I'm gonna make something different with this story.

In this AU, Izuku is a bit more chilled out and naïve. And since he does have powers, despite being quirkless, he wasn't as picked on as in canon. Although Bakugo was still a bully to him, Izuku's childhood wasn't as rough. So, I'm gonna make our diamond boy befriend a different classmate of 1-A. A classmate who can relate to his powers.

The1ststand: His weapon will be kinda obvious, though.

The light of the sun reflected on Izuku's diamond as he gazed up to see the massive gate. Behind it was the battle ground where their cadre would be facing their entrance exam.

HUM!

POP!

HUM!

POP!

HUM!

"Will you kindly stop that?" Izuku looked up to see a tall, blue-haired boy with glasses glaring down at him. It was the boy who called him out for muttering during the orientation by Present Mic.

"What?" the white-haired blinked in confusion.

"That which you are doing with your quirk." He indicated the new bubble in Izuku's hands. To pass the time he had been making bubbles and promptly popped them. "It's distracting the other contestants."

Izuku slowly looked at everyone else. Nobody was paying special attention at him. Only a few scattered, brief glances.

"Nobody seems really disturbed." Izuku shrugged. The glasses boy scowled and adjusted his glasses

"We are all mentally preparing ourselves for a strenuous test, yet you don't appear to be taking this seriously enough. Is with this unpreoccupied attitude of yours you intend to become a pro-hero?"

Izuku shook his head. "No, that's what my smile and positive attitude is for. A hero makes everything better, and the first step is to make people feel better with a smile." To illustrate his point, Izuku showed his trademark smile…which he had been told put people off. The glasses boy looked disturbed and replied.

"You are far too naïve to be hero."

He left Izuku feeling a little miffed. Nothing worthy of note happened until Present Mic loudly announced the start of the exam.

"I really should have trained some more." Izuku berated himself for not having dedicated more time and effort in building up his stamina. Of course, he trained his body in the previous months, too. But apparently, it's not enough to compete with everyone else. The other contestants were running ahead of him.

Loud noises of explosions sounded from every direction. The mechanical villains Present Mic detailed in the orientation were making their appearance all over the makeshift city. The group ahead of him quickly scattered. Some opted to form temporary teams. The white-haired boy was left on his own.

Okay, no big deal. He still had his powers to fall on. At least, the ones that he could rely on. He could do this!

An empty store at his left crumbled. A mech running on a wheel, with two long arms and a single red optic – a One-pointer. It made a beeline for him.

Izuku hurriedly took three bullet-bubbles he kept on his pocket with shaky hands and took aim. The robot approached fast. Izuku's shaking spread over his body. Dead, unmoving garbage got nothing on the dread this thing sprouted in him.

He snapped three fingers. The bullet-bubbles acted like their namesakes and separated the robot's head from its body.

Izuku's trembling instantly became fueled by relief. "Thank God I trained my aiming."

"An extraordinary display of power, but quite lacking in élégance and opulence. Not bien at all." Izuku turned to the source of the strange voice. A blond boy of strange appearance, to say the least. His eyes were big and indigo colored. His face carried a sparkly glow to it, like it was completely natural to his person. His smile was quite angular.

"Uh, I'm sorry?" said a confused Izuku, not knowing what he was apologizing for. The boy moved his arms in accordance with his speech in slow, fluid gestures. Like his equally slow, fluid voice was an orchestra and him the maestro.

"I meant to say, your performance lacks the grace and flash of a hero."

Izuku blinked. Despite those words, he didn't sound offended. He had bore much worse from Kacchan. "Don't know about the grace part, but I can make a good flash."

The sparkly boy quirked an eyebrow. "In that case…" and he broke into a run on the opposite direction "…show me, monsieur!"

"Six minutes and twenty seconds left!" Present Mic announced. Izuku was already on the sparkly one's tail, determined to show off his 'flash'. They came upon a group of robot targets. Quickly, Izuku looked at the bulkiest part of a three-pointer and urged the energy to be expelled from his gem.

"Diamond Blast!" a beam of luminous white punched right through the killer machine's torso, making it explode. Aiming beams fired from his forehead were a bit difficult to aim, precisely. And energy fired from his hands was never sufficient to do damage.

"Oh, quite lumineux!" the boy spoke for the first time without any trace of condescending or critic. "Mais, not quite as mine."

