I do not own My Hero Academia or JoJo's Bizarre Adventure.
Sitting on the ground with her knees under her, Ochako stared with rapt attention at the holographic projection of All Might. Behind her, her parents were also watching with their eyes glued on the figure of the Number One Hero. Somewhere above her was the couch.
"Now then, I'm sure you're wondering why I am giving the results for U.A.'s entrance exam. Quite simply, I am going to be teaching at U.A. come this school year." All Might said, "That information is not meant to be available to the general public yet, though. There should be a NDA contained in the letter that you'll need to sign."
Behind Ochako, she could hear her dad bending down to pick up the piece of paper that had fallen out of the envelope.
"But enough of that! On to your results. You'll be happy to hear that you passed the written portion. As for the practical, -" Ochako stopped breathing as All Might spoke, "-ordinarily, twenty-eight points would not be enough to pass. HOWEVER!"
Everyone in the room went completely still as they waited to hear what he would say.
"Let me show you this video!" All Might pointed a remote at a screen in the background. Ochako groaned internally, because if didn't get the results soon, she might die.
A quiet voice could be heard from behind camera, "Er, All Might, we don't really have time-"
They were cut off by the video that started playing. It showed the inside of some kind of office or classroom with two figures standing inside. One of them was the hero who did the presentation, the other was-
"Deku." Ochako said quietly. So, he really had gone to talk with the faculty on her behalf, not that she had really doubted that he would. What's more, it seemed like he actually succeeded!
"Um, Present Mic. S-sensei!" Deku hastily added the honorific at the last moment, "I need to talk to you about something."
The video paused, and All Might spoke again, "I'm sure you recognise this young man. He came to see us after immediately after the test. Why, you might ask? Stay tuned to find out!" He unpaused the video. As much as Ochako liked All Might, she really wished he'd stop dragging this out.
"Hmm? What can I do for you young listener? You want an autograph?" Present Mic asked as he turned to face the green-haired teen.
"DO I?!" Deku said excitedly, before snapping out of it, "Wait! No! I need to talk to you about something important! It's about the girl who saved me. Uraraka? I-" He paused, before suddenly blurting out, "I think you should give her more points!"
"Care to explain why you think we should?" Present Mic asked, rubbing his chin.
"Uh, well. She saved my life. Isn't that what heroes are supposed to do, save people? That alone should be worth points. An-and even if it's not, she surely would've been able to defeat more villains if she hadn't stopped to saved me, so could you at least give her the points she would've gotten. I guess you could argue that she should've focused on the exam, but when the Zero-Pointer is that big and dangerous, what do you expect to happen!?" With each word, he spoke faster and quieter. By his third sentence, Ochako was straining her ears to make out his words. However, he suddenly stopped as though he had realised something important, "W-wait... Did you expect this to happen? Was that the true purpose of the Zero-Pointer and- and the exam in general? To see if people would try to save others and act like heroes?"
"GOLD STAR!" Present Mic yelled in English, then went back to Japanese, "You figured it out. So, you don't need to worry about your hero getting points."
Deku sagged in relief. Ochako felt pretty close to collapsing herself. Both her parents also let out sighs at the good news.
"Um, so can I get that autogra-" The video ended and All Might started speaking again.
"Yes, as young Midoriya deduced, there was a secret factor to the exam, one that judged the character of those who participated. After all, strength is only part of being hero, more important is the drive to do good and help others! And as such, Rescue Points were also a factor!" All Might said, "For not only saving Midoriya's life, but also carrying him to safety, you, Uraraka Ochako, have earned FIFTY Rescue Points!
"Congratulations young Uraraka. You made it." All Might declared proudly, "I am honored to welcome you! To YOUR HERO ACADEMIA!"
As he spoke, a scoreboard showing the scores of the various passing examinees was displayed, but Ochako wasn't paying attention. She was too busy freaking out.
Laughter and shouts of 'Yes' filled the room as Ochako jumped into the air. While in mid jump, her dad grabbed her out of the air and pulled her into a massive hug, which her mom was quick to join. All three of them were going crazy in celebration. At some point during the hug, Ochako accidentally started floating both her parents.
