"Ooh!" Nen cooed as she jogged through the apartment, almost sliding in her socks on the hardwood floor, her bright yellow hoodie, only partially zipped, hung off one shoulder, her brown hair in a messy bun. "That must be the pizza!" She announced and swung open the door, smiling brightly at the pizza. She takes it and returns to her friends. She had a good crowd. "I have drinks in the fridge! Help yourself!"
"Oh, are you sure?" Deku asked from his seat at the kitchen island as he set his pencil down. At the island sat Deku, Ururaka, and Iida, working on an assignment together.
"She wouldn't offer if she didn't mean it, idiot!" Bakugo shouted from his spot next to the kitchen table, standing with his hands braced on the table, practically seething with frustration and not just from Deku. Kaminari and Kirishima sat across from him, trying to make sense of the assignments.
"If you have enough time to shout, you have enough time to help me with the pizza, firework." Nen stated and shoved half of the pizzas into his arms. Bakugo seethed at the nickname but took the pizza.
"WHICH ONE OF YOU LOSERS ORDERED CHEESE?" Bakugo shouted, not really caring who ate what, but peeved at the name and irked at being roped into all of this.
"Bakugo, stop shouting this instant!" Iida shouted at him, not realizing he too was shouting. "It is rude to shout while a guest in someone else's home!"
"You're shouting now, nerd!" Bakugo shouted back.
"Toru, could you help with these pizzas?" Nen asked, passing the rest over to her classmate.
"Sure thing!" Toru chirped happily, taking the pizzas and returning to the area where she, Jiro, Momo, and Mina sat around the coffee table. Off to the side, on laying on her stomach on the floor, Tsu worked on her homework. Mineta was sat at the coffee table in her line of sight. He had been caught snooping and she offered to make sure he stayed in one place.
Nen walked over to the fridge and with her good hand opened it and started grabbing a few different cans. She tried to use her braced arm to hold them against her chest. After two, they stated slipping through and falling on the ground.
"Oh, let me help!" Ururaka offered and hopped off her stool and walked over, picking up the cans with a smile. Nen smiled at her.
"Thank you!"
"No problem!" Ururaka grinned brightly at her friend. "What happened to your arm, anyway?"
"Oh, I hit Kirishima too hard during practice." She admitted as she handed her friend more drinks. "I don't think Recovery Girl likes seeing me too much in the nurse's office."
"Oh, I don't think she likes seeing anyone in the nurse's office!" Ururaka offered as the two straightened up. "Oh, wait, that sounded bad." Nen giggled at her and handed out cans of soda to the two boys at the island.
"It's alright, I understand." Nen assured her. "Recovery Girl just wants everyone safe, right?" Ururaka nodded like a grinning bobble head, making Nen laugh harder. She grabbed a few cans from Ururaka and dropped them off at the table with the three boys. Kirishima and Kaminari thanked her but Bakugo just grunted. She didn't say anything to him and just rejoined her friends in the living room.
"Alright, where were we?" Nen asked as she grabbed a piece of pizza. Momo was helping Nen write her answers down since she had already mostly finished her own work. Everyone was working on their own assignments and munching away at the pizza. Every now and then Bakugo would be shouting at Kaminari and Kirishima. Nen could hear Ururaka giggling at Deku and Iida. Mineta was whining every now and then about being baby sat but Tsuyu always had a handle on him. Even though her wrist still had a dull ache, she was relieved to have everyone over. Hideo had followed her off campus and she was worried this was going to be a regular thing.
"Oh, Nen, where is your bathroom?" Midoriya asked. Nen looked over her shoulder and indicated down the hall.
"It's right that way. It's the door on the left!"
"Right, thanks!" He said and left the room. Deku did as he was told and walked down the hall until he hit the bathroom He did his business in peace and left the bathroom. He was making his way back down the hall when something caught his eye. He was surprised he didn't see it on his way to the bathroom. It was a photo of Nen and her parents. There were a few photos on the wall, actually, but he stopped and smiled at the picture. It was Nen, a few years younger, in a bright yellow sundress, laughing. She had her arms linked with her parents' arms. Her dad was smiling at her and her mother smiled, have relaxed but tired, at the camera. Deku blinked, recognizing her mother's face but not sure how. Nen looked a lot like her mother, but her mother's hair was bright blonde. Then he looked at her father and then the pieces clicked into place.
