Now, for anyone who hasn't been in a close-up situation with someone trying to grab you before – firstly, lucky you. Secondly, you should know that unlike what some people say, your mind doesn't always have you move away from someone else. Even if you've been training in fighting, you might go to block a blow when it's a grab, or simply freeze up in the worst cases. Neither of which helps as I bring my arms up to block the slowly reaching out metallic-looking arm of the helmeted guy. The third thing to note is that you don't always act the best way even if you do try to move or block. In this case, I'd have probably been better off aiming for his legs and moving back, something I was just starting to realize.

The fourth thing? I should've remembered why I was here in the first place.

As the armoured man grabbed me and pulled me closer… he spun me around by accident. And while my suit is a biohazard suit and thus non-conductive… the same could not be said for my gas tank. I saw a brief spark hit his hand before a smell of ozone entered the air and I was flung to the floor, the man's arm dropping down limp.

"Eh? What just happened Kan?" The other hooded figure asked.

"It's Meanufacturer like this!" The proclaimed villain announced. "And I dunno, the kid had electricity in that tank of his. Arm's gonna need a moment to reboot."

"You're not getting a moment," Taro growled. In the meantime I took that moment to get behind one of the shelves and out of sight, trying to ignore how everything was already getting a little foggy as I tried to stop myself from having a panic attack "You gonna harass my customers, ya get out of my store, old friends or not."

Meanufacturer looked back at Taro. "Ya changed man. Ya used to be all cool with this. What's the problem with a favour?" The villain accused. This is bad. I've done well on reducing the time it takes to transform but that's not the issue here. My Blood Stalk form isn't a Smash form, but there's enough gas left over afterwards that in an enclosed space like this I could end up transforming one of the others. And I've never tried to control a Smash in Blood Stalk form before.

Taro glared at the Meanufacturer. "Ya wanna peddle that discount Trigger of yours? The stuff that got me fired the last time ya needed a favour?" Taro drawled. "Ferget it. I'm turning my life around an' won't let ya ruin that. Now both of you leave before I call tha cops." That would explain why he was in the alley when I met him. Oof.

I heard a growl… and looked out from behind the aisle. Are those… cat paws for feet? And a tail? "Ya never were the brightest Taro. What, ya think we're gonna let ya go with tha secret? We've kept it fer five years." The cat-man remarked. "Ain't gonna let some dime-store clerk ruin it if he ain't gonna help us."

Taro's expression darkened at that. "Funny, ya didn't seem ta mind fer five years, so what changed Teronosuke?" He countered

"It's Claw! Claw of the Tiger!" Oh, you have to be fucking kidding me. Meanufacturer and Claw of the Tiger? At least I think the former is that – I'm still not completely perfect in Japanese so I assume it's what he means. "And it ain't your business!"

"You got forced out, didn't you? It's the only reason you'd try a new stomping ground." Taro continued. "Can't have been heroes or the police though… you'd be in jail still."

"How were we supposed ta know a couple of dealers of the legal stuff had the brains ta figure it out?" Meanufacturer questioned. Even as I hid as far back as I could, trying to steady my breathing and focus. "We decided we didn't need their shit"

Wait. Two dealers. Of the 'legal stuff'. Legal Trigger. Did these guys got beaten up by the Hotta Brothers? They were literally guys who, hopped up on legal trigger, were an offscreen fight against Aizawa! Not to mention they're absolute morons who are more bark than bite.

"Wait, you mean them? How did they outsmart you, Kan?" Taro asked.

Meanufacturer snorted. "They got lucky. Said something about 'Bad' Trigger. Ours is just cheaper and we make more our way!" He insisted.

Oh my god, they DID get outsmarted and beaten up by the Hottas.

"Oi, Mean, where's the guy you tried to grab before?" Claw asked… before he LEAPT over the aisles and landed in front of me. I sucked in enough of the Nebula Gas to try and see what he was. As I expected, he looks like a living cat, probably some sort of cat quirk, but he looks feral, eyes like twisted slits staring straight at me, claws on his hands out. "Hah! Looks like tha rat tried ta scurry away!"

