Disclaimer: I don't own Boku no Hero Academia
Chapter 208:
"I was telling my parents and grandparents all about your report last night. My grandpa was totally into it," Satoshi said with a laugh as he leaned over the right side of Zach's desk before class.
It was the day after Zach gave his presentation, and he was glad everyone came up to him to tell him these things themselves. Zach nodded and smiled at Satoshi after hearing that, while he was thinking, Grandparents huh? Maybe I've been underestimating the old too. Memuria seemed very intrigued by everything I had to say, even if she doubts my ability to stop all villains. I even doubt that myself though. Always have. It could just be impossible, but if I don't try, no one will.
"We video called our parents too late last night when we thought they would have woken up for work," Jaime started. Her and Roger made Zach look back and over his shoulder to the American exchange students, and Jaime added with a laugh, "My mom thinks you're even crazier now."
"My parents were just too tired to care, but they sounded like they could believe it," Roger mentioned with a shrug of his shoulders.
"I've heard guys from Class 2 talking about it-" Hisashi mentioned from his seat back to Kerushi behind him.
"That's because I was talking to them yesterday about it," Kerushi replied before Hisashi could finish. "I mean, how do you hold something like this back? I wanted to talk to everyone I knew…"
"Anima loved it," Kotsumura said from the seat on Zach's right side, though he was sitting on the edge of it and leaning off closer to Zach. "But my parents thought it's all crazy talk. I tried convincing them, but it didn't come out nearly as convincing as when you said it."
Zach shrugged as he had figured that would be a problem. Do I publish it online? Or should I go on a talk show and reveal it first before I publish it so people interested can look on their own, but only after I discuss points I think everyone can get behind first? Or…
"The one thing my dad got really caught up on being impossible though," Kotsumura continued, getting Zach to refocus on him as Kotsumura wanted since his friend seemed to just be thinking hard about something else. "Was the guy you say didn't even have a name for his Quirk. That he's that old."
"He exists," Zach replied with a small smile and shake of his head. "He's definitely real," Zach assured as he still saw some looks of disbelief around him.
"Well who is he?" Kotsumura wondered. "He's still alive, right?" He asked that and then hesitated with a more anxious look forming but relaxed as Zach gave him a small nod.
I hope so. Blackstar says Drac's missing, but I believe in his strength. He's still alive. Zach smiled more to himself after his reassuring thoughts.
"Then who is he?!" Kotsumura exclaimed more interestedly again. Others started looking over as Kotsumura rose his voice like that, and Zach hesitated while Kotsumura questioned him, "What's his name?"
Zach paused with his lips pursed, then he had to laugh and looked away for a moment. His laugh was unnerving to his blond classmate, as Zach chuckled like it was an inside joke for only him to know as he started shaking his head. "You don't want to know," Zach said with another laugh, though that one sounded darker and his warning sounded way too serious for his smirking expression. Zach reached down off the left side of his seat and unzipped his backpack, pulled out a book quick, and then zipped the thick bag up just as quickly.
Tomoki and Muoko were standing next to each other around Tomoki's desk, but the two had just been listening for a few seconds and glanced at each other after Zach's warning. Each of the class reps pieced it together quickly, and they rushed around the far row to come up on Zach's left side. "Do we know the name?" Tomoki asked, his excitement almost masked by his anxiety over that question.
"No way!" Kotsumura realized as he looked to the representative couple and then back to his spiky-haired friend. "Wait- you used Jesus as an example a ton, right?! Is it Jesus? Is Jesus real?!"
"No- I mean," Zach cut himself off as Kotsumura asked different questions right there. "I don't know. But no, I didn't meet Jesus," he laughed again as Kotsumura had been completely serious with that question. Two thousand years plus would have been way too insane to believe… At the time I first- no, even now. That's impossible- shouldn't say impossible. I can think it though. "But really," Zach continued again. "You don't want to know."
"I really do," Muoko countered that and nodded when Zach looked her way.
He turned his head and glanced around him, noticing everyone in the classroom looking his way interestedly. Should I say anything? If Drac's alive then… well, it's not like saying anything would affect him.
"I'll give you a couple hints," Zach began.
"Oh just tell us," Reika snapped his way past Kotsumura who was between her and where Zach was sitting.
"I'll play the game," Kotsumura countered, glancing back to Reika and giving her a grin that surprised the girl behind him a bit. "If he's giving hints, then it must be someone he thinks we can guess right?"
"Hmm," Reika stood up and stepped towards Kotsumura's desk, leaning over it to the boy's right and then nodding at Zach with a grin of her own. "Alright then, who is this guy?"
"The thing is," Zach started differently this time. "The stories about him, are pretty messed up. They're skewed though, or so he tells me, because of how people of the past viewed people with abilities like him. Yet there was another reason he was considered the way he was."
Across Class 1, all the students were watching Zach with wide eyes and keeping their mouths tightly shut as he told a story about their own world this time that sounded as crazy as his usual stories about Terra. Dendo got out of his seat and maneuvered around to be able to see Zach's face as he talked, while Inasa just leaned over his own seat back behind Zach and stared to his classmate with an insanely interested smile over his face. This is real, right? Inasa's smile grew wider as he saw Zach grin too before continuing to them.
"I know that stories get altered after several generations pass because I have him as a reference. Although he tells me, that his father did have a similar power to his own, he also told me that when his dad died he told him how his was much, much stronger. And that his father's father did not have any power at all. Yet maybe, it just skipped a couple generations, I don't know," Zach hesitated for a moment while he thought back on this conversation that had unnerved him so much during a private sparring session he had had with Drac once. His pause and the look on his face that appeared there unnerved every one of his classmates as they could see this story even had Zach feeling like it was crazy to imagine.
"The stories of him were blown out of proportion," Zach continued. "Because of his famous ancestor, and the atrocities that his ancestor committed. His great, great, great to some power grandfather was a terrifying man who was brutal to his enemies. So when someone in that region where there were already stories about that man, appeared with crazy and scary powers, of course the two became mixed. Maybe it was coincidence that it just happened to be an actual relative of his, or maybe his ancestor really did have insane powers to allow him to kill as many hundreds, and thousands, as he was rumored to have impaled…"
A couple of people in the room found themselves frozen where they stood or sat as they heard that. Did he just say… "Impaled?" Muoko Kimi gulped as Zach made eye contact with her.
"You can't be serious," Kameko whispered, confusing Imino and Elinari at his sides who did not understand that reaction from their classmate with sweat covering his face.
"His accent when we met made the name he gave me to call him by so much worse. Somehow, the movies got his accent right, though I guess they do know where in the world he was from…"
Movies? Reika thought, then she glanced to her right and noticed a few of her classmates staring towards Zach with completely shaken expressions.
"They got a lot about him right, actually. It's how I know the stories we think are just fairy tale, do have a lot of truth in them. There were things they had wrong though. He doesn't suck blood, and he was fine in the daylight," Zach's voice got lower while some of his classmates stopped believing him and leaned back, while others just dropped their jaws and stared at him with bulging eyes of disbelief. "You want to know his name?" Zach asked with a look right back at Kotsumura and into his nervous eyes. "This man with powers who was born before the first revelation of Quirks. Do you want to know the name I called him by?"
Kotsumura gulped. His Adam's apple bounced up and down, then he grinned a nervous grin and nodded his head.
