Two months.
They went so quickly, Izuku was sure someone had used his Erasure projector on him. He spent his days terrifying the students, working with Mei and Nezu in their lessons. Whenever he wasn't doing his lessons, he was hanging out with Mei, and if he wasn't doing either of those, he was watching TV or playing video games with Katsuki.
Izuku had offered to get Katsuki a recommendation, but he had just yelled at Izuku for even thinking he wouldn't be good enough to beat the practical exam, so Izuku stopped offering. Nezu had increased the difficulty of their lessons (as much as he could, Izuku was doing work that even 50yr old scientists struggled with and Mei wasn't very far behind).
And then, the day of the exam arrived. His exam was a day earlier than the Hero course one because he and Mei were going into the support course. As Izuku finished gathering up his usuals; [Power belt], [Control Goggles], [Self-tying Shoes], [Erasure projector], etc, he waited in the common area for Mei, who he could hear was getting her best stuff as well.
Mei was more focused on the technology side of their babies, filling gaps that Quirks couldn't or rarely filled, as opposed to Izuku replication and improvement. This meant that most of her 'babies' could be used by almost anyone, without any significant difficulty. He only had to wait a few minutes, before Mei came walking out, holding a large bag.
Izuku picked it up for her with his Telekinesis, and she shot him a thankful smile that put a smile of his own on his face. He didn't even know why. Whenever he saw Mei smiling, or doing anything really, he just seemed to smile. He had told his mum, and she had just laughed and said that Kan's job was going to be easy, whatever that meant.
As they walked together to the exam room, they got a few weird looks, but Izuku was used to that by now, the goggles and thick belt gave him a sci-fi scientist vibe, which he sort of was. He liked that. "So Mei-day. seeing as we already know we're getting in, you wanna mess around with everyone?" Mei gave him another smile that made him feel warm in the chest and nodded.
After they had each had 'the talk' from their respective parents, they had stopped announcing themselves as 'baby-making partners' as they both agreed it was time to find another way of saying it, so they settled on business partners. But every now and then, when they wanted to mess with people, they would talk about their babies and their 'baby-making sessions' and how they were going to 'make babies' later.
Basically making everyone uncomfortable, which was hilarious to the 2 of them. (More than Nezu's intelligence rubbed off on the 2) "Hell yea Izu! It's always fun to see people's reactions, and you know how much it makes Power-Loader squirm". She giggled at this and Izuku briefly felt sorry for the Hero. Mei had latched onto him and hadn't let go, bugging the teacher near constantly for tips and tricks, designs and materials.
Power Loader had quickly learned that you just say yes to Nezu's students, or at least Izuku, as they wouldn't ask for anything unnecessary. It also stopped Mei from bugging him further if he just gave her what she wanted. Mei was fine with the arrangement.
They arrived outside of the exam room, a large hall filled with their possible peers, not that any of them were going to be keeping up with the 2 N-1 students. They nodded to each other, before going into their favourite skit.
They started walking down the middle of the path, talking slightly louder than normal. "Izu! You should have seen what our baby did this morning! It rolled around the living room before releasing fluid all over the carpet!" The opening line, complete. Reactions? Awkward looks/ disgusted stares. Stage one complete.
"Wow, Mei-day! That's disgusting! We'll have to make a new baby tonight to replace the broken one!" Comeback, complete. Reactions? Disgusted looks/shuffling away. PERFECT. They reached their seats and continued like this, keeping their voices loud and making sure everyone in earshot could hear what amounted to Gadget talk, cleverly disguised as talking about children.
It was even better when Power-Loader walked past them, squirming a bit, before sighing deeply. "Please stop it you too, your drawing way too much attention to yourselves". Mei tilted her head as she gave Power-Loader a look of confusion and amusement that made Izuku's heart flutter. It was really freaking cute!
"Too much attention? Sir, we are going to sell our awesome stuff! We should have as much attention on us as possible!" Power Loader sighed again, before heading up onto the stage, and the two of them laughed before someone behind them shushed them. This caused them to giggle a bit more. Power Loader then tapped the microphone at the front a few times, before starting his speech.
