She'd thought UA would be different than junior high, but nope. It was still school. Classes. Lunch. And homework. A lot of homework. English. History. Math. Science. Heroics. 'Plus Ultra' apparently meant going above and beyond shoving homework down their throats.
Talk about cream of the crop.
And people wanted to go to UA?
It was ridiculous.
"And I was lying. No one's going home. That was just a rational deception to make sure you gave it your all in the tests."
Her eye twitched. Then twitched again. She could still hear his smug laughter. And that weird smile. It pissed her off. A rational deception? No goddamn way! He'd been serious about kicking someone out of UA. Or he was a psychopath who liked toying with their emotions for shits and giggles, which was worse. Or maybe better. And then there was the kid who'd broken his finger throwing the ball. Deku or something weird. That was a shit-ton of power. And strange. Her Quirk had drawbacks. Every Quirk had drawbacks. But she'd never heard of a Quirk that shattered bones every time it was used.
And she would know.
Her dad had studied Quirks like they were going out of freaking style.
But that wasn't important.
Because for better or worse, she'd survived her first day.
She could finally head home and –
"RRRRRRRYYYYYYYYUUUUUUKKKKKOOOO!"
Hands in her pockets, backpack slung over her shoulder and hair still frazzled from Kaminari demonstrating his Quirk during the distance run for some weird reason, Ryuko sidestepped the approaching missile at the last possible moment. She felt, rather than saw, Mako's beaming smile shift into bewildered confusion when her arms didn't grab anything. But before Mako slammed face-first into the ground, tumbled head over foot and crashed into a garbage can, her arm snapped out. Latching onto her 'bestie's' collar right before Mako jumped out of range, she yanked backwards, watched Mako's legs and arms dancing like a caught insect and then gently placed her new friend down.
"Oh, hey, Mako."
Unaware of her close brush with death and visit to Recovery Girl, Mako was unfazed when her backpack – adorned with bunnies and launched skyward at the moment Ryuko caught her – landed in her best friend's other hand, "How was your hero stuff, Ryuko? Fun and exciting, I bet."
"Nah, not really," having finished her good deed for the day, Ryuko tossed Mako her backpack.
"That doesn't sound right," perplexed to the point of confusion, Mako pouted, realized she'd been left alone and hurried to catch up, "Did you go to the wrong class or something?"
"I'm pretty sure I didn't."
"Are you sure?" Mako asked with too much emphasis to be taken seriously, "Because I went to the wrong class this morning, only there was this nice guy who accidentally brainwashed me when I asked him for directions. Which sounds bad, but turns out, we're in the same class, plus he's really nice."
Ryuko didn't catch anything on the first go.
Or the second.
Or the third.
But on Mako's confession's fourth cycle, her brain finally caught up, "Wait. What? Brainwashing?"
"Ryuko?"
Another voice interrupted her before she could ask Mako to elaborate what she meant about 'brainwashing' or if it was another figment of her imagination. Like living next to a group of Yakuza. Or the underground fighting ring down the street. One hand holding onto her backpack, she turned around and saw Kendo walking towards them with someone she didn't recognize and who immediately looked suspicious, "Oh…Kendo, right?"
"It's good to see you," the ginger haired heroine-in-training's teal eyes swept from Ryuko to the girl standing next to her before ending in a wave, "Guess you're in Class 1-A, huh?"
"Yup," she shrugged, her voice drier than a desert, "So, was your day as fun and exciting as ours?"
"Well…"
Kendo clapped her hands nervously yet enthusiastically, almost as if she couldn't decide which was worse, "Vlad King had us demonstrate our Quirks. How they work. What our limits are. It was interesting, but to be honest, forming teams might be difficult. Some of our Quirks work better together than others. And other Quirks aren't useful for fighting. It depends on whether Vlad King creates our teams or if he lets us pick our own teams. What about you? I'm sure your orientation was boring."
She tried answering.
Unfortunately, she didn't have the opportunity to do so when the guy next to Kendo shoved his way into their conversation with a smarmy grin.
"Neito Monoma," with a smile, he held out his hand, "A pleasure to meet you."
All the red flags were waving in her mind.
He was up to something.
She could smell it.
"Sorry," without caring about manners, decorum or camaraderie, Ryuko slapped away Monoma's hand, "No offense, but you're a little too creepy for my tastes."
That should have been the end of it.
But it wasn't.
"Well. Well. That was easier than I thought."
Monoma's annoying voice, already smug enough to piss her off without trying, somehow evolved to a level she'd only theorized, "Now, let's see what makes you special."
A crimson substance flowed between his fingers.
Blood.
And it was like someone punched the breath from her lungs, "What the – ?"
"He pulled the same stunt on Tetsutetsu," unfazed by her classmate's apparent treachery, Kendo sighed into her hand, "Monoma's Quirk is Copy. As in – "
"Oh my god! He stole Ryuko's Quirk!"
Ryuko ignored Mako's spontaneous declaration, but just to be safe, she twisted a few droplets of blood between her fingers.
She still had her Quirk.
Good.
For her.
Not for Monoma.