"He went by, Drac-"
The door to Class 1 opened up, and Zach sat up in his seat and looked towards the door as Hazano sensei walked in. The homeroom teacher stared at all his students in semi-annoyance but mostly just confusion at how stunned they all looked. Most thought Zach had just been cut off, but Zach was planning on slowing down so that he would be ready to finish like that right when Hazano came in. Pretend like I'm cut off, when really we did just call him "Drac." I'm serious. His name was actually Dracard. His father's name was Dracula, Zach thought with a glance over towards Himazuri who was gawking at him in shock that he was seemingly not lying about this. Zach imagined in his head the memory of meeting the man, and after a few seconds Himazuri got out of his head in a panic and started panting in reality while the others were all rushing to their seats at the annoyed clearing of Hachiman's throat.
Zach sweatdropped as Himazuri never made it to the part of that memory he was trying to show her. She got freaked out by Arachna. Should have just skimmed forward, but it's hard not to think of her in that memory. She was amazing in every way, died fighting those Somalian pirates and again in Wampajawa. But damn, was she the scariest in the army. Didn't have to threaten most people when she was with me. God, why is it we're all so afraid of spiders?! Even Zach thinking back on the way Arachna looked still gave him shivers, though he smiled nostalgically at the sight of her in his mind. His smile dropped down though as he saw a couple of bodies, both belonging to her despite being in different places. I'm just glad they woke me up after that fight in Somalia before my time limit would have run out. Me and Darling were fucked after that- Zach's teeth ground at the way he worded that in his own head, reminding him too much of what had happened to Darling that day.
Hazano started class and informed his students of what their practical training would be for the morning, and what time they were going to come back in here to try and get two presentations done that afternoon. First period started, but it did not last long. The peace of the morning was shattered in a single instant as a siren filled the classroom out of nowhere minutes into class. Half the students jumped up as the alert went off, a blaring first buzzer noise of ERRR followed by three loud DOO DOO DOO's then a pause of two seconds while everyone started spinning to the source of the noise that returned for another four long low beeping noises.
Kotsumura had tensed up, but he looked to his left in confusion and eased a bit as Zach was moving differently than the others who had jumped up. Zach reached down to his backpack and unzipped it all the way, yanking out his laptop and pulling a camouflaged black sat phone off the side of the thick computer that he slammed onto his desk as it made two more DOO DOO noises.
What kind of alarm is that? "Sazaki!" Hazano yelled at his student who just interrupted the class.
"Zach, what are you-"
No one else knew the signal because it was a code that Zach had created himself. The top of Zach's laptop glowed red on a clear circular piece that made Zach pop open the laptop at the same time as he pressed a button on the side of the sat phone he just put on his desk next to it. "Lifebringer, come in." A deep, modulated voice came out of the radio in English sounding like a person was talking to him.
Immediately the entire classroom felt a change in the air. The atmosphere just got much darker, and a few of the students who were not so quick to understand realized what their classmates all thought as they glared towards Zach. The excited, fun mood from before class had vanished completely. Hazano marched down the line between desks and demanded to know in a low voice, "Who is that, Sazaki?"
"Zach! What's going on?!"
"What are you doing-"
"What's wrong?" Zach asked the radio while his computer started up on its own next to it.
"Picked up a bogey launched over central Asia. Moving east over a thousand miles per hour."
"You have visual?" Zach asked, ignoring everyone around him as he did.
"Getting a sat lock on it now," the voice replied, and Zach turned to the screen of his laptop that finally turned on and showed his desktop.
After his desktop appeared, three different windows popped open showing coordinates and a satellite image. The image zoomed, and a white box moved around on it and locked on to something shooting through the atmosphere. Hazano stopped demanding things of his student and just walked past his desk now to look at the computer screen himself, and he froze up as the image zoomed again and showed what was flying across the sky. "Is that-" Hazano began.
"Is this a live feed?!" Dendo yelled down at Zach as he had ran up on Zach's left side.
"It's a BART Missile, can't tell its payload from the size though. Could be anything."
"Do you have its projected target location?" Zach questioned, and he listened to Rebel typing quickly on the other end of the radio. I'm so fucked- Don't think about that now. This is…
Zach looked at the other window that appeared on his screen to the side of the live view of the missile traveling farther across China so it was almost at the coast. It was about to reach the East China Sea heading northeast, and the new window that appeared showed a trajectory location appearing over Japan's mainland. The new white box that appeared from the satellite imaging zoomed in on a part of Honshu that made everyone behind the screen stare with wider eyes. Then they watched as that white box zoomed in and then got smaller on top of a single city. And then that white box zoomed in on Yutapu to an even more precise location on top of a building that the satellite could see in high definition.
"Oh fuck," Dendo muttered in disbelief as he took a step back.
His teacher did not care about the curse word his student just said. "Is that our school?!" Roger yelled out as he was farther back but could partially see the building from back where he was standing on his chair.
"Take the laptop."
"Inasa!" Zach yelled behind him while he was jumping out of his seat. He grabbed the radio and laptop in his right arm, reached to the window with his left, while turning his head back and looking at his classmate whose eyes shot open huge as Zach yelled, "With me!"
"W-Wait," Hazano began.
"No time," Zach countered without looking back at his teacher. Out from his left arm extended a thick black sleeve that covered his hand and stretched to the windows before creating a much bigger hand. That huge hand pulled the window open in an instant while Zach had been looking back towards Inasa, and Zach rushed at the window and yelled out, "There may be countermeasures against me. I need your help!" Zach dove out the window and massive black wings ripped out his back and flapped below him to send him soaring into the sky.
"Sorry sensei," Inasa said to his homeroom teacher, while throwing open the window closest to his own desk.
Hazano did not say anything against Inasa though, instead just pushing Zach's desk out of the way and stepping closer to the windows himself. That missile's heading straight for us. Who was that Sazaki was talking to though? How did they have satellite images at the ready- He's Death. He's Death and there's a bomb heading for this city meant to kill him.
"Holy shit," Trabo fell back onto his seat while staring at the windows in shock. "If they fail at stopping that thing… That guy said, they don't know how big the blast is going to be, right? So, like, is there even any point in running?"
"Kameko," Dendo started after a few seconds. He looked towards his classmate who stared back at him in anxious confusion, and Dendo continued, "Take ten others and go warn everyone of what might be coming. Tell them to get ready to use their Quirks to protect from a blast, and wherever you are when the blast comes just get as many people inside your Tortoise Fortress as possible. Everyone with long range attacks on me," Dendo called out to the rest of the classroom which included his teacher who stared at the boy in growing amazement as Dendo was suddenly taking charge despite him being the teacher here. Dendo yelled out while moving towards the door himself, "We'll go up on the roof and if the missile comes into the city, we'll try to blow it up in the air. It'll still cause massive damage, but we can minimize casualties."
"Don't you think Zach and Inasa can do this-" Kotsumura started.
"It's not about what I'm hoping for," Dendo snapped as he sped up for the door. "It's about being prepared for anything. Muoko, get Class 2 to help!" He called out before reaching the door, then he rushed out and made as fast as he could for the roof access.
"You got it!" Muoko replied just as loudly and started running herself.
"You heard him!" Tomoki yelled out. The vice-rep spun around and yelled out at everyone, "Get moving! This is an emergency!"
