Nedzu was vaguely aware that, as a rodent, being in alone in a secured room with the serpentine-mannered Orochimaru was not one of his most intelligent ideas. That Orochimaru had not blinked since they had locked the door did nothing to relieve him of his worries.

"You believe the school to be compromised." Orochimaru repeated, "And you wish to employ our services in ferreting out the spy."

"Ye, Orochimaru-san." Nedzu wanted to shift under the detached reptilian gaze, "I am aware of the abilities that Otogakure has and the services it offers. I would be vey grateful if you would accept the task."

The former lab experiment knew better than to threaten the student in his school, nor was he at all inclined to. So he risked, "I would have gone through the proper channels to contract the job, Izanami-san, but with the current lack of information security, I felt that something unconventional would have the highest odds of avoiding All for One's attention."

"A wise choice, principal." Orochimaru allowed, "But both I and Izanagi have removed our names from the active roster, so you would not have hired us, had you chosen that alternate path-running a sprawling collection of motley individuals is quite time-consuming, and it has not left us with the motivation to clean up after this sort of foolishness."

His eyes glinted with amusement. What will you offer as motivation? Will you try to threaten the few I care about? Will you offer me wealth I have no need of? Will you compromise your morals? Struggle against your beliefs? What are you when pressure comes, teacher of heroes?

"I understand completely, Orochimaru-san." Nedzu acknowledged gravely, "However, this is an issue of national-if not international security."

Orochimaru steepled his fingers. Golden eyes gleamed. You would appeal to my better nature? "Ah. So it involves All Might. What about him do you fear the spy will discover?"

"I'm afraid you are mistaken, Orochimaru-san." Nedzu lied, "the issue with the spy revolves around the students' safety, not All Might's. As you are aware, the USJ attack targeted students, and while they proved capable of defending themselves, they are not at the level of average professional heroes, let alone All Might. The school invests heavily in security for a reason, and the spy could mean all our measures would be rendered ineffectual."

This is a danger to us all, including your son.

For the first time since the meeting had begun, Orochimaru smiled. A viciously amused smile, all sharp edges and predator's glee. "Come now, Principal Nedzu." Purred the snake to the mouse, "The USJ attack was far worse than you claimed. I recognized Kabuto's handiwork on Aizawa-sensei's wounds, and the presence of residual injury-make the man get at least ten hours of consecutive bed rest and a few straight meals in the near future-indicates the severity of the original damage, clearly showing that the attack was without precedent in scale. It was an organized effort that stemmed from months of preparation, and yet, despite the potential existence of a spy, the relocation of the students was wholly random, indicating that their demise was not a priority-they were bait. Then for whom? A hero of course."

I trust my son to defend himself, and others as well. I know my power, I have nothing to fear.

Nedzu sighed. "And my hasty reaction, coupled with my concern, revealed that I believed All Might to be vulnerable."

You can see that I am desperate.

"Correct, Principal. The villains have waxed, or the heroes have waned, and either way, our enemies in black see an opportunity. Now, is All Might vulnerable, or is it that his attachments have made him so? If so, is it the fault of the boy with the Quirk near identical to his, so bright and brilliant and yet easy to exploit?"

Amuse me, and I may assist.

"Young Kabuto's observations, I presume?" Kabuto had never concealed his possession of hidden depths, but the extent of them was terrifying.

Orochimaru raised an eyebrow, "A poor parent would I be if I did not pay attention to my son's dinner conversation."

Nedzu was not in a position of power here. And alliances were built upon (an appearance) of trust. "You are correct, Izanami-san." He admitted, "All Might is weakening, and his successor is Midoriya Izuku. We fear that there shall be a crime renaissance when the secret is revealed, with All for One directing it from the shadows. That is why I am asking you to help us."

You protect your own. We share common interests.

There was a puff of smoke, and a giant purple snake appeared between them. Like Nedzu, the non-human acted with human intelligence as it (he?) raised his head to Orochimaru's ear and hissed.

Even off the active rosters, Orochimaru's skills had not waned. He remained so perfectly unchanging that even with Nedzu's superhuman senses, he could divine nothing about the message's nature. Orochimaru thanked the snake, and he disappeared in another puff of smoke.

There was genuine excitement on the face of the one titled kami of the dead as he leaned forward and said, "Let us discuss terms."

I agree.

Kabuto led his newly acquired ally through two vents, a fire escape, and into a hallway. Opening the window, he gestured, "We've barricaded the gym, so we can only get in and out this way. I'll lower you down."

"I'm going to fall." said Hitoshi-san, dead-eyed, "And break my neck. And die."

"Don't be ridiculous," the medic-nin brandished a green-glowing hand, "I won't let you die! Now, if you're worried, Tsuyu-san could always carry you down-she's just down the wall, want me to call her?"

The poke at Hitoshi-san's pride did the trick. "Fine," he grumbled, "but if I die, I'm haunting you."

