A/N:Thanks as always to the excellent Huynher for his beta-ing skills! Enjoy the closer for this arc!
Inko found herself holding her breath as the final match was announced. She honestly did not have a clue what she ought to have been feeling; on one hand, her boys were about to fight each other in front of the entire country. On the other, they were about to show just how strong and brave they were in front of the entire country. It was a strange mixture of fear and pride, all in one; complicating matters further was that—as a mother—she could not possibly choose a side. She was proud of both her darling boys, too proud to put into words. So rather than speak or fret, she chose to watch and pray that they would both be okay.
"And now, the moment you've all been waiting for! It's time to start the final fight of the festival!"
My baby boys... you've come so far. Good luck to both of you.
"He cannonballed through robots, he scored the final goal in the Riot Ball match, and he crushed the competition in the tournament! Now here he is, ready to rock and roll! Ladies and gentlemen, CASEY MIDORIYAAAAAAAAAAA!"
I clenched my fists reflexively as I walked through the entry hall towards the ring. Izuku had made it—just as I knew he would. But pride in my brother would have to wait; for the moment, he was my opponent. Even without considering our relationship, though, fighting him wasn't going to be anything remotely easy; not only did he possess One for All, he had enough control over Full Cowling to blast away Todoroki's attacks. I had been under the assumption that he was still restricted to 5%, but obviously he had been hiding his full strength just as I had.
I can't assume anything about his current punching power. I have to fight under the assumption that he can potentially fill me up with one blow. I doubt he's that strong yet, but no point in risking it with One for All. Problem is, I can't beat him without rushing in... and he'll probably do his best to grapple me, too. Hit-and-run is the only solution here, with Kinetic Mine for traps and distractions.
Truth be told, I had one more trick up my sleeve—but I had already revealed Kinetic Mine on television, and I definitely didn't want to risk giving away my only other secret attack if I couldn't help it. Even so, I had no illusions—this was going to be an uphill fight no matter what. With that in mind, I took in a deep breath and stepped out onto the field, approaching the ring.
"But if Casey wants that gold medal, he'll need to get through one final test: his own brother! This kid has wrecked the robots in the race, he rocked in Riot Ball, and tore through this tournament like no tomorrow! Give a big round of applause for IZUKU MIDORIYAAAAAAAAAAA!"
Izuku steeled his nerves as best he could. He had come a long way, and he had no intention of backing down now—not even for Casey. Not that his brother would accept any less than his best.
Kinesis is a lot more flexible than One for All. That's his advantage. I can hit top speed a little faster than him, but odds are he charged up a bit before the match to give him a quick boost right away. And our top speeds are about the same, so I can't rely on being quicker. His quirk doesn't protect him against grappling, but as much as he needs to close in to attack he's not going to stay in range long enough for me to grab him if he can help it. I'll have to be patient and wait for an opportunity to hit him with a smash, or otherwise get him in a hold of some sort.
Having settled on the only strategies available to him, Izuku strode forward into the center of the ring, looking his brother in the eye, careful not to show any sign of fear or hesitation. The gaze was returned, but no words were exchanged; their eyes said all the words their mouths could not.
Bring it on, bro.
"BEGIN!"
"Holy cow," Kaminari exclaimed, "Look at them go! Already zooming around at top speed..."
The rest of 1-A, save for Bakugo, watched the display in united suspense. None of them had seen the explosive blonde since his match with Casey, but their worry was quickly replaced with shock and amazement at the subsequent match between Izuku and Shoto. Now, at the final match of the festival, it was as if the center of the ring was the center of the world, and all their thoughts were on the fight unfolding in front of them.
Kirishima frowned in slight confusion. "Huh? Why aren't they attacking each other? They're just running and leaping around the ring..."
"They're evenly matched in more ways than one, and have trained together enough that they know each others' moves," Iida remarked. "So for the moment, they're probing each other's defenses, waiting for an opportunity to strike."
"Wh-who do you think will win? If they're as even as they look..." Uraraka gazed down, trying her best to follow the fast-paced action below.
Tokoyami nodded. "Hm. Impossible to predict..."
"Hang on," Momo said, peering down. "I think Keikkun may be setting up those traps that he used on Bakugo. Look how he keeps doing handsprings from time to time... it's just a hunch, but I think that's how he sets them."
Jiro gave a look of agreement. "Sounds about right. Not that Izukkun wouldn't see that, though..."
The green-haired boy in question had, in fact, seen exactly that.
Kinetic Mines, Izuku thought, and he's making sure to spread them around. He wants to restrict my movement, but at the same time wants to leave himself space to run around as well. But that also means he has to keep storing up that energy he's building up. He can't get rid of it without attacking, and he's not ready to do that yet.
Deciding not to give his brother the chance to strike first, Izuku found a decent opening and went for it, darting in for a punch just as Casey was landing after a big leap in the hopes of knocking his brother up to full. Casey managed to spin out of the way just in time, causing a small crater to form where the punch connected with the arena floor. In the same motion as the spin, Casey came around with a kick aimed directly at Izuku's head. Ducking out of the way, Izuku attempted a retaliatory blow only for Casey to leap away again and attempt a flanking maneuver. This time, the latter connected with a punch that sent Izuku reeling; it was only Izuku's memorization of the location of the Kinetic Mines that saved him from staggering right into one of them. But now he was on the defensive, and Casey quickly began pressing the attack a bit more to capitalize on that disadvantage.
Izuku responded with a feint in the hopes of drawing his brother into grapple range; this time, he managed to catch Casey by surprise, grabbing the latter by the wrist and attempting to pull him into an arm bar hold.