"I'll inform the rest of the staff," Hazano told his students who were acting as heroes already to the point he did not feel the need to supervise them. "Stay safe," he added, then he rushed for the door himself. Sazaki. You've put this whole school- this whole city in danger. You're a menace. A danger to us all! So please… save us.
"What are we going to do?!" Inasa yelled over the wind, wishing he had his costume to help him fly and speak right now. He was a master of Quirk control though, and he was keeping up with Zach as they flew across the sky together. "Drop it into the sea?!"
"And make a tidal wave?" Zach yelled right back.
"We could stop that too-"
"It would still cause irreparable damage if it went off in the ocean!" Zach yelled again to cut him off. "And it wouldn't just be a tsunami in Japan we'd have to worry about! The waves would carry in all directions. Kill thousands if not millions in coastal damage!"
"You think it's a nuke?!"
"I'm preparing as if it is!" Zach shouted.
"Virus is in the laptop," Rebel told his former leader, keeping his tone intense and monotonous as there was someone with Zach right now who might be able to hear him. Anyone who could hear that would have thought the voice was just talking about any regular computer virus though, while Zach understood exactly what Rebel meant by it. "Just attach this laptop to the control panel and we'll get in. Whether to deactivate or mess with the navigation system inside."
"How long will that take?"
"Can't know for sure until we're in, so get to it fast," Rebel snapped. "It's already crossed the northern East China Sea and most of Korea. It'll be over the Sea of Japan in twenty seconds."
"Are we getting close?!" Inasa yelled over at Zach who had the radio lifted up near his ear to be able to hear it over the wind. Zach's body was not covered in Death, with all of his Death only focused on his huge wings that were not wisping any or losing power as they looked solid and like they were covered in feathers. Inasa just carried himself inside a funnel of wind, though there were also four tornado-like gusts sticking out from a single point in his back and swirling around behind him in the main wind stream that changed his direction and speed in the air.
"Yes," Zach called back towards his classmate. "It'll be in sight in seconds. Slow down, we're going to have to change directions."
"We can't let it get any closer to Japan!"
"If we slow it down immediately, we may trigger a backup system to set it off at that moment," Zach countered. Inasa stared at him with wider eyes, and Zach continued loudly, "If it's meant to kill me then they likely projected I would come for it. Any attempt to change its course or slow it down could set it off prematurely and kill us both!"
I can't control the wind from too far a distance. If I do send it straight up in the middle of the Sea of Japan, I could get it out of danger of hurting anyone else-
"Don't think about it!" Zach yelled at Inasa who he saw getting much too serious as Inasa never usually did. "We aren't dying up here! That'd be stupid," Zach snapped it at his classmate seeming too willing to sacrifice based off that last expression alone. Part of the reason I brought you is so I don't consider it myself. So that I'm more careful. You're my contingency plan to stop this thing, but you're also here to prevent me from letting this bomb go off at all! "I need your help Inasa. I don't need you to die," Zach said, shaking his head at his classmate who stared back at him with wide eyes, then started nodding only to turn with his eyes growing wider and making Zach spin back around himself.
"I see it," Zach said while moving his radio in front of his mouth for a second.
"I've scanned the missile during its flight, and I don't think there's a camera on it. That could be as much to make you drop your guard though."
"Could the weight of the laptop set it off as I connect it?" Zach wondered quickly, as he was changing his flight pattern and starting to fly back to the east himself. He started slow and then sped up slowly, but quicker and quicker as the missile approached so that as it got to him they were moving the same speed with Zach turning his body and flying over the rocket. Inasa turned himself around too and controlled even the wind in front of him to prevent it from hitting his face and front as he shot himself as fast as he had ever moved before into the east.
This is insane! Inasa thought as he and Zach flew with a missile heading in the direction of their school. Everything is on the line! The student never felt more like a hero, as he had never felt more pressure on him. It was suddenly thrust on him too, as he was sitting in class expecting another calm day like any other until minutes ago. Everyone he knew was relying on him though. Everyone, we won't let this happen! Inasa smiled wide despite the pressure and intensity of the situation. He looked to Zach who was leaning down over a lower part of the missile but just ahead of the jets that were heating up his legs and burning the pant legs of his school uniform because of how close he was to them.
"…They wouldn't want it setting off prematurely, and the laptop does not weigh more than what I think their margin of error would be." It was not much of an assurance, but Zach agreed that if the missile had bumped into anything in the air it could have blown up without ever reaching its target.
He set down the laptop that magnetized to the missile and locked in before Zach opened it back up. Despite all the wind slamming into it, the top of the laptop remained open after Zach popped it up. A blue light covered half of the screen, and Zach asked, "Can you get in?"
"The steel's too thick," Cody replied out of the laptop, a mouth moving in the blue that Inasa could not see from Zach's right side following alongside the missile and staring more towards the coast of Japan in the distance.
"Running out of time," Inasa warned at the top of his lungs.
"You'll have to pop the panel and connect him inside," Rebel said.
"Quickly," Cody added, making another window pop up with a timer on it showing they had under a minute until they would be over the Japanese coast. "And where are we sending this thing-"
"Plotting a course now into space," Rebel announced.
I trust you, Zach thought, deciding not to question it and hoping Rebel would somehow manage to get this thing out somewhere it would not just explode in the upper atmosphere. Zach reached down to the edge of the steel panel while pushing out even more Death down below the soles of his feet and keeping careful not to let any Death touch the missile he felt would be able to sense it. His left hand gripped the panel, and without using any Death, he peeled it up bending the metal off of the missile and exposing the navigation system inside.
He grabbed the laptop and pressed a button on the left side of it that unlocked it from the steel panel before putting it down into the system and connecting it to a piece inside it. "Go go go," Zach muttered, watching as a dozen different screens popped up on the laptop screen that he had to watch carefully.
"There are hundreds of different systems in here," Cody said in shock. "Important! If this thing slows down at all from its current velocity we're going to have major problems. Like, timer drops to two seconds left problems."
"Timer?" Zach asked.
Rebel's station in America had all the same windows Cody just made pop up on Zach's screen on them, along with a hundred others as he looked at everything Cody could see and not just a few important things Cody thought Zach could be able to follow along with. He spoke into the microphone in front of his mouth, "The same amount of time the missile would take to reach Shiketsu High School. If the navigation system is messed with in any way, the timer will drop. If the course changes in any way even with the missile still trying to send itself to your school, it's going to drop. Even if it stays the same speed…"
"Yet if I change the time dilation, and slow the amount the system registers as one second… Alright, the timer now drops a second every thirty minutes. There are immediate triggers as well not connected to the timer, but those are not automatic. Someone controls them and is probably watching the missile's path right now. Hold on… and we've got those triggers jammed. Signals will not reach any of them." He worded it as 'we' in the final part, as he noticed several of those manual triggers getting disconnected before he was able to do a thing. Nice work, brat, Mica thought, right before Cody yelled out of the laptop that Zach was in the clear.
"Alright! Inasa!" Zach yelled out. "Push up underneath the front of the missile! Get it aimed up!"
"Altering the navigation and setting a point in space. Keep the laptop connected and open over the panel so I can see out the webcam on its way out the atmosphere. I'm going to try and get it out there without blowing until it's- Alright. I've got one hour until it blows. Or two seconds. However you want to count," Rebel smirked while taking control of the missile that was changing direction and now had two seconds on its timer as it would for the next half hour.
