Howdy folks, how's it going?
Here it is, the promised update to this particular fruit of my possible, maybe even likely, madness. Just for the record, I am not liable to do this two updates a month thing again. I'm exhausted.
As always, big shout out to Chaos Productions for his assistance. Be sure to check out his stories and the TVtropes page for Strength of an Honest Soul when ya have the chance.
As always, I own neither BNHA nor Warhammer 40k
/
A week later found the no less exhausted number one hero at the threshold of a by now familiar apartment, in all his skeleton-thin, emaciated glory. He took a moment to adjust the collar of his currently incredibly baggy suit in an ultimately futile attempt to look more presentable and less haggard before he rang at the doorbell. A few moments later the door opened, and Toshinori was greeted by an equally familiar warm, motherly smile.
"Yagi-san, right on time." Inko greeted with that serene cheer of hers even as she opened the door wide to allow him entry. "Come in, come in, dinner is almost ready."
"Ah yes, thank you, Midoriya-san." The hero replied as he made his way in, having long since given up on trying to refuse the woman's invitations, and definitely not wanting to be faced with the oddly terrifying twist her smile took upon said refusals.
Months after, it still boggled Toshinori just how easily he had settled into the routine of at least biweekly dinners at the Midoriya household, how utterly refreshing it felt to be just like any other average Joe enjoying the companionship of friends. For despite all the shenanigans, that is indeed what the Midoriyas had become to him. Good friends, people who had welcomed him into their lives and he had genuinely come to care about, despite the obvious eccentricities…
The noise of something big tumbling and crashing down followed by what could only be described as a small explosion pierced through the man's musings.
"Zoggin' dammit!"
"… Young Izuku's tangled up in one of his little projects, I take it?" The number one hero ended up asking, for lack of anything better to say, despite knowing the answer full well. He was honestly not sure what to make of the fact that what he had just heard was such a common occurrence around the place he barely reacted with more than a mild flinch these days.
"I'm afraid so." The Midoriya matriarch replied, having the decency to look slightly embarrassed. "He found something in the thrash of Dagobah beach that left him quite hyper. He's been cooped up in his bedroom fiddling with it all afternoon."
Toshinori tried hard not to cringe, both because he knew that what the woman called a "bedroom" could more accurately be described as a war zone at this point and because of his own unwitting part on feeding the boy's… destructive creativity by supplying him with the raw materials he needed.
At least that beach had been cleaned out almost over night and become a lovely place for the general public to visit. Silver linings and all that, right…?
"I suppose it's time to get him out of there." Inko commented indulgently, before calling out a little bit louder. "Izuku, dinner's ready and Yagi-san's here!"
"Comin', Mah!"
As the number one hero took his seat at the table, the crash of a door being violently opened and the stomping of running feet echoed through the house until the boy in question stood at the dining room's entrance, soot smudges all over his face and a pair of goggles on his head. The moment his blood red eyes fell on the emaciated man, the boy grinned wide in a way Toshinori only knew was supposed to be friendly because he'd known him for months.
"Hi, Yagi! Been a while." Izuku greeted with all the energy of an excited puppy. "How'z ya doin'?"
"Hello, my boy. I've been doing well, thank you. Sorry, about my absence, work has been keeping me quite busy this last week." Toshinori replied with an apologetic smile, amused despite himself at the boy's cheer, before adding with a bit more… concern. "May I ask what has you so busy?"
In an instant, the boy's mood plummeted from excited cheer into childish sulking, smile dropping into an annoyed frown.
"Found me an ol'muscly car engine in all dah beach junk." The boy said, arms folded in grievance. "It'z perfect for sumthin' I'z workin' on, so I'z been tryin' tah rig it in. But dah zoggin' fing's bein' a dikk and not pluggin' propahly!"
"Hheerrm, I see…" The emaciated man replied lamely, half confused by the boy's words, half concerned about whatever this "sumthin" was. He knew better than to ask though, because he'd since come to learn Izuku was surprisingly secretive about his projects and because, honestly, he was not sure he wanted to know… "Well, my boy, maybe it's best if you take a little break, come back to the problem when you're fresh."