"Nice try..."
Suddenly, Casey twisted his body around and threw Izuku into the ground at a low angle, causing him to roll right into one of the Kinetic Mines. Izuku braced himself just in time to avoid getting blown out of the ring by the resulting shockwave of debris flinging itself apart.
"I practiced plenty of escape techniques, Izuku. I've gotten pretty good at them, too—OOF!"
Casey grunted in pain as a counter-punch by Izuku sent him back a bit. By the mere fact that the punch did damage, Izuku knew his brother was at full capacity—and from the bit of bruising forming on him, just a little bit over. Before Izuku could follow up, though, Casey responded by smashing the arena floor with a punch strong enough to crater a decent chunk of the ring and even set off a few more Kinetic mines around it in the process.
Now that he's gotten rid of that excess energy, he can get back to attacking me. But at the same time, he's been forced to get rid of all his... traps...
Izuku looked at the ground, then at a spot near the edge of the ring that was untouched by the powerful eruption caused by his brother. Thinking quickly, he ran towards the latter as fast as he could.
I'd been absolutely right to avoid getting hit by Izuku as much as possible, considering how much that punch of his legitimately hurt. I may not have been polka-dotted like I was after getting hit by the zero-pointer, but I could tell that I had been set over my capacity more than even Izuku likely anticipated. I didn't like having to get rid of all the traps I had set for him, but at the very least I had enough room in the tank that I would be able to take maybe one punch from my brother without needing a stretcher after the match. As the debris cloud from my mega-punch cleared up, I saw Izuku running towards an undamaged part of the ring.
No way you forgot that was one of my Mines, Izuku. What are you up to?
Determined not to let him get there to enact whatever plan he had in mind, I charged after him... only for him to spin around to face me and throw a pebble of debris at the edge of the massive crater I'd caused. The spot where it landed flung itself apart right in my face, blinding me with dust from my own trap.
Dammit! TWO mines! Dumb luck that one didn't go off with the rest!
I didn't have any time to shake the dust from out of my eyes before Izuku caught my arm again. I twisted around as before to throw him... only for him to do the exact same maneuver and slam me down right onto the last remaining Kinetic Mine near the edge.
He reversed the reversal?!
The resulting shockwave, combined with our momentum, sent us both flying out-of-bounds. I felt my back hit the grass, and looked over to see Izuku lying next to me.
"WHOOOOOOAAAAA! Ladies and gentlemen, it looks like both brothers are out of the ring! And they landed at about the same time! Let's go to the slow-motion replay..."
Gazing up at the massive screen hanging above us, I watched the last move in amazement and suspense... and saw myself landing just barely half a second before Izuku.
"You saw it right there, sports fans! The winner of the match by ring-out—and the winner of the UA Sports Festival—is none other than IZUKU! MIDORIYAAAAAAAAAAA!"
The crowd erupted into massive applause as my brother and I staggered unevenly to our feet and embraced.
Bakugo watched the award ceremony on a TV set in the waiting area, still not knowing what to think or feel. Technically, he shared third place—shared! Third place!—with Todoroki. But he couldn't. At first, he thought about just leaving altogether, but something made him stop and watch the ceremony in private. Seeing the two brothers embrace, even on the victory podium, stirred something in Bakugo that he was pretty sure he didn't want to feel. Somehow, the sight of Deku inviting Casey up to the first place platform and sharing the gold and silver with him made it feel worse.
Idiots. Who shares victory? Why would anyone do that? Wasn't the whole point of winning to prove you were better? No matter how much he tried, Bakugo simply couldn't wrap his head around it.
It doesn't matter. They're up there... and I'm down here. Hiding. Like a weakling...
"Young Bakugo."
The blonde turned around to see Principal Nezu standing behind him with two cups of tea. "What do you want..."
"Well," the rodent-like creature said cheerily, "for starters, I'd like to offer you some tea. You look like you could use it."
Seeing no reason to refuse and feeling no real motivation to do much of anything at the moment, Bakugo begrudgingly accepted the offered cup and sat down at the table in the center of the room. "So you gave me your damn tea. What now?"
Nezu smiled warmly. "That's up to you, Young Bakugo. You look like you have quite a bit on your mind."
"Yeah..."
"Would you like to share, perhaps?"
Bakugo scoffed and averted his gaze. "Why? What's there to say? I lost."
"You didn't lose," the principal responded calmly, "You won third place. Plenty of people didn't make it even that far."
A snarl escaped him. "That's not it! Don't you get it? It's not first place! It was first, or nothing!"
"And why, may I ask, is that?"
"Because the best heroes don't lose! The best heroes win! They always win! All my life, people have been telling me that I'd be the best, over and over and over again! And if I'm not, then they'll know they were wrong!" Bakugo growled, his fists shaking as he clenched them. "If I'm not the best... then... then I'm nothing."
A pause hung over the room. "Ah," Nezu chuckled, "It seems you had more to say than you thought."
Somehow, that stopped Bakugo in his tracks. It felt like he'd let out a breath he'd been holding in since he got in to UA, but there was still so much more inside—he could feel it. And he didn't know what the hell to do about it.
The principal smiled at him again. "Tell you what: why don't we sit here for a bit, and you can take your time telling me more? It's not like you have anywhere else to be right now."
On any other day, under any other circumstances, Bakugo would have told the oversized talking rat-thing to go to hell, principal or not. But something kept him rooted to his chair, his eyes locked over his cup of tea. Somehow, he felt something inside him break.
I guess I am weak...