Their Hero Academia – Chapter 36: The Sports Festival Part 9: Round Five – FIGHT!
"Up next, we have the high-speed Hero student, Isamu Haimawari! He took first place in the Obstacle Course, survived Quirkball, and shot his first opponent out of the ring! Going up against him, we have Izumi Todoroki, mistress of the elements! She's mastered fire and ice and pushed past a truly explosive first opponent! This is going to be an intense one, folks!"
"Another exercise in violence and flashy abilities. Of course."
"Why you gotta be such a downer, Eraser?"
"You and Mightnight keep making me come up here against my will. If I were a more violent person…"
"Hey, you can do what you want to me, but leave my girlfriend out of this!"
Isamu was doing his level best to ignore the crowd and not doing a very good job of it. Too much noise, too many people. A bunch of them were just cheering, making noise. Quite a few people were cheering for Izumi. And what surprised him was that some people were cheering for him. Sure, he assumed some of his friends from class in the stands might be. Shinso was probably cheering for the both of them, even. But he wasn't used to having this much attention on him. He'd had just a small number of friends (which reminded him, he should really call them) in middle school and junior high, and was even more surprised to find he'd made friends so easily at U.A. But people who'd never met him, cheering for him to succeed? Totally foreign territory.
Okay, so Izumi. She looked like she'd recover pretty well from collapsing fighting Kirishima-Bakugo. The rings on her regulator rig were giving off a soft-green glow, meaning she didn't have any stored heat in them. That meant she'd have to rely on ice at first, until she could build up enough heat for fire. That was decent. He could handle ice. His repulsion field treated ice just like any other surface, and he could adhere to it too, if he had to.
Honestly, he was grateful to be facing Izumi and not Kirishima-Bakugo. Not that he wanted to fight a friend of his, but Kirishima-Bakugo was terrifying in ways Izumi definitely wasn't. He wasn't sure he could take either one of them, especially after the display of power Izumi had put on, but he was even less sure about Kirishima-Bakugo.
"You, ah, ready for this, Izumi?" he asked.
Izumi nodded. "Quite ready," she said.
"I'm not going to go easy on you," he added.
She shook her head. "Nor would I expect you to."
They both turned their attention to Hakweye, who nodded slightly. "You're ready, then?" Another nod from both of them. "Then… FIGHT!"
Isamu threw himself forward, hands and feet both touching the ground, and he rocketed himself towards Izumi. She took a fast step back and pointed at the ground, throwing up a wall of ice probably two meters across and taller than she was. He had to hit the breaks hard, firing his repulsive force in the other direction, to keep from slamming into it.
Quickly, Izumi came around from behind her wall (she had probably started moving moment she'd thrown it up), and he felt the temperature drop around him sharply. Even as he tried to push back, the ice formed faster than he'd expected, until he found himself lifted off the ground, frozen in a block of ice, just his head pushing out.
A hush fell over the crowd. He had to do something. He had no time to waste; if he didn't do something quickly, he'd be eliminated.
"Haimawari," Hawkeye began, "can you continue?"
He barely heard her, instead focusing on concentrating on his Quirk for all he was worth. The ice around him was one structure and he had four points of contact. Perfect. He triggered his Quirk, pushing his repulsion field out from all of his limbs and directly into the ice. With an ear-shattering crack, the ice broke, sending shards everywhere and sending him flying back. Equal and opposite reaction, of course. The laws of physics were harsh sometimes. As he flew back, he saw Izumi protecting herself from the shards with a quickly formed ice shield.
He hit the ground, skidding, throwing his hands out and applying his adhesive force to keep himself from going further. And then he got fight back up shot forward again. An ice pillar shot up in his way, forcing him to go around it, then another, and another. Each time, he had to change directions, move back or to the side. It was only after the third one that he realized… she was herding him. Every time he had to change directions, he was moving closer to the edge of the ring.
Clever. It had almost worked. Isamu skidded to a stop, spinning around and rocketing around the edge of the ring. The only good part about the ice pillars was that they had also temporarily obstructed Izumi's view of him. Just enough time for him to rush her and…
A blast of flame, came rushing at him. He barely had time to duck his head out of the way, the flames missing him by mere centimeters, and he could feel the heat from them. Izumi had anticipated his move here too. Was he that predictable?
She switched back to ice, trying to trap him again, obviously wary of using her flames directly on him. Only an intense burst kept him from becoming ensnared in an icy prison again.
Izzy didn't let up. She called up more ice, trying to box him in, walls of ice forming on all sides. Isamu stood, putting a hand against the wall of ice in front of him. Solid. He took a step back, but found a wall of ice had already formed behind him! Looking up, the walls were starting to join together…
No room to slide, nowhere to run… he was trapped!