He aimed his lower belly to an in-coming robot. Only now did Izuku noticed the intricate belt around his nave-line with a big lense over it. A beam of clear blue shot from the lenses and pierced through the machine. But it didn't end there; after the deed was done, his beam of light dispersed, filling the air around them with sparkles.

"Voi lá!" he made a gesture, like displaying his lightshow as his masterpiece. "A true hero makes the world look better by giving it beauty!"

Izuku was star-eyed. "That was awesome."

"Merci." He made an exaggerated bow.

More and more mechs followed after their fallen brethren. Izuku and the show-offish boy finished them off one by one. With every destroyed mech, the two aspiring heroes got more and more creative on the usage of their abilities. Like subconsciously trying to one-up one another.

In a dark room, a group of teachers observed the exam on various monitors. A small group of them, the senior teachers, would be the judges.

"We have quite a batch, this year." Spoke a soft, almost unhuman voice. "I see several of them are actively competing with each other. That is good! A little competitive spirit makes a fine hero."

Other teachers voiced their agreement. One however, retorted dully:

"Many of them are treating this like it's a game. Enjoying themselves far too much. If they believe that is how a pro fights, they won't last an hour in our school." The speaker's gaze went from screen to screen where he spotted such behavior, including one with a white-haired boy.

The soft speaker hummed. "You bring about a good point. Perhaps its best to level up." In the shadows, the 'person' smirked and pushed a red button tagged 'Zero'.

"…And this is my light grenade!" Izuku showed off his latest invention; he created a soft bubble and placed it against his forehead. Light poured out of the gem and into the bubble, filling it completely. It shone like a mini, warm sun in Izuku's hands.

"Light grenade!" he tossed the luminous bubble with great accuracy at a three-pointer. The bubble popped and the energy within exploded, destroying the headpiece of the machine. The move also provided a small light show.

"Very lumineux." The blond, whom has introduced himself as Yuga Aoyama, applauded controllably.

"Thanks. Since I can't aim very well with my head, I came up with this move. I aim better with throwing stuff."

The non-verbal competition was short-lived. A few streets away, there was another explosion akin to a demolition of a building. That meant a new mech making their debut. Except this sound was much louder and the earth beneath their feet truly shook. Screams and shouts were heard around the source of the noise.

The two boys shared a look and silently agreed to go investigate. In the opposite direction ran other competitors.

Izuku gasped upon seeing the reason. A humungous mech, bigger than a five story-building, holding onto a five-story building, glared emotionlessly down on them, tiny humans.

"T-that's the Zero-pointer."

Aoyama hummed. "It is quite fortunate. We gain nothing to engage that monstrosity."

Izuku's eyes went wide when he noticed a chestnut-haired girl trapped under a pile of rubble. And the Zero-pointer moving towards her. He would have moved to go help her, but his partner/rival halted him.

He spoke assuring. "Don't worry. Nothing will happen to her." He pointed up to a camera attached to the building, recording the scene. "UA's staff has been observing our conduct. They won't let anyone get hurt."

Nonetheless, Izuku eyed the girl. She looked so scared, trying to liberate herself. Even though she wasn't in life-threatening danger (he hoped), her expression cried out for help. How could he call himself a hero if I ignore that?

He gave his colleague a steely look. "Aoyama, this exam may not be a real thing, but if I let someone in need of help down now, how can I help people in a real situation?"

He took off in the direction of the girl. And the metal monster. Firing light grenades, one after another, and some hand diamond blasts at the tank-like tracks of the mechanical behemoth. It did little to no damage.

"Hey, are you okay?" he reached the girl, and without waiting for an answer, he grasped the large concrete chunk on top. "I'm gonna try to move it, so you can get out."

She nodded and Izuku took a breath. "Ok, superstrenght! Don't fail me now." He gave the chunk a mighty tug.

It didn't even budge.

"Oh, come on!" superstrenght was one of his unreliable powers, much to his occasional frustration.

"Need some assistance, mon amie?" Aoyama was right behind him. He aimed his navel belt at the girl, making the diamond boy skip a beat. But the laser fired was much thinner than usual and began safely cutting cleanly through the rubble. Noticing Izuku's expression, he divulged. "I can adjust the width and potency of my laser. Now," he looked at the troubled girl. "rest assured, mademoiselle, you will be out of harm's way." He winked, his face sparkling.