"Good Morning UA applicants! It is great to see so many young people interested in the support department!" he ruffled the papers in his hands a bit, flipping over to a new page. "You are probably wondering what you have to do for this test. Well, as the application letter said, you were meant to bring in 3 devices of your own creation, and there will also be a written test".
Izuku and Mei gave each other a look. They had already done tests far more advanced than the one they were getting today, and they wondered if Nezu would give them a harder test than the other applicants. He probably would, that was a very Nezu thing to do.
"You will have an Hour and a Half to complete the written exam, before being separated up into 15 groups of 5 for individual review". He scanned the crowd, eyes landing on Izuku and Mei for a second longer than they should have. "If you received a recommendation you will be in group A, these people include:-"
Power loader than went on to list who was in each examination group, before test sheets were handed out and the written portion of the test started. They had been right. Mei confirmed that their tests were for 3rd-year transfer students, while the other applicants had the 1st year test.
Izuku chuckled, before diving into the test, completing it fully in about 25 minutes. Nezu must have known Izuku's seat, as it had a small treadmill on the ground below it so that Izuku wouldn't suffer from too bad of Hyper-activity build-up.
Mei finished up at around the 35-minute mark, grinning over at Izuku, who grinned back, feeling warmer. The 1.5 hours eventually came to an end, and they were separated into their groups. Izuku and Mei were both put into group A, as they were technically recommended, students.
They walked together to the exam room. And when I say walked, I obviously mean Izuku floated the two of them and all of their stuff down the hallway into the large square room with desk forming a circle.
They grabbed two tables next to each other and set up what they could. Izuku pulled out his [Erasure projector] and was planning to show off his belt and Goggles. Power Loader was already familiar with them, of course, but they would still place him above all the other applicants, probably combined, except maybe Mei.
AS people started trickling into the room, the 2 of them got excited. Izuku had already prepped some video space on the Goggles and was going to record the other's Quirks. Mei smiled fondly as Izuku ran over to the first person to walk in, a tall girl with purple eyes and pure white hair.
"HI THERE"
The girl was definitely not ready for Izuku. She had just put his stuff down under the desk, and when she looked up, there was a green-haired boy floating in front of her face. She stumbled back a bit, before righting herself.
"My name is Midoriya Izuku! What's yours!?" he floated a little closer, sticking out his hand for her to shake. She took it cautiously, shaking his hand. His grin widened even further. She did a small bow and responded. "My name is Miakuto Semu, it is a pleasure to meet you Midoriya".
Izuku waved his hand. "The pleasure is all mine! If you don't mind, I'm very enthusiastic about Quirks, what is yours!?" She looked at him sceptically, before seemingly relenting, and explained her Quirk to him.
She held up her hand in front of her face, and it transformed into a socket wrench before his eyes. "I call it Tool Kit. I'm able to change any of my extremities, from my fingers to my legs, into various different tools. If I focus hard enough, I can create a simple drill, but otherwise, I can't do electrical equipment".
She looked back up to see the boy's hands moving as if he was writing, mumbling. She saw the pink-haired girl laughing at him from her desk. The pink-haired girl grabbed a wad of paper and chucked it at the boys head, and he snapped out of it on contact. "That's such a cool Quirk! You were practically made for Support Item creation!
"So useful as well!" That surprised her. Most of the kids at her old school had told her it was a worthless Quirk only useful for tightening bolts and hammering nails. "I can tell you use it to build stuff, but can you make forks and knives and stuff like that? Regular cutlery, maybe even pencils or pens?"
She was startled. The boy had known her for literally 3 minutes and was already picking her Quirk apart. "Well, I can make forks and knives, but I've never tried to make a pen before". He waved his hand as if signalling to try, so she did. And to her surprise, a small ball-point pen appeared instead of her pointer finger.
