Blue Team entered first.
The Naruhata warehouse stood at the end of an industrial road where half the streetlights had stopped working.
A chain-link fence surrounded the property, its warning signs faded by years of rain.
Present Mic crouched beside the locked service gate while Switchback examined the hinges.
“No alarm wire,” she whispered.
Sonar tilted his head.
A soft pulse left his throat.
The sound was almost too low to hear.
His visor translated the returning echoes into lines across its surface.
“Large open interior.
Two mezzanines.
Partitioned room at the rear.
No obvious movement.” “Obvious is doing dangerous work there,” Present Mic said.
Lockstep pressed one hand against the gate.
His Quirk fixed the metal against movement while Switchback cut through the lock.
The severed section did not rattle.
Blue Team slipped inside.
Midnight watched through seven separate feeds.
The warehouse appeared in fragments.
Concrete floor.
Steel supports.
Rows of empty vehicle bays.
Present Mic moved at the centre with none of his usual theatricality.
His head turned towards every scrape and distant drip.
“Blue Lead,” Midnight said.
“Thermal scan shows a weak heat source in the rear office.” “We see it.” “Could be electrical.” “Or a welcoming committee.” Nezu glanced towards her.
Midnight kept the channel open but said nothing else.
Present Mic reached the rear office.
The door stood partly open.
Sonar pulsed the room.
“One heat source.
Low.
Stationary.” Switchback entered first.
The source was a portable space heater.
It remained warm despite being unplugged.
“Someone left recently,” Present Mic said.
Lockstep checked the plug.
“Within an hour, perhaps two.” The office had been stripped.
Dust marked rectangles where monitors once sat.
Cable ends hung from holes in the wall.
A bank of surveillance equipment had been removed so quickly that one mounting bracket remained bent.
Present Mic touched nothing.
“Photograph everything.” One support officer moved towards a steel cabinet.
The door opened onto empty shelves.
Empty except for a torn strip of packaging.
Sonar crouched beside it.
“Medical.” The label had been ripped away, but a printed warning remained.
For controlled sedation only.
Present Mic’s face hardened.
“Control, Blue.
Possible medical packaging.” Midnight enlarged the feed.
The torn plastic looked similar to materials recovered at the abandoned hospital room.
“Bag it,” Tsukauchi said through the shared command channel.
“Do not assume it contained the same compound.” Mitsuki stood behind Midnight.
“They used that place.” “Likely,” Nezu said.
“Was Izuku there?” “We do not know.” Mitsuki made an angry sound.
Katsuki moved the blue marker forward on the map.
“They’re closer.” Midnight looked down.
“Maybe.” “They found medicine.” “That proves people prepared medicine there.” “For Deku.” “Possibly.” Katsuki glared at the screen as though certainty could be forced from it.
Blue Team continued.
In the centre vehicle bay, the concrete had been cleaned in wide, overlapping arcs.
Industrial solvent lingered in the air.
Scentinel was with Green Team, but Sonar’s visor detected shallow grooves beneath the polished surface.
Lockstep crouched.
“Tyre marks.” “Vehicle size?” Present Mic asked.
“Transport van.
Maybe small ambulance.” A support officer found a broken plastic fastener near the drain.
Blue and white.
Part of a temporary vehicle permit.
Present Mic stared at it.
“This was their staging point.” “Or one of them,” Tsukauchi said.
The rear partition contained two chairs bolted to the floor.
Leather straps had been removed, but rectangular wear marks remained on the arms.
Present Mic’s hands curled.
One chair was adult-sized.
The other was smaller.
Not made for a four-year-old, but small enough to trigger the thought.
Midnight’s breathing changed.
Present Mic saw the child-sized shape through his camera and immediately stepped between it and the lens.
Too late.
Katsuki had seen it.
“What’s that?” “Equipment,” Masaru said.
“It’s a chair.” “Yes.” “Why is it tied down?” No one answered.
Midnight pressed the communication switch.
“Blue Lead, confirm whether the small chair shows recent use.” Present Mic remained in front of it.
“Control…” “Confirm.” He turned towards the chair.
Switchback crouched beside the mounting bolts.
“Dust disturbed around the base.
Straps removed recently.” “Blood?” Midnight asked.
“No visible blood.” “Fibres?” “A few.
Grey synthetic.
Adult clothing, probably.” Midnight exhaled.
Not relief.
Only the absence of one particular terror.
The final discovery waited inside a metal drum behind the warehouse.
