A/N - thank you all for the lovely comments, hope I keep you hype for future chapters

Isuke Koenji was forty-five years old. He had worked for the hero department of the local government ever since graduating from Musutafu Public University at the age of twenty-one, and worked his way up. He wore his short hair in a side parting, and though he had rarely used it, official records remarked that his quirk was Moustache, just as his father's had been. He had spent five years overseeing quirk counselling on a local government level, another seven in various roles regarding hero agency regulation, and a brief secondment to the Justice department, where he had served on an advisory committee regarding the construction of Tartarus. His coworkers would say he was hard working, and precise to a fault, something they attributed to his strong work ethic. The truth, though, was that disorder upset him, on a base, almost primal level.

It was for this reason he had no children, knowing that the noise and chaos they would produce in his peaceful home would bring him nothing but distress.

Similarly, overseeing the bi-annual provisional hero license exams brought Koenji nothing but distress.

A hall teeming with teenagers, often given full license to harm one another, and the men and women who worked under him working hard to make the call- would this child be an asset as a hero, or a liability? It was an unenviable task- what administrator wanted to feel the guilt of knowing someone they had authorised lay dead in a disaster zone or at the hands of a vigilante? But people were people, and heroes were heroes. That was the way of the world.

The licensing system at least put a leash on the chaos.

The team he was supervising today were some of his less experienced examiners- a woman named Hoshi Kinugashima and a man named Minose Okuwa. Both of them were dressed neatly, official badges over their blazers and hair appropriate, but it didn't take a genius to tell that they were nervous. Kinugashima kept moving her hand as if to tuck a stray hair behind her ear, only to find it already pinned in place, and Okuwa fidgeted with his pen, holding it between two knuckles and rolling it back and forth.

It was up to Koenji to take the lead show them how these things were done. He wished, for a singular moment, that Sasaki could have found time in his busy schedule to attend- the mere presence of the foresight hero seemed to remove some of the chaos that made events like this so dangerous.

Koenji's moustache twitched as he viewed their assigned examinees. A ketsubutsu student, a full-grown man and a thirteen-year-old, the latter two sponsored by prominent hero agencies. It was irregular, to say the least.

He turned to his subordinates. "Places," he said, and the two of them hurried forward to sit in front of their monitors.

"The Todoroki kid's got an emitter quirk, I guess?" Kinugashima asked, eyes skimming briefly over all three files. If Koenji recalled correctly, she'd come to the department from industry, a company that specialised in support items.

"Yeah, paperwork says it's called Firestorm. Guess we better switch to thermal imaging," said Okuwa, already at the console, adjusting the display from the cameras set up around the arena. There were more than strictly necessary, but they tended to get damaged in this sort of fight.

Koenji watched the video feed of their team talking in the briefing room. The man in the motorcycle helmet, Izuku Midoriya, was doing most of the talking, his hands moving animatedly as Ensetsu Todoroki nodded. The third team member, Risou Kakuyama, was not as engaged, and Koenji made a note of this.

"The paperwork also says the kid's thirteen," said Kinugashima, conversationally, crinkling her nose.

"Kinugashima," said Koenji, not looking at his subordinate. "Focus on the relevant information, please."

"Yes, sir." Kinugashima pulled her face into a mask of flawless professionalism, turning back to her screen.

"He's got a pro sponsoring him, he's not gonna be bad," said Okuwa, adjusting the instrumentation.

"Who knows?" Kinugashima shrugged. "He's a legacy kid after all, and Burnin used to work under Endeavour. I mean, the first Endeavour."

Koenji was about to reprimand both of them when Okuwa frowned. "What's going on with the old guy's body temperature? He's running hot."

"How hot?" Kinugashima pushed a non-existent strand of hair behind her ear, her eyes on the display.

"I dunno, this is only a surface reading, but about thirty eight Celsius?"

"Eh, that's not too dangerous," Kinugashima squinted at the display. "Could be his quirk. Paperwork says he was quirkless until recently."

"A late bloomer." Koenji took a note on his clipboard, pen quiet against the official headed paper, moustache stroking itself thoughtfully. "I'll have medical take a look at him when we debrief. Make sure it's not anything infectious."

The gate opened, and their team stepped forward into the arena.

"Holy shit, look at that guy go." Okuwa swore, as the man, Midoriya, shot forward. Behind him, the Todoroki kid was using his quirk, the temperature profile cameras showing the air around him shift to red, then white. Okuwa kept on top of it, adjusting the temperature range until the top of the scale sat around five hundred Celsius, but Koenji's focus was on the helmed man.

Koenji pursed his lips. Did the man have an unreported speed quirk? Misrepresenting a candidate's quirk would be grounds for disqualification. "Kinugashima, can you get that on playback please?"

"That guy is fast." Kinugashima's movements were smooth and competent as she brought the footage up on a secondary display for Koenji, parallel with the live footage. "But the computer says it's within normal human parameters."

