Rule #56: Beware the next generation…the children are our future
"DAMMIT!" Roared Bakugou as he stood dressed in full hero costume with an armful of children littered about him like daisies. "WE'RE HEROES! NOT BABYSITTERS!"
"Yes, well, this was our exercise for today" Yaoyorozu replied diplomatically as sticky hands pulled at her long hair. It was true. As part of that day's hero exercise, both classes 1-A and 1-B had joined forces to look after UA's daycare children. That is, children who were typically the offspring of faculty and staff who worked at the school. Aizawa had framed the exercise as a lesson in dealing with difficult civilians; but it was more or less just an excuse for the (daycare) teachers to take a break. Kids were a handful on their own, add developing Quirks into the mix? Well, some tears were to be expected.
Currently, all the first year hero course students were being passed amongst the toddlers like shiny new toys as they moved around training ground beta. It appeared that even All Might had misunderstood the plans for the lesson; although he was currently being suffocated by a gaggle curious children climbing over him like he was part of the playground they were at, to answer any questions. Further down, Aizawa and Vlad King looked to be picnicking with the daycare teachers (if you could call it that) whilst all the kids—high school & daycare—ran amok. I s'pose they think if we're old enough to save people, we should be old enough to look after some kids. Toru mused as she absently pushed one of the kids on the swing. Then again knowing us, I've probably just jinxed it all, haven't I?
"…I can't believe how much bigger they're making the training grounds!" Mina exclaimed as she passed by, playing tag with Sero, Kaminari and some of the kids. The sounds of construction echoed across the urban area, but Toru knew that they were safe in their small alcove; even if the cranes swung high above their heads and scraped against the blue sky as more towers were added to the already busting simulated city.
"Y'know, we really shouldn't be here without wearing hard hats" Kaminari warily eyed one of the cranes in question as it swung its load over the playground.
"Why?" Sero asked as he skirted around tiny outstretched hands.
"You see that guy? The one way up there eating his lunch? He drops a potato chip from that height and it'll cut you in half"
"Really?" Perked up the blue kid next to the blonde, fear swimming in his eyes.
"Uh huh, straight down the middle"
"…I DON'T WANNA BE CUT IN HALF!" Wailed the kid as he scampered off to find shelter beneath the slide.
"Ryu! No! He was just kidding—!" Sero hurried off after the boy as Mina turned on her friend, their game of tag forgotten.
"Nice going, dumbass Denki!" Mina whacked the blonde up the back of the head.
"Ow! Hey!" Kaminari whined, rubbing the back of his head as he pouted. "Hagakure! She just hit me!"
"Kids, behave" Toru intoned, still pushing her little monster on the swing. "Or I will ground you both"
"Besides, that's scientifically impossible" Mina continued.
"Are you calling my mother a liar?" Kaminari sized up the pinkette.
"No, I'm just saying the woman is incredibly loose with her science!"
"Hey! Hey! C'me 'ere!" Toru scolded as she chased after the little snot-nosed feline monster in front of her. "Don't eat that, Aoi! Aoi! C'me 'ere!" All around her chaos ensued as the hero students were quickly and easily overwhelmed by the boundless energy of the toddlers. Their senseis had long since disappeared, citing more 'important matters' to take care of; meaning that whatever semblance of control they had had over the children had disappeared as soon as their teachers' backs had turned.
"What's wrong, Sasuke?" Mina crouched next to the weeping kid next to her knee.
"K-Kibo took—took my All Might figurine again!" Wailed Kibo (now holding the headless figurine of a well-loved All Might), as another kid—this one much stockier and wearing a mischievous grin—waved back at them with the now decapitated figurine's head. "He—he snapped his head off!"
"Well, that's not foreboding" Tokoyami sassed, having overheard the exchange.
"Not at all" Agreed Ojiro as a couple of the kids hung from his tail like they were on the jungle gym.
"Now, that's not very nice Kibo" Mina scolded the clawed boy. "What do you say?"
"So?" Kibo sassed, uncaring as he turned to bury the head in the sandpit.
"No—"
"—YOU BETTER SLEEP WITH ONE EYE OPEN DURING NAP TIME!" Sasuke threatened as he was shooed over to the ball pit that Yaoyorozu had functioned out of a paddling pool.
"Oh my God" Toru smiled, "They're like tiny little Bakugous"
"HUH?!" Said blonde reared his head at the sound of his name from beneath the pile of kids climbing all over him.
"Nothing, Bakugou" She waved away, Aoi now sat on her hip as she sucked her thumb looking for all the world like the cat that got the cream. Pun unintended.
