Chapter 9: Internships: Kinetica
Toschi gawked before the enormous tower, staring up at the large planet sculpture on the roof hundreds of feet above him. Ayabuska nudged his arm, grinning, and tilted her head in the direction of the door. The two of them, plus the second-year winner, stepped through the glass entryway and were greeted by a secretary.
"Welcome! You three are the interns, I presume? Please change into your hero costumes in the respective locker rooms and head to the top floor. All Might will be waiting for you there."
Ayabuska left to the female locker room, and Toschi and the other student went to the male locker room. As Toschi slipped his chest plate on, the student held out his hand.
"Rashido Kasabaki," he said, and Toschi returned the gesture.
"Toschi Hatsume. You nervous?"
"A little," he said as he pulled his hood over his head. His costume consisted of loose, baggy pants and an oversized sleeveless hoodie, and Toschi saw a thin armored tank top under it. "We're going to be working with All Might and his sidekick, Sir Nighteye. It's gonna be a bit stressful making a good impression, especially Nighteye. I hear he's really stern and intimidating."
"Yeah, it's gonna be a tough week trying to keep up with those two. I think Nighteye doesn't go do all the fighting, he helps with the logistic aspect of the agency and directs All Might to trouble."
The two left the locker room, chatting casually, and entered the elevator. When the doors opened, they were greeted by Ayabuska, and Toschi held back a laugh as Kasabaki slapped a hand over his nose to keep it from bleeding. She laughed and spun around, showing off her costume. The third-year's costume consisted of a red, skin-tight leotard and boots. It framed her curvy body snugly and had white lines crossing over her arms, down her chest, and along the sides of her legs. A white cape flowed down her back and down to her ankles, and she wore a set of goggles on her forehead. Two rocket nozzles extended out of her elbows, and Toschi saw another one on the sole of her upturned boot.
"What do you think, boys?~" she teased, strutting between them. "I had it made out of a fireproof carbon-nylon fiber alloy that's nearly tear-proof. It's water resistant, and it can survive in outer space. Have you ever been to space? It's great, you'd love it."
A large door opened behind them, and a booming voice filled their brains.
"I AM HERE… TO BEGIN THE INTERNSHIPS!"
The three turned and gasped. All Might stood before them, fists on his hips, a proud smile on his face. "Welcome, young heroes!" he said, spreading his arms wide. "I trust that you all are excited for your internships here? Now, before we begin, I would like you to introduce yourselves and your Quirks. I have a general understanding, but for us to work together it is important that we all know each other's limits so that we can overcome them together. Young lady, how about you go first?"
"I'm Delta Vee," Ayabuska said, stepping forward. "My Quirk is Rocket: it gives me rocket thrusters on my feet and elbows. My body turns the food I eat into a type of rocket fuel, and I can ignite it to fly and deliver extremely powerful punches. I can fly at over five times the speed of sound, and I can separate oxygen from my fuel so that I can breathe at high altitudes. My costume is made of a special material that allows my rockets to adjust my body temperature, and all of that allows me to travel through outer space."
"A phenomenal Quirk!" All Might exclaimed. "You have great potential in you, young hero."
Kasabaki introduced himself next. "I'm Gemini, and my Quirk is Morphogenesis. I can transform up to two of any of my body parts into any object. I can create shields, weapons, and even machines and vehicles, and I can move and control the objects I transform my body into, no matter how heavy."
"A powerful Quirk indeed, young hero! A strong combat type, I expect." He turned to Toschi. "And now, the young hero who saved our city.
"I'm Kinetica. My Quirk is Stasis, and it allows me to lock any object in position for a time relative to its mass. Any force applied to it while it is locked will be converted into kinetic energy when it is released, but higher concentrations of kinetic energy are harder for me to safely control."
"Excellent," All Might said, placing his hands on their shoulders. "All three of you have very powerful Quirks. You all have the potential to do great things. Now, let's begin. Sir Nighteye has been finding trouble throughout the city for you all to fight. You three will work together to defeat criminals. Fear not, they should not be a problem for the strong students you are, but if you encounter anything too dangerous, either Sir Nighteye or I will come to help. We want you three to do this all on your own; this is practice for when you are on your own, possibly running your own hero agencies. Good luck young heroes!" He leapt through an open sunroof, disappearing into the sky. The three students gazed at where All Might had departed from, then Delta turned to face the two.
