Starlight: The Rise of a Hero
Chapter Three: Father
They had stopped in front of the large double doors, and with Nejire posed to knock at them, there was a rumble from the inside of the Development Studio.
"God damn it Hatsume! Get the fire extinguisher! QUICKLY!" Power Loader's grouchy voice shouted from within. The faintest hint of smoke was perceptible on the air.
Nejire gave Leon an awkward expression, backing away from the iron doors.
Leon gave her a perturbed look, moving forward to open the doors himself.
"It's not like there's smoke coming out from under the door." Finding one of the mismatched handles able to be turned, he pulled the door open. The sight that greeted the two of them exceeded even his expectations.
"Now look what you've done. You did put out the fire, but… you also covered your entire body," Power Loader said, off from the side, not having noticed the two upperclassmen yet.
A young girl, covered in foam, stood next to a small pile of metal. He could only tell that she was a girl because she'd had some kind of goggles on her face, which she'd pulled up as they entered. She pulled them back off her hair, and tried her best to wipe the foam off of her hair, which appeared to be thick, pink dreads.
"Jeez, that didn't work out so well, huh? Perhaps I should've just used a normal fire extinguisher."
She was definitely a first-year, because Leon hadn't met her yet. Her form shivered as she caught sight of the two of them. A sense of deathly foreboding came over the two, and Leon even took a step back instinctively at the spark of light in the girl's eye. Shaking the rest of the mixture off in a comical fashion, she moved towards the two of them. She stopped right in front of the much-taller Leon, sizing him up.
"Whoa. Are you two upperclassmen? You look like you could use one or two of my super-cute babies!" She proclaimed, feeling up Leon's midsection and arms.
"Hey," Leon snapped out, recoiling from the much younger girl's touch, "please don't touch me like that!"
"Oh! I'm sorry. I touch people to see which of my babies would work best for them," she explained. She appeared genuine in her embarrassment, but she must have seen that he wasn't reassured by her apology. He was panicking, looking towards Nejire, whose eyes had gone dark.
There was a soft, spiralling energy wrapping its way around her right arm. When her cold blue eyes met the light again, they were focused and locked onto the poor girl.
"I will annihilate you," she noted gently, "if you do not back away from him."
It was not a side of Nejire that Leon had seen before. She was furious, and Leon took hold of her arm, snapping her out of her very angry reverie.
"Hey. Don't blast the poor girl out of existence. She already apologized!" He exclaimed, giving Nejire an appropriately worried expression. She paused, closing her eyes and breathing deeply.
"I will let it pass this time, Miss…?"
"Hatsume. Hatsume Mei, and I'm sorry for touching on your boyfriend. Can we restart these introductions. You two are just so cool, you're the first upperclassmen I've met this year. I got excited, I'm sorry…" She brushed her hair out of her face with her hand, genuinely shame-faced.
She looked away, dejected. Leon quickly corrected her, with both his and Nejire's faces blushing violently.
"We're not dating, we're just...really close," he explained. He hoped his poker face was good enough to fool her.
"Could have fooled me," she quipped, sarcastic as all get-out. "You're both blushing."
Both of their faces blushed even harder as a result.
Nejire snapped out of her embarrassment first. "I'm Nejire, and this is Leon. We're two of the Big Three, so you'd better take us seriously. We were just coming over to see Power Loader, and meet any new first-years, like you." Her voice indicated some level of interest in Hatsume.
"Why would you want to meet the first years?" Mei asked, confused.
"I love to study Quirks! They're SO COOL!" Nejire declared, exploding with enthusiasm.
"Well, mine isn't all that interesting…" Mei stated, awkward energy pouring off of her.
"I'll be the judge of that. I'm sure it's totally PLUS ULTRA!"
Power Loader gazed over at the three from where he was cleaning up Hatsume's mess. An approving smile formed on the face underneath the mask.
"She's already making friends, huh?"
Mirio phased his body out right as Tamaki's tentacles would have slammed into him, twisting his body around and slamming a knee into the other boy's face.
His Manifestation fading, Mirio declared himself the winner.
"POWERRRRRR!" he shouted with force.
He then helped the other boy up, the glint in his eye never fading.
"That was a good match, but you should've eaten more takoyaki, your manifestation wasn't quite fast enough this time." Mirio's proffered advice wasn't ignored as Tamaki dusted himself off.
"Yeah, well I was already full, okay? I had rice-balls for breakfast and transforming into rice plants or seaweed isn't really part of my quirk." The dark-haired boy moved his bangs out of his eyes, pushing them into their usual position. "And anyway, Powerrr-boy, I didn't expect to be fighting you on the first day! You're like the strongest guy in our entire school!" Tamaki finished, exasperated. Mirio smirked, before bringing up the elephant in the room.
"Dude. I'm not nearly the strongest person at this school. I can think of at least three other people that out-class me. Nejire out-maneuvers me and can just fucking fly away from our fight if she wants to, not to mention blasting me from a distance You are a fucking terrifying opponent, too. I would be hard-pressed to beat you at your best. Today, you just didn't have the right tools at your disposal." His cheery disposition had become thoughtful and caring, patting the other boy on the shoulder.
"And we both know that Leon is on a different level. He's probably the only one who can beat you one-on-one, at least in a fair fight," the taller boy stated, accepting but annoyed, "but we saw what he could do last year when he said he was 'only capable of using fifty percent of his power safely.' I'm excited to fight him again, but I'm afraid that I haven't advanced as much as he has." Mirio said, tailing off, clearly reminiscing about their fight. Tamaki was shocked.
"If even you are worried about keeping up with him, Mirio-san, then that's just more of a reason to give this year our all. Let's catch up to Leon. Together," he said, extending his fist toward Mirio.