"Woah, your really good at Quirk analysis Midoriya, I hope that we will be in the same class!" He bowed, still floating, and wandered off to the next new person, starting a conversation with them. The Pink haired girl walked over laughing. "Please don't mind Izu, he's very passionate and excitable about Quirks! They help him make his babies!"
Semu gasped as the pink-haired girl walked away laughing, plopping back down into her chair. She turned to the green-haired boy in confusion. Babies? He was the same age as the rest of them? A mystery, for sure.
Izuku was LOVING this exam. It would be a while until their examiner would arrive, probably either Power Loader or Nezu himself, meaning Izuku had time to meet all the new people! He liked Semu's Quirk, it was useful, but not very replicable. Maybe he could make a shape-shifting multi-tool! With a thought, he got [MUM 2.0] to put the idea on his ever-growing list.
He went around the room, meeting the 2 other recommended applicants after Semu, a pair of twins named Jun and Yejun Marioka. There Quirk allowed them, while near each other, to share memories and become 3x smarter, each. Izuku again, LOVED there Quirk, but again it wasn't replicable, meaning that past the usual enthusiasm, he had no reason to continue questioning them about it, instead choosing to talk about being a twin, as he was curious.
This went on for a while until finally, the door opened, and Nezu entered. The applicants immediately quietened down, standing behind their desks. Nezu straightened his tie, before calling out to Semu to step into the other room to show off her inventions. She picked up her bags and walked inside, coming out a few minutes later with a small smile.
Going next was the twins, they went in separately before going in together to talk to Nezu. They came out a little while later before Nezu called Izuku in. When he entered the room, he found it practically bare, with Nezu sitting at a desk, holding a sheet of paper. He floated over to Nezu and saw him stamp the accepted box.
"I accept you into UA high Izuku Midoriya! Please don't tell anyone about how quick it was. I'm not worried about accusations of favouritism, but you don't want to be disliked by your classmates do you?" Izuku shook his head, and Nezu pulled up a chessboard. "Would you like to play a match? I'll even take off the [Cognition Amplifier]."
Izuku nodded and they played a match, and Izuku got absolutely flogged. He may be smart, but Nezu was an absolute master at chess, even without the Cog Amp. He exited the room, smiling broadly, waving Mei in as Nezu called for her. She walked in, and when she came out a few minutes later, Izuku Smiled and walked over to her.
He didn't even have to ask if she got it. She gave him a big hug that brought a blush to his face and warmth to his chest. They were both now officially UA students!
After spending the night watching movies with Inko and the Hatsume's to celebrate them getting into UA, Mei had fallen asleep on the couch, her head on Izuku shoulders, pinning him down, while Izuku was getting ready for his assignment in the morning.
Nezu had asked him to be there as a judge for the Hero course Physical exam, and had even given him one veto slot! Izuku was allowed to choose one applicant at the end of the exam that would be put into the class of Izuku's choosing! And while it was an unpopular decision with a few of the staff, Nezu allowed it anyway.
Izuku had half a mind to just select Katsuki now, but he knew he should have faith in his friend. He would save his Veto for someone he thought deserved the spot. He was super excited, but he couldn't jump around or he would wake Mei up, and he knew that if he did she wouldn't fall asleep again, and Izuku couldn't have that.
At Kan's insistence, Izuku had been put in charge of making sure Mei got the proper amount of sleep, so as to not lead to any doomsday weapons being constructed. He was still trying to find a Quirk he could use to put Mei to sleep, He had tried Midnight's, but it was reliant on a mutation, so he wouldn't be able to replicate it easily. He continued his search to this day.
As he was sorting the papers in front of him with telekinesis, he felt Mei stir next to him and instantly froze. Her head had fallen and had landed in his lap before he could grab it. He stayed frozen until he was sure that she wouldn't wake up, before patting her head softly, returning to his sorting. It helped that he didn't need his hands for the telekinesis anymore, it was like another, multi-purpose, limb.