"Dat'z quiter's talk…" The green-haired boy retorted with a grumble.
"Now, Izuku, Yagi-san does make a good point." The boy's mother cut in, the mouth-watering aroma of her cooking spreading through the dining room as she brought in the dinner. "Besides, you know you shouldn't bring your work to the dining table. Go clean your face and wash your hands, sweetie, so we can eat."
"Yeah, yeah, Mah…" Izuku relented sulkily, briefly vanishing over the corner to do just that. Soon as he was done, the trio got to enjoy a peaceful meal, or as peaceful as it could get with the way the boy savagely attacked his plate. Table manners seemed to be one of the few areas where his mother had not had any form of success in, the number 1 hero had mused more than once.
"So, Young Izuku." Toshinori broke the companionable silence, trying to lead into the reason he had come here today. "I wasn't able to ask after the fact, but how'd the exam go?"
"T'waz awshum!" The boy replied excitedly with a full mouth. "Lotsha'botz and-"
"Izuku, chew." His mother kindly reminded, to which the boy complied.
"Roigt, sorry. T'waz awsome! Lotz'a robots errywhere, and t'waz an all-ya-can-krump-fest! I didn' leave one'a dah scrappy gits unwreked!" The boasting stopped as suddenly as it had started as Izuku's excitement made way to an annoyed glare. "I'just had a lil' setback at first, cuz ya'n All Moight, me dakka wuzn' killy enuff."
The emaciated man tried hard not to cringe at the accusation. Trying to dissuade the boy from using lethal ammunition in the exams had been a herculean effort in and of itself, marking the only time he'd seen Izuku being legitimately angry at him in his hero form. Which made the fact that it had proven to be a somewhat counterproductive measure all the more painfully ironic…
"But it wuz ok tho, I managed tah improvise." The boy continued, swiftly changing back into an excited mood. "I took one'a dem scrappies an' used it tah krump dah others. Most fun I evah had! And, and den dere wuz diz BIG scrappy git, ya? Well, I krumped'im dah bezt of all! Filled'im full of rokkits and made me dah biggest boom in dah city! Really, it made dah newz later when I got home!"
He took a moment to breathe in and out, all the boasting cheer bleeding into a calmer but still quite hyped state, made obvious by the megawatt grin that bloomed on his face.
"I even got to help some of the other gits while I was at it. In short, t'was the best time of my life."
At the boy's proclamation, his mother smiling that indulgent smile of hers while Toshinori blinked, briefly overwhelmed by his excited ranting.
"I see." The emaciated man said at length. "And you think you did well enough to be accepted in U.A.?"
"Zog k-"
"Izuku." Inko's smile took some edges of scolding. "Language."
"Sorry, Mah. As I wuz saying, who knows." The boy replied with a shrug, surprising the number 1 hero for the lack of boisterousness in his tone. "I think I did pretty well, so dem's good odds that I did. If I didn't, well, I dun need dem. I'z just gun go to othah skools till one accepts me. An' if none do, dem's all a bunch'o wimpy gits, and I'll be a hero anyway, cause I dun need no fancy schmancy skool tah tell me how ter save gits."
…
…
"That's my Izuku." His mother chuckled, beaming with pride.
Well, Toshinori considered with a bemused grin, it could do with a lot less blatant disregard for the law, but overall it was a fine answer indeed.
"Fair enough, my boy." The skeletal hero replied with a chuckle, before reaching for his pocket, pulling out an envelope. "That reminds me, All Might asked me to hand this over to you."
"Wot?" Izuku asked as he nabbed the letter being handed to him, the confusion in his expression being quickly replaced by giddiness as he realized what it was. "Oooooooh, dis be the U.A.'z lettah!"
