Chapter 23 - Let The Countdown Begin

                                    

                                          


                          
A timely explosion had saved the brown-haired girl in the nick of time.
                          
"Ochaco-chan, you alright!?" Atsuhi exclaimed as she, Todoroki, and Kirishima ran over to help said girl out, while Bakugo landed beside her, looking on at the approaching hoard of robots.
                          
Jeez, we were just fighting those things up until now, and now there's even more of them!?
                          
With no room for complaint though, the former group of four, which was now up to five, began plowing their way through even more of the security machines as they tried to buy time for Midoriya and Melissa. Fortunately, according to Ochaco, the two successfully landed on the top floor. And now it was up to them to fix the security system and finally stop this madness.
                          
Atsuhi, however, was facing a big problem. She was quickly becoming sloppier and sloppier with her movements, her attacks, her dodging. The female had dubbed the robots simple to beat. And she had been entirely correct. However, as simple as one robot might've been to put out of comssion, a couple dozen, maybe even hundred of them, had proven to be too much.
                          
Now couple that with the earlier fight against actual villains and the many, many flights of stairs the four had had to climb up to reach this floor.  
                          
Atsuhi had long discarded her heels, however small they might've been, for if she hadn't, she would've surely already broken something by this point. That, however, was far from enough to make up for all her lost stamina. Not only was she getting sloppy due to lack of energy from the continuos use of her Quirk, her vision was slowly becoming blurrier, dark spots, which shouldn't have been there to begin with, obscuring the majority of it. Her breathing was heavy and her heartbeat was echoing off in her head.
                          
A whirring sound from behind her alerted her to an approaching robot and she turned around to hit it. A movement a little too sharp for her exhausted state. With no time to react, her knees finally gave out, too tired to support the weight of her body any longer, and she neared the ground at an alrming rate, closing her eyes at the anxious anticipation of the impact – a feeling all too familiar to her by this point.
                          
No sooner however, the robots around her were blown away, as someone grabbed a hold of her arms before she fell, steadying her in place, then helping her wrap her arms around their neck as they hoisted her up on their back.
                          
I can't believe this is happening again...
                          
As the spiky blond hair of her savior (for the second time that day) tickled her cheek, Atsuhi gripped Bakugo's shoulders tighter when he launched up with yet another explosion.
                          
"You holdin' on tight?"
                          
"Y-Yeah!"
                          
"Good."
                          
He landed swiftly, blasting away more of those robots that seemed to have no end to them. Atsuhi only looked on in both confusion and shock, while some guilt surged up within her. She had failed to even do something as basic as protecting herself twice already, both times having to rely on Bakugo's timely help.
                          
"Bakugo-kun, you can just let me down, I'm alright, I'll-"
                          
"Just tumble to the ground again? No need to lie about it. We've been fighting for a while-" He paused, grumbling as he fired off another explosion at a few more of the pesky machines. "It's only natural you're tired. I thought I told you to stop pretending you're alright when you clearly aren't." As he went quiet, Atsuhi looked down, realizing that he could still see right through her.
                          
And yet, she was thankful – he was right. She probably couldn't fight anymore. At least for a few more minutes. If she were to try, she was sure to quickly need someone's help again. And who was to say that Bakugo would be conveniently close this time too.