"Don't touch him," Taro growled out.

"Or what? Claw's too close and ya Quirkless! Wha-" And that's all the Meanufacturer said before there was a sound like a muffled explosion and he was sent tumbling down the aisle, pieces of his helmet scattering around him as he did. Claw looked at him before slowly looking up… and by the time he had a dark shape appeared behind him before slamming a massive fist into the back of his head, sending him stumbling forward before he landed in a heap on top of his friend. I slowly turned my head to look up at the dark shape… and heard the tell-tale his of my gas canister activating as the whole world went cloudy again for a moment.

When enough gas had cleared, I could see that what was standing in front of me was an uncanny image of five years ago. The Strong Smash, from the same massive blocky arms to the swollen upper body with seemingly three head pieces, to the mechanical legs. The only difference was that this time his entire body was the same metallic silver. A powered-up Strong Smash, a Strong Smash Hazard. But how? Unless my gas tank is leaking, I haven't released any gas out. I forced myself to my feet and held my hands out, splayed and ready to stop the next punch…

Only for the Strong Smash to raise his fist… and wave before the gas dispersed into grey clouds… and seemed to be sucked back into Taro's mouth. "Ugh, was hopin' I wouldn't have ta do that. Ya alright, Andros?"

I looked at the… apparently totally in control of himself Taro. "Ah buh… ah buh buh… WHAT?" I finally managed to put it into words, still dumbfounded. "How? What? Who? Quirk?"

Taro chuckled at that. "Yeah. Funny thing. Even with fingers like these-" He remarked while raising his hands to show the pointed ends that are his fingers… huh, I hadn't noticed them the last time "-I didn't seem ta show a Quirk when I was younger. Kan and Teronosuke… they were my 'Friends' back when we were younger, always stirrin' up trouble, and even though I told them I didn' have tha extra toe joint, they insisted I was lyin'. That I was Quirkless. An' back then, there wasn't exactly much study on tha… 'invisible' Quirks."

Ok… ok making sense so far. "So… your Quirk was something you didn't even know how to use?" I asked slowly.

"Not til you came along," Taro remarked. "Didn' really do it til a month after I got outta hospital and inta a new place… I realized that tha me on the TV… I liked how strong he was. And I wanted to be strong. And then, grey clouds and BAM!" He splayed his arms wide at that. "Big, metallic and strong. Almost broke the floor I was standin' on at tha time."

"Wait, it was always that metallic? Taro, you weren't that silver before – that's a different version of Smash!" I pointed out.

Taro blinked slowly. "No kiddin'? I just thought it was a funny paint job an' tha fact I didn' just go around breakin' stuff." He scratched his head at that. "I asked a better doctor – ya know, one of those wit' a Quirk identifia on staff-"

"They have those?" I asked incredulously. "And I wasn't- no, you know what, so many Quirks, not a surprise SOME people can just tell what people are."

"Only the big places," Taro remarked with a shrug. "But what they told me is my Quirk's supposed ta refine things. 'parrently that's why I ain't ever had health issues wit' my diet, it all gets refined ta tha good stuff."

I blinked… and then my jaw went slack. "No. way. It can't be…" I started… then noticed that Taro had tilted his head. "Oh, uh… when Nebula Gas is refined – assuming my gas is the same as the show – it's usually stored in a special container first. When refined, it allows for a controlled transformation… so you've basically turned yourself into a living Fullbottle!"

"Eh? Fullbottle doesn't really sound that cool though." Taro remarked. I grabbed onto the nearby aisle to prevent myself from facefaulting out of whiplash from the severe change in tone.

"Um… I dunno… they also called Smash like that… Smash Hazards?" I added. "Is the name that important?"

"Course it is!" Taro insisted. "Gotta have a cool Hero name!"

But you're not… ah, never mind, he helped me out, I'll let him have that. "About that… aren't you going to get in trouble for using your Quirk like that?" I pointed out.