"Alright, since I'm the oldest one here, I will assume to role of leader. Who here is best at combat?" Gemini raised his hand and it became a morning star, a heavy, spiked metal ball attached to a chain. "Alright, you can lead the way into any fights we get into. Kinetica, how good are you with problem solving?"
"I built this costume myself." He pressed a few buttons, and the suit transformed a few times, Delta pouting when she saw the rocket thrusters appear on his elbows.
"Fine, you're kind of a wild card. You can pretty much do anything we need you to. And, since I'm the best in my class, I'll create strategies for us to take on each fight as efficiently and quickly as possible. I'll also distract villains so that you two can take them down."
"How are you going to do that?" Gemini asked, and she smirked, squeezing her arms together in front of her. Brushing past the blushing teens, she pressed the call button for the elevator.
"Let's go see Nighteye and get our assignments."
An hour later, people screamed as the gang of masked criminals shot their rifles into the air, bursting down the door to the bank. "EVERYONE GET THE FUCK DOWN AND NOBODY GETS HURT!" The lead robber grabbed a child from a screaming mother and pointed his gun at the lone security guard. "If you even think about calling for help, I'll blow this little brat's brains all over the wall! I mean it, my Quirk lets me read minds!" Three of the robbers took off towards the vault, and the other five stayed behind, guns pointed at the hostages. One of the three placed his hand on the vault door, and it shrank, falling to the floor with a quiet ting. The biggest one walked in and lifted his shirt. On his belly, a large mouth opened up, and the other two began dumping money and gold into the mouth.
On the roof, Delta Vee landed, smoke trailing from her elbows and knees. She reached to a small earpiece radio. "Kinetica, what's it look like in there?"
"Eight of them, armed with rifles." He was in a building across the street, a video projection streaming from his wrist. It showed a view of the inside of the bank, taken from the security cameras. "Nobody's hurt yet, but they look serious. The leader has a kid in his arm."
"We need to get the people out of there somehow," Gemini said from beside him. His fingers had transformed into thin cables, one hand plugged into Kinetica's suit, and the other snaking down through an electrical box, under the road, and into the security room in the bank. "Should we try to knock out everyone in there with gas or something?"
"Not an option," Delta said. "We don't know what those guy's Quirks are, and if we try something like that they may start shooting."
"One of the guys in the vault has some kind of mouth thing on his stomach, and they're filling it with money." Kinetica zoomed in the video feed. "Another of them shrank the vault door, and the third one is another mutant-type. He's big and scaly, kinda looks like a crocodile."
"Can you tell what any of the others have?"
"Gemini, can you make a drone or something? I have an idea." Gemini closed his eyes, and a chunk of his hair swirled and glowed, quickly forming into a small, spider-like robot. Kinetica held out his palm, and the robot hopped onto it. The nanobots on his hand glowed, and lines of code flowed through the spider's eyes. It hopped off and climbed into the electrical box, slinking through into the bank. Kinetica flipped down his visor, and his vision was filled with the robot's view of the room. His fingertips glowed, and as he moved his hands, the robot moved accordingly. He piloted the drone up to the ceiling, its little legs skittering along as he positioned it over the criminals. It lowered itself on a tiny wire, and snipped a tiny piece of hair from each criminal, putting them into a compartment on its back. After a few seconds, five profiles popped up in Kinetica's visor.
"Yep, one of them can control gases. That rules out that plan."
"Well, we can't go in there," Gemini said, the cables turning back into fingers. "It's too much of a risk to the civilians. We'll have to get them when they come out."
"I agree," Delta said, "My Quirk doesn't work well in an enclosed area like that. Kinetica, you got a plan?"
He was thinking hard, watching the villains reach the last few piles of money in the vault. "Gemini and I will create shields to protect the buildings, and we'll trap them in the crossroads of the street."
Gemini looked over at him, and Delta called in from the radio. "What are you thinking right now?"
"Delta, have you ever heard of a fuel-air explosion?"