"Hey Kendo! Kendo—!" Pony Tsunotori strode over to the class representative with a little girl sat on her shoulders and clinging to her horns.
"Hm?" Kendo glanced up from where she sat with a couple of the quieter girls as they wove daisy chains.
"—Haha—!" Giggled Ari, the little girl that sat on her shoulders.
"—Haha!" Pony replied in a rather mocking manner. "Kendo! Where's Kojiro?"
"Uh, he's changing some kids nappy" Kendo replied, after sparing a quick glance over her shoulder towards where the gentle giant had disappeared.
"Really? But what about his fear of germs?"
As if in response, said gentle giant returned pulling a little red wagon behind him, one that held the freshly changed child in question and the dirty nappy that was held out as far in front of him as the barbecue tongs would allow. The kid appeared supremely happy with the arrangement, his mischievous grin looking a little wicked on such young features as Kojiro stuffed the nappy into there nearest waste receptacle. "O-okay!" He exclaimed quietly. "We should b-be good now. That nappy weighed m-more than he does"
"WE GOT AN ESCAPEE!" Came the sudden war cry from across the playground where Kirishima and Testutestu were watching over some of the smaller ones around the roundabout and mouse wheel. "PIGTAILS RUNNING!"
That was all the warning they got before a little red headed streak zipped across the playground and made a beeline straight for the fenced-off perimeter. Thankfully, the child didn't get very far before Asui's tongue whipped out from somewhere behind Toru and wrapped itself around the escaping struggling child, snatching her up like a fly. From there, she was easily pulled back to the roundabout in which she was deposited with a sulking pout. "THANKS TSU!" Kirishima called back as his partner scolded the sulking child whilst her peers giggled at the scene.
"Put me down! Put me down!" Aoi struggled in Toru's grip and was quickly placed on her feet before she raced over to whatever had caught her attention over by the slide as Toru meandered over to where Midoriya was worriedly hovering over the Bakugou who remained buried beneath a pile of children whilst Todoroki watched on with barely concealed amusement, despite clearly being completely out of his element. Passing by the ball pit, she was treated to the sight of Monoma and Awase intermittently popping out of the multicoloured balls like meerkats, turning this way and that as their hair crackled with static electricity. "…I think we're safe!" Monoma glanced about with wide eyes, only his skewed blonde head appearing from beneath the balls as he searched for kids from the sanctuary of the ball pit. Sanctuary, which was ultimately destroyed when Tsuki whacked him over the head with a foam noodle; effectively playing whack-a-mole with the blonde as he disappeared back beneath the balls with a startled yelp.
"Did you say we were safe?" Awase appeared next, Sen doing the same to the spiky-haired hero. Toru grinned as both boys were ultimately drawn into a game of real life whack-a-mole, with themselves as the objects of desire.
"Hey Midoriya, Todoroki, Bakugou" She nodded to the trio (unlikely as their friendship was, they always seemed to be together).
"Hagakure" Todoroki nodded in return as the toddler in his arms seemed to slip through his grip like Jell-o. Midoriya just sent frantic glances between his friends as he silently asked for help, but didn't want to upset the blonde at their feet. After all, the greenette knew better than any of them how explosive Bakugou could be; and no matter how sturdy children were, it was unlikely that they would appreciate being blasted across the playground. Despite this, Toru couldn't keep the joy from her voice as she asked "Need some help there, Bakugou?" The evil eye she received in return was totally worth it.
Sometime later—whilst all the children had been fed and watered like the little monsters they were—Toru found herself wandering amongst the (thankfully) somewhat tired children on the outskirts of the playground, as she slurped at the instant noodles Sato and Yaoyorozu had managed to scrounge up for all the older kids to share. Sriracha wasn't her go to flavour, but it would do for now; besides she was hungry enough that she'd probably just about eat anything right about now. Much like how Kuroro appeared to be shamelessly bribing some of the toddlers into giving him food.
Letting her gaze rove over the gathered children, Toru felt her brow furrow as she mentally counted off the children she could see. It appeared that they were one short. "Hey Monoma" She turned to the ruffled blonde who sat atop the monkey bars as he angrily slurped his noodles and glared at any children who came near.
"Nn?" So worn out by the day's experience, Monoma had lost all sense of his usual overbearing pomposity.
"Have you seen Rei?"
"What? He's not with you?"
"Oh no…"
"Haha! You lost the guidance counsellor's baby!"
"You were the one who saw him last!"
"Just shut up and help me find him!"