"Indeed, it is. All Might insisted I hand deliver it to you personally." Toshinori, explained. It was no secret to the Midoriyas that his heroic self would be teaching at U.A. starting this semester, he had distractedly let that slip a couple of months back. "He also asked me to assure you that while he was observing the exam, he wasn't part of the judging board. Whatever that letter says, it's entirely on your performance, my boy."
"Well, then, no point in keeping up the suspense." Inko commented, looking at her son encouragingly. " Go head, Izuku, open it."
The green-haired boy needed no further prompting before all but shredding the envelope, which caused its contents, a small metallic piece, to drop and bounce towards the center of the table.
"…Wot?" Izuku grunted, blinking owlishly at the object, which activated the very next second, bright blue light shooting upwards to form a holographic screen.
With All Might on it.
"I AM HERE AS A PROJECTION!" The number 1 hero, in all his nice-suited, fully muscled glory, stood amidst a stage that wouldn't look too out of place in some tacky late afternoon contest show, grinning towards the camera.
"Ooooowwwaaaaahhh…" The red-eyed boy breathed out in wonder as he looked on.
"Izuku Midoriya! You have attended the entry exams for U.A. High School, my alma mater and soon to be workplace, and I am here to inform you about your results." The holo-recording continued unimpeded. "When it comes to the written portions, your performance was relatively decent. Your scores are firmly middle-of-the-pack, could be better, but certainly enough."
The boy could not contain an exasperated groan at that, and Toshinori couldn't help but give him a sympathetic look. Izuku was not dumb by any means, but the hero had long since found that it was extremely difficult for the boy's rather… hyperactive personality to make any sort of academic effort. He still tried, bless his simple, overwhelming desire to help others and his mother for having convinced him one thing would lead to the other, but being cooped up studying all but classified as torture in his mind.
"However, when we move on to the practical portion, that's where we find that you have truly excelled!" The record continued, screens popping up behind the hero to show several highlights of the boy's performance, or as it had perhaps been more accurately named by some of the teachers, rampage. "Throughout the exam, you amassed a score of 45 villain points from all the robots you destroyed. That was very well done, if I do say so myself. However, there was more to the exam than just defeating villains!"
The images then focused on the moment he had saved Pinky from being blindsided by one of the scrappies, and the moment when he had saved Roundy from being stomped by the big'un.
"Being a hero is about helping others, so what kind of hero school would we be if we did not reward such efforts? This exam had a secondary point system solely for such actions, rescue points. And by your bold deeds, you amassed 50 of them! So, with 45 villain points, and 50 rescue points, leaving your total score at 95 points, you are more than qualified for U.A.!"
The projected hero raised his hand then, as if encouraging his audience to take it, his grin suddenly a lot less bombastic, more genuine, proud.
"Congratulations, Young Midoriya, you passed. This'll be your Hero Academia-What's that?" The recorded All Might suddenly turned, slightly out of view, listening to something entirely off camera. "Oh, right. On the first school day, after classes, stop by the support course studios, Young Midoriya. Power Loader would like to have a word with you about one of the villain bots that's missing. All Might out!"
The hologram shut down, leaving behind silence as the two adults present turned to the newly accepted U.A. student. There were honestly a few ways Toshinori had been expecting things to go from here. Ear-shattering victorious yelling, celebrations with gunfire, heck, maybe even an explosion or two at the worst-case scenario. What he had not expected, however, was for the boy to just sit there, staring blankly at the projector as if still struggling to process what he had just heard.
Concern flashed through the man, who glanced at the boy's mother, looking for signs of anything wrong. The woman for her part, her eyes shining with unshed tears of pride, simply craned her head in her son's direction, as if encouraging him to take his doubts directly to the source.
"My boy…?" The emaciated hero eventually asked, when the silence begun to last a little too much for comfort. That drew the kid's attention, those blood-red eyes focusing on him. Then slowly, the boy's expression shifted.
If there was one word Toshinori would have chosen to describe what he was seeing in Izuku right now, that could only ever be "contentment".