He had one chance. He'd meant to save this for his last match. But if he didn't do it now, this probably would be his last match.
Up in the stands, Shota gasped, gasped again, then gasped some more. Two of his best friends were duking it out! Who was he supposed to root for here? Haimawari, who liked Heroes almost as much as him and Toshi and never told him to shut up? Izumi, who he'd known for longer, and who always encouraged him?
"Argh!" he wailed. "Why can't they both just win? This is killing me!"
"Relax, Shota," Asuka said, sitting behind and one seat to the left of him. "Simply making it this far is a victory in and of itself. *chirp* Our friends will be fine no matter the outcome."
"My money is on Todoroki," Shoji said, sitting next to Asuka. "She's negating Haimawari's speed by boxing him in."
"Yeah, but he can just go up and over it, if he has to," Mineta added, sitting in the row in front of him. "Might get a good look at his backside that way."
"Should you really be looking at backsides, Mika?" Kaminari, sitting next to her, asked. "Aren't you kind of seeing Yoarashi now?"
"Shinji and I aren't exclusive, Chi," Mineta replied. "So I can look at all the backsides I want and so can he. I told him he should check out yours sometime."
"Ah… thanks?"
Shota winced as it looked like Izumi got the drop of Haimawari, forming a dome of ice all around him. "Aaaw, man," he said. "I think she's got him now. No way he's going to get out of there!"
"Hang on," Sato said, leaning forward in his seat. He looked to his left and right, where Sero and Ojiro were sitting. "You guys see that too, right?"
"Something's glowing in there!" Ojiro said.
Sero looked to his right, where his boyfriend, Tensei Iida, was sitting. "Any sciencey ideas, babe?"
"I am afraid I do not have enough information to form a hypothesis," Iida said. Next to him, his sister, Sora, likewise shook her head.
Sero looked back over his shoulder. "Shinso, Tokoyami, any ideas what he's doing?"
Shota shook his head. He knew Haimawari had been spending a lot of time doing some private training, when he wasn't practicing hand to hand with him and Toshi, but he didn't know what exactly he was doing. "Dunno," he said. "Looks like it's gonna be big though."
"Oui," Aoyama said, from where he was sitting with Koda. He'd been extra grumpy since getting eliminated during Quirkball. He seemed to have calmed down a little since lunch, at least. "It seems all his practice is about to pay off. Our newcomer may surprise us yet."
Kirishima-Bakugo was on the edge of her seat, a white-knuckled grip on the railing in front of her. "C'mon, Izzy… kick his ass already…"
Isamu planted his feet, put one arm out, palm facing forward. He braced it with his other arm, took a deep breath, and concentrated all of his Quirk into it. The energy there hummed for a moment, making his arm shake with the effort of controlling all the energy. He probably had exactly one shot at this. He'd been able to fire off some lower power bursts in rapid succession, but the ice here already looked thick enough to make trouble.
When he could bear the power no longer, sparks of white energy already dancing along his hand, Isamu let the energy go in one massive blast.
KRACKA-POW!
A bolt of blue-white energy flared from his hand, punching through and shattering the ice before him. He'd done it! He'd actually done it! It felt like he'd just gone jogging for twenty miles, but he'd actually done it!
An ice ball smacked into his head, nearly knocking him over, and draining any sense of accomplishment. He could see now, Izumi had gotten out of the way before he'd fired off his blast. It had been too much to hope for that she'd been in the line of fire. But then again, he wasn't sure how much damage a blast like that would have done to a person.
He got moving, running rather than sliding, as Izumi alternated between blasts of ice and flame. With so many chunks of ice and ice constructions littering the ring, there was precious room to maneuver or fight. But there was a pillar. Isamu quickly slapped a hand against it, bringing his feet onto it and lifting himself up, gaining some altitude. Below, he could see Izumi readying a blast of flame to bring him down. She'd done the same to Kirishima-Bakugo.
But he had one thing she didn't. He pointed his free hand. It was now or nothing. And…
Kracka-Pow! Kracka-Pow! Kracka-Pow! Kracka-Pow!
He pushed out what remaining power he could, firing blast after blast. Low power, but maybe just enough.
The blasts were enough to get Izumi moving, barely one step ahead of where he was firing. Finally, Isamu pushed with the three limbs he had touching the pillar and launched herself into the air. He came down, smacking into Izumi, both of them rolling over and over.
"Todoroki is out of bounds!" came Hawkeye's voice. "Haimawari wins!"
