To say that Kendou had a terrible night's sleep would be an understatement. The entire night was spent tossing and turning around in her futon while her mind was a whirlwind of thoughts. Okay, she had a crush on Midoriya. That wasn't a big deal. It was perfectly reasonable to develop feelings for a guy friend. Stuff like that happened all the time. Yup, there was absolutely nothing wrong with having a crush on a totally attractive, smart, nice and hardworking boy who was antisocial and hard to read at times….

If it wasn't for the fact that she would wake up everyone else in the room, Kendou would've plunged her head into her pillow and started screaming.

She had a feeling that this was going to be a long day.

On the other side of the building, Midoriya was in even worse condition.

He had been experiencing nightmares the entire night and barely got any sleep. He knew that the training camp was going to be hard, but he wasn't expecting the added level of stress that he was currently feeling.

The fact that Ragdoll knew about him cutting still did not sit well with him. He wanted to believe that the cat themed heroine would keep her word and not tell anyone else. But in the back of his mind he had this sneaking suspicion that she already told Aizawa what he was doing. Unfortunately, there was nothing that he could do about it. So he would just have to wait and see what happens.

Morning training came and went for the would be heroes. Like the day before, they had been rigorously training their quirks and pushing themselves to the limit. Everyone was already starting to feel the wear and tear of their non-stop training. However, Midoriya was very noticeably on edge compared to his usual demeanor.

The lack of sleep finally caught up to him and he was feeling marginally worse than he did at the same point yesterday. Even during the few scheduled breaks that they had, he could be seen dragging his feet and looking more downtrotten than usual. Because of this added level of fatigue, he could barely even maintain his output of 'One for All' to nine percent

Jiro had made a few attempts at striking up a conversation with him. But after a couple of unsuccessful tries, she took the hint and just gave him some space. He barely even felt like talking to anyone.

The only relief for Midoriya and everyone else came when their teachers told them to stop training and form up in the clearing after their lunch break.

"Alright kitties, gather around!" Pixie-Bob shouted to the students. "This afternoon, you guys are going to be participating in a little bit of a team building exercise."

"What do you mean?" Asked Kirishima.

"You lot are going to be competing in a nice, friendly race." The blonde haired woman explained.

"A race?" The students asked in unison.

"That's right! The peak of this mountain will be your finish line."

"The rules are simple, your entire team has to be the first ones to reach the summit. Quirk usage is authorized, but do use your best judgment in showing restraint. Anything goes as long as you don't cause any intentional harm to others. Or excessive collateral damage." Mandalay was next to speak.

"There will be ten teams of four. When I pass out these sheets of paper to all of you, whoever has a number matching yours will be your group." Said Tiger.

"What do we get if we win?" Tetsutetsu questioned the cat themed quartet.

"The winning team is exempt from having to do the dishes tonight."

"Sounds good to me!" A few students echoed.

"If there are no further questions, I'll start handing these out."

As Tiger began giving everyone their randomly assigned numbers, Midoriya couldn't help but feel a slight bit of trepidation. He certainly wasn't the luckiest guy in the world, and he secretly hoped that he wouldn't have to be teamed up with Bakugou again. Shortly after the exams were over he learned that the explosion quirk user ended up failing. And needless to say, he blamed him for it. So far he was doing everything could to avoid the ashe blonde, so having to deal with that certainly wouldn't be good for his brain today.

"I guess we're on the same team, huh Midoriya-san?" Uraraka nervously approached the green haired boy, scratching the back of her head while giving him a weak smile. She briefly held up a small tab of paper with the number nine on it.

"Looks like it." Midoriya dryly responded.

Uraraka was a nice girl, even if he had the feeling she did everything she could to avoid him. The two got off to a very rocky start at the beginning of the year. She unknowingly made the mistake of calling him "Deku" on the first day of class and he made it very clear to her to never call him that again. Ever since then, she just stayed out of his way.

"Hey, are you guys on team nine?" A tall, green haired boy with blades on either sides of his mouth asked the two of them.

"Yeah, Kamakiri right?" The brunette asked.

"Yeah."

Before anyone could say another word, a male voice caught their attention. "Uraraka, you're on team nine, right?" Kirishima gave her a quick wave.

"Yup."

"Awesome!"

'Great, I just had to be in the same group as Bakugou's best friend.' Midoriya mentally scoffed.