"I did it." The boy said, calmly, softly, a simple smile on his face, so unlike the boisterous or downright bloodthirsty grins the hero had become accustomed to it was almost jarring.
"Eh, yes, my boy." Toshinori agreed, smiling back at his unlikely protégé. "Yes, you did."
/
A few days later marked the beginning of a new school year at U.A. academy. And bright and early in the morning, in the classroom of the newly formed Hero course class 1-A, only one student had already arrived. Sitting at her assigned desk at the back end of the room, Momo Yaoyoruzu eagerly waited for the beginning of the classes.
The tall, pony-tailed girl took a moment to check if all her school supplies were in order or whether she needed to quickly create anything, for the third time since she had arrived. While outwardly she gave off an air of calm and poise as she'd long since been taught a proper young lady should, inwardly the recommendation student couldn't help but feel giddy and nervous in equal measure, like any kid on their first day of school would.
On the one hand, she had made it into U.A., as one of the four recommendation students at that, which marked one of the best begginings possible for anyone trying to make a career in Heroics, and she was about to meet a group of classmates, people her own age, who shared in this goal of hers. On the other hand, well… she was going to meet people her own age, and if there had been one downside to her high-class upbringing, it was that her capacity for social interaction with people her own age in an ordinary setting was a bit more lacking than she liked to admit. In other words, she wanted to make friends, like any average girl, but was worried about unwittingly messing up and making things awkward, or worst-case scenario, ending up ostracized and alone the rest of the-
Bang!
Momo was quite literally rocked out of her worried musings, nearly jumping out of her seat, by someone roughly slamming the door open, and into the room came her first classmate. A boy, short, freckled, kind of plain looking, with a mess of spiky curls of a multitude of shades of green for hair, his student uniform haphazardly worn, with no tie to speak of, and a set of goggles with bright, lime green lenses resting on his forehead. The new arrival took a curious glance around the room, before his blood-red eyes fell on her.
The dark-haired girl could not help but blink in confusion as the boy looked her up and down. Now, Momo was well aware that she had a… rather well-developed figure for her age, and she was no stranger to being looked at by boys, annoying as it was. What confused her however, was how there was no lecherousness or interest of that sort in the guy's look. It honestly felt more like he was sizing her up. For what reason, she couldn't guess.
With a shrug, the boy broke off his staring and glanced around once again, before moving to sit a couple of desks in front of her, taking something out of his bag. Despite herself, she leaned a bit forward when she saw it was a small screwdriver and what appeared to be some sort of computer motherboard, which he began fiddling with, looking almost completely oblivious to the world around him.
…
"Hherm, excuse me?" Momo ventured, after a few moments of staring at him in confusion. At her call, the boy stopped, then slowly turned to look at her with a face of mild surprise, as if he honestly had not expected to be addressed.
"Yah?"
"Are you… perhaps from the support course? Because if so this is the wrong room." She inquired, her calm and detached demeanour bellying her anxiousness.
"Nah, I'z here for dah Hero course. Diz' dah right room, class 1-A, I triple checked." He grunted, surprising Momo with the odd, thick accent she couldn't quite pin down, as he seemingly lost interest and returned to whatever it was he was doing. "I'z only need tah head tah support aftah-huugh, classes. Sumthin' bout Powah Loadah callin'on me."
"I see…" The pony-tailed girl replied, not quite sure what to make of that, and feeling quite embarrassed at her first interaction with a classmate being her confusing him for a student of another course. Not exactly the best first impression.
A bit of an awkward silence fell, as the boy kept doing whatever it was he was doing and Momo wondered whether she should try to make proper introductions.
Just as she opened her mouth to speak however, the door opened again, this time to a familiar face. A boy with hair split straight down the middle in red and white, a sizeable patch of scarred skin on the left side of his face, turquoise and grey eyes coldly sweeping across the room. Shoto Todoroki, the other recommended student assigned to the class. She knew him only as a passing acquaintance from their entry exam, as well as his reputation as the son of Endeavor, the number two hero.