Documents had been burned there.
The fire had gone out before consuming everything.
Present Mic separated charred pages with long evidence tweezers.
Most contained vehicle schedules.
One displayed a hospital map.
A red line led from the private ward to the eastern service lift.
His voice disappeared.
Nezu leaned towards the screen.
“Blue Lead?” Present Mic lifted the page.
“They planned it here.” The words came out flat.
Another fragment showed photographs of emergency doors, guard positions and ventilation controls.
The kidnapping had not grown from opportunity.
It had been rehearsed.
Present Mic stared into the blackened drum.
He imagined Rampart’s people standing around a table, deciding which sound would make him run.
A gunshot.
Then another.
Reports of injured civilians.
They had known he would choose the larger crowd.
They had known Midnight would remain.
They had turned every decent instinct into an instruction.
“Search the rest,” he said.
His voice carried enough pressure that dust moved across the floor.
Switchback looked towards him.
“We are searching.” “Faster.” “Mic,” Lockstep warned.
Present Mic turned away.
Midnight watched him through the camera.
“Hizashi.” “I’m working.” “You’re pushing.” “They left less than two hours ago.” “And rushing will not bring them back.” The words sounded like Nezu.
Present Mic hated that.
“I was fast at the hospital,” he said.
“Fast in the wrong direction.” Midnight closed her eyes.
“You were not the only one.” “No.
You stayed.” “And he was taken anyway.” Silence crossed the channel.
Nezu let it sit for one breath.
Then two.
“Blue Team,” he said, “complete the search you are in, not the one you wish you had performed.” Present Mic looked towards the burned map.
His anger remained.
It changed direction.
Blue Team searched for another forty-three minutes.
They found removed cameras, medical packaging, restraint points, vehicle traces and a planning fire.
They did not find Izuku.
Present Mic stood outside the warehouse beneath the dead streetlight.
“Control, Blue.
Site cleared.” Midnight’s fingers hovered over the switch.
“Child located?” “No.” The answer seemed to hollow the room.
Mitsuki turned away.
Katsuki did not move the blue marker backwards.
He left it where it was.
“They haven’t checked everything,” he said.
No one corrected him.
Green Team entered the abandoned Quirk clinic through a loading entrance concealed behind an overgrown parking area.
The clinic had closed three years earlier after an investigation into unsafe rehabilitation practices.
Its public records described financial collapse.
Its electricity meter told another story.
The building had consumed power during four separate nights that month.
Tsukauchi followed Scentinel along a narrow corridor.
Dust covered the waiting room.
The treatment wing had been cleaned.
The distinction was immediate.
“Bleach,” Scentinel said.
Dr Kagawa adjusted his mask.
“Recently?” “Within twenty-four hours.
Industrial concentration.” “Covering what?” Scentinel’s nostrils flared.
“Blood.
Medication.
Several people.” Midnight watched Green Team from U.A.
The clinic’s body-camera feeds were colder than the warehouse images.
White tiles.
Stainless-steel trays.
Child-friendly murals peeling from the walls.
A cartoon rabbit smiled beside a door labelled QUIRK ASSESSMENT TWO.
Midnight looked away.
Izuku had already spent too much of his life inside medical rooms where adults decided what he was.
Tsukauchi opened the first treatment room.
An examination bed stood beneath a ceiling lamp.
Fresh paper covered the mattress.
Dr Kagawa checked the roll.
“Installed recently.” The room contained no patient.
No personal belongings.
No obvious signs of struggle.
A small restraint cuff had been attached to one side of the bed.
Mitsuki stepped closer to the monitor.
“That’s for a child.” Dr Kagawa measured it.
“Paediatric size.” “Was he there?” “We cannot confirm that,” Tsukauchi said.
“Every time you say that, he gets farther away.” Tsukauchi did not respond.
He had learned that defending uncertainty only made it sound like indifference.
Green Team moved through the clinic.
Scentinel found traces of Somnurel-B inside a locked drug cabinet.
Not enough to indicate storage.
Enough to indicate a vial had been opened nearby.
Dr Kagawa found disposable intravenous tubing from the same manufacturer used by Izuku’s hospital.
The batch number differed.
“Could have been used on anyone,” he said.
Mitsuki struck the back of an empty chair.
Masaru caught it before it fell.
Midnight continued watching the feeds.
She tried to interpret every room through Rampart’s purpose.
The clinic offered medical support.
The kidnappers had sedated Izuku heavily.