"Sir?" Okuwa called Koenji's attention to his live display. "The precognition quirk kid just lay down and gave up."

He watched as Midoriya choked out his opponent. It was curious that the boy with the premonition quirk had chosen to surrender rather than fight- Koenji had seen it before a few times, mostly when the quirk user knew they were hopelessly outmatched and wanted to avoid pain. He made a note to liaise with the other team's examiners after the match- that wasn't a great attitude to see from a hero.

"The emitters are going for the other two," Okuwa commented, briskly switching their perspective to focus on the two teenagers. Koenji noted the Todoroki boy's posture, his pinpoint control of his quirk as he raised the temperature in the area and deflected the enemy's attack. The perfect circle of untouched ground around him. Seeing that, it was easier to understand to see why a hero agency had chosen to sponsor him.

Midoriya shot in from the side, with the same peak-of-human speed he'd shown a few seconds previously, planting a foot into the chest of one of the grounded teenagers and kicking him into a wall. The wall cracked with the force, dust rising.

"Within human parameters?"

"Ah-" Okuwa swallowed. "Just about, sir."

Kanugashima rested her chin on her knuckles. "Did you want to call it?"

Koenji considered. Between the high-powered emitter type quirk from the Todoroki kid and the physical dominance demonstrated by Midoriya, the Shiketsu candidates were heavily overmatched. Any other team at the exam would face a similar predicament, he suspected.

But calling the match too early would feel unfair, and they would have to deal with the Shiketsu teachers. No, he decided. Calling the match would cause more trouble than it prevented.

Koenji's moustache wiggled. "Let it play out," he huffed finally, eyes on the screen.

Midoriya watched Todoroki leave, his white cape sweeping behind him. He wanted to go after him, but what could he say? What right did he possibly have, to dictate how the man dealt with his own family?

"Poor kid," Uraraka murmured, low enough that only Midoriya could hear.

Midoriya nodded, watching the door swing on its hinges.

Ensetsu had turned away from his uncle, walking over to where the pro hero Burnin was sitting.

"Are you going to be in trouble?" Risou asked, following him.

"With my mother?" Ensetsu raised an eyebrow. "Don't worry about it. She's probably going to have a long discussion with me about my future. There will be a presentation and then a quiz afterwards." Ensetsu's mouth quirked. "Maybe even an essay."

Risou looked sympathetic. "I think I'd rather be grounded."

"Maybe."

"Mr Midoriya?" An official with a clipboard stood at Midoriya's shoulder. "If you could come through to the examination room for the interview portion of the test? And Ms Uraraka, as Midoriya's sponsor, we'll be questioning you too, in a second room."

The examiner stood as Midoriya entered the room. He stood a little below average height, and greying, his hair parted to the side and a luxurious handlebar moustache on his upper lip. They bowed to each other. "My name's Isuke Koenji," said the examiner. "And I'm the chief examiner here. If you could take a seat, we can begin."

"Thank you," said Midoriya, putting his helmet on the ground at his feet as he sat. The chief examiner was interviewing him? He hoped the man couldn't see how nervous he was, the sweat accumulating on his back or the knot in his stomach.

Koenji's stare was impassive, revealing nothing. "On the table you will find a lie detector device," he said, with a gesture. The device he indicated was a small box made of black plastic, a hole in the front. "This will monitor your vitals as we conduct the interview. If you could insert your finger, we'll go through some baseline questions."

Midoriya did as instructed, the device's grip on his finger firm as Koenji asked him for the data he'd put on his entrance forms- his name, his date of birth, his blood type and his home address. After that, Koenji asked more factual questions, about hero laws and regulations. These might have seemed difficult to a high school student, but Midoriya had spent years working in a hero agency, and many of them were second nature. Midoriya answered to the best of his ability, until finally the examiner seemed satisfied.

Koenji shifted in his seat, and Midoriya half expected him to announce that the interview was over. "Tell me," said Koenji. "Mr Midoriya, what is a hero? What ideals should a hero support?"

It was a surprisingly open-ended question. What sort of answer was the examner expecting? Midoriya blinked. For a second he was back in his apartment, talking to Himiko as he cooked. Then as now his answers came to him. Even hopeless, even grieving, he had never doubted his ideals.

"Saving people," Midoriya said. "Being a hero is about saving people. Saving everyone."

Koenji noted down something and nodded. "What separates a hero from a vigilante?"

"Respect for the law and co-operation with the authorities," Midoriya answered, frowning. Was this a standard part of the exam, or was Koenji asking him these questions because he was suspicious of him?

"Tell me, have you ever read Destro's book?"

Midoriya swallowed. Destro had been a villain, the founder of the Liberation movement. Reading a book written by one of the century's most notorious villains during his time in Tartarus was something that the Hero Association probably viewed in a dim light, but his finger was in a lie detector. "I have," he said. "When I was at university."

The examiner nodded, noting down his answer. "Not many candidates admit to that," he said. "But statistically, most people have read the book. What did you think of it?"