Two minutes later, the criminals burst out into the streets, randomly firing their weapons at civilians as they fled. As they ran into the center of the road, two large blue walls burst up in front of them. They looked around in confusion, and two black walls popped up behind them, trapping them in the street. Outside, Kinetica's nanobots had formed the blue walls, and Gemini's hands were the other two. The villains heard what sounded like a sprinkler, and they looked up to see a woman in a red suit flying above them, a brown mist coming from her elbows. They raised their guns to shoot at her, but the mist began burning holes through their rifles as it touched them.
"Rocket fuel is highly corrosive," she explained to the scared criminals. One's hair rose like a cobra's hood, and he spat a stream of venom at Delta Vee, who dodged to the side. Her brows furrowed as she glared at them, and the thrusters on her elbows began to glow. "Improvised Super Move:" she began, then streams of flames shot from her elbows towards the cloud of rocket fuel mist. "Thermobaric Hellburst!"
The flame touched a single droplet of the fuel, and the entire cloud exploded. The sudden combustion of the fuel created a powerful rush of intense heat that released a massive shockwave downward at the villains, flames shooting into the air, narrowly missing Delta Vee. The explosion had the strength of a MOAB, around 18,000 pounds of TNT. Kinetica ducked as part of the wall bowed outward from the force of the blast, barely staying in one piece. A pillar of smoke rose from the middle of the walls, and Gemini transformed the walls back into hands. The criminals were sprawled out on the ground, unconscious. They were covered in burns, and several of them seemed to have broken bones. One of them had sprayed a wall of water at the incoming blast just before it ignited, which probably had saved their lives, taking the brunt of the shockwave and heat.
As police and heroes arrived to secure the scene and take care of the people in the bank, Kinetica felt a pit in his stomach when he saw what had happened to the criminals. His knees gave out, and he fell back, eyes filled with regret and fear. Delta landed next to him, rubbing his back.
"Hey, you good? It's okay, we stopped them."
"I almost killed them…" he muttered, not looking at her. "I didn't think your fuel was that reactive, I thought it would just knock them out, not nearly kill them."
Gemini kneeled down next to him, along with a police officer. "They're all gonna be fine, man, they'll just be in the hospital for a while. Besides, this was the best outcome in this scenario."
"Gemini here told us you made sure to take measures to protect the citizens," the police officer said, "Kinetica, is that it? You did good, if you hadn't thought to create those walls, the blast probably would have leveled the block."
"The police are gonna take over everything from here, Kinetica," Delta said, helping him stand. "Let's go back to the agency and make our report, and head out again. He nodded, and Gemini began to transform his legs, the light folding around him into a red convertible. Kinetica climbed in, and Delta blasted off, Gemini following as they made their way back to Nighteye. Kinetica was silent for a few minutes, before finally speaking.
"I gotta come up with less dangerous plans," he said, and Gemini laughed.
"Nah, that was fun! Let's do that some more!"
Three days later, on Thursday, the trio were out early in the morning. After spending the previous day helping All Might, they were going back out solo again. Over the past four days, they had stopped almost 30 crimes across the city, each one of them having their own difficulties. Kinetica was still a bit shaken from their first fight, letting the other two come up with the plans. Gemini had gotten food poisoning the second day from a villain's Quirk, and Delta Vee had been groped by some creepy guy, whom Kinetica and Gemini had to rescue from her before she dragged him into deep space.
That morning, they had separated a few small scuffles when they received a call from Sir Nighteye informing them of a suspected fight in the downtown area. As the three arrived at the location of the suspected fight, they saw a short woman yelling at the people around her. She was incredibly skinny, to the point where she looked more like a skeleton than a human. Her hair was thin and glowing green like her eyes, which were hollow and sunken. Before the three could ask her what the problem was, she held her hands out to the person she was arguing with. Instantly, the person collapsed, vomiting up blood as his skin began to glow a deathly green, open sores forming on his face. As people screamed and ran, she pointed her hands at more people, dozens of civilians dropping. The heroes burst into action, Delta trying to take the villain's attention away from the people as Gemini and Kinetica raced to help the injured. As Kinetica got close to the first victim, a message appeared in his visor.