The new arrival's heterochromatic eyes briefly fell upon her, the boy giving her a small nod of acknowledgement which she returned, before they slid further down towards the other student in the room, who just kept fiddling away at the piece of hardware in his hands, only after a while seemingly realizing he was being observed. Blinking owlishly, big red eyes looked up into the other boy's own, starting a stare off that seemed oddly tense to Momo, one side oddly curious, the other cold and calculating, and neither willing to budge. Was this a boy thing of some sort?
The green-haired boy suddenly surprised her when he flashed a wide, disturbingly feral looking grin at Todoroki, looking for all the world like he was spoiling for a fight. This seemed to even confuse the other boy, if the raising of his eyebrow was anything to go by, before he shook his head and fully entered the room, taking the seat beside her, and the green-haired boy, looking mildly disappointed, simply returned to what he was doing.
After that, their other classmates began arriving, alone or in small groups, taking their seats or joining up to chat, the room retaining an air of relative quietness until…
"YOU!"
The outburst had come from the newest student to arrive, a tall boy in glasses, with neatly combed dark blue hair and eyes, who actually also looked kind of familiar to Momo, who was pointing rather dramatically towards the green-haired boy.
"Oh, it's you." He grumbled as he glanced up at the new intrusion. "Wotcha want?"
With a heavy frown on his face, the new arrival marched towards the focus of his attention, a tension around him that made the pony-tailed girl suddenly feel concerned…
"I am Tenya Iida, previously from Somei Academy!" He declared as he stood before the other guy… and proceeded to bow at a 45-degree angle, narrowly avoiding slamming his head on the desk, as he spoke more quietly through gritted teeth, as if he was swallowing his pride to do this. "And I owe you an apology. I misjudged you during the entrance exam. While I don't think I can condone your behaviour, you proved yourself the better hero that day, figuring out the true purpose of the test."
Momo's interest was piqued at that. The taller boy, Tenya, who she now recognized as the son of the renowned Iida family, was admitting the guy with the goggles did better than him in the exam? She wondered what their entrance exam entailed and what exactly happened between the two…
"Uuuuuhhh…" Goggles hesitated, staring at the bowing boy with confused surprise, like he wasn't really used to getting apologies and not sure how to proceed. "It's alright, I guess?"
"Oh hey, it's you!" Another voice cut in, as another newcomer, a horned girl with vivid pink skin and black sclerae, skipped over to the boy's seat with a big friendly grin.
"Oh, it's Pinky." The boy commented as he saw her approach.
"Yep, it's me!" The girl replied cheerily. "Name's Mina Ashido, and I never thanked you for saving my bacon back in the exam. I really owe you for that."
"Uh… You'ze welcome?" He replied uncertainly. Momo couldn't help but think he seemed to be as unused to gratitude as he was to apologies, the way he looked so out of his element.
"Dude, you were awsome out there! Hijacking one of the villain bots and wrecking the others with it was badass!" Mina gushed excitedly as she leaned forward, staring at the still confused-looking boy with big, expectant eyes. "What's your name, anyway?"
Despite herself, the pony-tailed girl couldn't help but pay close attention, also curious about that, while the boy just blinked owlishly.
"I'z-"
"DEKU?!"
All students present turned to the door, where a dirty blond, red-eyed boy was staring at Goggles with a slack face of shocked disbelief. The boy, Deku apparently, actually smiled as he seemingly recognized the newcomer.
"Oh, hey, Ol'Katsu." He said with a wide, excited grin. "Wuldja look at dat, classmates once agin. Wot'd be dem odds?"
As everyone present watched with growing confusion, Katsu's shock seemed to bleed away from his face, giving way to an honestly worrying glower at the green-haired boy.
"Deku," The boy ground out, sounding downright murderous. "What in the everliving fuck are you doing here?"
"Uh, waitin' fer class tah start?"