"It looks like our group is pretty well balanced in terms of offense and defense. What do you think our strategy should be?"

"I'll go on ahead and take down anyone who I come across. You guys just stay close and watch our rear." The quirk inheritor sharply stated. They way he said it was more of a command than a suggestion.

"C'mon Midoriya, that's not a very manly strategy." Kirishima looked to him.

Ever since the start of the year, the hardening quirk user had a feeling that Midoriya didn't like him very much. Sure the guy pretty much blew off everyone. But when it came to him in particular, he always felt an added bit of venom in his voice the few times that he addressed him. He had no clue what it was about, and he tried to be as friendly to him as possible. But no matter what he did, the green haired boy wouldn't budge.

"Yeah, you can't just hog all the fights to yourself!" Kamakiri complained.

"It doesn't matter if it's manly or not. It'll be our most effective strategy and you guys don't have to needlessly burn any energy. I can take care of most everyone by myself anyway."

"Fine dude, you don't have to be so pushy about it. You can just go wild and the rest of us will try and keep up." Kirishima threw up his arms defensively, not wanting to make the situation any more tense than it already was.

"Good."

After everyone linked up with their respective teams, the hero course students made their way over to their designated starting spots. Each station was located a good five hundred meters away from the next, but everyone began at the base of the mountain. Mandalay, Aizawa, Kan and Ragdoll were all stationed at the top. Mandalay was there to give everyone the announcement and Ragdoll for the purpose of monitoring everyone's location.

"Alright boys and girls. On your mark, get set, go!" The brown haired heroine telepathically shouted in everyone's head.

Without a moment's hesitation, Midoriya powered up his 'Full Cowling' to nine percent and quickly dashed off up the mountainside. Leaving Kirishima, Uraraka and Kamakiri to their own devices.

"Geez, I thought this was a team event." Kirishima was the first to speak up.

"It's not like he was going to work with us anyway. We might as well just do our best to keep up and not slow him down." Uraraka said with slight groan. She knew the guy wasn't a team player, but she hoped that he wouldn't really abandon them like he just did.

"Let's just hope that he saves a few stragglers for the rest of us." Kamakiri said with an annoyed scowl.

~Three minutes later~

Jiro and her team were moving at a pretty good pace up the mountain. The purple haired girl was teamed up with Iida, Monama and Bondo. Their group was pretty well balanced in terms of fighting ability and they had formulated a pretty good strategy. Jiro would act as lookout by using her quirk to listen out for anyone who approached, while Monama and Bondo set glue traps along the way. Everything was going pretty well until the four of them decided to make a quick stop to scout out anyone else nearby.

"Jiro-san, have you noticed anyone yet?" Iida asked the girl who currently had one of her jacks in a nearby tree root.

"No one's close by right no-"

Jiro abruptly paused when the sound of footsteps about 200 meters away caught her attention. Whoever this person was, they were moving fast, really fast. Only two people that she could think of in their entire class had the ability of moving at such speed. One was Iida, who was standing right next to her. The other...

"Oh shit!"

"What is it?" Monama asked.

"It's Midori-"

*Bam*

*Bam*

*Bam*

Jiro didn't even had the chance to warn her teammates before a blur of green electricity fell upon them. She turned around to see Iida, Bondo and Monama all lying on the ground clutching their stomachs and completely incapacticed.

"Dammit!" She cursed at the sight of the three boys before looking up to see Midoriya giving her a serious glare.

"So...is anyone else close by?" He asked, very well expecting an answer.

All Jiro could do was let out a defeated sigh before pointing over to her left. She knew that she didn't have a snowball's chance in hell in taking Midoriya on in a one-on-one fight. "There's another group about three hundred meters that way."

"Thanks." He gave her a quick nod before dashing off in that direction.

'What's up with him?' She thought as the sight of green electricity disappeared into the trees. She noticed earlier that morning that the boy was in a less talkative mood than usual.

Meanwhile, on the opposite side of the mountain. The group consisting of Kendou, Yaoyorozu, Shishida and Shoda were navigating themselves through the dense forest.

"I'm surprised we haven't seen anyone else yet." Kendou said as she knocked down yet another tree branch with her quirk.

"It pains me to say this, but it might be for the best. If we can avoid running into other teams then it will be easier to reach the top."

"I am in agreeance with Yaoyorozu-san." Shishida said a few meters back.