"Let's move!" Zach called out to Inasa after dragging up on the front of the missile for a few seconds there, bringing it higher up as they reached the coast to make it point straight up and get out of blast range of the people on shore. Manual triggers may be deactivated, but if he has any agents flying around here or watching from its path, they could set it off themselves. We have to move it out of the way as fast as we can! Zach let go of the missile and he flew off from it fast once it was headed straight up into the sky.
Inasa spun away from the missile as well and did a dozen flips through the air as he sent one last massive wind to help it along and lost some of the focus on controlling himself for a few seconds. The two boys pulled back and stared up into the sky above them, at a long ballistic missile with an unknown blast radius that was now soaring up towards space. They were panting, and neither of them felt relieved yet as they glanced in every direction on the lookout for planes or other aircraft. They continued to stare up at a trail left behind from the missile as it soared ever higher, even as another figure came flying through the sky like a missile himself towards them.
Inasa turned in surprise then looked right back up, though he glanced down again when the number 2 hero got closer. "Hawks, it's alright," Inasa started. Hawks looked worried himself, but he was staring straight up instead of at the two teenagers flying near him. He gulped as he stared up at the size of the missile he had been called on by the government to stop in this emergency scenario. He was not expecting in the least, to find a couple of teens from Shiketsu High already in the path of the missile, with the missile heading straight up into space now for some reason.
"How…" Hawks started, lowering his gaze from up at the missile to the boys in front of him. Inasa lowered his smile down a little too at that question, and he turned himself towards Zach who Hawks was already more focused on. "Did you do that?" Hawks finished to the eighteen year old with spiky black hair wind-blown back during his flight so it was wavier now. Zach kept staring up towards the missile though, just watching as it neared the upper atmosphere towards some location unbeknownst to him.
Dragging everyone into it now? Not just me. Any collateral damage is fine? Killing all those people is fine, if you can kill me too?! Zach's eyes darkened more as they narrowed up on the missile that had yet to explode as he was waiting for it to while full of dread at the idea. It'll be a horrible EMP even if it blows up that high. Get it out of here, Rebel. Please. If it blows… If it blows right now, Zach ground his teeth and stared up with them grinding back and forth. That would be a bad thing. It would. I'd… I'd have to leave.
Minutes passed, and the three flying heroes stayed staring up in the sky together until even the trail left by the missile started thinning out and get blown away by the wind. They had lost sight of it up above, and the blast they were waiting to see never came. Zach continued to stare into the sky after when he thought there would still be problems. He looked up as if waiting for a blast, while really just avoiding Hawks' darting gazes. His eyes were red, and his thoughts moved rapidly through his mind, Norasaki's going to ask me again. I can't- I have to. If I don't, I'll be forced to leave. Re-shatter it. Terra was real. That voice was from an old vigilante friend whose location is unknown to me. His name is unknown to me. I don't know how he did what he did. I wasn't here. Terra. Eziano. Not my fault. I'm not Death. Quicker. Running out of time. How do I explain… I don't. I just say, that I don't know. They contacted me knowing I'd have a plan to stop it. That's the only reason. That's what my answer has to be!
"…I received word from the Minister of Defense that the missile you sent out into space narrowly missed an occupied Chinese space station in orbit. Luckily it flew past without incident, though it was tracked from the Xili Space Station until it exploded on an asteroid…"
Whoever those people were who got the missile out there did a good job, Zach thought with a stoic nod at his principal in front of him. Straight on to an asteroid without prematurely exploding. They did a great job somehow dodging space debris and satellites to get it a safe distance. "The firing mechanisms were deactivated," Zach countered the woman who just continued loudly about how if the missile had been detonated remotely when it passed close to the space station it could have killed the astronauts inside. "Prior to when they redirected the-"
Memuria slammed her hands down onto her desk, "No! This is not the time where you talk. Listen," she said it and glared at her student who closed his mouth and stared back at her with his hands together behind his back and his expression serious but unapologetic. "Listen to me," Memuria continued, curling her fingers on top of her desk and staying leaned forward while she glared at the student not responding to her expressions at all. In her peripheral vision on her left were two bald men, both Sazaki's homeroom teacher and her own assistant Norasaki. On the other side was a professional looking young woman in a suit with dark hair tied in a short ponytail who had her sunglasses on inside, and Hawks who was told to accompany Sazaki back to school after the incident.
"Who redirected it?" Memuria composed herself and questioned, though still leaning forward over her desk and glaring at Sazaki. "Who called you?"
Zach shook his head once. "I don't know." His response made Norasaki clench his teeth to the boy's side, as nothing signaled to him that Lifebringer was lying. "The laptop and attached satellite phone came in the package that was sent to me upon my release from Tartaros." Zach explained this calmly and did not look guilty at all as he stood there recounting it. "Inside the box was also my hero costume, a replacement arm as I brought a non-weaponized one with me when I turned myself in-"
"And you're saying you don't know where this box came from?"
"No," Zach replied to the number 2 hero who asked him that. "I do not know the names of most people I worked with after leaving Japan." Others in the room stared at him with wider eyes including the defense ministry official staring at him from behind her sunglasses. "The message I received with the package was labeled only with '-L' and I did not question its contents as it was sent as a gift from someone who had helped me with similar gifts before."
"So you don't even know where your gear came from?" Hazano asked skeptically, but Memuria darted him a dark look that had her teacher leaning back and quieting down.
"I had it registered immediately after receiving it," Zach explained slowly. "The costume was seen fit to be used in Japan, and as I had no other belongings after being released from prison I was grateful for the gifts. The laptop was one of the only things to survive my apartment's explosion. Today, by attaching it to the missile in mid-flight I was able to give someone else who was modulating their voice to mask it control over the missile. Yes, this was a dangerous and risky move on my part. And yes, there was no other way. Someone else already had control of the missile, and by giving control to the ones who warned us about it in the first place I was making a gamble that paid off. You say the missile exploded on an asteroid. How large was the blast? Can we tell or not, since it was out in space and the explosion would be different-"
"Do not…" Memuria gripped her desk harder and she glared down her student before taking in a sharp breath and standing up straight behind it. Her hands loosened on the desk and regret flashed through her eyes, her teeth gritting again though she had to maintain eye contact with the boy and would not look away from him like this hurt her to do. "Frequent disobedience to ignore our rules and laws is one thing. One thing too many actually, but just one thing, that I am not willing to overlook. I have warned you over and over," Memuria stared down her student while Norasaki and Hazano each looked to the principal with their eyes widening.
"But putting the rest of my students in danger while on school premises," Memuria continued in a low voice while even Zach's eyes widened a bit now. Hers stayed cold and narrowed at the teenager in front of her. "Contacting foreign unknown sources to help you who you refuse to speak truthfully on the origin of. Who were they, Sazaki? How did they have a satellite tracking the missile?"
"I don't know," Zach replied. "Someone powerful must have wanted-"
"Enough," Memuria shook her head at the boy and closed her eyes to stop him from speaking. "Sazaki," she began, and her eyes opened and stared deeply into the boy's. "Have you lied to Norasaki since getting here?" Her question came out cold, harsh, and she watched every movement on the boy's face only to see him as calm as ever as he stood there motionless in response.
