In the evenings after dinner, I exercised to tire myself out. It helped me sleep more soundly and ensured I'd get to bed at a decent time. I started by jogging for an hour and walking back to the dorms to lift some weights. I'd been walking downtown when I ran into three of my classmates.

Cho, the blonde who'd cheered me on on the day of our entrance exam. Hoka, (gun hands) who I secretly called bullets for brains, and bear boy whose actual name was Kuma.

"Hey! Hibichan!" Cho cried out excitedly, jumping up and down.

I flushed awkwardly. My own mother doesn't even call me that. I jogged over to them, trying to catch my breath. "What's up?"

Cho wore a cute pink dress that brought out her eyes, which were the same color. Bearboy sported neon sweatpants and a snapback hat with holes for his ears, and bullets for brains wore a black dress shirt that he left untucked.

"Night out?" I asked. "Don't you guys wanna rest before - "

" - We're not gonna be out long," Bullets for Brains assured. "The new club that opened up has half-off drinks tonight."

I gasped. "Do you know how much trouble we'd get in if we were caught drinking?"

Bear boy laughed. "It's a club for teens. The drinks are non-alcoholic."

"You should come with us!" Cho exclaimed, pulling on my arm.

"I'm not exactly dressed for…" I looked down at my red & black crop top, and matching sweatpants, "dancing."

"You look perfect," Cho assured.

"I need to get my reps in," I insisted.

Bear boy grinned, flexing his biceps. "Oh, you will."

"We go hard," Gunhands boasted, punching my arm. "Attack-stealer." He wiggled an eyebrow at me.

I stuffed my hands in my pockets and sighed deeply. "I dunno…"

"It'll be fun, I promise," Cho encouraged, pouting at me with wide eyes.

I pretended to ponder, biting my lip. "Oh, well if it's fun…"

She squealed and pulled me down the sidewalk.

~.~

I sat at the end of a leather couch fiddling with my glass of melon soda. The girls in our class formed a dance circle around Mina, who broke dance like the world was ending. The idiot Kaminari had one too many cokes and the sugar was clearly taking effect. He hadn't given back the karaoke mic since eight songs ago. Kirishima and Sero managed to start some sort of samba mess that several people joined, and Deku stood in the corner trying to show Todoroki some moves. I recognized them from our performance at the concert last year.

When we first arrived I basically twiddled my thumbs and looked down at my watch, waiting until Deku tired himself out and wanted to go home. But after a while, I'd actually started to relax. Everyone was content to do their own thing, which meant I was left to my own thoughts.

I wasn't worried about tomorrow. If anything, I was pumped. But the talk with Aizawa still bugged me.

I tried to find out why, but I couldn't get a straight answer.

I couldn't help but wonder what the first-year was like. What made them think they stood a chance against me, let alone anyone who'd had a year to prepare for this.

Not that I cared. It didn't matter who I had to fight. Kirishima. Deku. Icy-Hot. One of those class-B extras. Even that brainwashing guy. I would win fair and square. Not like last year. But a first-year who wanted to fight me…

Well, they either didn't know me very well or they were crazy.

~.~

My Dr. Pepper stung as I gulped it down. Cold. Carbonated. Heavenly. I laughed when I looked at my classmates. Cho didn't dance so much as jumped up and down in circles. Bearboy danced like he was in a mosh pit as opposed to a techno club, and Gunhands hadn't been kidding. His dancing was intense. Even more intense than the pink girl who broke dance in the middle of the throngs of people.

I froze, almost choking on my soda. Wait...why does she look so familiar?

My eyes scanned the room. It was hard to see under the black lights and fog the floor machines made, but I recognized several people dancing. The Tape guy, Sero. The red-haired guy with the hardening quirk. The blonde one with electrification.

I gasped when I saw.

Dancing in the corner was a boy with green hair. A guy with half red half white hair, and a scar on his face danced alongside him. They'd both gotten taller and more muscular since the last I'd seen them on TV, and they were dressed in club attire instead of their gym uniforms, but there was no mistaking it.

"Hibichan, you okay?" Cho asked me, taking a break from dancing.

"It's them," I said, my eyes wide.

She turned her head in the direction I was looking. "Who?" She asked.

I turned to her in shock. "You don't know who they are?"

She shrugged. "Do they go to school with us or something?"

I blinked, dumbfounded. "Yes they go to school with us and they're famous. They're from the class that survived the attack on the USJ last year."

Cho gasped. "Oh my god, that's them?!"

I'd engrained their names into my mind. Izuku Midoriya. Shoto Todoroki. Half of class 2-A is here. Does that mean...

My heart raced. I slammed down my drink. "I'll be right back," I declared.