Taro shook his head at that. "'side from it bein' self-defence, tha bosses who run tha stores say ya can protect tha shop so long as ya don't damage tha merchandise. Least they say they can handle it."

Aaaand there's the suspension of Taro's stupidity creaking. "And… you've called the cops, right?" I asked.

"Oh yeah. Kan and Teronosuke are morons frankly." Taro freely admitted. "If it were up ta me, they'd get hospital time but… ah… tha company… ain't happy if ya go that far."

And there it snaps. Hello floor my old friend. But… well, that's a bit… odd. Nebula Gas if used in certain ways did make people more aggressive in the show so should I- nah, he was kinda pissed at them before, so it makes sense.

"Is there… are you just some sort of magnet for trouble Andros?" Neito asked. With Sunday mostly taken up by helping out the police and plotting to get revenge somehow on Mei only for her dad to beat me to it if the wailing from her room was any indication, we were walking towards U.A. the next Monday. "I mean there's the original incident you had, the USJ-"

"That was five years later." I countered

"-the Mirio incident-"

"Which was your fault."

"-and now this." Neito finished, the smug grin never fading from his face… before looking over at Mei "Uh… but why is she so down?"

Indeed, Mei Hatsume looked the gloomiest we'd ever remembered her looking, even having a speaker somewhere playing mournful violin music because I seem to attract either regular people or the most dramatic people possible.

"Oh, that." I remarked, waving off the concern. "… her dad insisted that to make up for basically getting me into that situation she was going to have to spend an hour a day not doing anything involving designing her 'babies'."

Neito stumbled briefly. "But she's-"

"Yep"

"For an hour?"

"Only an hour." I insisted. Really it was somewhat distracting but… well, it does bring a little smile to my face.

Training continued through the week as it had the last week, although much more scattershot as more and more of the afternoons were dedicated to studying, preparing for the upcoming midterm exams and people going for private training to prepare for the Sports Festival. Of course, even then there were cases of people not wanting to do that training even when offered.

"I only wanted that match to fight you Gas Suit," Bakugo grumbled just before class. "And as fun as it would be to kick your ass, I want to save that for the sports festival. Offer the training for the extras who need it."

"Stop calling us extras!" Kaminari and Mina exclaimed in unison.

"Then get better at using your Quirks damnit!" Bakugo shot back.

"You're not one to talk on that, your Quirk is badass!" Sero remarked.

Yaoyorozu shook her head at that. "Actually… I don't think it's good by itself. It's good because you know how to use it, right Bakugo-san?" She asked

Bakugo merely grunted angrily in response.

"Oui, that makes sense~ ," Aoyama remarked. "It's like when I use my dazzling laser to propel me across, I only know it can do that by thinking of how it pushes against my poor estomac~ ."

"And I've got a few books on what frogs can do too." Tsuyu added… before she looked at me. I just held up my arms at that.

"Got nothing for you to go on other than increase physical training Tsu. You're a good allrounder as is." I insisted.

And the relentless pressures of the study group…

"Are you really sure it's a smart idea to let Mei talk about science in her dad's lab?" Sato asked. His face was one of a few concerned – and Neito's being an icon of him in the Thomson costume posing with Mirio – as Mei's screen indeed showed that instead of using my computer or a tablet, she was using her dad's video conference screens. I meanwhile was in my room and had insisted to Yubi that he supervise her. It was all I could do to resist the urge to be transformed too.

"Sure? No. About the only way we'd get today's session to happen, yes." I answered grumpily. Mei had gone full reclose in the last couple of days, so the temptation of science had to be dangled in front of her to get her out.

Mei just laughed. "Not a worry! With papa here I can show you just the principles I apply to my babies in action!" She declared, even as she pulled out what… looked like a cannon but was fitted onto her arm. Where was Yubi actua-

And then the screen rotated to show the rest of the room, where Yubi is dressed in a puffed-out safety suit with a cushioned wall behind him and a series of concentric circles.