Kabuto shrugged, "Sure, I'd love to study post-mortem astral projection. Promise to haunt me and only me?"

Hitoshi-san grimaced as he climbed onto the window ledge and took Kabuto's hand, "That doesn't exactly make me feel more confident about this. Alright, lower me down."

Kabuto complied, letting the General Studies boy go before swinging down himself. Sadly, while his classmates were Hero Studies students, they were not trained in shinobi-situational awareness, meaning that they didn't notice Hitoshi-san's entrance, let alone his.

He clapped his hands. "Alright everyone, this is Shinsou Hitoshi-san, and he's here to help with Enji. If we can prove that Enji isn't sentient enough to be held responsible for his actions, we'll only have to make a case for humane treatment and we'll get to keep Enji. If Enji's sentient enough to understand orders, we'll threaten to take this to court and bury them under paperwork and publicity. All say yea?"

He was greeted with noises of assent.

Oto's favorite son grinned, "Time to get to work then. Izuku-san, Hitoshi-san, Kyoka-san, you're up."

He took a step back and released the voice-changing genjutsu he had been using as a stopgap measure, since unlike his mother, he had never quite gotten the hang of neurological iryou-ninjutsu.

Some time after the video had been produced, backed up, and sent, there was a puff of smoke that heralded the arrival of a three-meter-long snake. The snake was diamond-headed, purple scaled, and a bit on the well fed side, which, Hitoshi thought privately to himself, was a relief.

The teleporting snake-monster might not want to eat him. However, 1-A clearly subscribed to the philosophy of fight instead of flight, so its arrival was swiftly answered with explosions, belly-beams, a shadow-monster, and ice. Kabuto, on the other hand, welcomed the giant human-eating creepy thing with a pat on the head, apparently unconcerned for his fingers.

"Don't worry!" The clinically insane boy reassured his far too unsurprised classmates and one very surprised Hitoshi, "This is just Manda, my sort-of-murder-uncle. He's on a diet."

The snake, now named Manda, narrowed slit-pupiled eyes at 1-A's resident rebel. While there was some tension in reaction to the act-notably with Tsuyu, not to mention Bakugo still looking tempted to follow up on his initial volley of explosions, most of 1-A seemed to be willing to watch and wait. Propably out of experience. There was a pause.

Then, "Orochimaru," said the snake with all the dignity someone called sort-of-murder-uncle could muster, "Wants me to congratulate you on your first joint foray into aggressive social activism and that your mother is very happy that you've been exploring non-lethal methods of gaining people's attention. Also, congratulations, you succeeded."

"Yippee." Bakugo crossed his arms, "What's the catch?"

Manda frowned at him severely, or as severely as a snake could, replying, "You will be required to comply with forensic investigations. In addition, seeing as you have all been rebellious brats who don't know the meaning of proper protocol, you're all getting extra law classes. Kabuto, you're the ringleader, so you especially."

"Seriously?" Kabuto whined.

Fast as well, a striking snake, Manda wound himself around the pale-haired teenager. The room froze for a moment, two, three. No one dared to breath. Then, the man-eater sized snake coiled back onto the floor.

The snaked looked at Kabuto disapprovingly, "Goodbye. You are far too thin. Eat a human and take the next month off digesting it."

Kabuto sighed with the air of someone rehashing an old argument, "You know very well that humans aren't particularly nutritious, Manda."

Manda huffed. "Youngsters these days. Listen to your elders, hatchling."

Another poof of smoke, and the anthrovorous reptile was gone.

Ugh. He was almost rethinking trying for the hero course, nothing here made sense.

Kabuto allowed himself a mysterious smirk (he smirked mysteriously all the time, so no one questioned it). Manda had hissed Nono's made contact with All for One in his ear when he hugged him. Given that Manda was here, Orochimaru had made common cause with the heroesl. Which meant… Mother, Wandering Miko, compassionate medic, Izanagi, was the one dealing with the villains, while Orochimaru, Snake Sannin, amoral scientist, Izanami, was the one dealing with the heroes. It was beyond hilarious. Of course, that meant Orochimaru had won the family bet on whether they'd get swept into the ridiculousness that was this world's shoddy excuse of a struggle between good and evil, therefore, as per agreement, they'd stop keeping a low(-ish) profile.

The paper that the reincarnated summons had slipped him held more information. The school was compromised, and it wasn't by him.

Hitoshi-san's introduction had been designed to normalize relations between him and the class, and from the looks of it, it had been successful. Hitoshi-san had now been drawn into conversation with the ever gregarious Eijiro-san, just as intended, and it was now only a matter of time before they assimilated Hitoshi-san into their ranks. That could be the pretext for initiating his "fall from grace" and subsequent identification of All for One's mole, which had the added benefit of allowing him to give his place to someone who actually wanted it. Scheming time!