Adjusting for Changes

As Shota left Nezu's office, he reflected on their conversation. In some ways, it had gone better than he'd expected. In others... Well, he probably couldn't call inspiring the genius's interest in Midoriya a bad thing, but the thought was still terrifying.

Of course, that was the point. To make Midoriya into a force so terrifying, that even a two-centuries-old crime lord would think twice before messing with him. And, damn it, the scariest part was that Aizawa thought that they might just be able to pull it off.

Speaking of which, when Shota had told Nezu his final idea, the other had said it had potential. Still, he needed to come up with a convincing cover to the true purpose for his request, if they were going to be able to go through with it.

So, Shota would have to do some thinking on that.

Of course, that was on top of the million-and-one other things to do. He stopped himself from listing a likely endless stream of tasks that awaited him. It wasn't like he had time for any of it right now, anyway.

Otherwise, he would be the one late to class. And he'd have to count on the students to get to today's assembly of their own accord.

With his luck, rather than everyone making it there on time and in one piece, someone would probably find trouble. Although, his two biggest sources of it were currently under house arrest. So, he probably had a few days' reprieve in that regard.

And yet, they still managed to leave a mess for him to deal with in the interim.

What a pain…

When he arrived at the classroom, he took a moment to readjust the capture weapon around his neck, making sure it could easily be loosened at a moment's notice. It wasn't that he expected anything to happen, but with his students' propensity to find trouble, it paid to be prepared at a moment's notice.

Despite the door already being open, leaving one less way to draw attention to his otherwise silent arrival, within three seconds of slipping into the room, his students fell silent. Ah, progress.

Once the students had taken their seats, Shota stated, "Today's morning schedule is going to be different, due to an assembly that will be taking place in a few minutes. But, before we go, there are some other changes I need to discuss with you. First off, I've made a slight adjustment to your seating arrangements. Kirishima, from now on, you will sit directly behind Bakugou and when Midoriya returns to class, he will be seated where you are now."

Usually, Shota didn't move students around, but with new facts brought to light, he felt that this was absolutely necessary.

It didn't do either Midoriya or Bakugou any favors to be positioned as they were. It couldn't be a positive influence on Midoriya's confidence to stare at the back of his childhood bully's head, all day long. And it certainly couldn't help Bakugou's development to have the constant reminder of the issues he was trying to work through sitting right behind him on a daily basis, either. Midoriya tended to get along with any of his other classmates perfectly fine, and Bakugou was more receptive to Kirishima than any other student in the room. It was probably the easiest change to make in order to start dealing with their problems.

Still, the move seemed to set off alarm bells for the other students. After Shota finished, he was certain that he could cut the tension in the room with a knife. In the beginning of the year, when students had tried requesting seating rearrangements, he made it abundantly clear that he won't allow people to move from their assigned spots.

"That's six seconds, Kirishima. You need to work on your reaction time."

"Yes, Aizawa-sensei." With that, Kirishima leapt into action. The boy quickly gathered his materials and moved into what, until that moment, had been Midoriya's seat.

With that taken care of, Shota continued, "I'm also going to require that each of you visit Hound Dog at least once, for a Post Villain Attack Psychological Assessment. This isn't an optional appointment. Once I verify the available time slots with Hound Dog, you'll be given an opportunity to select one for yourselves. If you don't pick one, I'll choose for you." He glared coldly at the students as he added, "And you wouldn't want that, I promise you."

A low murmur began throughout the room, but one glance around the room from Shota and they immediately fell silent.

Shota could still see the worry in the students' eyes, even as he moved on and informed them about the plans for this afternoon's training session and how, later in the week, they were going to have guests and he expected the students to be respectful and attentive.

By the time he was done, it was time for the assembly.

After the assembly concluded and the class got back to their room, Kirishima turned and took a few steps toward the seat that he'd occupied since the beginning of the school year before stopping, recalling that it wasn't his anymore.

Kirishima backtracked to the front of the room and went over to the last row, to the spot everyone had come to think of as Midoriya's.

He quietly sat in the seat.

"What do you think they were fighting over, last night?"