~.~

I glanced across the room at Kacchan. He'd been sitting the whole time, so I worried he didn't want to be here. But he looked calm. When he saw me, the corner of his mouth twitched up and he raised his glass.

I smiled, waving from the dance floor.

Todoroki tried his best to copy the moves I showed him but in the end, he nodded his head to the music. I didn't mind. I was just glad he was having a good time.

After the song ended, a slower one started to play. Todoroki stared with an odd look over my shoulder.

Huh? I glanced behind me.

Standing there with her hands in her pockets was a blue-haired girl in black sweatpants. When the light hit her clothes they shimmered red. She wore a casual smile that didn't meet her eyes, which were orange. I'd never seen her before. But the way she stood and looked at me...the aura she gave off…

It felt like…

"You're Izuku Midoriya." She glanced up. "And Shoto Todoroki."

"Uhh...yeah," I answered, flushing.

"I don't believe we've met," Todoroki said. As ever, he was polite and accommodating. But I could tell a part of him felt weirded out.

"I'm Asuga Hibiki," she declared.

"Pleased to meet you," I said, giving a small bow. "So um...what's up?"

She held out her hand. "I was wondering if you'd like to dance, Midoriya-senpai."

Senpai? I wondered. "You go to U.A.?"

"Yes. I started in the spring."

A first-year. "Well, um...the thing is, I have a boyfriend, so - "

" - I don't mean it like that," she clarified, waving her hand. "I wanted to talk." She glanced up at Todoroki again. "I'd like to dance with you too, if that's alright, Todoroki-senpai."

He kept up his pleasantries, but in the most courteous way possible he stated, "I'm tired. Gonna grab a drink." He shot me a look, and walked over to the bar counter.

"I hope I didn't piss off your boyfriend," she said, suddenly breaking into a mischievous smile.

I laughed. "Oh, no! Todoroki isn't...he's just - "

" - Dancing with another guy. What, you tryna make him jealous?"

I laughed harder. "Todoroki-kun and I have been friends for a while. Kacchan knows I don't see him that way."

She narrowed her brows in confusion. Oh right, I'm the only one that calls him that. But instead of inquiring further, she shrugged and held her hand out again. "Wanna dance?"

I shrugged back. "Sure!"

A slow song started to play. She placed a hand on my shoulder and held my other one in hers. I placed mine on her waist. Ordinarily, I would've freaked out being this close to a girl, but since Asuga was my underclassman and she wasn't interested in me that way, I felt comfortable.

"I'm surprised you're out the night before the sports festival," she inquired.

She's not really one to talk. Don't the first-years compete tomorrow too? Yet she's out just like I am. "I'm glad my friends asked me to come," I admitted. "If I'd stayed behind, I probably would've overdone it to prepare and exhausted myself."

"You don't seem worried at all," she noted with a raised eyebrow. "You must be confident."

I looked off to the side as I remembered. "I was stressed about it last year, yeah. But to be honest, I'm looking forward to it. I can't wait to see all my friends in action. Watch how they've grown and improved."

Asuga scowled. "You shouldn't be thinking like that. They might be your classmates but tomorrow they're your enemies."

I smiled warmly. "Maybe. But with everything we've been through together...I could never see them that way, even if we are competing. No matter what happens tomorrow, there won't be any hard feelings. They'll give their all, I'll give mine, and we'll support each other."

A disheartened expression overcame Asuga's face. "You're not what I expected," she muttered, as if she didn't expect me to hear.

What does she mean? "I'm not?"

"Yeah," she said, shooting me a dark look. "I thought you'd actually be a threat. But now I see I don't have anything to worry about."

Something about the way she said that didn't sit right with me. The statement felt harmless enough, but my dinner with Todoroki and Kacchan just hours before was still fresh in my mind. She glanced me up and down, as if sizing me up. Wait a second. She knew our names before she came up to us. A first-year who asks to dance with me and Todoroki...and now she's talking about the festival. Could she be…?

~.~

Fine. I'll admit it. I wasn't miserable. At least not enough to wanna leave. Kaminari finally tired himself out and passed out in Jiro's lap. Jiro stroked his hair out of his face with one hand while she texted with the other.

Mina and Sero were still going strong on the dance floor. I glared at them with scrutiny. Something tells me there was something in those drinks.

"I hope we get to duel each other again," Kirishima declared with a wide grin. "I think a rematch would be fun."

I gulped down more of my drink. "I'll kill you, shitty hair. Just like last year."

"May the best man win!" He declared, smashing his fists together.

I smirked, punching his shoulder.

We both looked up curiously when Icy-Hot walked over with sparkling water.

"Finally all partied out?" Kirishima asked.

"Not exactly," Todoroki stated. "I grabbed a drink to get out of dancing with someone."

"Whoa. I guess another one bites the dust," Jiro stated, amused.