"I haven't," Zach replied. Which means every time I've spoken in front of him so far, I've believed every word I said. I was telling the truth then. And I'm telling it now. I have no idea how they knew that missile was launched. It was lucky the missile was headed directly for me, as I was able to stop it with their help. I'm glad they still want to help me, the Army of Death. I'm sure that's who helped. They, they- even though I went to Terra, I would have joined them. Become a part of them. Other vigilantes did… Didn't they? People I knew before going to Terra. They did. But when I returned I saw the things the Army of Death had done and knew I couldn't join them. I knew I had to repent for my crimes and come back here, face the music.
"I don't believe you," Memuria said in a soft voice. Zach stared at her in surprise, then looked to Norasaki as if wondering if that was not the man's Quirk. That look though just appeared so fake that it threw Norasaki off that the teen would look at him like that. Zach slowly turned back to the principal who glared at him harsher as he turned to see if Norasaki thought he was lying. "You brought danger to this school, Sazaki. No matter how strong you are, or how intelligent you may be," she added while thinking back on the day before and things she had been thinking about nonstop since until this incident occurred. Memuria let out a short sigh and then rose her head with an intense and dreading look on it as she stared into her student's eyes. "Your loose cannon behavior is responsible for this incident."
"It is my opinion as it is your own, that this missile was sent by Eziano Mozcaccio. Signs of the launch site have been located, but heroes who found it have not located any clues to who the villains that fired it are or where they went." Memuria paused and glared at the boy who started to get a darker look himself as if thinking on Eziano too. She shook her head and said in a lower voice, "A man you antagonized despite not having a pro license. A man who you intentionally angered by what you told him on national television, which you already claimed that night you thought would make him angry. This is retaliation. You and him, fighting one another, has now put the children I am tasked with protecting in danger. You even brought out one of your classmates to help you, despite knowing that the missile was meant for you and could have been exploded prematurely when you approached it."
"The voice said they scanned for cameras and-"
"I don't care what that voice said," Memuria interrupted without changing her expression. There was not enough anger in her face that it had Zach feeling the pit in his chest grow even more. The old woman with grayish purple hair kept her mouth shut for a few seconds, then she opened it and said to the boy before her, "You have broken our student conduct policy several times. You have blatantly ignored the strict rules set before you in this learning institution. I see now that I have been giving you special privilege because of who you are, and what you have been through. However I can see now, that I was mistaken to allow you to remain here as long as I have. This school is not safe with you here."
"Zach Sazaki…"
"You are hereby expelled."
Zach leaned back on the gym locker next to his one that was still open as he could not decide what to do. I can't take my own costume with me? What kind of- it's not even a costume you made here. They say they'll send it to me after they do more checks, but I shouldn't have said anything about it. I could just take it. They're not my teachers anymore. She's not my principal. Hawks was there though. The Defense Ministry was involved. I don't need to worry about them figuring out how to make it. Like my arm. The steel is too strong, too rubbery while hard at the same time, yet hollow to be full of the wires and nerve endings and energy that my arm is full of. Recreating my costume is as impossible as figuring out how to build my arm without having every top-notch tech advancement from every corner of the world at your disposal.
Zach looked to his right at the open locker and the box inside with his costume in it. Everything else was already out on the bench in front of him, inside of his backpack. He looked from the box to his backpack, then back at the open locker, and he grit his teeth but he reached over and shut the locker on his costume. Then he stepped forward and looked down at the bag in front of him. He was already in his sweatshirt and jacket, and he had a pair of long pants on too, even though it was not that cold out today. It was just too hard to carry everything if he tried putting another piece of clothing into the heavy backpack.
His eyes clenched shut though after he glared at that bag for a few seconds. Why the fuck did I even do that? Zach wondered to himself. Terra's- it's not- Zach's teeth bared harder. It's not real! I KNOW THAT! Fuck, he shook his head around, shaking out memories of orcs and the Doorway girl and the evil space Empire that filled his mind. It didn't save me. I broke my mind for no fucking reason at all. Replaced all these goddamn memories again even though I couldn't even fully believe them- but they are the truth, a version of… Zach reached his right hand up and gripped the side of his head. "Nnnn," he groaned, his eyes squinting and glaring ahead of him in rage. "I hate this," he hissed. "I hate everything about this."
Zach reached down and grabbed his backpack, slinging it over one shoulder and then sliding the other arm through it as he headed for the door out of the locker room. Left back on the bench outside of his locker was his Shiketsu school uniform, damaged and burnt with several sewn-up holes in it. He walked out into the hallway in a blue jacket over his black pants, his hair still wind-blown and wavy instead of spiky due to his earlier flight. The hallways of the school were empty as he walked out, even though through the windows one could see it was clearly midday. School was out early due to the scare though. Not just Shiketsu High, but schools across Yutapu had been closed as well.
There were not many people left in the school building after Zach's meeting with Principal Memuria which already came after school had been cancelled. Zach moved down the hallways in no rush. He could already hear them outside of the school where they were gathered and waiting for him. Nice way to avoid calling a press conference, I guess. I'd have to if they didn't hound me immediately upon leaving. If I give them the answers I have. The answers they demand. They'll demand more afterwards. Say I need to explain myself even after I do, but I'll have given my explanation and in it re-cement how when my location is known beforehand it's a dangerous thing. Explain why I won't hold another before they even start calling me out for it. Preempt everything they can do. Zach's eyes were half-closed and he let out a heavy breath as he walked slowly down the hallway. Easy. It's easy. I need to smile for them though. Talk about my new path. The, plans I have. Plans…
He rose up his right hand again and rubbed his forehead with it, looking down to the floor as he continued dragging his feet on the way to the school's front entrance. Probably an assassin in the crowd too. If he kills some people in an attempt on me, I'm going to have to die in a few minutes. I gotta stop that… Hopefully. Eziano has too much power. Fucking intercontinental ballistic missiles. We never saw anything like that, but he built one for me. I'm so fucking honored. Zach let out another heavy breath and his eyes closed slowly then opened back up halfway again. The nightcrawlers are each on their own monsters. Together in one force, they're the worst villain organization in the world. Under the strongest, most resourceful… And unlike Death, and his army, the nightcr- assassins never took as big a hit as I did. Their forces were whittled away at, but never devastated. Never a large a chunk of them at once.
And he's intent on killing me. Zach shifted his gaze towards the windows to his left where he just heard a loud shout of his hero name. No one can see me in here. Walls around the school should prevent that. Guess they're not just clustered at the front entrance though. Surrounding me. This is global news. If I had died in that explosion, protecting this city, I'd be a hero who sacrificed himself for millions. Instead, I'm the irresponsible hero who could have gotten everyone killed today. I knew that would be the outcome though. I knew it before I even left the classroom. I needed you to be there, to keep me from thinking too hard about that, Zach thought it while looking down the hall to where a classmate of his stood still inside the school building waiting for him.
Inasa Yoarashi looked towards Zach with his lips flat and his usually jolly expression nowhere to be seen. The bulky teen slightly taller than Zach watched as his classmate approached before stepping to the side and right into Zach's path. The school building seemed empty other than the two of them, and Zach stopped before the future hero and now the strongest recruit in Shiketsu once again. "Is it true?" Inasa wondered. "The rumors, what they're saying out there?"