"Yeah, especially if we can avoid running into Bakugou-san, Todoroki-san, or Midoriya-san."

"I'm pretty sure we could take either of them if we ran into them." Kendou shot Shoda quick and reassuring smile.

"How can you be so sure?"

"Everyone is still tired from training this morning. And our group is pretty well balanced in terms of fighting strength. I'm sure we'd be able to give even Izuku a run for his money."

"You seem quite amicable with Midoriya-san, Kendou-san. What do you suppose would be our best countermeasure for him?" The beast quirk user asked.

Kendou's face immediately heated up into a slight blush before shaking it off. "I-I don't really know about all that. But if we run into him, we should probably limit his movement as much as we can. The less room he has to jump around, the better our chances are."

"You sure seem to know quite a bit about how he operates, Itsuka-chan." Yaoyorozu quirked an eyebrow at her.

"O-oh well, we just spar together a lot so…." Kendou bashfully rubbed the back of her head.

"Yes, it is a well formulated idea. If we run into him that will be plan of attack."

"Bakugou! Calm down man, you can't just keep running off like that!" Tsuburaba pleaded to his teammate after going off on his own for the fifth time since they started.

"Shut up, round eyes! You extras just keep look out and try not to fall behind. We're bound to run into shitty Deku at some point!"

"So vulgar." Shiozaki deadpanned.

"You might as well just give up." Satou gave them an apologetic shrug. "Once he's like this there's just no stopping him."

Out of nowhere, a giant wall of ice appeared in front of them and blocked their path.

Midoriya continued on with his manhunt through the woods. He knew that Jiro wasn't the type to lie, but he found it odd that he hadn't seen anyone else since leaving her and the rest of her team. He elected to stay on the ground instead of moving around through the trees to avoid making any unnecessary noise.

The problem with this exercise was that he had no idea who was teamed up with whom. The only other group that he was aware of besides Jiro's was Tokage, Kaminari, Sero and that black haired girl from 1-B. Even then, he had yet to come up with a good strategy that would help him in taking care of that group. Although he did feel bad for leaving his team behind, he admittedly was using this exercise to blow off some steam.

While he was in the middle of thought, he failed to notice to unstable patch of dirt in front of him before both of his feet began sinking into the ground. By a sheer stroke of luck, he grabbed onto a nearby branch that was close enough for him to reach and pulled himself up to the top of the tree.

'It must Honenuki-san's doing.' He momentarily pondered.

As if on cue, the ashen skinned head of the 1-B student popped out of the ground about fifteen meters in front of him. Midoriya wasted no time in firing off a low powered "Delaware Smash" at him. But, just before his attack could make contact, Honenuki retreated back into the ground. What was even worse was the fact that the softened mud had effectively absorbed the force of the impact.

"What's wrong Midoriya-san? Why don't you come down here?" Honenuki playfully taunted him after exposing himself once again.

"I think we both know that I can't do that, Honenuki-san." Midoriya replied with a bit of a smirk.

"You're right. I guess we're at a bit of a stalemate, huh?"

As much as Midoriya didn't want to admit it, Honenuki was right. In the little bit of what he had seen of the boy's quirk, he knew that out of everyone in their grade he'd have the most difficulty trying to combat his softening ability. Simply put, is was a mismatch for him.

"Looks that way."

"Yeah. You can't come get me because your fighting style requires you to be on hard ground. And as we just saw, your air blasts won't work if I retreat into the mud."

"And there are enough trees around here to where I can just run away the second you activate your quirk." The quirk inheritor retorted.

"So how about we call a truce? I know when to pick and choose my battles and I'm pretty sure the both of us are smart enough to see that neither one has a good enough advantage to make a move. Let's just call it a draw and look the other way for now."

"I'll agree to that."

"Then it's settled. I'm a bit disappointed though. I was hoping to get the chance to test my metal against you. Maybe if the terrain was a little more favorable."

"Maybe some other time."

"Sounds good to me. Y'know, I don't care what those 1-A guys say about you. You seem like a pretty cool guy if you ask me."

"Thank you, Honenuki-san."

"Maybe that's why Kendou-san has a thing for you." Honenuki began laughing.

"I-I u-uh…." Midoriya sputtered momentarily as he face grew into a furious blush.

