(Rei POV)
As I opened my eyes, a bright, sterile light hit me like a slap. My lids squeezed shut instinctively, but it was too late—my head throbbed from the sudden glare.
The first thing I noticed: cold.
Not just in the air, but underneath me. I was lying on something metallic—flat, hard, and unyielding. I tried to move, and that's when the second thing hit.
Straps.
Around my wrists. My ankles. Across my chest.
Tight.
I tugged reflexively, and panic flared in my chest like a spark catching dry grass. My breathing quickened, echoing in my ears. My muscles strained against the restraints, but they didn't give. Not even a little.
This wasn't a hospital.
But it reminded me of one. Sort of. The room had the same clinical stillness—like time had been frozen, everything sterile and too clean. No windows. Just walls painted in dull, lifeless gray. A hum from the lights above buzzed constantly, as if trying to drown out thought itself.
I swallowed hard. My throat was dry, like I hadn't had water in days. My mouth opened, but no words came out at first—just a cracked breath.
"Dad…?"
My voice felt wrong. Small. Hollow.
Memories came flooding back, jagged and scattered like broken glass. The monkey bars. The feeling. Dad's face. The shadow. The man in black.
All For One.
My heart spiked, hammering inside my ribcage.
"Dad—!?" I tried to scream this time, twisting against the straps, willing them to break. I had to move. Had to get out. Had to—
Then I stopped.
Because something else returned.
That feeling.
The strange pressure in my chest, the one that felt like my quirk was trying to claw its way out. It had been gone for months. Dormant. Quiet.
Now it was back.
But this time it was sharper. Like static, crawling through my veins.
I tried to focus, to call on my ghost hands. Just one. Something. Anything.
Nothing happened.
I looked down—or as much as I could from where I was pinned—and realized small metallic cuffs circled my wrists, glowing faintly with etched lines.
Some kind of suppression tech. My quirk was being locked down.
A door hissed open behind me. I couldn't turn to see it, but I heard the footsteps. Slow. Measured. Calm in a way that made my skin crawl.
"You're awake. Good," said a voice.
It wasn't the voice from the woods. This one was softer, clinical. Detached.
A man in a white coat came into view, standing over me like I was a bug under glass.
"You've been unconscious for nearly two days. We were beginning to worry your system wouldn't stabilize under the transport conditions."
"Where am I?" I rasped.
He didn't answer. He simply pulled a tablet from his coat and began scanning it.
"Vitals normal. Mental distress… elevated," he murmured to himself, more like an observer than someone speaking to another person. "Expected."
"Where's my dad?" I snapped. "Where is he!?"
The man paused, just long enough for the silence to hurt.
Then he leaned down, expression unreadable behind silver-rimmed glasses.
"You'll have time for questions later," he said flatly. "Right now, the master is more interested in your… compatibility."
He turned and walked away.
And the lights above me began to shift—no longer white, but tinged with red. A low hum started to build. A vibration under the metal table.
Something was starting.
Something I wasn't ready for.
The hum from the lights changed again. It grew deeper, almost like a low growl vibrating through the walls. The red hue above flickered, then steadied—casting the room in a glow that made everything feel wrong. Like I wasn't in a room anymore, but inside something alive.
Footsteps returned.
This time, there were more of them.
Two people in coats flanked the original man. None of them looked at me like I was a person. Just a… thing. A case. A puzzle they were assembling in silence. They talked in short, clipped phrases, using words I didn't understand. Terms like neurological sync, quirk modulation, and latent response tracking.
I barely heard them.
My body was already reacting. Muscles tensed. Stomach churned.
The first cold instrument touched my arm and I flinched instinctively. It didn't hurt, not really—it was just a scanner. A glowing wand moving slowly up and down, sending tingling pulses through my skin. But it made my skin crawl. It was too close. Too slow.
I turned my head away, but I couldn't stop feeling it.
Next came a helmet—round, metallic, lined with dark padding. They lowered it onto my head without a word. I tried to shake it off, but it locked into place with a click. Almost instantly, something inside began to hum softly against my skull, like bees trapped inside.
The man with the tablet leaned over again.
"You may feel pressure in the back of your eyes. This is normal."
Normal?
There was nothing normal about any of this.
He tapped a screen, and the buzzing in my head intensified. I squeezed my eyes shut as pain—not sharp, but deep—pushed inward from behind my temples. Like something was poking around inside my brain.
I gasped.
One of the others noted something on a chart.
The humming eased, but didn't stop. Another device came down from the ceiling above me. A thin arm with wires and needles at the end, like some robotic spider. I didn't know what it was doing—I couldn't even tell if it touched me—but it hovered over my chest for a long time, clicking softly.