Her expression immediately collapsed underneath the overbearing weight of annoyance and frustration. This was freaking terrific. Her first day at UA, and she'd not only had a sadistic bastard for a homeroom teacher, she'd run into some punk who copied Quirks. Wonderful. Sucking in heaping scoops of midafternoon spring, Ryuko rolled her up sleeves, purposely made of show of violently cracking her knuckles and prepared to teach an oblivious Monoma a few lessons about stealing shit that didn't belong to him. But Kendo seemed to realize her plans, because before she stepped between them, hands larger than average and a nervous smile stretching from cheek to cheek.
"Don't mind him, Ryuko! It's just Monoma's way of introducing himself," Kendo helpfully, in her mind, pointed out, hoping it was enough to dissolve the situation.
It wasn't helpful.
It didn't make her not want to punch him in the face.
But as Mako watched Monoma manipulate his blood as if he hadn't copied her Quirk without written permission, something else bothered her. Ryuko couldn't quite place her finger on it. It was important. She wracked her brain. Yet it was like an itch she couldn't scratch. No matter how hard she tried, it was like water slipping between her fingers. Until Monoma started experimenting with larger and larger weapons. A double-bladed lance. A massive sword. A sword and shield combination. Everything became clear.
"Hey, fyi," while she would normally watch everything unfold from the sidelines, Ryuko nevertheless lazily raised her finger "You should probably not – "
The copycat was too wrapped up enjoying himself to listen.
And so, having tried warning him, Ryuko retreated to her original plan of doing nothing.
"Such an interesting power."
He cycled through several weapons. An intricate rapier with a fleur-de-lis carved into the pommel. A set of daggers sharp enough to slice through the air itself. A long sword twice the length of his arm. Monona didn't stop. He couldn't stop, not even as his face paled and his heart rate skyrocketed, "To believe someone…like you…had…this…ability…"
A second later, he tilted sideways and fell to the ground.
Ryuko knew she should feel something. Anger. Guilt. Remorse. Excitement. Truth be told, she still wanted to deck Monoma for copying her Quirk. But this was a rare opportunity for her to see how her Quirk worked from the outside. Did that make her a bad person? She didn't think so. It didn't make her a good person. Or a good hero. Then again, she technically wasn't a hero. Not yet. So, while Kendo gasped and Mako's scattered thoughts took a moment to catch up to reality, Ryuko watched Monoma's latest contraption – a double-bladed katana – liquify into a puddle and ooze into his twitching fingers.
It happened fairly quickly.
Taking little more than a second from start to finish, leaving him breathing normally.
And giving her no incentive to bite her tongue and not speak her mind.
"Serves him right for snatching my Quirk."
Kendo, however, was more confused than panicked, "Is he going to be okay?"
"Who cares?" she shrugged, caring little, if that, about the thieving prick from Class 1-B, "I say we leave him and go home."
"No way!"
And just like that, Mako was off to the races.
"I know he didn't ask permission to look at your homework, Ryuko, but you can't just leave him lying on the ground like yesterday's newspaper!" Ryuko slouched alongside a surprised Kendo, both equally confused and bewildered by the illogical train of logic, "It's obvious to me this guy – " Mako motioned toward the unconscious Monoma, " – is a yarn ball of super jealousy since his Quirk doesn't work without other Quirks! Like an essay written in orange crayon! His self-esteem is lower than my dad's taxes! It's super sad. I hide my feelings with imaginary friends, but not everybody can do that!"
Kendo's head tilted sideways, "Wha…?"
"More importantly, if I learned anything helping my dad steal from the hospital, blood loss is a serious emergency!" Mako slid towards Monoma, pumping both arms and puffing her cheeks, "People die when they're killed by blood loss! That's why you gotta save him even if he acts like an ineffective Saturday morning villain, Ryuko!"
Ryuko stared at Mako.
Then forced herself to look at Monoma.
"Nah, he's fine," she nudged the prick with her foot, earning a weak groan, "Yup. Still breathing."
"Well, I'd better take him to the nurse's office," grabbing her 'friend,' for lack of a better term to describe someone she'd met only a few hours earlier, in her oversized hands, Kendo sighed. Again, "See you tomorrow, Ryuko."
Ryuko watched her leave.
And once Kendo disappeared into UA, resumed storming her way towards the bus station.
"What's wrong, Ryuko?" keeping pace every step of the way while leaning forward despite her overstuffed backpack pulling in the opposite direction, Mako tilted her head, first one way, then the other, before blurting out the first thing that came to her mind, "You look super grumpy."
"He had my Quirk for five seconds and could make better shit than me," she didn't elaborate. She didn't need to. It ticked her off. It pissed her off. If the prick hadn't knocked himself out, she would have punched him. It was her Quirk. She was born with it. She could remember the first time she used it – on the playground after getting dirt kicked on her face. And her dad's reaction. That's why she was pissed. That and not having the chance to introduce his nose to her eager knuckles. But that was that. Her chance was gone.
And so, staring at the sidewalk between her feet, thoroughly annoyed at everything and everyone without any means of calming down, Ryuko kept walking.
"Yeah, that's a real bummer," Mako's bluntness was matched only by her eagerness to help her bestie, "But if you're so down in the dumps, maybe you should practice?"
"Practice?"
"Like mom says whenever dad couldn't afford something – you can't keep coasting through life on talent and good looks," Mako explained as if it were the best advice in the world.
"…I guess that sorta makes sense."
It didn't.
But it gave her an idea.
And her mood slipped into the gutter.
As if she didn't already have enough homework.