She made it. She was going to be a hero.
...But for now, she had to get her parents down without the couch landing on them by accident.
-000-
In the dark of Izuku's bedroom, the hologram of All Might was wrapping up. It had been quite the surprise to find out that All Might was apparently going to be teaching at U.A., but it made some of his odd comments about their training being helpful for both of them make sense in retrospect. He had just finished explaining Rescue Points and telling Izuku how many he had received.
"I told you that having the heart of a hero would matter. Just like I told you that you would pass. Congratulation young Midoriya. I never doubted you for a second." All Might said fondly. It was more subdued than his usual boisterous attitude, more genuine, more like when he was Yagi-San, "Come now, Midoriya. To Your Hero Academia."
A scoreboard detailing the placement of the passing students appeared on screen. Izuku quickly scanned it for his name. He wasn't super concerned about how high he placed, but he was still curious to see how well he did.
3 | Midoriya Izuku | 32 | 42
3 | Kirishima Ejirou | 39 | 35
Oh, Izuku tied in third...
Wait! he got third place!
Izuku was stunned. That was way better than he was expecting to do. And to think he had been worried about getting in. Although, well over half of his points were Rescue Points, which he hadn't even realised would be a thing, so it kind of makes sense that he had no idea how well he'd do. Between helping those two other examinees and what All Might had called 'General Preventative Actions' (Which Izuku could only assume meant being careful to make sure nobody got hurt when he blew up a robot and whatnot) he earned thirty-seven Rescue Points. Then, he got another five for talking to Present Mic about giving Uraraka extra points, which All Might had called 'looking out for his fellow heroes'.
Speaking of Uraraka, he saw her name just above his in second place. With a total of seventy-eight points, she had way more Rescue Points than Villain Points. In fact, the other person Izuku shared third place with also had roughly half of their points be from rescue too. It seemed like Rescue Points were just as important as Villain Points, if not more so. He wondered if the top placement would also follow that trend.
1 | Bakugou Katsuki | 91 | 0
...Apparently not.
Wait, NINETY-ONE villain points! How the heck did Kacchan manage that! Considering that he also had zero rescue points, Izuku could only assume that he had been laser-focused on his objective. Honestly, that sounded exactly like Kacchan. Once he had a goal, he had blinders on to the rest of the world and sprinted towards his destination at top speeds. It was pretty much impossible to get him to notice anything that wasn't his target. If it wasn't important to what he was doing, he didn't care. Actually, Izuku wondered if Kacchan still called people nicknames since he never bothered to learn their names, they hadn't talked in a long time, and it's not like Izuku heard him talk to anyone else very often either. Again, Kacchan ignored basically everyone.
Izuku sighed, thinking about his former friend was bringing down his mood. Slapping both his hands to his cheeks, he forced a determined smile onto his face. It didn't make sense to feel bad now, he just got into U.A., he should be happy! His smile quickly became genuine at the thought of the fact that he made it in. He had to tell his mom! And Yagi-san too!
Oh... wait. Izuku looked back at the frozen hologram of All Might and felt rather silly.
Right, never mind then.
-000-
Silence filled the room. The hologram was paused on the screen displaying the scores of the people who passed the exam. Katsuki's eyes were fixed on the number one spot. Briefly, his eyes flicked down to second place, so as to compare their score to his own. He scored thirteen fucking points higher.
Holy shit... He actually did it.
Katsuki finally takes his eyes off the hologram and leans against his desk for support. He did it. He proved his strength, not just by coming in first, but by claiming the top spot by a landslide. Everything he had done to prepare for this payed off. All the hours, upon days, upon weeks, upon months, upon fucking years spent training, all sweat and injuries, all the burns, the sprained wrists, the sore muscles, the bruised skin, all of it had been worth it.