"Rei! Rei!" Toru turned wide-eyed to hurriedly search the playground for the canine toddler as Monoma dismounted from the monkey bars and joined in the search. Although his methods were a little more crude.
"Where are you, you little brat?"
"Dude! He's not here!"
"Did you just call me 'dude?" Monoma paled, suddenly realising what was going on, but tried to cover it up with at least some of his usual bravado.
"Focus!" Toru snapped.
"Oh! We are so dead!" Monoma worried, gripping tight to his hair as he panicked. "We're gonna be expelled! Oh forget expelled! We're going to prison! Oh forget prison, we're going to summer school! D'ya know what they do to guys like me in summer school?!"
"Monoma, calm down—!" Toru tried.
"—No! I can't calm down! We just lost the Hound Dog-Sensei's baby!"
"It'll be okay—"
"—No! No it's not! This isn't like losing some English teacher's baby—!"
"—That's because Mic-Sensei doesn't have a kid—"
"—This is big time!"
"Monoma—!"
"—Oh! It's over for us! Goodbye cruel world!"
"Would you quit crying, you big baby?" Toru sighed as she caught sight of said toddler crawling dangerously close to the base of the construction site that lay not too far from them. "He's over there! C'me on!" Pulling the blonde after her, Toru raced over to where she had last seen the canine only to find gone. "Wha—?! What happened?!" Toru spun around trying to search for the boy. "He was just here!"
"This kid's like a cheetah in a nappy!" Monoma despaired. "He's gotta be around here, somewhere! Find him! I don't wanna go to summer school!"
"Split up! He couldn't have gotten far"
As it turned out, the toddler had gotten rather far—or at least he'd hidden himself so well that the pair of teens had scrambled about the place like headless chickens as they searched for him; their actions growing ever-frantic as the day drew to a close and the pick-up time grew ever closer. Unfortunately, the pair were far enough from their peers that any possible help was unlikely to come.
"REI! REI!"
"REI! WHERE ARE YOU?!"
"Any luck?" Monoma called across the courtyard as the pair flickered about the scaffoldings and littered tools.
"No!" Toru whined.
"Aw! Look—look if we can't find this baby, I say we just give Hound Dog-Sensei something that just looks like one"
"What are you talking about?" Toru asked confusedly as she regrouped with Monoma.
"I'm talking about slapping a nappy on a teddy bear and putting it in a pre-school uniform!"
"Seriously—?"
"—Aah!" The high-pitched squeal cut through their conversation before any more could be said. And Toru was thankful that it did as the two teens snapped around at the noise to find Inui Rei happily seated atop a pile of concrete bags in the corner of the courtyard.
"There you are, you little shit!" Monoma cried. Toru was unsure if the tears were happy, pissy or just from exhaustion.
"Language!" Toru half-heartedly slapped the blonde's arm, although she was thinking something similar.
"Hey, baby Rei!" Monoma fell to his knees as he slowly crawled towards the toddler like he was approaching a wild animal. In the moment, the baby-voice was well-justified, but looking back it was ridiculous. "Who doesn't want to get Neito expelled? You don't! No, you don't! Stay right there!"
"Whose a good boy?" Toru cooed as she followed after the blonde, not really questioning his methods if they got the result they desired. "You're a good boy! Yes, you are—!"
Their efforts were quickly cut short however when Rei was yanked skywards by the platform in which the concrete bags sat. In doing so, the actions released delighted giggles from the toddler as both Monoma and Toru jumped to their feet, moods quickly swinging in the other direction. "Hey—!" Monoma fruitlessly tried to reach for the toddler as he flew out of their reach. "No! No! Stop!"
"You're not a good boy!" Toru scolded uselessly, "You're a very, very bad boy!"
"My baby! MY BABY! SOMEBODY SAVE MY BABY!" While Monoma screeched in panic, Toru quickly shot forth and began to climb the scaffolding in front of them. With practised movements, the invisible girl easily scaled the structure as she hauled ass after their escapee.
Soon enough, the girl pulled herself up onto the furthermost reaches of the steel scaffolding and tried her best not to glance down at her feet where the playground now looked like a blur of paint on a muted canvas; their peers no more than ants and the toddlers mere specks. "Ahem!" Monoma cleared his throat as he clung to an adjacent steel beam.
"Monoma?" Toru's brows furrowed. "How the hell did you get up here?"
"I took the elevator"
"Oh…"
"Look! You gotta stop fooling around, Hagakure!"
"I'm not!"
"Hound Dog-Sensei will be back for Rei any minute"
"Monoma, I'm not fooling around! I just climbed all the way up here—!"