The girl looked weirded out but sighed in mild relief and gratitude. "Thank you."

Izuku got his focus back on the incoming menace. Either it didn't notice them tiny humans, or it was content to just run them over.

"How long will it take?"

"Perfection can't be rushed, monsieur." Despite the singalong tone, Aoyama's expression did harden, and his pace quickened. He had just finished cutting the biggest chunk into two which Izuku was able to move away with more ease. Unfortunately, there were more to cut.

Desperately, Izuku began hurling light grenades at the tracks of the zero-pointer. Like before, it was fruitless. It felt like an ant trying to bite a giant.

He heard a pained groan behind him. Aoyama clutched his stomach, doubled over. Izuku leaned down to try and comfort the frenchman. For once, his smile looked forced and strained.

"My quirk has a…deficiency. I can only shoot my laser for a minute before I get a stomachache."

"Maybe I can do the rest." The girl suddenly spoke and with difficulty, touched the piece on top of her with all fingers. It began to lift off the ground; but it fell back down immediately. The girl was left puking her guts out. It must have been a drawback of overusing her quirk, too.

"Worry not, mademoiselle. I will rescue you." Aoyama got himself up with shaky movements. "Real heroes don't let something as trivial as a pain stop them."

Aoyama got back to work, doing his best to prevent the increasing pain from showing on his face.

"He's going beyond his breaking point…and he can will his quirk like moving his fingers." A mixture of admiration and envy filled Izuku. He had such incredible powers that many quirk users would love to have, yet they were no good when he needed them to save someone else. All he could do were light and bubble tricks. Had only he trained his light powers to have Aoyama's kind of accuracy.

"Of all the powers out there, why couldn't I have a quirk instead of this?" he grasped his gem. "Even a useless one, at least I would be able to control it."

Aoyama gritted his teeth, his smile looked more like a grimace. The girl was sweating bullets, occasionally glancing back to the approaching beast. They were in pain and frightened.

Without another thought, Izuku turned against the robot and broke into a run. There was a theory; his uncontrollable powers only seem to activate when his life was in imminent danger. Colliding with the moving tracks of a giant robot had to qualify.

"Please work! Please work! Please work!" he reared his fist back. Unnoticed by him, his gem glowed and the light travelled through his fist. "Diamond Smash!"

The fist coated in energy collided.

Aoyama was taught since young age to always look presentable. Gapping was severely frowned upon, but right now, that hard-wired lesson completely slipped his mind. All that was in his mind was the fact that monsieur Midoriya, whom couldn't do anything to help just moments ago, obliterated the Zero-pointer with one punch.

It was as if a giant cannon fired from where Izuku had been standing, blowing everything away. The robot's tracks were destroyed and scattered in pieces, like a bomb detonated underground. The rest had tumbledon its back. The surrounding buildings had their fronts ruined, though remained mostly standing.

The girl they tried to help out was in the same state of astonishment. Another competitor, one with engines on his legs, assisted Aoyama liberating her from the rubble.

"Incroyable. Magnifique. Miraculeux."

"Such power." The boy with the engines whispered.

"Why didn't he just do that from the start?" the chestnutt asked not at all accusingly.

The dust settled to show Izuku's frame lying on the ground, unmoving. Aoyama and the girl made a beeline for him with the engine quirk user following suite. Other competitors approached as well, curious to see the responsible for ending the metal colossus. The glasses boy kneeled down and checked his pulse.

"Is he okay?" the girl asked worriedly.

"He looks just passed out." The glasses boy turned to her. "He engaged the Zero-pointer just to save you?"

She nodded and indicated Aoyama. "He and his friend tried to get me out, but when they realized they couldn't, he went and punched the robot."

"He did not display such power until now." Aoyama revealed, feeling equal parts mesmerized and, possibly, suspicious?

"Is everyone alright?" a sweet voice made itself known. A short, old lady dressed in a medical robe walked by and began handing out gummy bears. "Does anyone have injuries?"

"He may need some help, ma'am." The engine boy pointed to the unconscious one, gentling flipping him so his front was turned upwards. The old lady's seemingly closed eyes snapped open upon seeing his face. She gave him a quick scan and proclaimed:

"He is merely exhausted. Nothing a quick nap won't fix. If you could please take him to one of the gurneys, I have others to attend to." Without another word, she turned to the others, asking for injuries.