"…ARE YOU FUCKING KIDDING ME?!" Katsu bellowed in apoplectic rage, startling everyone as crackles of flame began popping from his palms. "How the fuck did you get in?! Were the judges blind, deaf and retarded!? You nearly blew up the entire fucking test area!"
"… Katsuki." Deku replied with a deadpan expression, letting all the anger radiating from the other boy wash over him without a care. "All ya litrally do is blow fings up. Judging eithah o'uz gettin' in or not on dat alone sounds stoopid. Pluz, I only blew up, liek, a fifth of dah place at bezt, or rathah, dah big scrappy did, I juzt blew him up."
Momo's eyes widened in surprise. On the day of the entry exam, the news had been all over how a massive explosion had been visible from within U.A.'s walls, but the school had been tight-lipped on what had happened. That had been his doing?
"That's the guy who destroyed a 0-pointer? Damn, that's manly." Someone muttered in the background, as everyone present seemed to reach that same conclusion.
"That's not the fucking point, you piece of shit!" The enraged blond spat, seemingly all the more incensed by the generally impressed whispering.
"Hey man, what's your problem?" Mina asked, staring disapprovingly at the guy.
"Indeed, your conduct is unbecoming of a U.A. student!" Tenya was quick to concur, waving his arms in rather bombastic if oddly robotic faction. "Harassing a fellow student on the first day is a deplora-"
"Shut up, you damn extras, this is none of your fucking business!" The boy, Katsuki, spat at them with surprising venom, shocking the duo into quietness, but before he could open his mouth for more profanity-
"Oh, it's you! The green-haired boy!"
… Just how many people recognized this guy?
The newest speaker had been the latest, and if Momo was counting right probably last, student to enter the classroom, a brown-haired girl with a soft round face. Upon realizing that her outburst had drawn the entire class' attention to her, her already rosy cheeks reddened even further in embarrassment, and when her head went back and forth between Deku and Katsuki, she flinched awkwardly for some reason.
"Am I… interrupting something again?" She ventured shyly.
"Nah, it'z fine, Roundy." The green-haired boy saw fit to break the silence, throwing a glance at the other boy, as if amused by a joke only the two of them were privy to. "Dun' mind Ol'Splody here. He needz tah blow off steam erry' now an' den lezt he blows up. T'zall in good fun."
Momo almost did a double take at that, flabbergasted by the boy's words. Surely, he couldn't possibly be misinterpreting the blond boy's caustic aggressiveness for friendliness, could he?
"THE FUCK DID YOU JUST SAY, YOU BASTARD?! I'LL FUCKING MURDER-" Katsuki proceeded to let loose a stream of profanities, many of which Momo had never even heard of, leaving the pony-tailed girl, alongside a decent junk of the students who were now slowly inching away from the ranting teen, mortified. The target of his anger however, just looked on with a smirk that seemed somewhere between feral and fond. Then however, his expression suddenly shifted to confusion as his eyes fell on something behind the raving blond and the awkward brunette, something outside her field of vision.
"Oi," He voiced said confusion. "Wot'z dat big bug doing dere?"
Momo blinked in confusion at the apparent non sequitur, which only increased as Katsuki looked behind him, his expression shifting from murderous to uncomprehending, and the brunette Eeep'ed in fright and staggered back upon doing the same.
"If you're here for friendly conversation or empty boasts, the door is right behind me. Get to your seats."
The pony tailed girl, and most others too far back from the entrance, nearly did the opposite and jumped out of their seats at the blunt, bored-sounding voice, even more so when a large, yellow, caterpillar-like thing rose from the ground at the room's entrance, shedding what turned out to be a yellow sleeping bag and revealing itself as a scruffy looking man with black hair and outfit and a weird dark gray scarf.
"This is the Hero course, you kids need to be far quicker on the uptake if you want to make it here." The man drawled in a bored, unimpressed tone as he looked around the room to the students scrambling for their seats, before reaching down to pull something from his sleeping bag. "I am your homeroom teacher, Shota Aizawa. Inside your desks you will find uniforms like this, take them, go get dressed, and meet me out in the main field. You have fifteen minutes."