The doubt and fear that had been omnipresent for such a long time felt like it was evaporating. The ugly feelings that squirmed and churned in his gut finally stilled. They weren't gone, he'd never let them disappear completely. He held them tight, so that he'd remember what they felt like and what they meant. Katsuki needed to remember so that he'd never slow down, it was thanks to those repulsive feelings that he came this far after all. But, while they may not have been completely gone, they weren't suffocating like they used to be.
He felt oddly light. He finally reached one of the goals that he'd been chasing for so damn long. Not just getting into U.A., but that decisive victory that seemed like a pipe dream for such a long time. How long had it been since he felt like this, like he was on top of the world? Even if he knew he wasn't the strongest (That illusion had been shattered a long time ago), he still felt stronger than he had in a long time. He reached the first benchmark on his journey to number one, and suddenly the finish line didn't feel so far away as it once had.
Standing up, Katsuki made his way to his bedroom door. As he got close, he could hear his parents talking softly on the other side. Figures they'd hover just outside his damn room instead of giving him privacy like he wanted.
"It's way to quiet in there. It's weird." His mom said in that bizarre tone that you would only be able to recognise as concern if you knew her well.
"I'm sure he's fine." His dad said in the voice he used whenever he had to try and calm one of them down, which was often, "It's probably just-"
Katsuki interrupted him by yanking his door open. He tried to glare at them, but it was undone by the smile he couldn't wipe off his face. Not a feral grin or one of his usual scowl-smiles mind you, but an actual genuine smile.
"Oh gods, he's smiling. Who are you and what did you do with my son." His mom said, only half teasing.
"Shut up, you old hag. And why the hell are you hanging outside my room. Haven't either of you ever heard of privacy." Kastuki snapped, but it lacked any of his usual bite. Most of the time his shouts towards parents were just for show, but this one was particularly phoned-in.
"Never mind, that's him." His hag said, ruffling his hair. He halfheartedly smacked her hand away.
"So, how'd you do?" His dad asked.
"First fucking place." Katsuki answered, his smile growing and taking on a hint of his usual savage tint.
"That's what I expect from you!" His hag said, grabbing him and pulling him into a hug, "Hell, I'm surprised we didn't a bill for damages, since you fucking destroyed that exam!"
"Really dear?" His dad asked with a sigh, as he joined in the hug.
"What!? Mom jokes can be a thing too!" She protested.
Normally, when one of his parents, especially his mom, tried to show him any kind of affection, he'd yell and squirm a lot first before finally giving in and accepting it. Katsuki didn't want to act like he actually wanted it. But this time, a single curse thrown their way and about two seconds worth of half-assed struggling was all he bothered with before relenting to the hug.
He didn't really feel much of a need for the tough guy act right now. After all, he had finally seen real proof of how strong he was.
Same as last time, I wanted to write another slower chapter. I'm also trying to remember just how much time passed between the exam and the first day of school at U.A.
When I was trying to decide how many Rescue Points to give the characters, I thought the 60 rescue points Izuku got in canon felt like a bizarrely high number. After all, Uraraka saved him from falling to death and was willing to give up her points to help him out but she only got 45 Rescue Points. So why did he get 60 for saving her? So, I thought of two reasons why he might've gotten so many points. First idea is because punching the giant robot just looked awesome. Like, almost all of the faculty was marveling over how strong his quirk was and decided to give him a high score, meanwhile Aizawa was sitting there in the corner annoyed at his coworker's illogical behavior. The other possible reason for the high score is that, by destroying the Zero Pointer, he wound up protecting literally all of the other examinees, so they gave him a ton of points for saving everyone.
Fun fact, Uraraka in this chapter beat Katsuki's canon score by one point. If I hadn't bumped up Katsuki's score, she would've placed in first.
The soft Bakugou family scene was simultaneously hard to write and also added an extra ten years to my lifespan.
VladImpaler: I mean, Izuku does canonically draw heroes in his notebooks. I can't actually remember if he was ever shown doing it for his classmates (I think he was), but it is a common trope in BNHA fanfiction to have him sketch his friends. Yeah, it could be considered creepy though.
Also, I said Inko is not going to get a Stand from Izuku. Sorry, but you must have misread that part.