This annoyed me more than I like to admit. But after being stuck in those remedial classes with him, joining him and Deku in that internship at Endeavor's agency and fighting alongside him through crap knows how many villain attacks, I'd gotten to know Icy-Hot pretty well. At least, as well as anyone could. That was why, without saying a word, I could tell he was ticked off.

"Spit it out," I said, my gaze fixed on his neutral expression.

He didn't try to deny it either, like the nerd does. He looked me square in the eye and said, "A first-year girl asked me to dance with her."

"Tch. So?"

His brows narrowed. "She asked Midoriya too." He shot me a meaningful look. "And she knew our names."

That part wasn't what was weird. After the Sludge Villain incident, the attack on USJ, and being kidnapped by the League, my name was pretty well known. Todoroki was the son of Endeavor, the number one hero. It wasn't a surprise people would know who we are.

But Deku…

I stood up. "Where is he?"

"I think they're still dancing," Todoroki answered.

I glared across the room, my hand clenched around my glass. I couldn't see him anymore. Something doesn't feel right.

Without having to say a word, Todoroki held out his empty hand to me. I placed my empty glass in it, stuffed my hands in my pockets, and made my way to the dancefloor.

~.~

As I held his hand, I felt all the calluses. The places where his fingers healed crooked. The scars across his palm. It frightened me, at first. They were signs he'd put his well-being on the back burner if it meant a shot at advancing forward. He'd break his body over and over until he emerged victorious.

But he didn't seem to be taking the festival seriously at all. His carefree demeanor angered me. I'd been living and breathing that damn festival footage for a year. I hadn't made any effort to start or maintain friendships. I'd sacrificed opportunities to go out. Travel. Turned down jobs I could've had to save up money. All so I could spend as much time as possible preparing for the U.A. 's entrance exam and the day I'd fight the students in Class 2-A.

But of course, now they'd faced villains. Real ones. They've had their lives on the line. Been out in the field, face to face with evil itself. Witnessed death. Blood. Loss. Tragedy. I should've realized the festival would be a milk run for them in comparison.

It wasn't fair.

"Are you okay?" Midoriya asked, looking at me with worry. "You look upset. Did...I say something wrong?"

Anger burst forth from my chest tenfold. I could very well be dueling him tomorrow. And he had the gall to be concerned about my feelings. Maybe if he knew he could be fighting me he wouldn't be talking to me like this. As if I was a child that needed consolation.

But no...that wasn't it.

No matter what happens tomorrow, there won't be any hard feelings. They'll give their all, I'll give mine, and we'll support each other.

I see now. This is just who he is. He was just like Cho. He shouldn't be supporting his classmates. Didn't he understand? After they all graduated, they'd be in constant competition. For sidekicks. Recognition. Money. They'd all be trying to start their own agencies. The rivalry didn't stop after they were done with school. It would just get worse.

And he still wore that stupid damn smile on his face all while calling them his friends.

"Are you in the hero course, by chance?" he asked me.

It startled me out of my mental rant. "Yeah."

His eyes lit up. "Then tell me...what kind of hero do you want to be?"

I blinked, dumbfounded. What...what kind of hero do I want to be? Before I could stop it, a memory flickered in my mind.

When I was a child I used to be terrified of thunderstorms. Especially lightning. I used to think a giant dragon lived in the sky that made storms happen whenever he got angry.

One day, while my father was on leave, he took me to a park. We played frisbee and he taught me how to climb a tree.

Then the sky darkened, and one of the worst storms we'd ever had came out of nowhere. I'd clung to the tree so fiercely it cut up my hands and legs. I was too scared to climb down. But it was dangerous to stay. Trees were magnets for lightning bolts. Some part of me knew this but I felt if I opened my eyes and left myself out in the open, exposed, I'd die.

Without any hesitation, my father climbed up into the tree after me and grabbed me, lowering me down to the ground.

The moment my feet touched the grass, a giant lightning strike hit the tree my dad was sitting in.

I thought for sure it would kill him. But to my shock, the lightning wriggled and squirmed like a snake in someone's hand, until it had shrunk into a tiny ball of light that my dad cradled to his chest like a baby. Then, with a mighty roar, he thrust his hands up and the ball of light exploded into a giant stroke of light, shooting back up into the sky with ten times the power it had before.

It lit up the entire sky like the sun. When I looked at his face, he was smiling, like he'd released a fish back into the sea.

But in my eyes, he'd fought a dragon and won. At that moment, my father was a god. A fierce dragon wrangler, who wasn't afraid of anything.

He was the bravest man in the world.

"Kacchan!" Midoriya exclaimed, pulling me out of the past.

Kacchan? That's what he called his boyfriend, right? I looked up and froze.

Staring down at me was none other than Katsuki Bakugo.

And he didn't look happy.