"But… what about orientation?" The brunette ventured hesitantly, mirroring Momo's own thoughts if she was being honest.
"As I said, this is the Hero course." Aizawa-sensei retorted. "U.A. is know for giving its teachers a lot of freedom in their teaching, and I don't see the need for such frivolities. You now have fourteen minutes."
With that, the entire class scrambled to do as they were told. Far as first days went, Momo couldn't help but think this was certainly something outside the norm.
/
Fourteen minutes later found the whole class suitably suited up and out in the field, spread in a rough semicircle around their apparent teacher.
"Now then, we are going to be doing a quirk apprehension test." The man drawled, sounding more asleep than awake. "Izuku Midoriya."
"Yah?" The boy with the goggles replied, looking pretty bored himself.
'Oooooohhhhhh', the quarter composed of Momo, Mina, Ochako and Tenya thought simultaneously. 'So that's his name…'
"You ranked the highest in the entry exam-"
"WHAT?!" Katsuki all but exploded at the words, while muttering spread through the others like wildfire.
"Pipe down." Aizawa replied uncaringly, his annoyed stare cutting the blond off from spouting more profanities, before he turned back to the green-haired boy. "What's the furthest you could throw in ball toss exercises back in your old school?"
"Huuuuhh…" The boy blinked, face scrunching up as he struggled to recall. "Not sure… 'Bout forty-sumthin meters, I fink?"
"Allright." The man grunted, half-heartedly throwing a ball that the teen promptly caught. "Get in the circle and try again. This time, use your quirk."
"Really?!" Izuku perked up, suddenly a lot more interested in the proceedings.
"I won't know what I've got to work with if I don't see what you are all capable of." The teacher replied with a hint of exasperation. "These tests will be my measuring stick of where you stand at with your quirks. Enter the circle, and as long as you don't leave it in any way, anything goes."
Oddly enough, the man did not miss how the angry blond teen looked momentarily panicked at his words.
"Aye, aye, sir!" Izuku cheered, a shit eating-grin on his face as he made his way to the circle. "Now we'z talkin'! Lesse here…"
To the confusion of all but two of the students present, who slowly inched away to the back of the group, the green-haired boy reached for his pocket, mumbling to himself all the while.
Then their eyes bugged out in shock, as in a scene straight out of a morning cartoon, the boy pulled a freaking massive bazooka, a ramshackle looking thing, little more than a large steel cylinder with a welded trigger and side-grip, nearly as tall as he was.
"Awight den." He said cheerily, dropping the ball inside the barrel and mounting the contraption on his shoulder, taking aim at the sky. "FIRE'IN DAH HOLE!"
Click!
…
…
…
Nothing happened.
"What the z- wait, w-what?"
Initially seemingly confused at the misfire, suddenly the boy started displaying an odd shift in demeanour. He began nervously inspecting the weapon, his expression suddenly and increasingly more nervous.
Gone were the boisterousness and the cheerfulness, the almost too wide grin, in their place only wide, uncomprehending eyes and an almost trembling lip. Then he looked around, timidly avoiding the other students general direction. Something was off, it felt like there was something missing that by all rights should be there…
"W-why did it get so q-quiet?" Izuku mumbled, a picture of meekness.
"So it's true." Aizawa's voice broke the confused silence, drawing the boy's wide, teary, dark green eyes to him, the see the man staring him down, eyes glowing red and hair floating ominously. "Your creations need your quirk to actually function, however that actually works."
"You're E-Eraserhead." The boy stuttered timidly, eyes wide in recognition and worry. "Y-you should s-stop that…"
"You think villains will stop just because you're asking?" The newly revealed underground hero questioned, somewhat scathingly.
"N-no, I mean…"
"I have to say, this does not seem practical. Without your quirk, you're a sitting duck. What will you do, besides being a burden to those working alongside you, if someone comes along like me who can take it away?"