"We'll start with physics, and then move on to chemistry!"

"At least it's not boring!" Mina insisted, even as she seemed to have perked up slightly at the mention of chemistry.

I meanwhile just had slumped onto the desk.

And to my shock, business.

This time I was the one in the conference room, the next afternoon, but I wasn't there for study group but rather with Mei and Yubi to talk with a representative from Intelli Labs.

That is, the white-beret wearing, tea-drinking, Saiko Intelli with her much more professionally dressed mother behind her.

"You think you have a machine that could try to refine the gas?" I asked with an eyebrow raised in the suit. "I mean, I'd be willing to supply for it if it works-"

"I double-checked my mother's handiwork while under a particularly sublime and very rich blend." Saiko insisted. "It works."

"The chance for kids with better Quirks, huh Yubi?" Jo Intelli remarked with a smile. Jo as in, Above, Superior and the like. Japanese pun names man.

Yubi sighed. "Sometimes they overlook flaws Jo, as I've been so clearly reminded." He remarked. Mei for her part sheepishly rubbed her head.

"We'd need a proper sample to test with though," Jo remarked.

Mei looked at me excitedly. "Do you still-?"

I grinned back… and pulled out the Fullbottle Mei had handed me over a week ago. It took transforming back and forth in private to finally get some Blood Stalk gas stored in it, but now it had caused the bottle to look like it was a murky red sort of colour on the inside.

Saiko leaned forward to look closer at the screen at that. "What is that?" She inquired.

"Sweet baby Number 11, the Fullbottle," Mei remarked. "It's designed to detect a specific kind of pollutant and suck it all into the bottle – like a specific kind of Nebula Gas in this case!"

And thus, the intellectual talk began, and I felt really out of my depth.

Not to mention just general downtime where I could finally do what I wanted to do. And that meant… chatting online. The debate forum had grown, and I had some people to talk to there. Some students like me, others older. Wish I hadn't mentioned U. A. to them

The_Aeon said: So, the Sports Festival is coming up. Any bets on our own U.A. student?

QuirkNebula said: Please no. I already have to put up with training and worse midterms -_-

Len-Gal said: Oof, and its Japanese tests too. Full week of tests.

The_Aeon said: It's still big entertainment for everyone else is all.

MightyAllMight said: And they don't announce the system ahead of time, so maybe we can chill?

The_Aeon said: Yes MAM

Len-Gal said: Yes MAM

QuirkNebula said: wwwwwwwwwwww

Oh sure, nothing really revolutionary or enlightening happened there, it was more and more just a place to hang out and swap hero news, but it was my sort of people… even if some of the Japanese leaning habits like using w instead of lol are leaking in. And they reminded me of life before this… but the more time I spend here, the harder it is to keep that as my life. I don't even know how I'd count my age.

Ah, but I doubt I'm the only one pushing along like this. I mean, Mid-Terms, the weekend, then the Sports Festival, then there's a week for internships to be sorted I believe. I mean I'd be surprised if they just tallied all the applications over the weekend, sometimes hero groups want to take time and it takes time to get back to them. Paperwork and all that. Not to mention the Sports Festival happens during Golden Week anyway, the time students usually get off and… huh, did the manga just shorten it or does it all happen over one day? There have been some small changes I've noticed, extra days the show never covered and all that…

I just hope everyone else is coping just as well.

Toru Hagakure was not coping well. Oh sure, she wasn't dumb, but hearing Mina's whole drowning in depression the other week had emphasized to her she needed to push herself harder. She'd been so focused last week on physical training that she had neglected her studies, and she was realizing just now that it might have been the worst idea in her life, she was NOT coping well under pressure.

So, she had set up a reward schedule. She gets some study done; she has a caramel treat. Do some more, caramel treat. Skip the study, no treats. There was no penalty for say, texting Andros and asking him for English advice – he wasn't as helpful as she expected with grammar – or Momo for advice on math – half the time it would come with remarks that she should do it herself but she still helped.