"Oh man, you're too easy. Anyways, catch you later dude." The lipless teen said with a quick wave before retreated back into the mud. Midoriya watched as the ground returned back to it normal state.

'That was a close call. I should probably go back and check up on the others.'

"Congratulations Team Nine, you guys were the first ones to make it here!" Said Mandalay to the group of students who just arrived to the finish line.

"That was a pretty smart strategy, incapacitating at least one member of the other teams to slow them down." Ragdoll complimented Midoriya.

"Although your group could've done a better job at working as a team. Do you care to explain yourself, Midoriya?" Aizawa gave the boy a stern look while he waited for his explanation.

"It was the most logical course of action sensei."

"And why is that?"

"I have the advantage in speed, power and mobility compared to the others. It wasn't necessary to have my teammates waste their energy when I could scout ahead and subdue as many enemies as possible along the way."

"I see…" Aizawa said with a slight nod. He knew the boy's explanation was just an attempt to avoid getting into any type of trouble. The man could practically smell bullshit coming from a mile away. But he couldn't argue with the results. "I can agree with your reasoning. But do be sure to consider making more of an effort in the future."

"Yes sir." Midoriya bowed.

"Alright, you guys can head over there and relax while we wait for the other teams to finish." Mandalay motioned over to clearing a few meters away.

"Yes ma'am."

The four of them did as they were told and took up residence at the clearing. Midoriya could practically feel the tension from the others, but he just wasn't in the mood to care about it right now.

"Y-you were pretty awesome out there, Midoriya-san." Uraraka said after taking a seat on the ground a fair bit of distance away from him.

"Thank you." He responded, not bothering to look her way.

"I still say you should've left a few people behind for us. We didn't even get to see any action." Kamakiri complained.

"I'll keep that in mind for the future, Kamakiri-san."

"Let's just be glad that we don't have to do the dishes tonight. Thanks to Midoriya we get a little bit of extra rest." Kirishima gave his green haired classmate a thumbs up.

"Oh yeah, you still have to do those late night study sessions with Aizawa-sensei and Kan-sensei, right Kirishima-kun?" Uraraka questioned him.

"Yeah…but hey, Bakugou, Kaminari and Ashido are there so at least it isn't boring."

"Tch." Midoriya gave a subtle scoffed that didn't go unnoticed by the others.

The two 1-A students decided to just let it go instead of making a big deal about it. Whatever his problem was just wasn't worth the effort.

"I don't think this is such a good idea. He doesn't seem to be in a talkative mood today." Kendou told Tokage as the two of them looked towards Midoriya who was sitting by himself near the trees.

"All the more reason for you to go over there and cheer him up!" Tokage patted her on the shoulders.

"I think we should just give him his space."

"And I think that now is a good time for you to put the moves on him."

"And what the heck is that supposed to mean?" The ginger teen quirked an eyebrow.

"It means, you go over there, cheer him up and flirt a little bit."

"I'm pretty sure I don't even know how to flirt."

"It's easy. Just give him some compliments, wave that side ponytail around and let him get a peek at the goods?"

"What?!"

"I'm just messing with you girl...mostly." Tokage chuckled.

"You're having way too much fun with this."

"That I am. Look, if you don't go over there in the next ten seconds then I'm going to show him that picture I took of you in the locker room after your match with Bondo."

"You're joking."

"Am I...am I really?"

"Fine…." Kendou relented with an exasperated sigh. Why in the world was this girl her best friend again? "But later tonight you're deleting it."

"No promises. Now go over there and secure your man class rep!" Tokage said with a not-so-subtle push in the right direction.

As Kendou made her way over to Midoriya, her heart rate began steadily increasing. Theoretically, there shouldn't have been anything to worry about. All she was going to do was have a regular conversation with him. Nothing out of the ordinary, they talk all the time afterall. It wasn't like she was just going to outright say that she liked him. That would've been absolutely insane. She was simply going to have a nice chat with her very attractive friend whom she had a crush on. No big deal right?

"H-hey, Izuku." Kendou uncharacteristically stuttered out.

"Hey." Midoriya looked up to her. Since when were his eyes such a pretty shade of green?

If he was being honest, Midoriya wasn't much in the mood for talking right now. But he knew it would be rude to blow off one of his only two friends. Instead, he just decided to roll with it.

"So uh...I noticed that you were looking kind of down today. Is something wrong?"