"Yeah," Zach replied quietly with a short nod. He lifted a half smile using the right side of his mouth and gave Inasa a partly apologetic look. "Thanks, for today," Zach said.
The apology in Zach's voice was for this being the last time they would be able to see each other, in school at least. He was apologizing that he got himself expelled and could no longer stay with the rest of them, but Inasa frowned deeper than Zach had ever seen him frown before at the sound of the apology. So fake, Inasa's face scrunched up and Zach's expression started to shift at the angry look in Inasa's eyes for him pretending like that. "Why do you do this?" Inasa questioned under his breath.
Zach stared at the teen who was always smiling and laughing along whenever he told his stories about the alternate world. And as he looked at Inasa he could see that the question just asked was in reference to all of it. Every moment the two of them had shared since Zach came to Shiketsu High. "I… don't know what you mean," Zach said quietly, his eyes lowering from Inasa's that were harder to meet as he responded like that. I can't break it again. Not like this. Not, I just can't. I won't be convincing otherwise-
"I don't know you at all," Inasa said, his voice low and almost in a growl though it was more frustrated than angry here. "We just-" Inasa paused as he started that. The two of them had just saved the city together, and yet as he heard himself be praised on the breaking news he heard just how harshly Zach was being treated. He wanted to feel bad for Zach too. He wanted to defend his friend, and yet he did not know his "friend" at all to do that with any confidence. "All this time and you, you haven't once gotten real with me."
Zach lifted his head and saw Inasa's teeth grinding so hard. His heart clenched up at the sight of the usually happy teenager's pained expression to know so little about him, in this moment where Zach was about to leave and he would never be able to find out as he wanted to. If I just, had a little more time, Inasa's eyes shook and squinted a bit before snapping open again as he kept himself from glaring at Zach as this was his own fault. I didn't try enough! Kotsumura and Himazuri did and I, I wanted to too!
"Something real?" Zach whispered back at Inasa as he watched his former classmate's expression twisting like that. Zach's own face scrunched in anger that Inasa was asking for this, but Inasa nodded back angrily at him with his own teeth clenching harder too. "You, really want to-"
"Yes," Inasa hissed, barely seething it through his teeth as he looked at Zach from only a couple feet away.
Real? Zach thought. His heart pounded and his eyes closed as the word echoed in his mind. What is real? Something. Right now. What- The first thing that popped into Zach's mind made him wince, but he opened his eyes and looked at Inasa and into his eyes while thoughts of that underground rushed through his head. He breathed heavier while Inasa started to stare with less of a frustrated look and one slowly getting more focused and surprised as Zach looked at him like that. "There was," Zach started, but he stopped himself as he imagined a woman crucified to a wall next to him. He saw the blood smears on walls that started to rot and blacken, and numbers echoed in his mind, Fourteen. Twenty-three. Sixty-six. Hawkins' face flashed in Zach's mind. Disfigured. Enraged. Snarling at him and roaring as he split apart, glitching in and out of himself.
"What?" Inasa whispered, seeing Zach thinking about something real, and pressing him despite the pained expression of the scar-faced teen before him.
Zach heard in that whisper a sense of desperation that this was his last chance. It is. I'd never talk to him- Zach tried to distract himself with the present moment, but he gasped out as floor B15 flashed through his head. "I only saw it for a second," Zach whispered. Just on the fall down to B16 and while we flew up! How can I remember it, so vividly?! Fear flashed over Zach's face, then he slowly pushed it down while lifting his eyes and meeting Inasa's gaze that showed he still wanted to know no matter how Zach was reacting just starting to think of this.
"I was in, Scotland," Zach started softly to his classmate who nodded his head to show he was listening and to have Zach continue. What did he only see for a second? Inasa wondered, confused by what it was Zach was talking about here, but just content so far in the fact that it felt like it was real to him.
Zach paused for a moment, but seeing that look on Inasa's face, mixed with the thoughts rushing through his own head, he had to keep going. "I heard there might be a human experimentation lab in this area I searched. I, had hoped I was wrong, but I had to check it out anyway. And I…" Zach thought back, and it all started rushing at him at once. "I found this building. A two story building, white, normal, right in the middle of a field somewhere. It was weird," Zach continued and paused for a second as he thought back on finding this place. "That there would be such a building there. It was, so out of the way. But it was inconspicuous. Didn't turn heads unless someone were to question, why is there a building like that here?"
Inasa gulped as Zach stared him in the eyes while saying all this. "But when I got closer to the building to check it out, and I saw the blood splashing onto the windows…" Zach paused at Inasa's eyes going wide, but he only grit his teeth for a moment before continuing to him, "Inside, everyone was dead. This little monster had killed them all. Ripped them all apart," Inasa got a darker look on his face and started nodding, understanding why this was painful but also appreciating in that nod that Zach had gotten serious with him. Zach started shaking his head back though at the other teen who seemed to be misunderstanding something here. "That's not-" Zach started. He ground his teeth and continued in a hoarser whisper, "Everyone was dead, on those floors."
Zach got specific and then shook his head, his eyes clenching shut as he said, "But inside the elevator, below the buttons for the first and second floors, there was this panel I pulled off. And I… I knew if I went down there-" Zach hesitated and turned his head to look into Inasa's eyes, "Into any one of the sixteen basements below that building. Where the rest of the lab was. Where, the test subjects were running wild. I-" Zach gasped and his eyes watered and piled up on his bottom eyelids causing Inasa to stare at him in even more shock. "When I saw 'GOD' smeared on the window that had gotten covered in blood, I already knew that it was- it was going to be bad. And when that drugged-up person, experimented on and fucked with so badly that he had become a monster, praised his God in his final moments before the drugs made his eyes pop and killed him- I knew! I knew, that it was going to be, it was going to be bad."
"I knew it," Zach whispered to himself and closed his eyes tightly shut. "But I- even though I knew it was going to be bad. That whatever I saw down there would, change things. Change everything," he whispered. His head bowed a bit and a tear slid out of his right eye and down his face before he opened both eyes again. "When I tell you, you can't imagine it," Zach started, lifting his head a little and looking up into Inasa's stunned eyes. "I really mean that."
"I thought I was ready, enough, at least," Zach said softly. "But after a couple minutes down there, on this world," Zach emphasized with his teeth clenching together and his gaze glaring into Inasa's eyes. Zach's fists curled at his sides and he hissed, "I saw things that I needed to see. Things, that I chose to go down there and witness. I could have left. I could have run, far away. And maybe I should have. I had no business being there. It wasn't my job, to go down there and- and try to- I don't know. It didn't matter what my goal was. It didn't matter what I thought I could do. I was wrong," Zach finished and shook his head rapidly at Inasa, while a couple more tears fell out of his shaky eyes full of regret and despair.
"And I can hear the chants of 'Sacrifice!' 'Sacrifice!' 'Sacrifice!' Echoing in my mind, even now," Zach continued with his lips curling and pulling far apart at the corners. Inasa's eyes trembled at the sound of that, as he tried to imagine what it was Zach was describing with barely any details. Yet he did not want to ask for the details that had led to whatever it was Zach was describing. "As they ripped each other- skinned each- devoured… fucking monsters and demons!" Zach's voice cracked at the end, and he gasped out, "And God. God… That fucking bastard, haha, ha," Zach's laughter came out broken and nervous, and he rose his right hand back to the side of his head that he grabbed before taking in a deep breath.