Although Hagakure was a bit worried about what she'd do when she ran out of caramels.

Some people focus on one book at a time when studying. Some people even try for two if they think they can do it. But usually their attention is too split by the effort and it's all wasted, it might even make them stress more.

Those people were not Mezo Shoji, who had decided he could best train and study… by doing both at the same time, with his lower arms turned into hands and holding open books with an elongated finger to turn each page, an eye from each of his middle arms focusing on those books, and elongated upper arms holding a third book in front of him.

This not only tested his ability to store the information but also helped him multitask, allowing him to rapidly alternate between subjects. It had always done him well when he tried two at once in the past, but at U.A. he needed to go beyond and try harder. He needed his sensory skills to be the best there were, especially after realizing just how good his senpai were.

One might readily ask how someone who managed to get to the final section of the Sports Festival like Aoyama could do so badly in the tests. Well aside from the fact that he made a trio of the three lowest-scoring students in the classroom who still got to the final competition, one peek into Aoyama's study space could tell you everything.

He had mirrors set up everywhere around him, and his textbook set up in front of him. This way, he could look anywhere he wanted to, and see not only himself but also his textbook. He was trying hard though… if for no other reason that with such a class like the one he was in, Aoyama refused to let himself be outshone for too much longer. He needed to try harder than he used too at school, somehow, he didn't think the tests would accept his charming good looks~ .

And then came what I'd call the week of hell if I was being overdramatic. The week where the walks to and from U.A were in silence as people ran through information in their heads, where even faces like Ochako's were turned grim, as the hell that is the Japanese testing system was hitting us full-on. For those who don't know, in Japan tests are much different. The first thing is that tests are usually set so you spend the whole day either doing tests or having lunch – usually two tests, with a lunch break in between. That alone would give me a reason to despise the testing system because while my memories were faint at best, I remember tests like that playing havoc on my nerves in the old life.

And then you get to the reason that both Kaminari and Mina were so distressed when they were told of their scores, and something that had me almost to Bakugou levels of pissed off. The minimum mark for passing in Japan is usually 60%. After the birth of Quirk based societies this had seemed to slip away from most middle school and primary school tests – going down to 50% - but U.A. is still the best of the best when it comes to hero schools, both in training heroes and in intellectuals. They kept the old marking system in order to try and promote excellence… or maybe Nedzu was doing this as a bit of payback on humanity. I don't know, either fits.

Unfortunately, this also meant it was a super high-stress situation. And while I could easily go into detail about the fact that I brought a backup gas storage tank with me or that I was directing any puffing up down to my legs as not to screw with the penmanship, it was definitely not something I was worrying about alone. Jiro's absentminded playing with her earphone jacks almost got to the point of her tangling them up in themselves. Iida's arms were stiffer and going through the robot motions without him even saying anything – not surprising given the school he came from. Dark Shadow had flat out come out and was trying to go over the study he and Tokoyami had done – from what I could tell Tokoyami was correcting his Quirk. And Izuku had shown up outside the first classroom and immediately launched into a faster and quieter mumbling spree than we had ever seen before.

Not that it got much better in the exams themselves. The slight buzz in the air as Kaminari subconsciously released small sparks out of stress with none of the stone-faced determination shown from the finals of the term. The slight simmer of steam from Todoroki as he finished, making it clear he was fighting the urge to cool himself off from the pressure. The little looks from Momo to other members of the class when she put her pen down. The utterly chewed up mess Kirishima was turning the top of his pen into. Tsuyu's deathly silence, not a ribbit to be heard… and that Minoru Mineta was focused like a laser pointer on the test. Of Sero, I didn't see anything, but sometimes that pressure isn't so openly shown.

It's not something easily described by going through it moment to moment. Hard work and pressure, the feeling that you might not have enough time to finish or you might have misremembered information for an answer, that crushing pressure one feels when taking on the exams. Lunch was only a temporary relief, with little chatting as we devoured and then moved on to the next exam. Day in and day out, one after another. Math, Science, Literature, Hero Art History, all came at us like an unrelenting assault, with English as one of the last. It was only on Friday when we emerged from the Midterms, did it seem like the dam of pressure broke, allowing us to talk to each other again, allowing us to relax and be teenagers again, allow for us to focus on the upcoming festival.