What? Isamu looked. They were near the edge of the ring and… Izumi's head was just a little bit over it. He was also, he realized, on top of Izumi and way too close. He felt a crimson blush spread over his face. He didn't think of her like that that, not at all, but this was still some of the closest he'd been to a girl, other than Mika riding on his back earlier today.
"Ah… sorry," he said. And realized he was still on top of her. Hastily, he got to his feet and helped her to hers. "You okay?"
She gave him a small smile. "Battered and bruised, but otherwise all right," she said. "I managed not to pass out this time."
He gave her a smile in return. "You nearly had me," he said. "…Please don't let Kirishima-Bakugo kill me."
This actually got a small laugh out of her. "You have my promise."
And then he realized the crowd was cheering his name. And he nearly passed out himself.
"Yoooowwww! Quite the win for this unknown! Haimawari advances to the next round! We're gonna get some clean up and then be back for the final fight of the second seed!"
"Let's all give a big hand to FireFox for getting rid of that ice so quickly and to the Support classes for cleaning up the steam and water! We're now ready for the final fight of the second seed! Toshinori Midoriya, the Number One Son of the Number One Hero vs Kana Tetsutetsu, the Steel Sentinel of Class 1-B!"
"Let me just say now: Anyone who breaks any bones will be expelled. I've been through that particular scenario enough times now."
"Good one, Eraser! Who knew you'd taken up jokes? That wife of yours must really be getting to you!"
"Right. Jokes."
So, Kana Tetsutetsu. Toshi was carefully reviewing what he knew about his friend. In many ways, she was like the PG-12 version of Katsumi. She was strong, driven, dedicated to proving herself, but a lot less angry. As Representative for her class, she was also fair, honest, and a bit of a big sister. And she was by far the more patient of the two (anybody who could put up with Monoma and was friends with Mineta had to have the patience of a saint).
Her Quirk let her turn her arms, from fingertip to shoulder, into metal. This gave her incredible punching power and a strong resistance to damage that she called her "Ultimate Guard."
She was also, frankly, a better fighter than he was, an actual martial artist. Toshi had a number of moves Mom had taught him, but he took after Dad and Grandpa Might in that he was more of a brawler, relying on heavy hits and his patented "Gravity Smash" stomp move to do most of his damage.
"You're going to give me a good fight, Toshi?" Kana asked, grinning. Not a feral grin like Katsumi so often sported, but one that said, "I welcome the challenge."
"Of course," he agreed, returning the grin. He liked a good fight as much as the next guy and Kana made a great sparring partner. A straight-up fight like this was a good match for the two of them, neither had a big advantage over the other.
It'd be a good chance for both for both of them to show off what they could do.
"Ready?" Hawkeye asked. Not a lot of nonsense here, compared to some of the other matches. She seemed to have moved up from "annoyed" to "impassive", which was an improvement. When they nodded, she stepped out of the ring. "Now… FIGHT!"
A lot of the other matches had started quickly, fast and furious blows or other bursts of power. Here, the two were more careful, slowly circling each other looking for an opening to exploit. It was Toshi who made the first move, throwing a right cross and increasing his gravity at the last moment.
CLANG!
Kana got her Ultimate Guard up in time, arms crossed in an X in front of her. Fortunately for Toshi, his durability went way up when he increased his gravity or he'd probably have broken his hand. She returned with strikes of her own, fast punches that he had to block. Going to higher gravity slowed him down, requiring split second timing to shift form normal gravity to heavy gravity and back again.
"Not bad," Kana laughed. "But you're never going to beat me if you keep going that slow."
She took a quick step back, giving her room to drop down and sweep her leg, knocking Toshi off of his. He landed hard on his back with a grunt. Quickly, he sprung back to his feet and brought his own gravity down, jumping up and over her, but her reactions were quick and she was already spinning around with a left-armed metal punch. He sidestepped that, backpedaling away from her fists.
Toshi took a deep breath and brought his gravity down, doing a backflip that brought him to the edge of the ring. There, he'd bought himself a little space. Kana was already running to meet him, so he ran towards her, then cut his gravity (not enough to float, just enough to make him light) and jumped, the extra force of his muscles combined with his lowered gravity shooting him forward like a shot from a sling.
Kana got her guard up again, but he wasn't going for a strike. Instead, he amped up his gravity, controlling his descent, tackling her at the waist. For a moment, he was on top of her and he increased his gravity several times over, pinning her to the ground. He scrambled to try and pin her arms, but she was faster than him and she boxed his ears, hard.
At least she'd turned her arms back to flesh before she did that. As it was, it left Toshi seeing stars, his concentration broken and his ears ringing. Unable to concentrate on maintaining his heavy gravity, Kana was able to shove him off of her, making him land hard on his butt.