They might have brought him there to stabilise him.
Yet the bed paper was uncreased.
No child-sized footprints marked the cleaned floor.
No green hair clung to the pillow beneath the ultraviolet scanner.
Nothing.
Tsukauchi entered the records office.
Most filing cabinets were empty.
One drawer had been overlooked.
Inside sat bundles of police evidence bags.
Each bore a case number.
None corresponded to the clinic.
Tsukauchi’s expression hardened.
He opened the first.
Empty.
Second.
Empty.
Third.
A packet of unregistered medication.
The evidence tags had been used to transport contraband beneath official seals.
A national investigator photographed every label.
Tsukauchi read the authorising signatures.
Two belonged to serving police officers.
One name appeared in Izuku’s altered case file.
Detective Nakamura.
The man who had leaned over a hospital bed and told a four-year-old he killed his mother.
Tsukauchi’s anger became very still.
“Green Lead?” Nezu asked.
“Police evidence materials used for criminal transport.
At least one officer connected to the hospital interview.” Present Mic’s voice entered from Blue channel.
“You have enough to arrest him?” “For theft, evidence tampering and conspiracy, perhaps.” “Then do it.” “Not through the local department.” Tsukauchi closed the drawer.
“If he knows we found this, Rampart learns which property we searched and how quickly.” “We’re still protecting the operation?” “We are protecting Izuku.” Present Mic went silent.
Tsukauchi understood his frustration.
He shared it.
Every piece of evidence seemed to demand patience from people who no longer possessed any.
Scentinel called from the rear exit.
“Detective.” A set of tyre tracks crossed the service yard.
One vehicle had arrived.
Two had left.
The tracks were recent.
The second vehicle was heavier.
Tsukauchi crouched beside them.
“Direction?” “North road, then uncertain.” “Could one carry medical equipment?” “Yes.” “Or a metal container?” Scentinel looked towards him.
“Possibly.” The word meant almost nothing.
It lodged in Midnight’s mind anyway.
A metal container.
The hospital stretcher.
Heavy transport marks.
She looked towards Red Team’s silent feed.
Still moving.
Still searching the docks.
Tsukauchi completed the clinic sweep.
No Izuku.
No direct proof he had ever crossed the threshold.
Only a prepared paediatric room, matching medical equipment, police evidence tags and fresh vehicle movement.
“Control, Green.
Site cleared.” Midnight forced herself to ask.
“Child located?” “No.” Mitsuki turned towards Nezu.
“How many empty buildings?” “As many as they prepared,” he answered.
“And if all four are empty?” “Then each one teaches us where to look next.” “That sounds very clever.” “It is not intended as comfort.” “Good, because it isn’t.” Katsuki moved the green marker closer to the centre.
“Green found kid things.” Masaru looked down.
“Yes.” “That means they were close.” “Perhaps.” “They’re not failures.” “No,” Midnight said.
“They’re not.” Her voice almost broke on the final word.
Gold Team’s disaster-training facility was built to imitate catastrophe.
The building contained artificial streets, collapsible walls, smoke vents, false lift shafts and tunnels designed to teach heroes how to navigate unstable environments.
At night, without instructors or emergency lighting, it resembled a city that had already died.
Ectoplasm created twenty clones at the entrance.
They separated in disciplined lines.
Power Loader led the technical team into the control wing while Searchlight examined the internal walls for recent heat traces.
“Multiple powered rooms within the last day,” Searchlight reported.
“Main control chamber, eastern simulation tunnel and basement server area.” “Any people?” Ectoplasm asked.
“No current heat signatures.” The clones opened doors simultaneously.
Feeds multiplied across Midnight’s screens.
Stairwells.
Concrete tunnels.
Artificial rubble.
A school-bus shell used for rescue exercises.
Mitsuki stared at the grid of images.
“How can anyone watch all of that?” Midnight’s hand moved across the console.
“By looking for what changes.” One feed flickered.
She enlarged it.
“Gold Six, return to the previous corridor.” The clone turned.
A section of wall looked slightly darker than the surrounding concrete.
Searchlight joined it.
“Recent heat on the interior.” Power Loader removed the panel.
Behind it sat communications equipment.
Not old training machinery.
Modern receivers.
Signal jammers.
Police-band scanners.
A device programmed to mimic emergency-dispatch notifications.
Present Mic swore quietly through Blue channel.
Ectoplasm entered the concealed room.
Maps covered one wall.