WARNING: HIGH RADIATION DETECTED
"Be careful!" he yelled to Gemini. "She gave them radiation poisoning!" Just from being in the area, he began to feel a metallic taste at the back of his throat, and his head began to feel like it was full of lead. His suit morphed up around his face, forming a gas mask, and he breathed deep, feeling the radiation slowly leave his system. Gemini transformed his nose into a gas mask, doing the same, then turned his arm into a stretcher. They began carrying civilians away from the woman, who was now trying to get Delta. Several police cars arrived, and they began moving victims so that Gemini and Kinetica could go and fight. Suddenly, Delta crashed into the wall above them, and she would have slammed into the ground if it weren't for Kinetica freezing her just before she hit the ground, and Gemini turned his foot into a cushion when he unfroze her. She landed softly and immediately got back up again, Kinetica and Gemini following her as she blasted back towards the woman.
Gemini turned his left arm into a large lead shield, blocking irradiated objects the villain threw at them, and turned his right hand into a morning star. He swung it around his head and launched it at the villain, who narrowly dodged the beach ball-sized weapon. She leapt towards him, but froze in mid-air, glowing yellow. Kinetica was standing behind her, arm outstretched. Delta dove down and blasted across the street, her arm pulled back. Just as she passed the villain, she rocketed her arm forward, slamming her fist into the villain, and Kinetica released her.
She flew back, crashing along the ground as she rolled across the city, slamming to a halt against a fire hydrant. The heroes rushed towards her, and she screamed, face contorted in rage. She placed her hands on the ground and pulled them up, a glowing ball appearing between her hands. Kinetica's visor sounded a warning, and his eyes widened.
"That thing's a critical mass!" he yelled, rushing towards her. "It could go nuclear!" Delta's eyes went wide, and Gemini stumbled for a second.
"You mean that thing's a nuke!?" he yelled.
"It could become one if it gets any larger!" The villain raised her hands above her head, the ball glowing a terrifying blue, the air smelling of ozone.
"I will do it!" she screamed at the heroes. "Stop right there or I'll kill us all!" They slowed down, circling around her as she glared at them, hair whipping around.
"Why are you doing this?" Delta Vee asked. "Why are you hurting these people?"
"All those bastards think they're better than me!" she screamed. "All you people going around showing off your Quirks! I hate it! Why do you get to do what you want, but I can't!?"
"We got a psychopath," Gemini muttered to Kinetica. The villain screamed in rage and flung her arms down, the ball hurtling to the ground. A bright yellow flash filled everyone's eyes, and they heard Kinetica and the villain screaming.
Kinetica had his hands outstretched, yellow tendrils of energy lashing out from his body as he yelled. The ball had been frozen at the moment it detonated; Kinetica was literally holding back a nuclear explosion. A powerful wind swirled around him as veins of yellow energy fissured through the ground. The villain shrieked as the yellow tendrils lashed around her, her legs trapped in the middle of the explosion. Her skin began to crack and decay, and as the horrified heroes watched, she screamed as her skin crumbled, turning to a black dust. Her terrified expression haunted their minds as her skin began to melt off her face, her body disintegrating until it was nothing but a pile of charred, shattered bones and flesh.
Kinetica sweated through the effort of containing the energy of the explosion. The energy was beginning to leak out, and the tendrils were thrashing through the air and across the ground, tearing through everything they touched.
"Delta Vee! Go get All Might!" he yelled. "I can't hold this forever! Gemini, start evacuating people! If I lose control of this, it'll explode and vaporize the city and everyone in it!"
"We're not leaving you alone!" Delta screamed. "You'll die!"
"We're a team, Kinetica!" Gemini called from behind his shield. "It's all of us, or none of us!"
A shadow fell from above them. "I AM HERE… TO HELP!" All Might announced, landing next to Kinetica. One of the tendrils whipped at him, and he crossed his arms.
"CAROLINA SMASH!" he yelled, flinging his arms forwards. The tendril was knocked back, but swung around and slammed into All Might's knee, knocking him down.
"All Might!" Kinetica yelled to the hero, who was standing back up. "I'm holding in the energy of a nuclear bomb! You need to get everyone out of the city before it's too late!"
"Where is the villain?" All might called through the wind. Kinetica closed his eyes, gritting his teeth.
"She died! I accidentally killed her!"