And yet if we had known what was happening on that same day… we wouldn't have celebrated.

How long had it been since she had walked these steps normally, instead of using her Quirk to precisely control a piece of metal beneath her? How long had she stopped to just watch and listen to one of the last unknown spots of Japan? The youth of today probably couldn't imagine there was something left unexplored in this world but… she supposed that was little different from her generation. She sighed a raspy sigh, the weight of her age for one moment clearly pressing on her before she pushed forwards, rasping her fists against what seemed a solid rock face… and she stepped into the face, almost phasing through it, entering into a void of pitch black.

She felt the rush of air and ducked down, a fist briefly appearing out of a void that blended in perfectly with the rest of the darkness, before she leaped into the air, bouncing off the attack as a figure swung through the area she had been an instant earlier. Leaping into mid-air she spread out both hands. Into one, a long staff of polished metal appeared, and inches away from the other, a bullet, it's shot seemingly unheard, stopped before dropping to the ground, the staff being brought forward to block a similar object in kind, the clash of metal on metal bringing sparks that briefly highlights a skull-like visage.

"Enough." She rasped out, and like that, any movement in the air stopped. "Sloppy. Just because I do not have my staff with me doesn't mean you can get away with being sloppy around me. Ninjutsu!" A light focused down on the old woman as she held her free hand out. "A metal bullet? Surely you didn't think I'd have missed a wooden one?"

"No Lady Papillion." The skull masked man remarked, kneeling before her, with only his silver mask illuminated in the light. "I simply saw it as training."

Lady Papillion snorted at that. "Excuses. And Taijutsu!" This time it illuminated a figure who didn't seem to wear a mask, only a silver emblem of a butterfly illuminated on her head. "Just because you could see what I was about to do doesn't mean you should attack. Consider what your foe will do beyond that!"

There was no reply at that, a simple dip of the emblem, as if someone was nodding their head.

"And Genjutsu…" At that an area that seemed to be simply more shadows vanished, revealing a third figure dressed in a metallic oni mask. "You relied too much on your Quirk there. Extra training for you."

"Yes, Lady Papillion." Genjutsu remarked, the voice digital in nature. "Immediately?"

Another snort. "Of course not. I wouldn't have interrupted training to simply pile on more." Lady Papillon pointed out as she grabbed a mask that flew out of the shadows and into her hand… the mask of the butterfly. "In fact, I found someone… interesting. Someone you all should take time to study and… consider as a training opportunity." At that, she reached into her cloak… and tossed out a folder that soon landed and slid across the floor.

As it vanished into the shadows, there was a brief moment of stillness… and then… "Is this the fruit of your little mission you went on, Sensei?" Ninjutsu remarked, more than a hint of amusement in his tone. "I'd have thought you'd be more… personal about this."

"Do not disrespect Lady Papillon by acting so familiar Ninjutsu." Genjutsu's digitized voice rang out. "We do not question her orders."

Taijutsu spoke no response, but the slight drop of the silver butterfly in what little light there was said everything about the clear exasperation she felt at such a stiff and inflexible approach.

Lady Papillon rasped out a chuckle. "Oh no, dear Ninjutsu. I haven't planned this out as anything personal at all. In fact, if it were a few years earlier… you might have had a fourth member competing." She freely admitted. "But don't think I'll take simple failure from any of you lightly. I expect you to make an example of this… hero-to-be. To test your skills against someone… more on your levels."

There was no more noise except for the sound of a folder sliding back across the floor towards her, as the three shinobi students of hers left, either to do their research or to prepare to head out. And she simply peered down at the open folder… and smiled.

"You're a feisty young snake in the grass… but even a snake can be taken down by a butterfly in the right circumstances." She remarked.