Kirishima glanced over his shoulder at Mineta. They didn't interact much, but it was obvious that right now, the smaller boy was as disturbed by this as he was. Heck, he was sure everyone was concerned by it.

"How should I know?" Clearly, something had happened, if Mr. Aizawa was outright separating them.

"You and Bakugou basically shared a room last night."

Kirishima felt his smile falter slightly at the reference to the hole he made in the wall. He guessed if Mineta knew about it, everyone probably did. "Yeah, but we didn't talk or do anything." In fact, it was the first time that he hadn't stirred to the sound of Bakugou pacing and intermittently crackling his hands at some point in the night, since they moved into the dorms. Which had seemed like a good sign at the time.

But the way Aizawa was acting, you'd think something horrible had happened between Midoriya and Bakugou.

It didn't help his nerves when Present Mic showed up for English and briefly paused when he spotted both Kirishima's new seating arrangement, as well as the empty desk in front of him. Their english teacher cast a quick glance at Mr. Aizawa's receding form before diving right into the lesson, as if he could cover up the reaction, but it was already too late. He was sure that most—if not all—of the class had noticed his uncharacteristically silent moment.

When Shota left the classroom, he was tempted to go straight to Hound Dog's office about his public rant about Aizawa's students, without first consulting him. But, all things considered, with the parade of students that would be going through his office led by the very two he had a fit over, Shota felt that Karma had already been set up for him. Shota would grant him the small mercy of not charging into his office, on top of that.

Instead, he made his way to Recovery Girl's office and knocked on the door.

"Come in," she called out. "Unless it's an emergency, I'll be with you in a minute."

When Aizawa stepped in, he saw Shuzenji was giving one of the students from his expelled and reaccepted class from last year, a girl with a Mutational Quirk that gave her dog-like features, a set of gummy bears. "Now remember, dear, you need to be more careful, especially during the work study program."

The girl bit her lip nervously, but nodded and said, "Yes, ma'am."

"You can go back to class, you slept right through the assembly."

"Thank you," she said.

As the student passed Shota, he tried to ignore how her gaze momentarily settled on the scar below his eye before she flashed him a nervous smile. "Good morning Mr. Aizawa."

In response, he gave a small nod of acknowledgement and a quiet, "good morning."

With that, she quickly left the room.

Shota suddenly found himself wondering how the students he had last year were doing. They'd just finished their first round of work studies that Summer. Had just encountered and taken down their first villains.

Luckily, no seats had been vacated, but he wouldn't be surprised if some of the students had cases where more senior team members of the agencies that they worked under had gone on patrol and never came back. It had been a harsh summer, especially after All Might announced his retirement.

How were they faring with the changing environment that he was about to throw his first years into?

He forced his mind away. No point in worrying. He'd made sure that the students who made it to their second year had what it took. That was all he'd needed to concern himself with. Before this year, it was all he'd focused on: ready to focus on shattering the society-fed delusions in the next batch of starry-eyed new students, as soon as he was done with the previous set. It wasn't logical to waste time or energy to think about them, anymore. He'd prepped them and he was done.

It wasn't nearly as easy to listen to that argument now as it used to be.

Shota forced himself to focus on the task at hand.

He recalled a long-ago summer that had ended in a painfully empty seat.

"Shota, what brings you here? You rarely come to my office. In fact, I don't think I've seen you since I recommended you wait another two healing sessions, before going back to teaching after the USJ attack." There was a touch of disapproval in the last part of her statement.

"There was no way I was going to waste a week and a half on the healing and resting cycle, when I was already well enough to handle my student, then. I did wait for returning to heroics, though."

"Was that by your choice, or because Yamada made sure of it?"

Shota huffed in annoyance. "What gave it away?"

"He dragged you into the announcer's booth for the 1st year-round of the U.A. Tournament. Usually, you get in a patrol then, and it's your most active one of the year."

"Well, what do you expect? All the big heroes are watching children with little to no training beat each other to a pulp. Heck, All Might even showed up to the thing, even when he wasn't working here. The smarter villains aren't going to ignore that opportunity." As a result, he didn't just bag a large number of criminals in that time. They were usually higher-level ones than average.