His eyes cleared of some of the blurriness and he refocused on Inasa in front of him. He let out a heavy breath and rubbed his eyes quickly with his right sleeve. "Geez," Zach muttered, shaking his head and then lowering his arm and giving Inasa a serious but steadier look again. "You said something real, and I came at you with-"
"No, I believe you," Inasa said, cutting off Zach and shaking his head as Zach tried to go back on what just happened. "I do," Inasa repeated as Zach frowned that Inasa would say that. Inasa saw though, that Zach's retraction here was what sounded much more fake than what he just heard, even if that should have been unbelievable. "I don't get it," Inasa continued softly. "But," Inasa smiled brightly and surprised Zach who opened his eyes wider at the sight of that smile.
"I'm glad, you told me," Inasa said. As Zach finally confided something "real" with him, Inasa thought, Nothing he ever said about Terra ever sounded so real. I knew he was always sugarcoating everything, and I don't know if there were similar stories in Terra he left out or if that's really just the cover. But, "Thanks, Zach." Inasa bowed his upper body far down to his friend in front of him. "Thank you for saving the school today too. And for letting me help you!"
"You don't-" Zach began, but he stopped himself and just sighed after a moment as Inasa bowed farther so his head was almost touching the floor. "Yeah, thanks for helping me," Zach replied to him instead of telling Inasa he did not need to bow. "I've got to get out there now though," Zach added, focusing on what was next to move past this encounter he was getting too caught up on, as well as moving quickly away from the dark thoughts still threatening to take over all the space in his mind.
"Good luck out there!" Inasa yelled out while standing back straight up. He gave Zach a thumbs up that Zach laughed once at before raising his hand, giving a small wave as he walked by Inasa this time without his classmate from Class 1 stopping him. "You can do this," Inasa finished, turning and saying it to Zach's back as he continued away towards the building's entrance. Zach walked without dragging his feet like he had been when Inasa saw him approaching before, and the teenager who could control the wind smiled in a semi-accomplished way, only semi because half of his mind was too occupied with what Zach just told him for him to feel any kind of good way.
Zach made it to the lockers at the front of the school right inside the entrance. He planned on walking straight out confidently towards those reporters past the front gate, but there was an ambush in wait for him in the school's mud room. Zach was walking between two rows of lockers, when at the end of the rows two boys stepped out from either side and into his path. To his right stood the taller of the two with green hair, spiky bangs on the left side and a flip of his green hair on the right. He had a v-shaped scar on his right cheek and black eyes with dark green irises in the middles of them. On the other side of Dendo stood a shorter boy who had blond hair and was looking more upset than angry. Dendo doesn't really look angry though, Zach noticed after taking another step and looking past the initial appearance of the two who stayed to see him off. He's just bad at showing it.
"You, really got expelled?" Kotsumura wondered after he and Zach stared at each other for a couple seconds. That brief period was all it took to convey the reality across to his two classmates, and Zach just nodded at the blond who asked that feeling he knew the crappy truth already. "Damn, what's the principal even thinking-"
"This one's on me," Zach countered before Kotsumura could finish putting the blame on Memuria. "I knew after saving Sato that one more time and… and this," Zach finished, with a sad but also accepting shrug of his shoulders at the way things turned out.
"You going to be alright?" Dendo wondered, giving Zach a curious look at how calmly he was taking this.
Zach nodded back at the taller teen with green hair, and he flashed a smile at the two in front of him. "Yeah, I've got contingencies ready for a situation like this." Kotsumura's eyes widened to hear that, though a glance to his side showed Dendo just nodding like he suspected as much. Zach chuckled at Dendo's nod suggesting he thought it would be fine, and then he added to his friends, "Shouldn't be too tough for me out there. Just another month to go until graduation, but I talked to Memuria about it after she expelled me and she says she'll give me a partial transcript. Show whatever school I go to finish out the term that I've done the work and have the grades I need from one of the top two hero academies in the country."
He explained himself in a reassuring tone to Kotsumura whose upset look stayed sad but did get a little more at ease upon hearing that. "Anyway," Zach continued again after he finished, and he stepped forward down between the lockers towards the two. He already had all his things on him, and he just smiled at the guys he walked up in front of so they were close and could see the grateful smile and look that fully covered his face. "Thanks, you guys. Our time together was short, but you accepted me and made me feel like a part of the class these past couple of months." He grinned a little more while the two before him just got surprised looks over their faces, and Zach nodded intensely at the two while grinning in that way. "I'm looking forward to fighting together, side by side, as heroes."
Zach walked between the two and closer to the exit behind them that the boys spun around to when Zach walked past. As Zach was moving by though, he glanced to his left at the shorter boy who looked back and saw Zach's interested look. "How'd it go, by the way?" Zach wondered, stopping himself before leaving and raising his eyebrows at his classmate who did a quick glance in Dendo's direction before looking right back at Zach with a reminder to himself that it did not matter if Dendo heard this.
"Great," Kotsumura replied. He grinned more and in less of a sad way that things were over here, as it seemed like even though Zach was leaving things were not going to change too much between them. "I took Tiona out to go night skiing. We had dinner at the lodge too. It was fun," Keiji smirked and Zach could see from his look that Kotsumura actually thought the date went really well.
If he had that kind of confidence during it, I bet it did, Zach thought back at the blond, though his smile did lower a little bit as Kotsumura continued about how he was going to ask her out again next week. "Might not want to wait so long, if it really was fun…" Zach started, though he glanced the other way and noticed Dendo still staring in Kotsumura's direction in surprise at what he was hearing right now. Zach smiled again but looked back to Kotsumura and added seriously to his friend who looked interested in what Zach thought, "Term's almost over, like you said you know. I guess too much right away might seem clingy or, something. But I think… well, I don't know," Zach stopped himself as he saw Kotsumura was going to take whatever he said here and go with it by the look on his face.
Kotsumura got confused as Zach stopped himself there and started sounding unsure. Zach scratched the back of his head though and glanced away, If he thinks it's working out great, I don't have much to add. "It's not like I know any better. Never, been very good at holding a relationship myself," Zach trailed off and looked back through the glass of the doors in the direction of the main street past the school gates where the noise was getting even louder with demands to question him by every reporter in the world it sounded like.
"Well you gave me some great advice," Kotsumura countered Zach's attitude there, making his friend look back his way and regain that smile at Kotsumura's return of the grateful look Zach gave them before. "So thanks for that, man. I owe you." A whole lot.
I'm glad, Zach thought back while just giving Kotsumura a nod in response. In his head he saw the first day of school there at Shiketsu. Talking to Kotsumura and Reika on the way to the locker rooms before Ranking Day, watching the two of them fight after his initial fight with Dendo, and then he recalled the fight that happened after theirs. When Manzo challenged Dendo and the two were out there fighting, and Reika had come over between him and Kotsumura to stand next to the blond who just beat her, confusing and making him flustered by her strange attitude that he had thought would be angrier. Zach remembered the smirk he saw only on the half of her face closer to him during that next fight while Kotsumura fidgeted nervously about his victory, and despite being anxious about it he had still called her by Tiona that day after having the guts to challenge her and defeat her in combat. I think I figured it out, on that very first day.