"Who is that?" the girl asked.

"That is mademoiselle Recovery Girl, lead medical staff member of UA. Her quirk allows her to heal injuries with a kiss." Aoyama supplied.

The girl opted to not comment that, for a healer, she didn't seem particularly caring about the diamond boy. The engine boy diligently carried Izuku to a gurney where he slept profoundly.

Izuku was surrounded by darkness. He was the brightest light. He was the sun that burnt in the day and the night. The light that illuminated everything; magnificent, unending, perfect. As it should be.

All around him were the lesser lights. So small, so flawed, so ephemeral. He was here to make them better. To guide them. To correct them. And, if need be, to snuff them out. As it should be.

Close to him were three lesser lights that were closer to his state of perfection. Closer, only. As it should be.

The Yellow Star, so strong, so hot, so full of power. But so easy to snuff out when its hard shell is broken.

Then there's the Blue Star. So beautiful, so dignified, but so unable to guide herself alone, relying on other for direction. Blue and Yellow, despite their flaws, small as they were, understood their place in the sky.

Finally, there was the Pink Star. So rebellious, so unruly, so childish, so inconvenient to keep around. And yet, so cute, so precious. Despite the Pink Star carrying many more defects than its two sisters, Izuku loved her the most. She was his Starlight.

"Oh, Starlight!" Izuku sighed with a voice that wasn't his own. "Do you really wish to go?"

The Pink Star wanted to go away. To be out there among other stars. Izuku didn't want Pink to go away. But Pink had swayed Yellow and Blue to her side. Izuku could so easily overruled them. They would obey his will. As it should be.

But…why not?

"Then go with my blessing, Starlight." He fondly caressed the pink light. Then his grip on it tightened. "And try not to cause too much trouble."

And the Pink Star departed.

"But first…" Izuku grabbed the Pink Star before it could get out of his reach. With two long black-nailed fingers, he pulled a tiny speck of light from the star. "…a little bit of you will stay with me. For you are mine, no matter where you go or what form you take."

Izuku let the Pink Star go and focused entirely on the pink speck. He squeezed it tightly and its hue changed to a pale gray. "You are mine. Now and forever."

If Izuku could see his own face, the smile was borderline psychotic.

Izuku awakened sorely to find himself on a medical room. He looked around to see a short, old woman, typing on her computer. She must have felt his presence, for she immediately turned to face him.

"Ah, you're awakened. Good. You must be all rested up, now. You're free to go."

"Uh…thank you. What happened?" he groggily got up.

"You activated your quirk at the last moment and punched the Zero-pointer, destroying it." The nurse lady explained as if she had rehearsed it.

"I did?" he blinked. So his superstrength did manifest. Guess the whole life-danger-theory was pretty much confirmed.

The nurse scrutinized him before saying. "I should tell you that was most reckless, young man. But since you are alright, I will not push it. You may leave now."

Izuku got up slowly. His muscles were sore and he felt a phantom exhaustion, but nothing too bad. As he walked to the exit, a thought just occurred to him.

"Excuse me, but have we met?"

The nurse froze for a moment. She answered coldly. "I don't think so."

Izuku blinked. "Ah! I remember now! You're Recovery Girl, the healing pro-hero."

The old woman's frame relaxed a little. "Yes, that is me."

What followed were a minute or two of Izuku fanboying, cut short when Recovery Girl politely asked him to leave.

The doctor finished her report on the injured competitors. This year there hadn't been that many, which made her job much easier. That left her more time to make an important call.

She opened a chat with her acquaintance. Today was the day Recovery Girl had expected for almost a decade. She rubbed her left eye, feeling a phantom pain from long ago.

On the chat, a message awaited her reply.

Captain Stars: So how was it? (− ꝫ −)

Recovery Girl: Didn't feel her presence. But the boy looks too much like her. (≥ ˷ −)

It took a while for a reply to come...

Recovery Girl is not who she appears to be. And neither are others.

As for Izuku's dream, SU fans will get its meaning. MHA fans, don't worry. It won't impact the story. I'm writting this with MHA fans who don't know a thing about Steven Universe in mind.