Unfortunately, it barely made a dent in the crime rates at that time. He wouldn't be surprised if the reason Ingenium, who was used to functioning as part of a team, had been working alone when Stain found him, was because that very spike in Villain activity had spread his agency too thin to function normally.

Rather than press the subject, Shuzenji asked, "So, what brings you here today?"

"There are a couple of things I want to discuss with you."

"And what might those be?"

"The first is that, I want you to know that I am aware of Midoriya's Quirk. I've already talked to All Might and Nezu."

The tiny woman gave a small nod. "Thank you for letting me know. I will keep that in mind, when dealing with Midoriya in the future."

"You should also be expecting some paperwork in the next regarding his receipt of a Quirk counselor, as I plan to fill out that form, as soon as possible."

"You're going to counsel Midoriya about his Quirk?" she asked, sounding surprised. "You certainly have taken an extra interest in your kids this year, haven't you?"

He rubbed the back of his neck tiredly. "I know. The other reason I'm here is actually because of that. I need to be informed of when my students arrive at and depart from your office."

Shuzenji sighed and asked, "Are you worried some of your students are dawdling in the halls, after they leave my office?"

"Not as much as I am aware that some of my students are self-treating."

Recovery Girl paused. "'Self-treating'?"

"After the fight Midoriya and Bakugou had, I forbade them from approaching you, unless necessary. Midoriya used a well-stocked medical kit, with more alternative materials than medical grade supplies." He grit his teeth before stating, "Honestly, the only reason that I haven't sent him up for a check up is because he's not showing any signs of pain. So, I'm assuming he knew when to come up here."

Shuzenji nodded and said, "He came up twice during the training period for the licensing exam, so I'd say so. But I—"

"That's it?" Aizawa asked. "I sent him to you twice as many times."

"I thought his healing on the last day of training seemed to take up more energy than expected." She sighed and declared, "I'll make sure to keep you informed of arrivals and departures."

"Thank you." Shota had a feeling that he was going to need to pay close attention to it, in order to make sure Midoriya didn't do something like that in the future. Hopefully, there weren't any other students trying to pull stunts like that, either.

He didn't care if his kids had supplies. They had Shuzenji here for a reason.

I really want to get through this and the next few chapters because I'm reaching a point I've been wanting to get to for some time.

So, at the end of the first night, I said that I had originally planned to wait a few more chapters before starting to work on the problem that is Midoriya and Bakugous' relationship. The point here where Aizawa swaps Midoriya and Kirishimas' seats was going to be that starting moment. So, that's the actual first step I wrote for dealing with them, even if it is not the first to appear in the final story.

Although I hate Mineta for being a pervert, I have to grudgingly admit that he has displayed the possibility for being a hero (by this world's standards, which doesn't seem to take personality into consideration). He's one of the best strategists in class 1-A and does show that he can care about others like a human being. That being said, I hate him as is. If he gets an improvement/redemption arc, which I wouldn't put past Horikoshi, I think I could one day change my opinion about him (it's an extremely long shot but he's shown he can do them with characters like Endeavor). As it stands now though, I probably won't be doing much in relation to him beyond acknowledging his existence.

Recovery Girl's time will come. It's just not today. Honestly, she wasn't even going to make an appearance this chapter but it was too short for my liking and Aizawa was going to talk to her about this sooner or later. So, I decided, why not now?

Also, if it seems weird that Aizawa would refer to a coworker by their family name when he refers to others by first name, she was probably established as UA's nurse when he was a student and I would like to think that it would be difficult to move beyond that mindset completely and even using her name instead of her hero title would be a big jump.

As for Nezu, I don't know if he would have been on the staff when Aizawa was a student but I have a head canon that Nezu is his only name, another thing reflecting the differences between him and most people.

So, I was just doing a random check through to add some depth to the chapter and the question popped into my head: If all those heroes are at the tournament, what's going on where they'd usually be on patrol? I pictured that, knowing where all these heroes including All Might were, the Tournament would be a prime opportunity for Villains to come out without worrying about them (even more so if the hero makes it into any footage of the crowd). Goodness knows that it would cause serious issues for heroes who are still o patrol at the time, overwhelmed by villains taking advantage of their reduced numbers.