"It's okay, young Kinetica! It is unavoidable in the hero industry!" All Might pushed through the energy, grunting as it slammed into him over and over. He made his way to Kinetica's side, and looked over at his chest plate. "Can you make that costume of yours create some sort of shield around the explosion?"
"Press the first, ninth, seventeenth, eleventh, and the fifth buttons, in that order!" he yelled. All Might typed in the combination, and the nanobots rushed down Kinetica's arms and swirled around the globe of death, forming a case around it. Glowing yellow lines crossed the orb, pulsing brightly. Kinetica relaxed his hands slightly. "That should help contain it, but I don't know for how long! We need to get this out of the city!"
"Can you even move it?" Delta called. "I thought your Quirk locked it in place!"
"If we use enough force, combined with the restraining shield, we might be able to move it, but it'll take a lot of strength for me to contain the energy!"
"We have to try! Come on!" Gemini yelled, and he jumped onto All Might's back, wrapping his legs around his waist. He stretched his arms out to the side, and they formed into a set of plane wings. "Delta! Give us some boost!" She flew over and grabbed onto a set of handles on Gemini's back, grunting as her boosters went into overdrive. All Might grabbed onto Kinetica, and slowly, the group began to lift off. They quickly began to accelerate, flying faster and faster.
"Delta! Aim us for the ocean!" Kinetica yelled. "Hurry! My arms are going numb!" Delta closed her eyes, then opened them as small holes opened up near her foot thrusters. Excess fuel began leaking out, and ignited on contact with the hot flames, producing a loud explosion as it jerked the group forwards, nearing the speed of sound. The orb began to grow brighter as Kinetica's eyes drooped, and Gemini leaned his head down.
"All Might! Start hitting the orb in the direction of the open ocean! Kinetica, just hold out a few more seconds!" A flurry of blows rained down on the orb, and Kinetica's head fell. The orb shot off like a bullet, and Gemini turned sharply, aiming them back at the mainland. "We've got a few seconds before it blows! Cover your eyes!"
Delta's thrusters sputtered and slowly died, her body starved of fuel. All Might reached his arm back and caught her as she nearly slid off Gemini's wings, exhausted. He wrapped all of them in his arms and braced himself, then the world turned white. All Might felt the blood in his back begin to boil, and a massive shockwave struck him, the sound nearly tearing his eardrums as he was flung down into Kamisu, a coastal city east of Tokyo. He threw one arm out, digging it through the side of a building to slow himself down before crashing into the ground, nearly getting blown away by the rush of wind from the blast.
Kinetica lifted his head, vision swimming, ears ringing, trying to take in his surroundings. On the horizon, he saw a terrifying pillar of fire, a rolling, seemingly living cloud of destruction rising through the stratosphere. Bright orange and purple flashes dotted the surface of the cloud, a deep, loud rumble shaking his brain. A powerful wind, smelling of seawater and ozone, washed over him. Windows were breaking all around him, and he heard screams and cries of pain and terror from every direction. The sound and smell of destruction filled his head, his mind racing as he began to panic. An image flickered in his vision: the agonized screech permanently frozen onto the villain's face, flames bursting from her eye sockets as her skin boiled and blistered, sloughing off of her bones as they charred and crumbled, like a log in a fireplace. He saw himself standing there, unable to help as she died an excruciating death, doing nothing.
He screamed, clutching his head, trying to shake the images from his brain, the villains final shriek echoing through his head, threatening to shatter his skull. Yellow energy burst from him, the ground under him cracking and crumbling as it flickered between being frozen and unfrozen, each wave of power building up more kinetic energy in the street.
"Kinetica! You need to calm down!" Delta Vee's voice broke through the wall of noise, dim and muted behind the rushing in his head. He felt his head pounding along with his heartbeat, his body going numb as his power overflowed. He felt a suffocating pressure wrap around his body, and everything stopped. A dull ringing was left in his head as he collapsed, sweat dripping down his face and stinging his eyes. A grey coil of fabric was wrapped around him, leading into the hands of a dark-haired man with glowing red eyes, hair standing on end. He blinked, and the glow disappeared as his hair fell back down, his face tired and unkempt. The coils retracted as Delta and Gemini rushed to him, while All Might walked over to the tired man.