"YOUR DAD IS BENJIRO KATAYAMA?" Deku shouted, startling almost everyone. "YOUR DAD IS THE HEAD ENGINEER OF KATAYAMA INDUSTRIES?"
"Katayama Industries?" Kaminari asked. "I've heard of them. They do a lot of work for hero agencies, right? I hear they're one of the best."
"Woah, Nen, your dad works for Katayama Industries?" Kirishima asked.
"Not just that!" Deku interrupted, joining them in the room once more. "It's his family's business! They've been in business for years but he really grew it into what it is today! He took it international!"
"Yeah! That's how he met my mom!" Nen smiled at Deku. Two more pieces fell into place. He realized where he had seen Nen's mom before and while he had a brief "aha!" moment, it was replaced by sadness and compassion.
"I think my family has done some business with the Katayama company lately." Iida mentioned off handedly.
"Wow, why do you stay in such a small place?" Mina asked. "You guys should be mad rich right?"
"Oh, well, my dad travels a lot, and I don't need a lot of space, so an apartment is just fine by me." Nen explained. "And we have a family home in Tokyo, near the main offices."
"What about your mom?" Ururaka asked, confused. "Does she go with him?" Nen was waiting for this question but dreaded it all the same. Nen shook her head.
"My mom died a few years ago." Nen told them. The room got uncomfortably quiet.
"Oh, I'm sorry." Ururaka apologized. "What happened, if you don't mind me asking?"
"Not at all!" Nen smiled at her. "My mom was a hero, actually. She died in the line of work. Her hero name was Valkyrie."
"Oh hey! I remember seeing that in the news." Toru said.
"Yeah, something about her quirk backfiring or something I think." Jiro added.
"From what the news said, it sounded almost like she ran out of her quirk." Deku explained. "It was like a battery, and the more she used it, the more it degraded."
"Close, but not quite." Nen said with a smile. "My mom's family has a quirk that allows us to manifest our wills, our life energy, into physical forms. Each person has a unique style and color. Mine's yellow for example. My mother had pink. For her, it was easier to manifest her quirk into something like an extension of her own body, like wings."
"Is that where she got her name from?" Tsuyu asked and Nen nodded.
"For me, it's easier to use it like a force field." Nen explained. "I'm learning how to use it like armor!"
"But wait," Mineta piped up from his corner. "How does that relate to how your mom died? Do you guys have a limited amount of power to use?"
"Not quite." Nen giggled. "We have to be sure of ourselves. Our quirk depends on things like our confidence, our surety in ourselves, our willpower." She thought over her words carefully. "How do I explain it, the quirk itself is volatile and we have to trust ourselves to keep it under control. My mom was unwell for a long time, so it became harder and harder to remain in control."
"What, so like if you get the flu, are you going to explode or something?" Kaminari asked. Nen snorted.
"Not that kind of sick." Nen explained. "I don't know all of it, but I remember how my mom was. When I was little, she was so happy and so bright!" Nen's smile fell. "I don't know what happened, but one day she came home, it was like someone turned the light off inside of her. She hardly smiled, she was tired all of the time. I heard her and my dad arguing more."
"Something must have happened when she was doing hero work." Momo suggested.
"I asked my dad about it, but he won't tell me." Nen said, still curious about it herself. "One day, during a fight with a villain, she lost control and the explosion burned down half a town."
"That's not gonna happen to you is it?" Mina asked, worried about the thought of losing her friend. Nen smiled a big smile and gave her a thumbs up with her good hand.
"No way!" Nen reassured her. "I'm never going to let that happen to me!" A few of the girls giggled. "Now, let's focus on something less depressing!"
"That excludes homework then!" Kirishima said as he leaned back in his chair, hands behind his head, "because man, my grades are making me lose the will to live." Nen laughed out loud with her friends, agreeing. Conversations returned to normal for almost everyone. Nen's tongue tingled, knowing she had just lied to her friends. There are many ways her quirk could kill her. Losing control was more common than most of her classmates knew.
Bakugo, from his spot at the table, watched Nen for a minute as she continued to work on her homework with her friend's help. He remembered seeing it on the news. The family members who even had any variation of the quirk had to be evaluated to determine how much of a threat they posed, as in were they likely to also lose control.
"Wait a minute." Toru spoke up, getting Nen's attention. "Your mom's family. She has a brother who does here work too!" Nen could practically hear Deku's head exploding from behind her and she giggled.
"Yeah, my uncle."
"YOUR UNCLE IS THE NORSE HERO: WOTAN?"