Mirio smirked, laughing to himself.
"Together," he affirmed, their fists slamming together.
A certain green-haired young man walked into Recovery Girl's office, looking from side to side. There was a certain degree of caution to his actions, like he knew that he was in trouble.
"Izuku Midoriya. I thought I said I didn't want you in my office the first day of school," the voice of Recovery Girl echoed out from the right side of the room, where a desk was situated.
Izuku jumped, his eyes jumping to where the older woman was standing up, making her way toward him, murder written all over her features.
She stopped in her tracks less than a meter away, and she sighed.
"I don't like seeing you kids get hurt, it's never fun for anyone. I suppose you had your first battle training today?" She said, using her powers to heal his burned right hand and forearm. He felt the drain on his stamina immediately. It wasn't much, but his arm felt like it was in muscle failure, and she reached into her pocket, handing him some gummy bears.
"Eat those Haribo gummies, and lay down for a bit. Why don't you tell me about this quirk that damages you so?" She wasn't the first person today to ask about his quirk, and she probably wouldn't be the last today, either.
"It's called Flame-Edge. And...Well, how should I put it… My quirk allows me to produce heat and pressure by pulling energy out of the air, making the air around me super cold! It's sorta limited, though, and if I concentrate too much pressure on one limb, it can end up hurting me. I did get the second highest ball throw, though. Even beat out Yaoyorozu-san's awesome cannon in the process!" His enthusiasm over his small victory amused the older woman, and she got up, returning to her desk, which was a meter or so from his bed.
"Don't mind me, keep talking if you have more to say."
"Well, there's not really much else to it, I can't control it too finely at high outputs, and my mom doesn't like it when I use it at home. She says it reminds her too much of my dad."
Hawks eyed the two power-houses as they re-entered the classroom, both obviously post-shower, back in their uniforms.
"Did you two have a productive training session, I hope?" he said, eyes narrowing, sizing them up, one at a time. He'd already studied the other students, aside from the other two, which hadn't returned quite yet. He had sent a feather to trail them, and they were on their way back from what seemed to be the Development Studio.
Pleased with the two's hurried nods, he acknowledged their obvious hero-worship of him.
"Please. I may be the number two hero, but in the classroom, I am just your teacher. The only time where I will be 'Hawks' is when all of you fight me at once, and you struggle to find a way to beat me." The casual tone of his voice almost made them disregard his statement.
But they realized at the same time what he'd been saying, and they looked toward him awkwardly.
"I'm not joking," Hawks said, "ah and just on time, here are the last two of the class."
Nejire and Leon were indeed just walking through the door, surprised at his ability to immediately detect their presence. They saw as a feather flew out from behind Leon, and re-attached itself to Hawks's right wing.
"Should have known that you would have known where we'd been, Mr. Hawks." Leon's face showed his clear amusement.
"I know you needed to go to the Development Studio to check on the state of Ms. Hado's bracers, but next time, please let me know where you're going, I won't always be three steps ahead of you."
There was a grimness to the forest that he walked through. The man, whose grey-white hair seemed further bleached by the mid-day sun, crinkled his thin lips into a crooked smile at the sight in front of him.
The rough, wooden building appeared to be old and decrepit, but as he entered his old home, he took the stairs down to the right, opening the steel door.
His father's study was down the hallway to the left. Leaving the clinical basement behind for the rustic, warm feel of his father's study.
"Father, I've returned," he said, kneeling at the entrance to the room.
"Stop bowing to me, Tenko. It isn't becoming of you." The voice of All For One rang out, irritated, as he turned to face his adopted son. "As I've said in the past, I want you to see me as your equal. You cannot rule this world if you are to bow down to everyone stronger than you."
"Please, stand."
His son did as he asked, looking his father in the eyes. He took the chair his father had offered on the other side of his desk, settling into it comfortably.
"I have spoken with the rest of the Guild, and we will be meeting later this week to ascertain our short-term goals. Do you want the details after I attend?" Tenko Shimura's voice was hesitant.
"That will not be necessary. Your plans are your own, are they not?" They were, but his father seemed to be missing the point.
"They are, but I feel as though you should be included, if I am to inherit your quirk." There. He'd said it.
"That would be apt, if you were inheriting my quirk."
The silence in the room grabbed ahold of Tenko by the ears, crushing his brain as he started to scratch at his neck. "But, my plans require his quirk, what can I do on my own?" The panic was starting to take hold…
"Stop that. This instant."
As his father commanded him, he fell motionless, his arms flopping to the sides, face looking towards the floor.
"You do not need my quirk. You are more than sufficient to rule this world, upon your own merits alone. What need do you have of a quirk which can only cause more needless destruction? Tenko, I am not the same person I was fifty years ago. Looking at your grandmother's body… it changed me. I admired her, which is why I took you in. She restored just the tiniest portion of my humanity. That's why I encouraged you to challenge this world, as I have, and as your grandmother did."
The eyes of Tenko Shimura shone with a twisted sort of hope.
"I can see that you have grown into a powerful young man, and you have exceeded my expectations, in that regard. What I'm worried about is the sort of world you'll create," All For One said, his humanity showing.
"I… I want to create a world where there's no pain, and no suffering. But the fakes, they stand in my way. In the way of Taurus, and they will fall beneath my wrath. The 'Guild of the Stars' will create the longest era of peace this world has ever known!" The wicked ambition in his eyes roared to life, and All For One looked at him, uncertain.
The same wicked ambition that had once fueled his own endeavors.
A/N: Big themes being put on display in this chapter… please review if you feel so inclined. As always, I hope you enjoyed my writing. Until next time...
-Alexander, AKA MeridianPine