"Eraserhead, we sure are lucky you showed up!" Eraserhead glanced to the collapsed teen, then his eyes flitted over to All Might's.
"I just happened to be in the right place at the right time," he said as he turned to leave. "That kid needs to learn to control his power, or he'll never be a hero."
"Wait a minute! We will need your help here! The city has been damaged, and civilians are certainly in trouble. We as heroes must give them hope for survival and the future!"
"… Very well. I'll go alert the police from the neighboring prefectures. They can help more than I can in this situation." As he headed off, All Might turned to Kinetica.
"You performed excellent, young Hatsume! I wish I had your courage and determination when I was your age! You shall turn into a fine he-"
"Shut up," Kinetica growled. He sat up, callously brushing away the hands of his friends. "How the hell can I be a hero?"
"Kinetica, what are you talking about?" Delta asked, but he cut her off.
"I killed someone! All I've done this week is hurt people! My plan nearly killed those bank robbers, all we've done is beat people up, and then I just killed that person! I could have stopped her before she blew it up! I could have saved her!" A tear rolled down his cheek as his voice shook. "I'm no better than the villains I'm supposed to stop!"
"Kinetica," All Might said, placing his hands on the teen's heaving shoulders, "Every great hero has done things they regret. I watched my master die right in front of me when I was a little older than you, because I wasn't strong enough. I have worked hard for many years to become the Symbol of Peace, I have given up nearly everything to give the country; no, the WORLD, the hope it needs to keep on going every single day, to give the people a reason to get up in the morning when everything seems bleak. You have the potential to become a great Symbol like me."
"I wanted to become a hero so that people wouldn't have to get hurt," he said, pushing All Might's hands off of his shoulders, "I wanted to become a hero that keeps everyone safe. I've become what I wanted to stop; I have to stop myself. If I keep going like this, I'm going to end up hurting those close to me. I can never let that happen." He turned and walked from the heroes, head down. Delta started after him, but Gemini held out his arm, stopping her.
"There's no point," he said, watching his friend depart. "He's already made up his mind. He wants to stop people from getting hurt; if he thinks that he's the reason people are getting hurt, then he will become the hero he dreamed of by stopping himself."
For the next few weeks, Toschi didn't go to school. He stayed at home in either his room or the garage, withdrawn from everyone. Several times, his classmates had dropped by to check in on him, but he always made an excuse not to see them. More often than not, he was making the excuses for himself, feeling a heavy pressure in his heart whenever he thought of his friends. Several times, he had found himself regretting dropping out of the hero program, but each time, he had looked over to his workbench, where his broken visor sat. Seeing his reflection in it reminded him of why he chose to leave, and steeled his resolve.
After about a month, he arrived back at school. He had been visited by the teacher of the Support course, Power Loader. He had been impressed with Toschi's ingenuity ever since he first saw his self-made costume at the Sports Festival, and wanted him in the Support course. Toschi had accepted the offer on the condition that he would stay in his homeroom class; when they went out for their hero training classes, he would go to the workshop and join the Support students.
His first day back, he opened the door to the classroom and was immediately ensnared in a tough web.
"He's here!" Omakase yelled, pulling his friend into a tight embrace. "He's back!" His classmates surrounded him, peppering him with questions and telling him all the stuff he had missed out on. Sasaki wrapped his arms around the entire class, lifting all of them in a massive group hug, until Midnight, getting annoyed with all the noise, cracked her whip on the chalkboard. Five seconds later, everyone was in their seats, mouths tightly shut.
"Now, I know you're all excited that Hatsume has rejoined us," Midnight said, pacing in front of them, "But keep in mind that he is still a month behind you in your studies. He will need to focus hard to keep up with you all. That being said…" She faced Toschi, a warm smile on her face. "Welcome home."
Author's note:
Wow, heavy stuff for Toschi, huh? That'd scar me too. Anyway, I apologize for the delay in posting this chapter and the previous one, I had a bit of writer's block. Next up, we'll travel forward in time to Class 1-B's (3-B's) graduation, two years later. We'll explore his life after school, and how he first met Melissa Shield (in this AU, she's around 23-24 in the current timeline). See you soon, and, as always, I hope you enjoy!