Time blurred, and before Shoto knew it, it was the day of the Sports Festival and he was standing alongside the entirety of the first year classes, waiting at the starting line for the first event to start.
The first event would be a race.
Shoto stretched out his right arm and rotated the shoulder, his face set in sharp lines. He tapped his booted feet against the ground, testing their traction.
Robots, huh. Original.
They had used robots in the entrance exam, Shoto had heard from his classmates; that they would use it again was slightly disappointing. It would have been nice if they'd tried a little harder to come up with something different (honestly, it wasn't like they couldn't afford it), but there was no help for it.
"I hope you're watching, shitty bastard," he murmured aloud, as Present Mic shouted down the numbers from five. He pulled his leg behind him for support, and drew his arm back as the numbers counted down from 3, 2, 1.
Fwoom.
Two oncoming robots, each easily five meters tall, stalled and came to a stilted halt as a massive column of ice enveloped each, encasing them entirely in ice.
Shoto stopped for a moment to consider the students behind him, frozen but not from shock, before internally shrugging and moving onwards. He did call behind him the warning about instability, but otherwise didn't give them any thought as he forged ahead. Someone's vaguely familiar voice shouted recriminations behind him, but Shoto was moving forward and had no intentions of falling back for the sake of placating someone's delicate feelings.
This was war: Shoto had a goal to accomplish and something he desperately wanted to prove, and if they wanted fairness, they should have put in the effort necessary to meet him at the top.
He ran, throwing out ice with his right arm and stomping his power into the ground as robots moved towards him. He made good time without running into any obstacles or other players, and soon reached the second stage of the race—which was crossing a massive canyon, apparently, laced throughout with ropes of various lengths and sizes.
He stopped for a moment at the foot of the canyon, comparing the merit of few ideas, before deciding to go with the quickest option with the greatest possibility of success.
His right foot touched down on the closest rope and froze it, the ice eating up meters of rope by the second. Shoto looked over his shoulder once, and smirked. Then he turned back, took a deep breath to push down his unavoidable nerves, and jumped.
The boots proved to be worth the incredible price tag. The rubber soles gave Shoto the traction he needed to stay on the rope as he constantly produced more ice with his right foot, giving him the continued momentum necessary to push himself forwards. It took considerable balance to keep from falling off the rope, and the thrill of the danger may have had his stomach constantly leaping in his throat, but it did nothing to stop the half-terrified grin that refused to stay off his face.
He continued through the canyon this way, sliding and pushing, and reached the end a few minutes later with only two heart-stopping incidents of near-slippage. Shoto didn't give himself more than a second or two to get his breath back before he pushed himself up the red stairs to the last stage at a run.
He ran the short distance to the next obstacle, and when he had reached the start he came to an abrupt halt, and stared. He could hear Present Mic's distant voice howling something about mines (and the large sign that cheerfully proclaimed, "MINEFIELD AHEAD!"), and he could see the distinct markings of disturbed dirt on the ground. He hesitated, but in the end, there was nothing for it but to move onward.
He picked his way as quickly as he could through the minefield, aware of the crowd getting closer from the sudden increase in explosions of pink. The blast from each mine that was set off wasn't particularly strong; just loud, and awfully bright and colorful. Shoto was just glad it hadn't occurred to anyone to booby-trap the mines with something like glitter, for example, which would have been unspeakably awful.
It was smart, the way they had set up the field to be particularly difficult for those in the lead, as they would have to pay extra attention to the mild-discoloration in the dirt, while at the same time keeping up a fast pace in order to stay ahead. No doubt they had thought it up as a way to bring about some balance—
His instincts screamed at him.
Shoto looked sharply behind him as an explosion—one of a number which, in hindsight, he had been hearing come up behind him—brought a body with spiky-blond hair hurtling in his direction.
Feet never touching the ground, Explosions used the force of his quirk to bring him within touching distance of Shoto's right side, snarling at him about how he had chosen the wrong opponent to declare war on.
Shoto heard him, but possibilities and counter-moves were already shooting through a mind sharpened with adrenaline, and the words were mostly lost to the wind.
He brought his left arm up to guard even as he leapt back—and just in time, too, as Explosions's left hand blew a heated gust of compressed air at Shoto's left side, attempting to get under his guard.
Next, Explosions's left hand, bright with the force of his building quirk, came flying at Shoto's right-side. He slid a hand along said-arm and pushed it away, countering with a sharp grab to Explosions's right arm, and upon contact, pushed quickly-growing ice along the limb. The boy shook off Shoto's hand a moment later, and on some unspoken signal, they raised the tempo of their fierce dance.
Despite the escalation, neither was able to really let themselves go, so long as the mines were beneath their feet. They dodged and punched and kicked at each other, but each time their feet touched the ground, they were careful to ensure that they did so only on dark, undisturbed ground.
It was then that something incredible happened.