Then the whispering started.
Not from the scientists.
From the machine.
Faint voices. Disjointed. Like radio static twisted into language. I couldn't make out the words—but they weren't mine. They weren't me.
"Stop," I mumbled, my voice hoarse.
None of them looked up.
"Please, stop."
They kept going.
The worst part wasn't the machines or the wires or the helmet pressing into my skull.
It was the silence.
Not a single word of comfort. No one told me what they were doing or why. I was just… there. Like furniture. Like I didn't deserve an answer.
Eventually the machines started to retract. The lights faded from red to white again. The helmet lifted off my head, the hum inside it dying away.
The man nodded. "Baseline stability within expected range."
One of the others scribbled something.
And then they left. Just like that. No explanation. No questions. No anything.
The door hissed shut behind them.
And I was alone again.
Still strapped down.
Still scared.
Still trying to understand what any of this meant.
Why me?
And what they were really trying to turn me into.
I didn't know how long I'd been here.
Time didn't pass in this place. There was no sun, no moon, no clocks. Just artificial light that dimmed and brightened when they decided it should. Maybe it had been days. Maybe weeks.
Maybe more.
They came and went like shadows. Doctors, guards, voices behind glass. Some I never saw. Others I recognized by the way their shoes hit the floor. I didn't speak anymore when they entered. I learned quickly that my voice didn't matter here.
But I still had thoughts.
I still felt.
And now something was wrong.
Different.
I woke up in a different room. Smaller. Darker. The table was gone—replaced with a padded chair, metal restraints looped loosely around the arms. My ankles weren't shackled, but there was no door. Just blank, seamless walls.
Except one.
A mirror.
A long, cold sheet of glass staring back at me.
I knew what that meant. They were watching. Always.
The chair made a low click as I shifted in it. My legs bounced. I couldn't stop them. My heart wouldn't slow down. Something in the air had changed—thicker, heavier, like the calm right before lightning splits the sky.
Then, a sound.
Fsshk. The wall opposite the mirror hissed open.
And he stepped in.
All For One.
The man who took my father's life like it was nothing. The man who'd turned my world into a cage.
This time he came alone.
No guards.
No doctors.
Just him.
And me.
I froze as he walked forward, boots echoing in the silence. He didn't wear armor today. Just a high-collared black coat and gloves.
He stopped right in front of me.
"Do you know what the most fragile thing in this world is?" he asked softly.
I didn't answer.
He leaned forward.
"Hope."
I flinched.
"I've let you hold onto it," he continued. "Even after the pain. Even after you watched your father fall. I let you dream that someone might still come for you. That this would end. That heroes would arrive."
My hands clenched against the armrests. The restraints held firm.
He circled the chair slowly, each step slow and deliberate.
"But here's the truth, Rei. No one is coming."
A lump formed in my throat.
"You think you're special because of your quirk. And you are. But you're not irreplaceable. You're a resource. A blueprint. A vessel. And you'll become what I need you to become—whether you want to or not."
He stopped behind me. I felt his presence like smoke coiling around my neck.
Then he placed a hand on my shoulder.
"I want to show you something," he said, almost gently.
The room changed.
Without moving, the mirror lit up. But it wasn't a reflection now.
It was a screen. And on it… was my house.
My mother.
She was standing in the kitchen, wiping her hands with a towel, the familiar apron tied neatly around her waist. The stove was on. She looked tired, but peaceful. Music played softly in the background.
I shot to my feet, the restraints unlocking with a hiss—but it was a trick. I couldn't reach the mirror. I slammed my fists against it anyway.
"Mom!"
She didn't hear me. Couldn't hear me.
"This isn't live," I said, chest heaving. "This isn't real."
"But it is," he whispered.
My blood ran cold.
"She's alive. For now. Safe. But that depends entirely on you."
I shook my head. "Don't touch her—don't you dare touch her—"
"That is up to you, Rei."
He waved a hand and the image shifted again.
A hospital room.
Another.
A classroom.
The forest.
Every frame another piece of my life. People I knew. Places I loved.
Every part of my world held hostage by a hand I couldn't reach.
"I'm going to teach you how this world really works," he said. "Piece by piece. Memory by memory. Until you understand that resistance is pain—and obedience is mercy."
My knees buckled. He didn't even have to push me.
The screen went black. The restraints clicked again.
And then he walked away, without another word.
The door sealed shut behind him.
And I was alone again. But this time, it wasn't the straps holding me down.
It was the weight of everything I'd just seen.
Everything I'd just lost.
And everything I'd have to do to survive.
Those were my thoughts as I was dragged like trash back to the room I was experimented in before.Cold floor. Dim lights. Same restraints. Same silence.
But would it stay for long?