"Keep it going then," Zach said, going back on before if Kotsumura was already heeding the advice and thought it was great. "You move too slow and things won't be serious enough by graduation that you stay together. If you want to go for it, then go for it now," Zach said as his final piece of advice he could give out. Zach also turned his head a bit more though there and added, "Same goes for you."
Dendo stared at Zach in surprise with his eyes opening wide in confusion as Zach just smiled and turned away. Zach walked out the exit and started down the path outside of the school for the gates where he would be swarmed be the hundreds already outside demanding to hear from him and his account of the events of the day. Dendo watched Zach's back for a few seconds still in confusion, but he turned to Kotsumura who was looking his way, and Dendo started to his classmate, "I'm not into Reika."
Kotsumura rolled his eyes. "Obviously," the boy said and then shook his head with a chuckle while turning away and looking after Zach himself again. Keiji got a serious look thinking on what Zach just told him again, and he turned back to look into the school behind him he only had just over a month left in. Zach's never been wrong once since I met him. Kotsumura headed back through the mud room as he had been waiting here without any of his things, and as he moved farther into the school confidently, he continued loudly to the confused teen behind him, "It's pretty obvious to the rest of us who you're into, even if you won't let yourself think about it."
Kotsumura grinned at the hint he gave with his emphasis, and he finished without looking back at his shocked classmate behind him, "It's probably why you're the only two who haven't figured it out." He laughed to himself but got louder after a second, thinking, Though it's going to be impossible for you to keep it off your mind now. That's gonna be pretty funny to see… Kotsumurar stopped moving and his smile dropped down as he stood still in the locker room.
Outside of the school, Manzo Elia turned her head from where she was leaning on a corner around the front of the main building. She leaned away from the wall and took a step off as she turned and stared towards the back of her classmate with such a heavy backpack on who walked tall without looking like he noticed the weight. He had a calm look on his face and even a smile as he headed towards the gate and the people shouting for him to answer for their fears. Her right hand lifted up, but it faltered and her opening hand curled back into a fist and dropped as she watched him go.
Manzo stared at the boy she wanted to run after, to say something to, but she held herself back. I don't know him. What he said yesterday, I know you're the most amazing person I've ever met but, I don't know you. What you said about killing your mom, about the tragedies of Shigaraki and Raijin, the history behind All For One and Quirks… All those amazing things you talked about will forever change the way we think about Quirks. At least, it will forever change my life. What you told me the first day you were here, and everything since, you've changed me. I don't know how to put that in words to you. Zach's head turned a small amount to the right, and Manzo met his gaze with her eyes widening for a split second before her surprise vanished as of course he knew she was watching. And when he looked her way and into her eyes, his head made the tiniest nodding motion with an understanding smile shifting slightly different from the one he was going to face everyone with.
And she knew he understood it. All the words she found impossible to put together in one coherent thanks, she saw she did not need to tell him that she understood what he had done for her. And Manzo did not feel surprised this time as he gave her that look. She just smiled back his way with her curly auburn hair falling behind her head, her smile bright, and her expression feminine and beautiful as she rose back up her right hand. Instead of extending it and calling out to him though, she just rose it at her side and opened it into a palm, giving him a wave goodbye before he turned back forward to continue to the gate with his expression back to what it just was. Goodbye, Zach.
Hazano Worrod stared down from the second floor of the school out the windows tinted on the outside so no one could just look in and see him. He could see outside of the gates though, and despite the walls being high enough that the sidewalk and road just on the other side were too hard for him to see at his height, the crowd was large enough that he could see it on opposite sidewalks and extending down other roads where the mobs of people around Yutapu had come to demand answers from the hero who had apparently saved them from a missile… that may have been sent their way solely because he was in their city.
The homeroom teacher of Class 3-1 saw Manzo near the corner of the building where she barely stepped out into his view. He watched the quiet farewell between the two, and his fists clenched down at his sides as he thought about the impact Sazaki had had on some of his students. All of them, Hazano corrected as he was listing them off individually in his head only to find that not one had remained the same from the start of the term. I saw them every day more than any of the other faculty. I saw the change happen gradually, so gradually that I missed it sometimes…
I know Memuria is right, but it's tough nonetheless, Hazano thought while watching the boy almost reaching the gate where a security guard gulped as he turned back to the boy he was about to let out into the madness beyond their school grounds. Hazano frowned deeper and his fists tightened even more as he watched the teenager's back, Despite what I thought on his first day, that boy I thought would never be a student of my class is now leaving and it feels like if any of the other Class 1 students were getting expelled right now. Hazano grit his teeth for moment but relaxed himself as a teacher and pro hero needing to be composed in a moment like this.
In the teacher's head though, he could see Sazaki fighting his other students on the first day. He saw the looks on his class's faces as Lifebringer taught them lessons without the kids even knowing he intended to do so. Subliminally making them better heroes. Training them. Making them elite fighters, a class that could challenge and defeat U.A.'s Class A with his help. A natural leader and fighter like I've never seen. But more than that, it's everything he does! The report yesterday. Stopping the missile today! Hazano's fists uncurled and he let out a sigh while wondering to himself, What will he do tomorrow?
I wish I could be there to see it…
Kotsumura had laughed at what he just told the oblivious Dendo behind him who was much too serious usually for anyone to tease him, even though Kotsumura knew a lot of the others over the past few years had seen what he and Zach were referring to. After he laughed though he found himself frozen in the locker room with his smile gone and his expression filling with sadness again. He was sad, even though Zach had just relieved him with his explanation of his plans for the future, and how he was looking forward to fighting together as heroes. Zach thanking them too, made him feel relief that he did not know where it came from, but he was glad that Zach felt they had helped him when he never thought he had.
As much as he wanted to just end this on a good note though, he stared back behind him past Dendo who was getting an annoyed look on his face but did not snap anything at his classmate when he saw that expression on Kotsumura's face. Keiji just stared outside towards where the shouting got much, much louder as Zach went out to face the masses turning against him more than ever. His depressed eyes shifted away from Dendo he was afraid would catch on to what he was thinking about, then Kotsumura lowered his gaze down to the floor and closed his eyes as he imagined what happened right after Zach flew out of the room.
Everyone had been so focused on Dendo and Hazano sensei's orders. They were rushing around to get to work protecting the school and preparing for the missile, but Kotsumura felt more confident than most that with Zach and Inasa out there they had no reason to be worried. He figured that was probably why he was the only one to notice. The only one to look down at Zach's bag that he had opened so quickly to pull out his laptop in that emergency, getting so solely focused on the incoming missile that he was not careful to zip up his bag right afterwards as Kotsumura had noticed him doing lately ever since his backpack started getting heavier and noticeably thicker on the regular.
Kotsumura thought of the shirt sleeve that had been partially hanging out of the bag while everyone rushed about around him. He had seen it and looked closer, to see the couple of water bottles below it and the secondary pair of shoes shoved to the side of a couple of Zach's books. I'd noticed his bag looked heavier the past couple weeks. Ever since, his apartment blew up, really… Kotsumura clenched his eyes shut then turned back the direction farther into the school again where he headed with his lips curled into a deep frown. He shook his head then opened his eyes, and he had to rub them once before steadying his look. There's nothing I can do for him now, he thought sadly.
Nothing, anyone can do to help him anymore.
A/N And just like that, school's out. Thanks for reading. Hope you enjoyed the chapter...