He continued his sorting and writing for a few more hours, still patting Mei's head, which gave him weird feelings in his chest. His mum was no help, she wouldn't tell him anything, and when he had asked Kan the man had wrapped the boy up in a hug before running off laughing.
So neither of them were any help. He wanted to ask Nezu, but he kind of suspected that the rat was running an experiment on him, and would just deny anything and everything, so he probably wouldn't be very helpful. So Izuku thought about it to himself. He hadn't had much time to dedicate to the topic, as he had been focused on preparing for the exams, but he was stuck under Mei, so he might as well.
He made a list of factors. Definitely somehow connected to Mei. Weird feeling in his chest, almost like his heart-clenching, due to random things she did. Most often appeared when she smiled at him or when they were making a baby together or just talking or cuddling as they sat on the couch, or- Okay, so it was pretty much whenever he was with Mei.
What did those factors mean? They had started around a year ago, but he had no idea what they meant. Maybe he should look it up? If the people in his life won't help him, maybe strangers on the internet will? He looked up "Weird feeling in chest when around best friend" and had a look through the first few websites, which were all about dating and relationships, which confused him.
He eventually reached a Reddit post (yes, Reddit is still running, and it's extremely popular) from r/AskReddit, where a 15 yr old boy (AKA the perfect person for Izuku's investigation to focus on) asking a similar question. Looking through the comments, Izuku had to admit that the evidence pointed to one specific answer.
Apparently, these weird feelings were the result of a crush on someone. This wasn't something he had any experience in, except for maybe in like year 5? But he couldn't really remember back that far, he had like 6 years of 24/7 days in between the present and that memory. Did he have a crush on Mei? That's what the science was pointing to, but surely not, right?
Mei was his best friend, his business partner, and the person he spent and had planned on spending the rest of his days with- Oh shit he liked Mei. He had already sort of planned out his life to be living with Mei, making babies and helping heroes for the rest of his life. This was big for him. What should he do? Now that he had made the observation, maybe his mum would help?
But what does liking her change? They spent nearly every one of her waking hours with each other anyway, so why risk their friendship by telling her about his crush? Or maybe he should tell her because they're such good friends? She probably does deserve to know, he told her everything.
Maybe he should tell her before the Practical Exam tomorrow? Or maybe after? She had been asked to watch as well, and she had been given a veto as well, so maybe he shouldn't give her something else to think about before she makes the best decision possible?
And maybe he was just having a small panic attack about this and just needed to calm down. If he broke down he would probably wake up Mei, and he had promised Kan to take care of her. Oh god, what should he do about Kan?! Maybe he already knew? Maybe that was why he laughed?
Izuku, now realising he was panicking, quickly grabbed a nearby [Erasure Projector], set a timer for the projector to turn off at 6:30, and pressed the On Button after getting into a position where he wouldn't fall onto Mei. His vision turned black immediately as he fell asleep for the 3rd time ever since getting his Quirk.
His vision snapped back into swirling colours.
He shook his head and they solidified, and he saw that he was now lying down on the couch, which was weird since he went to sleep sitting up. He looked down and saw Mei now curled up around him, face smooshed into his chest, hugging him tightly in her sleep. He knew that she would probably wake up soon, thanks to him being the one to enforce her sleep cycle.
His chest did the weird clenching thing and his face grew hot as he looked at her, and he knew he was blushing. He wanted to get up, but he also really didn't want to stop this, he was comfy, being hugged by his best friend/possible crush, and had just realised that he had been hugging her back in his sleep.
He found it weird that his body would move while he was asleep, something for further study, but as Mei started to wake up he pushed it out of his head. She came too slowly, seemingly confused about her location. She eventually seemed to realise, looking at Izuku, a blush of her own forming on her face.
Wait what!? She was blushing as well? Did that mean she liked him back? Was that how these things worked? He thought for a moment at the thing she had researched, most of them dealt with guys, so he didn't know if it was the same for girls. Maybe he shouldn't jump to any conclusions.