"It's not me who does anything." The boy said, now sounding outright frantic. "Please, turn it off before you-!"
Suddenly, the world seemed to slow down for Aizawa, freezing as shades of green seemed to dance at the edges of his vision. Slowly, a noticeable and uncomfortable pressure begun building at the back of his eyes, and as he looked straight at the kid's, for a split second he could've sworn he saw a flickering spark there. A weird weight seemed to settle on his head, an unpleasant sensation, almost like something scratching at the back of his brain-
"LEZZ GO, LEZZ GO, LADZ! HEAVE'OH, HEAVE'OH, WAAAAAAAAAGHHH!"
Something slammed the man square in the face, sending him flying backwards, to the students' momentary shock and panic. The man briefly tumbled, completely blindsided, before instinct kicked in and he rolled with the attack, landing on his feet. It took a bit longer than he cared to admit to shake the blurriness from his head, only to then be greeted by pain lancing through his face. A tentative touch in the affected area had him wincing. It felt like he'd been punched by a villain with a strength enhancing quirk, and he was sure it was gonna bruise. Slowly, his hazy vision focused back on the blood red eyes glaring at him.
"…What was that, Midoriya?" He asked.
"You'ze shuldn't a done dat." The green-haired boy said, a serious frown on his face. "Me quirk's always on. I can'tz shut it down and it dun like bein' told what tah do. You wuz tryin' to tell it wot to do, so it slugged ya, liek it does erry time sumthin' tries tah supress it. I wuz warnin' ya tah stop, but you wuzn't listenin'."
Shock surged through the underground hero as he saw the meaning in the boy's words. He hadn't been fumbling with the loss of the crutch of his quirk, he was trying to keep Aizawa himself from getting hurt by a quirk that reacted poorly to outside influence…
"Now, can I do dah toss or not?" The boy asked, holding up the scrap bazooka.
Before answering, the hero took a glance to the rest of the class, to gauge their reactions to what had just happened. Some, like Bakugou, stood with jaws dropped, flabbergasted, others, like Uraraka, flinched away from his gaze as they stared on with undisguised worry, and others yet, like Todoroki, just coolly observed.
"Eh," The teacher ultimately chuckled, smirking despite himself. "Alright, we've wasted enough time as it is. Get it done, Midoriya."
"Aye, aye." The kid said with a smirk, before resuming a firing stance. "As I wuz sayin', FIRE IN DAH HOLE!"
A loud explosion roared across the field, making many of the assembled students wince and one in particular hold her ears in pain, as the ball was launched high into the sky, leaving behind a trail of smoke as it soared.
Aizawa watched it go, until it disappeared into the horizon, before checking a small screen that he pulled from his pocket. With a grunt of mild surprise, he lazily turned it towards the other students for all to see.
It read 800 meters.
"There's eight tests for you to do." The man said, his gaze (somewhat less intimidating than he intended on account of his left eye swiftly swelling shut) sweeping through the most recent batch of prospective heroes. "You're expected to use your quirks to the best of your abilities in each and every one, so be inventive, think outside the box, and show me what you've got. As the motto of our school goes, Plus Ultra. Show me if you've got what it takes to go beyond."
Some of them glanced around at each other, and quite visibly, the confusion and nervousness was bleeding out of them, to be replaced by resolve and determination.
A decent start, the underground hero found. And now for the finishing touch.
"Oh," He continued, a wide grin on his face. "And the student that comes in last will be considered to have no potential and be expelled."
Aizawa knew he had a reputation as a stern and humourless teacher. But as he saw the predictably horrified faces at his declaration, well, let it never be said that there weren't things about his job that the Erasure Hero loved.
/
Welp, that's that for now. Hope you guys liked how things went down. How will the tests go? Will anyone get expelled? And how does Izuku pull weapons from his pockets like a Looney Tunes reject?
All will be revealed in due time, so I hope you stick around to find out.
Next up, I'll be updating Through the Eternities, so look forward to that.
Cya all on the next one.