Hospital floor plans.
Traffic routes.
The Bakugou neighbourhood.
The alley where Daichi died.
Photographs had been arranged beneath them.
Eraser Head entering his agency.
Present Mic leaving a radio studio.
Midnight on patrol.
Mitsuki collecting Katsuki from nursery.
Masaru outside the family home.
Izuku and Inko walking beneath a railway bridge weeks before the final attack.
Midnight stopped breathing.
The control room blurred around her.
A photograph showed her kneeling beside a frightened child during an unrelated rescue.
Another showed her placing herself between civilians and a villain.
Notes had been written beneath each image.
Approaches distressed children directly.
Prioritises physical shielding.
Will remain with vulnerable target if team divides.
Midnight’s hands left the keyboard.
Nezu took control of the Gold channel before she could.
“Document every page.” Ectoplasm’s camera moved closer.
A second note had been attached beneath Present Mic’s photograph.
Responds immediately to mass-casualty threat.
Beneath Eraser Head: Suspicious of authority.
Will personally investigate system irregularity.
The hospital operation was there in plain language.
Separate Eraser Head through corruption.
Pull Present Mic towards a crowd.
Leave Midnight with the child.
Then design the room around defeating her.
Midnight pushed her chair backwards.
Katsuki looked up.
“What is it?” “Nothing.” Mitsuki’s eyes moved to the screen.
“That’s you.” Midnight stood too quickly.
The room tilted.
She caught the console.
Present Mic’s voice entered her earpiece.
“Nemuri.” “They watched me.” “Yes.” “They knew.” “We know.” “No.” Her shaking worsened.
“They did not guess.
They watched me with other children.
They turned every time I helped someone into instructions.” Nezu muted the field channels.
“Sit down.” “I should have seen them.” “You were photographed during public work.” “I should have changed.” “Changed what?” “How I move.
How I protect people.” Nezu looked up at her.
“You believe the answer is to become less protective?” Midnight’s mouth opened.
Nothing came.
Mitsuki stepped closer.
“They would have studied something else.” Midnight looked at her.
“If you stood farther away, they would write that down.
If you checked every nurse, they would prepare a real nurse.
If you never promised anything, they would use the silence.” Mitsuki’s voice remained hard.
“You failed.
So did I.
So did all of them.
Stop giving Rampart credit for inventing every decent thing you did.” Midnight stared at the photographs.
Her guilt did not disappear.
For one moment, it stopped multiplying.
She sat.
Nezu restored the communications.
“Gold Team, continue.” The concealed room contained more than surveillance.
Power Loader discovered plans for the hospital ventilation system and a timed sequence for the false gunfire.
Searchlight found heat traces near a metal workbench.
Someone had burned documents there less than twelve hours earlier.
One surviving page contained a list of colourless code names and departure times.
No destinations.
No Izuku.
A clone searched the basement and found a child-sized raincoat in a storage crate.
Mitsuki gasped.
Katsuki stood.
It was yellow.
Not Izuku’s.
A manufacturer’s label showed it had been part of an old training dummy set.
The false hope lasted less than five seconds.
It left damage anyway.
Ectoplasm’s clones completed the sweep.
No hidden child.
No occupied cell.
No green hair.
No small footprints.
“Control, Gold.
Facility cleared.” Midnight closed her eyes before asking.
“Child located?” “No.” Three teams.
Three properties.
Three different sections of Rampart’s operation.
Transportation.
Medical support.
Planning.
No Izuku.
Katsuki placed his hand over the Gold marker.
“They found how the bad people did it.” “Yes,” Midnight said.
“So Gold helped.” “Yes.” He moved the marker towards Blue and Green.
“Then they’re all closer.” Nezu observed him.
“The child has an unusual understanding of cumulative investigation.” “He likes notebooks,” Mitsuki said.
Katsuki looked towards the remaining marker.
Red.
Eraser Head’s camera showed black water between rusting boats.
He had barely spoken for twenty minutes.
Midnight touched the communication switch.
Nezu placed one paw over her hand.
“Give him thirty seconds.” She stared at him.
“Why?” “Because he is looking at something.” On the screen, Eraser Head crouched beside a set of drag marks on the dock.
Threadhound moved his reinforced fingers just above the grooves.
Hushline watched the shadows between the cargo containers.
Midnight counted each second.
At twenty-seven, Eraser Head spoke.
“Control, Red.” Midnight activated the channel.
“Go.” “We found the boat.”