Mei quickly got off of him, unravelling herself from the hug they had found themselves in, mumbling a 'good morning' before running up to her room. Izuku watched, confused. He shook his head, he needed to focus on the exam coming up. He couldn't afford to be distracted and pick the wrong person.
He went up to his room to shower and get dressed, and Mei was gone by the time he got back, which was weird. He got up and started to walk towards the viewing room. On the way, he decided to swing past the workshop to see if his experiment had succeeded.
Lately, he had the epiphany that with the [Technopathy Module], he would be able to almost instantly program robots and other autonomous devices. He had set up an experiment a few days ago and wanted to check if it was done. He arrived at his and Mei's personal workshop.
He noticed 2 things, One: Mei wasn't there. She was probably waiting at the viewing room, but it still made his chest do the weird thing again, but he shook his head and focused. Two: his experiment had been a success. The automatic builder he had created had finished the project. The [Automatic Builder] was vaguely similar to the machines used to build cars.
It had a central platform, where the device would end up, built to its entirety, and then had the building parts all around it. He had set it up last night to build very specific blueprints for a project he had been putting off for way to long and was thrilled with the results. Standing in front of him, plugged into the wall, charging its mobile battery, was a working suit of [T-45 Power Armour] from [Fallout].
He briefly wondered if Nezu would allow him to wear it to the viewing room, before coming to the conclusion that if Nezu let him abduct students, it would probably be fine to wear a big metal suit. Hey, that's exactly what Power Loader did! Just not as complicated. He put the suit on and it booted up, the HUD on the screen showing a full-body image of the [MUM 2.0] at the side, as well as a power meter and a scanner.
The suit finished booting up, and he started running towards the Viewing room, as he had spent a long time in the workshop, and now only had around 10 minutes until the practical part of the exam started. He reached the room and heavily overestimated his ability to stop quickly, crashing into the door, knocking it clean from its hinges.
As he entered the room, most of the teachers got into battle-ready stances, before seeing the insignia on the front of his suit. In the middle of the chest was a green circle with the black silhouette of a bunny's face, with X's instead of eyes. All of Izuku's gadgets were branded with this logo, but everyone outside of the UA staff only knew it as Ins0mniacs Profile Picture.
"Izuku, what the actual fuck man?" Present Mic spoke up, speaking what was on everyone's minds, but Nezu was giving him a sadistic grin, and Mei was staring in awe. Izuku had made her play Fallout before, so she recognised the suit.
"Well, Hizashi. This is the T-45 Power armour! Its a versatile suit of armour that increases my physical strength by a factor of 20, and if it works correctly, allow me to take a hit from someone like power loader's exo-suit with no problems!" He did a few stretches in the suit, testing the joints. He could hear the hydraulics going off as he did.
"Anyway, aren't you meant to be in the exam hall Hizashi? You were written down to be the MC". Izuku added this on calmly as he took the helmet off of his Power Armour, and Present Mic jolted out of his seat and sprinted to the exam room. Izuku and Nezu laughed, Mei joined in with a small giggle.
He went down to where Nezu was sitting, passing a strange blond man that was coughing blood (holy shit) and sat down next to Nezu. He brought used his Telekinesis to bring a packet of tissues towards him, making them land in the blond's lap. He seemed surprised, but looked over to Izuku and nodded.
As the examinee's gathered around the gates, Izuku had his Arena B drone fly around above the examinee's, pulling up file after file, looking at their Quirks and their academic history, to find any people that stood out to him. There were a few people with impressive middle schools, mostly rich kids and children of Pro Hero's, like Iida Tenya.
There were also a few students with Quirks that interested Izuku, and Nezu laughed as Izuku saved a few students files to his list already. The first out of the Arena B group to get on Izuku's list was one Uraraka Ochako, who's Zero Gravity Quirk fascinated Izuku to no end.