"—Hagakure! Look! There he is!" The blonde cut in as he pointed off towards the side where the canine toddler now happily sat close to the edge. "I got this!" He gripped tight to the vertical beam at his back and leant out slightly to scold the boy. "Hey! You get back here this instant young man!"
"Seriously?" Again, Toru raised a brow at the copycat.
"Whelp, that's all I've got" Monoma shrugged noncommittally when Rei didn't even seem to register what was going on. Rolling her eyes at the blonde's 'attempt', Toru skirted around the beam at her back and tip-toed after the toddler who must've had some kind of sixth sense as he began to crawl away again.
"No! No, no, no!" Toru leapt forward, fruitlessly trying to reach for the boy and cursing herself that she could no longer (as far as she knew) fly. When his shirt slipped through her fingers, Toru felt the world come out from underneath her (and not just because she was dangling over the ground seven stories in the air).
"MY BABY!" Monoma's cry sounded over her shoulder as Toru fearfully watched the toddler fall. A fear which was quickly replaced with relief when he landed on an ascending beam being pulled skywards by an adjacent crane. Why the construction workers didn't just stop and help, Toru didn't know, but she was grateful for the sudden appearance of the tool. Quickly climbing to her feet, she followed after Monoma as they scaled further up the steel frames.
Another story later and the pair were again met with the ascending baby; with Monoma a little worse for wear, Toru wasted no time in launching herself forward and gripping tight to one end of the floating steel beam. A choice that probably wasn't the best at the time. "Hagakure! He's slipping!" Monoma called out. With the added weight to one end of the beam, Rei easily slid down the steel like it was a slide and into the invisible girl's waiting hands.
"Got 'im!" She cried, relief evident in her voice as she hung from the steel beam by one hand whilst the other gripped tight to the boy's collar. "Monoma! I'm losing my grip!"
"Uh…" Scrambling for something to help him, the blonde quickly snatched a nearby hook and clipped it to the back of his waistcoat. Swinging out across the landscape, Monoma easily snatched the canine toddler from the invisible girl's grip and cradled him to his chest.
"Nice save!" Toru called back as she eventually hauled herself up onto the beam as she had planned to do before.
"I'm never having kids!" Monoma exclaimed, clearly exhausted.
"And the world is better for it!" She grinned at the muted glare sent over the boy's head at her. "Look! Here comes Hound Dog-Sensei!" She glanced down at the ground in time to see the trickle of teachers coming to pick up their offspring. "I'll lower you down!"
Jumping back onto the scaffolding, Toru easily manoeuvred herself over to the controls for the mechanical hook and it didn't take long for her to figure out how to use it. Pushing the right buttons, she lowered both teen and toddler down through the stories to the ground below and it was only once they had safely met the ground that she stopped, leaning over with hands on her knees in relief. "Thank God!" She sighed. "Now, time to get down…I think I'll take the elevator this time"
Once back on the ground, Toru quietly joined Monoma at his side as he returned the troublemaking toddler to his parent. The tail end of their conversation floated over her and she wondered just what kind of conversation she had wandered into. "…No…why?" Monoma stalled.
"Oh! Because he's absolutely terrified of heights" Hound Dog replied as he retrieved his son from the blonde's arms.
"Sure!" Monoma sounded a little hysterical—not that she could blame him. "Okay, okay"
"Thanks for everything you did today, I'll see you at school!"
"Well, that was fun" Toru commented dryly; taking great pleasure in the way the copycat jumped at her sudden appearance as the two wandered back to the playground.
"Geez! Wear a bell!"
"Hey—!" Whatever comeback Toru had lined up was quickly cut short by the sudden appearance of both Kirishima and Bakugou who seemed to have lost the last of their dignity. Somehow, Bakugou had mounted Kirishima's shoulders and was clinging to his headband like they were reins. "TOOT TOOT! BEST FRIENDS COMING THROUGH!" Kirishima declared as he bulldozed his way across the playground.
"OUTTA THE WAY FUCKERS!" Cheered Bakugou, whose exhaustion had apparently turned off all inhibitors.
"Bakugou! Kirishima!" Iida appeared at the edges of their dust cloud, frantically waving his hands as he tried to get them to stop. Everyone else just watched on amused and tired.
"…Part of me wants to ask" Monoma stared at the spectacle as if he was really seeing them for the first time. "The other part says knowing will be far more disturbing than anything I could come up with. So I'm just gonna finish eating my cold noodles"
"Good call" Toru agreed.
