a way that didn't cause mass panic. People spasmed in fear and disgust as the spider's legs slapped them. There were too many legs, not enough space for them, and some legs rested on the people around them. Yasuka stopped its growth, iring her experiment. Freaked out by the monster and the fact it was now touching them, the rest of the onlookers screamed, trying to make their way out of the building. Their panic quickly spread to the spider.

Yasuka took cover as the spider became aggressive and defensive, assuming the humans running around its legs meant to harm it. Its large mouth swooped down to bite one of its attackers. A young man was pierced by the fangs, which were now the size of daggers. When the fangs disengaged, Yasuka could see the venom dripping from his wound. The pro hero smiled as this only sent the crowd into a larger panic as people rushed to any exit they could find. Some even retreated deeper into the bank.

Several people were entangled in the spider's moving legs, falling down. Some unlucky souls injured themselves in their falls. Others would get an ankle or arm pinched between two legs and lifted into the air accidentally, only to be dropped those few feet to twist their ankle or daze them. Very few people were able to navigate the undulating mass to the exit, trapping people in a room with a venomous, frightened, enlarged monster.

The spider was willing to bite anything that moved, condemning many of the runaways to a slow, painful, venomous death. Yasuka watched all of this behind the cover of one of the desks, giddy with excitement. Nobody even glanced at her, too absorbed with their own survival. Besides the people rendered too injured to move with enough dexterity to navigate the floor of legs, the room soon emptied as people fled deeper into the bank to escape the monstrosity.

Once Yasuka heard the blare of sirens, she made her way into the back of the bank, easily finding the alternative exit. She escaped the crime scene as she deactivated her quirk. When the police and pro heroes entered, they would only find a few dozen injured victims suffering from lethal venom injection and a small spider. The investigation would be muddled by rumors too large to be believable, only made larger through rumors and gossip. Not to mention, the hundred or so people in the bank at that time would find themselves with a new fear of arachnids. As Yasuka walked back to the base, she wondered how many people's nightmares would feature the star of her debut.

𝐀𝐔𝐓𝐇𝐎𝐑'𝐒 𝐍𝐎𝐓𝐄𝐒 ━━━━━━

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￣￣  :hearts:   :hearts:   :hearts:   :hearts:   :hearts:   ￣￣

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I hope you enjoyed!

#Ethergency