He was glad that he had been able to convince Nezu to have the applicants send in a video of their Quirks in action, and as he watched Uraraka's video, he found himself rooting for her. A bit out of the desire to study her Quirk, but from the way she interacted with the other applicants, calming a purple-haired boy down as he had an obvious panic attack, he wanted her to get in because she would make an excellent hero.
Just because he was already there, he flew down in front of the two and got the face of the purple-haired boy. The two of them looked at the drone in confusion, and the little arm that Izuku had installed on them gave them a small wave and a thumbs up.
The boy's name was Hitoshi Shinsou, Quirk: Brainwashing. Verbal Implantation into victim-activated when they respond. Not very helpful in this exam, but not even Izuku had been able to get Nezu to change the exam to be fairer to non-combat Quirks. Nezu apparently loved watching people blow robots up more than he liked fairness.
As Present Mic gave everyone the go-ahead, and the applicants started sprinting into the arena's, Izuku started switching back and forth between all the screens, adding people to his list, before eventually, the time to release the 0-Pointer was at hand.
Nezu pushed the button, and the Arena's started to rumble.
Uraraka was having a pretty rough day.
She had woken up later than she had wanted too, almost missing her train. She realised she was wearing the wrong pair of sneakers, she grabbed her old pair. She had tried to stop a blonde boy from face planting out front of UA as he tripped but was thrown to the ground by explosions from the boy's hands.
The exam had actually gone pretty good. She was at around 32 points, and there was only a minute left. There were some people with higher scores, such as the fast boy up to around 45, but for someone with a utility Quirk, she liked to think she did pretty good in this combat exercise.
She was still thinking about the thumbs-up robot that had flown down to Her and Shinsou as she calmed him down, but the thought was thrown out of her head as the ground started rumbling. Next thing she knew, there was a crack and she was thrown to the ground, pain emanating from her ankle, that was trapped under some rubble.
She turned to try and reach the rubble. And that's when she saw it. The behemoth of steel. The 0-Pointer loomed over the arena, casting its shadow over everyone. People started to run away from it, and she tried to pull herself from under the rubble to run too but cried out in pain when she tried to move her leg.
She saw the purple-haired boy from earlier turn back towards her, and she could see the fear in his eyes turn into determination. He grabbed for the fast boy in the blue jumpsuit and yelled something at him. The second the blue-haired boy responded to the yelling, his arms stopped chopping through the air, and he busted towards her with the Purple-haired boy on his back.
The Purple-haired boy jumped off as they got to her, and grabbed her hand as the blue-haired boy lifted the rubble off of her leg. "Hi, my name is Hitoshi, I'll be your rescuer for today. Can you stand?" She shook her head no, and he nodded. "What's your name?" That one she could do. "It's Uraraka Ochako-"
Suddenly her mind went blank, the pain in her leg fading, and before she knew it, she was standing outside of the arena, and Present Mic was yelling about how the exam was over! She tried to remember what happened during the last 2 minutes, but all she could remember was giving Hitoshi her name, and then, safety?
Shaking her head, she got healed by Recovery Girl and went home, awaiting her letter.
Izuku had watched with excitement during the exam, seeing plenty of people worth Veto-ing, just for their Quirks. He shook his head. He had to stop thinking of people as only their Quirks. It was wrong and it was really dark.
As he watched the Arena B 0-pointer nearly crush one of the people on his list [who was going to get in, so he didn't have to Veto her] he was worried, but soon Iida kid was running in with the Brainwasher on his back, saving the girl. Izuku looked up his scores. While Iida would be getting into UA, Hitoshi hadn't done well enough to get into the hero course, and had just barely got accepted into Gen Ed.
But Izuku knew that his Quirk was probably the worst to have for an exam like this. He could see how useful of a hero Hitoshi could be He tapped Mei on the shoulder, ignoring his crush on her for a moment. They compared Veto Lists before Izuku tapped Nezu on the shoulder.
He had Hitoshi's file on the screen as he passed it over to Nezu. Nezu raised an eyebrow at his selection. "Are you sure Izuku?" Izuku nodded.
"Yes sir, I want him in 1-A"