My Hero Academia: The Dragon's Quirk

The fall was a brutal transition from one hell to another. One moment, they were in a cold corridor illuminated by LED lights, fighting trained assassins. The next, they were in a freefall into a deep darkness filled with the roar of wind and the smell of hot metal. Leone's adrenaline-fueled wild laughter echoed for a moment between the steel walls of the exhaust shaft before being swallowed by the sound of them plummeting at a terrifying speed.

For Tatsumi, his soldier's instinct immediately took over. His analytical mind, momentarily paralyzed by shock, was now working again at lightning speed, processing the variables: terminal velocity, the narrow diameter of the shaft, and the combined mass of his body, his heavy armor, and Leone clinging to his back. Gravity was their new and most unforgiving enemy.

"Leone, hold on tight!" he shouted, his voice barely audible over the roar of the wind.

He forced his consciousness to reconnect with Incursio. Although most of its energy systems were still diverted for internal repairs, its basic motor functions still responded. He couldn't fly, but he could still move. With a muffled roar, he extended his dragon wings. It wasn't a graceful movement. The metal spurs on the tips of his wings immediately scraped and gouged the steel walls of the shaft, creating a shower of sparks that momentarily illuminated the darkness. The incredible friction managed to slow their fall, turning it from a deadly freefall into an uncontrolled slide.

Below them, Leone, with the superior night vision of her Lionel Quirk, became their eyes. "Giant turbine fan ahead! Five o'clock! There's a gap between the third and fourth blades!" she shouted, her hoarse voice cutting through the noise.

Using Leone's warning as a guide, Tatsumi twisted his body, using one wing as a makeshift rudder, directing their slide. They shot past the giant, rusty turbine blades with only inches to spare. They could feel the residual heat from the long-inactive engine. The shaft wasn't a straight tunnel; it was a vertical labyrinth filled with deadly industrial obstacles. They dodged steam pipes spewing hot gas, passed thick cables dangling like snake tendrils, every maneuver a gamble between life and death.

After what felt like an eternity, they finally saw the bottom. An emergency landing platform made of steel grating. They hit it hard, not landing, but falling and tumbling across the hot metal before finally coming to a stop, just inches from a rickety safety rail.

The sudden silence was deafening. There was only the sound of their ragged breaths and a deep, constant rumble of machinery from somewhere below them. They were in a massive, dark, and incredibly hot room. This was the belly of the beast.

At the Temporary Command Post

"I've lost their signal! They've vanished from the sensors!" Hawks' voice was sharp and tense, his usually calm face now filled with genuine concern. On his main screen, the two blue dots marking Tatsumi and Leone had disappeared from the 75th-floor layout. "That exhaust shaft... it must be lined with a lead-graphite alloy to withstand the heat. It's blocking all kinds of signals. I can't track them."

At her hidden post on another building's roof, Akame pressed her communicator. She had seen the flashes of battle on the 75th floor, then silence. "Status, Hawks? Tatsumi and Leone are not at the emergency pickup point."

Hawks took a deep breath, forcing himself to think clearly. Panicking wouldn't help. He quickly opened the deep infrastructure layout of I-Island, valuable data they had obtained from Kageyama. His fingers danced across the holographic keyboard, tracing the complex network of pipes and shafts. "I found it... The shaft seems to have several branches, but its main path ends at the Heat Exchange Facility on sublevel 7. Right above the island's main reactor shielding. It's an industrial hell down there. One of the most dangerous and unstable places on the entire I-Island."

He marked the new location on Akame's map. The distance was immense, separated by dozens of floors and hundreds of now fully alert guards.

"Akame," Hawks said, his voice now calm again, filled with a commander's authority. "Your new retrieval mission: find a way to sublevel 7. Avoid all contact. I can't guide you directly there due to the signal interference, so you'll have to rely on the layout and your instincts. They're going to need a way out, and you are their only hope."

"Understood," Akame replied curtly. No hesitation, no questions. She turned off her communicator, packed away her sniper rifle, and pulled up her hood. She turned and disappeared into a ventilation shaft on the roof, becoming a ghost now hunting inside the steel labyrinth, searching for her lost comrades.