Was this really still part of the exam? Midoriya racked his brain for details of the book. It had been banned at the time, and Fumiko had bought him a copy from one of her friends. Yotsubashi's prose had been loaded with emotion, almost breathless, hardly surprising for an author who had killed himself shortly after writing it. But the core of it had been relentlessly logical. People suffered, Yotsubashi argued, because their fundamental natures were denied. Just like a man with a fish quirk needed to keep himself hydrated, the argument went, a man with a flame quirk needed to be allowed to burn.

"I think the author wanted a world where people were treated fairly," said Midoriya. "But he wanted to achieve that by entirely upending our society."

"And that's a bad thing?" his examiner prompted.

"I believe so," said Midoriya. "Our current system isn't perfect, but that doesn't warrant ripping everything up. And Yotsubashi supported the idea of violent revolution, which would hurt lots of people. If he really wanted that sort of change for the good of everybody, he would have gone through legal channels. The Diet, or-"

"Alright." Koenji raised a hand, and Midoriya shut his mouth. Had he said too much? "Do you believe that relaxing the laws around quirk use lead to a fairer society?"

"I don't," said Midoriya.

"No? Why not?"

"Sir," said Midoriya. "I spent my life up until this point believing I was quirkless."

The interview could have gone better, Midoriya considered, as he entered into the third and final stage of the exam, the search and rescue, after a brief medical examination. There was no sign of Risou or Ensetsu, but he recognised the golden eyed Rito in his group of ten, and the teen gave him a nod of recognition. Their scenario was a coastal town destroyed by tsunami, houses reduced to matchsticks in knee-deep standing water.

There are people in this world who use their quirks to hurt others. If Yotsubashi's proposals were implemented, people like- Midoriya had hesitated there -the quirkless people would have no defence.

Koenji had seemed unconvinced. Yet the author argues that quirk users need free reign.

A quirk users' right to freedom doesn't trump everybody's safety, he had answered.

Is that your final answer? The examiner had asked, and Midoriya had nodded. But he wasn't sure if it was the right answer.

The klaxon sounded for the scenario to start, and the teenagers around Midoriya immediately descended into squabbling.

"Alright," Midoriya called, raising his voice. "Listen to me, all of you."

There was silence as the teens turned to him, the only adult in the group, falling silent. Midoriya cleared his throat. "Rito here has a Premonition quirk, but he needs line of sight. One of you or you-" he said, nodding to the two UA students whose quirks allowed them to fly. "Take him up high so that he can see the entire area- he should be able to predict any structures about to collapse so that we can prioritise them."

He half expected the teenagers to ignore him, but to his surprise the winged girl he'd nodded to saluted and gestured for Rito to climb on her back. The others looked at Midoriya expectantly, and he started giving orders. He paired the boy with the Bloodhound quirk and the girl with the Fireworks quirk to sniff out people trapped in already collapsed buildings and summon others, and split the other teams similarly, pairing himself with Rito when the boy returned.

Midoriya didn't have a quirk well-suited to this sort of situation, but the fake masonry and timber felt light in his hands as Rito directed him to the survivors, and he carried the volunteers who were roleplaying as man with broken rib or lady with concussion to their triage centre, until finally their time was up and the klaxon sounded again.

He took off his helmet and sat down in the mud, exhaustion hitting his body as the adrenaline receded.

If he'd thought hard about it, he could have come up with a better answer to Koenji's final question. Perhaps he should have refuted Yotsubashi's central thesis, and argued that quirk users were free.

Next to him, Rito climbed onto a piece of timber roofing that jutted awkwardly from the ground. The two of them hadn't talked, he realised, except about the task at hand.

"Sorry my team beat you," said Midoriya, quietly. An elderly volunteer tottered past, wearing a sash that read five year old with broken neck and spine.

"Yeah, well, thanks for not showboating," said Rito stiffly, adjusting his Shiketsu cap as he stared into the middle distance. "None of us were badly injured, and that meant we won our next match." He frowned, looking down at Midoriya. "Congratulations, by the way."

"What?" Midoriya looked around him, and scrambled back to his feet as he spotted a flash of pink- Uraraka walking towards him from the edge of the exam area. Rito's quirk was very short-term.

Uraraka was grinning as she approached, her hands behind her back. The old examiner, Koenji, trailed behind her, looking decidedly more serious.

"Mr Midoriya," Koenji began, his moustache bristle-stiff. "I must say that I had my reservations about your candidacy. But you strike me as a thoughtful and honourable man, and there can be no doubts as to your other qualifications."

"Thank you, examiner." Midoriya gave a bow and Koenji handed him his license. The little piece of plastic was somehow heavier than any of the beams he'd moved in the exercise, and he kept his head down in a bow as he felt tears prickle in his eyes.

"Now," said Uraraka, smiling broadly as she put an arm around his shoulders. "Now we get to put you to work."