Back on her feet in an instant, Kana converted her arms to metal again, delivering a downward strike that Toshi had to scramble to get away from. She followed with more blows, nearly striking him each time, until she was able to grab the front of his uniform.
One-handed, she lifted him. "I've been working on my throwing arm," Kana said. "Want to see how far you'll go?"
"Not today!" Toshi shouted, increasing his gravity as much as he could. If he did it too fast, he'd hurt himself, but if he did it just right…
He quickly became too heavy even for Kana to hold up and she was forced to drop him. The concrete cracked again under his feet when they hit.
There was a moment when they stared each other down… then both launched into another flurry of blows.
"Come on!" Katsumi roared. "Somebody punch somebody! Quit dancing around it! One good headshot… BOOM!"
Next to her, Izzy jumped, startled by the outburst. Katsumi smiled apologetically. "Sorry, Iz," she said. "But, I mean, c'mon! One of them should be able to clobber the other faster than this!"
Izzy shook her head. "It has been a long day of fights and they are nearly equally matched. Toshi has more mobility, but Tetsutetsu's reflexes and guard, combined with the open arrangement of the ring, make it difficult to take advantage of that. Likewise, Tetsutetsu has great power and skill, but so does Toshi."
"Yeah, okay," Katsumi admitted. "It's a good scrap either way." She truthfully didn't care who won. She knew that neither one of them would let it go to their heads. Both of them were her friends, so she wasn't playing favorites either. But the longer the fight went on, the more likely it would come down to someone making a mistake. And someone else making a mistake wasn't the same as winning by pure skill or power alone.
"Show her no mercy!" Sora Iida shouted, springing up from her seat. "Your chance of victory is as certain as the probability of death in the horizon of a black hole!"
"…Not that I've got anything against cheering," Sero said, "I mean, all for supporting Midoriya, but what the heck kind of cheer was that?"
"One using the accuracy of science!" Iida said.
Her brother Tensei seemed to disagree. "You are being hyperbolic and irrational, Sister. There is a one hundred percent probability of death within the event horizon of a black hole. Your suitor may be skilled, but he cannot achieve one hundred percent probability of victory."
"I am being a supportive girlfriend!"
"You are being inaccurate!"
"Both of you, shut up!" Katsumi roared.
"Aw, but I liked watching her jump up and down," Mineta wailed.
"That goes double for you!"
Katsumi turned her attention back to the fight. "Somebody better win so I don't have to put up with this."
Toshi blocked Kana's latest blow, his movements only partially slowed by his increased gravity. He returned with a strike of his own, which she sidestepped, thrusting out her leg in a series of kicks that drove him back. The two of them were just too evenly matched.
Okay, direct confrontation wasn't working… he needed to be smarter about this. Brawling wasn't working, so what would?
A thought sprang up in his mind. Yeah, that'd do it. It was risky, it was reckless, it was… Honestly, it was a perfectly Midoriya move.
He ran towards Kana, lowered his gravity, and then jumped. Not forward or back, but instead straight up. With almost no gravity to hold him down, his assent was fast, shooting up like a rocket. Up and up he went, the rush of the wind on his face making his eyes water. He had to do this right though, not go beyond the limit they'd set which was just about… now.
Gravity seized Toshi like a snare, as he increased his many times over. More times than he would ever dare on the ground, making him almost too heavy to even move. But here, he didn't have to. He just had to fall and stick what Dad liked to call the "Hero Landing".
BOOM!
Toshi hit the ground hard, with his fist and feet, setting off a massive shockwave that cracked the concrete of the ring and sent Kana flying. She'd been able to get out of the way of being directly under him, but she had to stay in the ring. No escape. She landed outside the ring, battered, but rolling and already back on her feet. She was tough, that was a fact.
It took Toshi a moment to recover his wits. He'd done this trick before, against robots in training, but he'd put more gravity behind in that he had before. Not quite one of Grandpa Might's or Dad's famous Smashes, but pretty impressive all the same.
Still, he couldn't help but feel some guilt. This wasn't the kind of trick he could pull off fighting a Villain, not unless he had no other choice. Too much potential for property damage or worse.
…It'd been pretty cool, though.
"Tetsutetsu…" came the voice of Hawkeye. She looked a bit disheveled. Had he knocked her over too? Crap. That was bad. "Tetsutetsu is out of bounds! Midoriya wins!"
"Everybody okay down there? That was a smashing final move! Looks like the Number One's Number One Son is on his way to the top!"
"Another Problem Child. Of course."