In the Belly of the Beast

Tatsumi and Leone slowly got to their feet, their bodies aching from the hard landing. They were on a platform in the middle of a room so large its edges were lost in darkness. The air was heavy, hot, and incredibly humid, like being inside the lungs of a Leviathan dragon. The deep, constant rumble of machinery came from below them, making the entire platform vibrate ceaselessly.

"What is this place?" Tatsumi asked, his visor switching to thermal vision, trying to map their surroundings.

"Looks like we're in the biggest engine room I've ever seen," Leone replied, her golden eyes already adapted to the low light. "And I think..." she pointed down.

Tatsumi followed her direction. Below their platform lay a scene of industrial hell. Giant pipes the size of subway trains crisscrossed each other, some of them glowing red-orange from the incredible heat of the fluid flowing within. Thick, hot steam shot out from valves with a deafening hiss. In the distance, they could see colossal pistons moving up and down in a slow, powerful rhythm, each movement shaking the entire room.

"Our comms are completely dead," Tatsumi said after trying to contact Hawks to no avail. The electromagnetic interference from the giant machines around them was too strong. "We're completely on our own here."

Leone grinned, a wild glint in her eyes. "I've been in worse situations than this, Dragon Boy. At least it's warm here." She stretched her sore muscles. "Let's find a way out. Every machine has an off switch, and every labyrinth has an exit."

They began to explore this new, dangerous world, moving carefully along narrow catwalks suspended over dark chasms. This was a completely different world from the sterile corridors above. Here, everything was made of rusty steel, slick with oil, and vibrating with unseen power. Every step had to be calculated.

As they moved, Leone's enhanced senses became their guide. Her sharp nose tried to catch the scent of fresh air amidst the smell of hot metal, ozone, and steam. Her sensitive ears tried to distinguish strange sounds from the monotonous rumble of the machines. "That way," she whispered after a moment, pointing to a smaller service tunnel in the wall. "I smell something different. Not as hot. Maybe it's a ventilation path that leads out."

They entered the tunnel. It was quieter inside, allowing them to finally hear their own footsteps. That's when they found it. In a small, seemingly long-abandoned control room, they saw the remnants of the PLF's secret operations. A few empty crates with the Humarise logo lay in a corner, and more horrifyingly, they saw a charred portable containment cage with its door ripped from the inside, as if something incredibly powerful had once tried to force its way out.

"They weren't just using the lab sublevel," Tatsumi muttered, his mind connecting the dots. "This entire underground part of the island is their secret facility."

The Closing Trap

After walking for nearly half an hour through a confusing network of service tunnels, they finally found a large steel door at the end of a maintenance corridor. It looked like an exit, a door leading to another part of the sublevel complex.

Suddenly, Tatsumi's communicator crackled to life with loud static, then Hawks' voice came through, distant and distorted, as if he were shouting from across an ocean.

"...Tatsumi?! ...Leone?! Can you hear me?! My signal is finally getting through!"

"Hawks! Yes, we hear you! We're on sublevel 7, near an exit to the industrial sector!" Tatsumi replied with relief.

"Thank God! Listen carefully, you have to get out of there immediately! You're right where they want you! The PLF knows you fell into the exhaust system! They couldn't follow you from above, so they sealed all the exits on your level and are now sending troops from below to sweep the entire area! It's a trap!"

Hawks' warning came too late. Just as he finished speaking, the steel door in front of them began to slide open with a heavy groan, revealing a brightly lit corridor beyond.

Standing there wasn't one or two guards. A full squad of PLF elite troops in heavy combat armor stood in formation, their weapons raised. And in front of them stood a man larger than a normal human, both of his arms replaced by a pair of six-barreled rotary gatling cannons that gleamed under the lights. The barrels began to spin with a low, menacing whirring sound, radiating an aura of mechanical death.

The man grinned, revealing metal teeth. "I figured the little rats would seek warmth," his deep, vibrating voice echoed in the corridor. "Unfortunately for you... it's a little too hot in here."

Tatsumi and Leone exchanged a look. The path behind them was a deadly labyrinth of heat. The path before them was blocked by a small battalion and a cyborg lieutenant. They were cornered.

Leone grinned, baring her fangs, showing not a shred of fear. "Looks like," she whispered, her voice a low growl filled with the anticipation of battle. "This party isn't over yet, Dragon Boy."