"No, I just didn't get a lot of sleep last night."

"Same."

"Sorry to hear that. Why were you having trouble going to bed?"

Kendou's face momentarily heated up at the question. She definitely couldn't tell him that she lost sleep over the fact that she had to come to terms with having a crush on him. Instead of fumbling over her words like an idiot, she quickly thought of a good excuse.

"O-oh, no reason. Some of the girls in our class snore so it's hard to fall asleep with all the excess noise."

'Genius'

"Oh, that sucks."

"Yeah…. You were pretty awesome out there today. From what I heard you took out Kaibara-kun and Awase-kun's teams like it nothing. Pony-chan said that you were like a force of nature out there."

"I guess." He said with a slight shrug.

"Hey, do you want to eat dinner together? We haven't had the chance to hang out much since we started training. A-and I kinda want to pick your brain about this move I've been thinking of trying out." Not a total lie, but not the complete truth either. She did want his opinion on a new move that she was working on.

"Y-yeah, sure. I'd like that." He flashed her a smile that in her opinion seemed a bit forced.

"Awesome." She returned the smile.

~M-K Ultra Created~

~Ibara Shiozaki, Itsuka Kendou and Kyoka Jiro have been added to the chat.~

T-Rex: What's up guys? It's time for us to put operation: "Get Wonderboy to fall in love with Itsuka" into action.

Fist: What the hell?

Cross: Would anyone care to fill me in? Also, why are you texting us if we're all in the same room?

T-Rex: Because we don't need the others catching wind of our operation just yet.

Cross: Alright?

Microphone: Long story short. We're trying to get Kendou and/or Midoriya to ask each other out since they're both obviously crushing on each other.

T-Rex: And we need to come up with a full proof plan to make it happen.

Cross: Oh my.

Fist: -_-

Fist: Wait. Why did you name the group "M-K Ultra"?

T-Rex: M for Midoriya, K for Kendou, Ultra because we all go to U.A.

T-Rex: Pretty brilliant right? : - D

Microphone: More like pretty cheesy.

Cross: I agree.

T-Rex: Whatever...Anyways back to business. We need to get these two to spend some more time alone together so Itsuka can pull the trigger. Any ideas?

Microphone: Well we don't really have a ton of opportunities besides during dinner.

T-Rex: Good point.

Cross: I do recall Pixie-Bob mentioning that we have another team exercise amongst the classes tomorrow after dinner. Possibly then?

T-Rex: It depends on what it is.

Microphone: Sounds like our best bet.

Fist: You guys are putting way too much thought into this...

T-Rex: Well someone has to.

Fist: We still don't even know if Izuku even remotely likes me.

Microphone: He definitely does, I don't think he'll admit it though.

Cross: Midoriya certainly doesn't strike me as the type to outwardly express his feelings in such a way.

T-Rex: He'll come around once Itsuka confesses her love to him.

Fist: -_-

T-Rex: It's settled then! Tomorrow after dinner will be our chance to give the two lovebirds some alone time. Just try not to get too frisky out there Itsuka. ;-D

T-Rex: What the hell?!

Microphone: Um…?

Cross: Itsuka threw her pillow at Setsuna.

Fist: I'm going to bed.

Microphone: Yeah it's getting pretty late. See you guys in the morning.

T-Rex: I'm keeping this pillow by the way!

Author's Notes: A bit of a bridge chapter before everything kicks off. But it still moves the story along, so I'm happy with it. It's too bad Midoriya was having such a shitty day. Sadly, things are going to get bad before they can get better for him.

1. Should Honenuki be Midoriya's "rival" in this story? I think he should. I was brainstorming on how a fight between them would go and it occurred to me that Honenuki might actually have the one quirk that's a prefect counter for anything that Midoriya might be able to do right now in the story. Like I mentioned in their brief exchange, the main deciding factor (In my opinion) would be the terrain for any future confrontations. Plus, I just really like his character and he seems like a pretty chill guy in the manga. Let me know what you guys think.

2. The invasion starts next chapter. Quite a few unexpected things will be happening and I look forward to writing them out. I hope that you guys are ready. And I apologize in advance if it's not up within the next few days. I'm still working out the kinks.

3. For the sake of this fic, Sero passed his exam along with Mineta. I know it's kind of a random change, but it's important for the story.

Like always, thanks for reading feel free to leave a review.