As Shoto went to dodge a brightly glowing foot, an even brighter light, accompanied by a massive wave of sound, erupted behind him. He swung his head, eyes widening in shock, as a gigantic pink cloud enveloped a good half of the minefield. He was aware that at his side, Explosions had stopped to look too, and their heads moved up in unison as a small part of the pink cloud shot forward, and faded away to reveal—
"Ladies and gentlemen, was it on purpose, or an accident? Class A's Midoriya is in hot pursuit with that clever move!"
In an instant, he was over their heads.
Explosions didn't miss a beat. He threw himself into the air with a quick succession of blasts, and was soon shooting forward himself. Not to be outdone, Shoto pressed his foot into the ground and released the cold half of his quirk. It would leave a path behind him for the others, but it couldn't be helped: Shoto didn't have the luxury to be thinking about the people he was leaving behind.
As he ran parallel to Explosions, they drew closer and closer to the swiftly slowly Freckles, as the momentum from his explosive idea wore off. He would fall short of reaching the goal, Shoto predicted, and found the thought to be surprisingly disappointing.
For a split second, as he and Explosions passed the point where Freckles was dropping and they all fell into a row, Shoto felt the world freeze, as if trying to capture a moment that would go down in history.
Out of the corner of his eye, Shoto saw something, human-shaped and clinging desperately to the top of a large board, fall, ever so slowly, in that frozen moment. Then, the world went pink.
The explosions didn't hurt, but they did momentarily blind him, succeeding in creating a temporary obstacle.
When he managed to push away the disorientation and break through the cloud, Shoto was faced with the sight of Freckles a considerable ways ahead.
Chagrined, Shoto threw himself forward, running as fast as his quirk and his legs could carry him. Finally on safe ground, he and Explosions picked up speed, but it wasn't enough to do more than chisel away the gap between them and Freckles.
Shoto ran and ran, but he still hadn't closed the gap by the time the light of the tunnel had grown close enough to touch, and when the crowd began to go wild, and Present Mic announced the winner, Shoto slammed his way through the entrance with the disappointing knowledge that he had been too late.
As winners waited for the rest of the participants to make their way through to the end, Shoto took the time to get his breath back.
He was relatively certain he had come in second place. It had been hard to tell, in the darkness of the tunnel, but as they came out of the mouth of it, Shoto had thought he managed to get in front.
No doubt they would announce it soon enough, so there was no point wasting time thinking on it. Shoto wiped at his sweaty forehead and tried to get his breathing under control.
He had pushed himself a bit harder than he had meant to, towards the end there, but he hadn't been expecting to need to, so he only had himself to blame. Obviously, he now needed to recalculate the odds; his classmates were more capable than he had expected, and while he had been wary of Explosions from the start, Shoto thought he had been right to add Freckles to his list of people to keep an eye out for:
"Technically speaking, I am more powerful than you," Shoto said calmly, not all perturbed to be speaking such self-assured, arrogant sounding words, because they were entirely true. Freckles himself didn't look terribly upset by the words, though he did seem a bit nervous to hear them. Shoto ignored the way Iida, outraged, tried to force his way into the conversation, and continued: "And I know there's something going on between you and All Might. Don't worry, I won't press. I just want you to know that because of that connection, I have no recourse other than to beat you into the ground with everything I have, so… No hard feelings, I guess. Plus Ultra."
Refusing to feel embarrassed by the rather lame ending, Shoto turned to leave the waiting room, Present Mic—who would be serving as announcer for the festival—yelling that it was almost time to start nudging him out the door.
He looked at Freckles as he remembered the way the race had gone, and the way Freckles (Midoriya, Shoto amended, with a mental sigh) had reacted to his declaration of war. Midoriya was clever, clever enough to get this far and finish first without needing to use his quirk even once. To get first, against even a few decent competitors, was hard; doing it without using your quirk was something Shoto would have considered impossible, before today.
Losing stung, especially with the knowledge that Endevor was in the crowd today, somewhere. But if Shoto had to lose to anyone, it was oddly satisfying to know he had lost to Midoriya, and not anyone else.
Shoto looked away, then, and went to grab one of the bottles on offer near the entrance. His side felt cold from his consistent use, which meant the always-present threat of dehydration was especially pressing. The sports drink felt amazing going down his throat, and Shoto drank deeply.
When everyone had finally staggered their way through the tunnels and gathered in a rough group, they announced the names of the winners.
Shoto felt slightly satisfied to see his name above Explo—above Bakugo (oh, was that his name?), and only a small twinge of dissatisfaction to see it below Midoriya's. But as Midnight went on to discuss the rules of the next event (a cavalry battle) and the allocation of points, Shoto narrowed his eyes thoughtfully. While the crowd turned as one to face Midoriya, every single visible eye glinting with greed, Shoto looked instead at the other students and began planning how, this time, he would claim a certain victory.