So I definitely meant to upload this yesterday, but for some reason, wasn't working. I don't know if my computer was acting up or if the servers were down, but no matter what I tried I just could not get to the doc manager. Then I tried to get on and edit this later last night, but I was also in my brother's room watching him play Deltarune, soooo...no work got done. But here it is, it's done now! I hope you like it!
We're crowded into a room with no elbow space despite its size. It's almost as if every high school in the country, hero course or not, is here. I end up sandwiched between Jiro and, of all all people, Aoyama. That sparkly smile makes me want to sock him in the face. Perhaps even worse, though, is the little purple pig darting between everyone's legs and sneaking peeks up skirts. Even the girls who aren't wearing skirts, he stops to stare at their butts and breasts. The second his eyes turn my way, I gnash my teeth and flip him off. I can visibly see the shiver that runs through him. God, could he get any more disgusting? It's not our fault skin-tight clothing impedes us less.
When I'm sure the perverted imp has moved his sights off me, I glance down at my own outfit. My first time seeing it was in the changing room they filed us through earlier, since I've been restricted from training until now. Frankly, the hero who designed it did a good job. It's a simple design, completely black top to bottom. The top only covers my chest and neck, the pants hugging snuggly down to my ankles. Both are made of the same soft, elastic material, the only exception being a slightly stiffer strip that wraps my chest and back to provide some protection to my heart. The only accessories to it are the matching custom shoes and a thick black headband that holds my bangs securely away from my forehead.
Without my bangs, my forehead feels disturbingly bare, but I resist reaching up to touch it. Instead I pull my ponytail tighter and cross my arms. Between the heads of the crowd, I can just barely see half a figure draped across the podium preparing to speak.
He talks exactly how he looks: drained of any energy to speak of. He also routinely drops his head in exhaustion and takes inappropriately long pauses between sentences. In the end, he succeeds in delivering the message, though.
"All one thousand five hundred and forty participants will have to compete in a free-for-all exercise. We have many heroes in today's society, and after Stain's appearance, people have begun to question how qualified those heroes are."
He goes on, but I don't care about the reasoning. What he just said means we're all gonna be pitted against each other, and as someone at odds with everyone else, that makes me a prime target no matter the challenge. Maybe I really should have swallowed my temper earlier.
"Therefore it will be a test of speed. The first hundred to pass can move on."
I grimace, voices of shock raising in all directions. A hundred of us. There's fifteen times that number of people in this room. That makes my odds even worse.
As he explains the rules with targets and balls, the distress in the room only grows. I toss my head with a huff, not all too pleased myself. It's not that I'm afraid I won't pass. Me, getting a hero license...I should laugh. The idea's ridiculous. However, I've been house-bound for the past week, and I was looking forward to stretching my legs and having some fun, and fun to me is winning.
They begin handing out the targets and balls, and I readily plaster all three of my targets on my front. That's where they're easiest for me to defend, after all.
Then the room begins to rumble. Gasps raise as the ceiling splits, and as if it were a paper box, the entire room unfolds to reveal a massive, multi-terrained arena. Mountains, industrial, city, nature...anywhere a battle against a villain might take place is represented in one corner or another, and in the center, a wide dirt plane, of which we currently stand in the middle. The edges of the arena are stands, where judges and presumably teachers sit dotted around to watch. Immediately, classes begin to spread out.
I tap a finger against the ring of deflated balls resting against my hip. I have to admit, they did good to give these to those without a place to store the balls.
"Guys, we should stick together," Midoriya yells, turning to us with a determined expression. He's really gonna go for it, isn't he?
Bakugo doesn't waver and storms away. "This isn't some field trip!"
Kirishima rushes to follow him.
While the others call after them, something red moves out of the corner of my eye, and I turn to see Shouto walking in a different direction. I've only taken a few steps after him when he declares, "I'm going off, too. It's hard for me to use my abilities to their fullest extent around others."
He starts into a run and I speed up after him. When Midoriya calls after us, Shouto glances back to look at me. He doesn't stop running when he orders, "Go back, Kyou. You'd do better surrounded by people with battle intensive quirks."
"Your quirk is plenty battle intensive," I argue, catching up to run alongside him.
He turns back forward. "If I'm forced to protect you, I'm more likely to fail."
"Good experience. Heroes have to fight while protecting people all the time. But don't assume you'll have to."
"I'm not assuming. You aren't fit for battle."
"Shut up and watch."
To my dismay, his mouth actually does snap shut and stay shut. He really doesn't want to talk with me, does he? And does he really think so little of me? Sure, my quirk may not be the most battle-ready quirk in the world, but that doesn't make it any less potent. Or dangerous.
He heads straight to the industrial area, the beginning buzzer sounding just before we enter the premises. A quick glimpse over my shoulder reveals an all-out assault on the UA students who stuck together. Could I have survived that?
...Possibly. But fighting multiple opponents has never been and will never be my strong suit.
I turn away and forget about it. At least our classmates are pulling the attention away from us.
Shouto stops to rest in the shadow of a cylindrical building, and I join him. Neither one of us is seriously breathing hard, and the detail makes me smile a bit. A lot of things might have happened since we last saw each other, but one of those things is that we both got a lot stronger!
"Fifty two people have— no, fifty three people have passed."
I click my tongue. Half already? I guess that bloodbath at the beginning must've passed a lot of people. Wonder how many of our class went down.
"No choice," Shouto grimaces. "We'll have to hunt."
"Let's go, then."
He glances at me, eyes assessing, then returns to running. I keep pace with him the same as before.
He runs into the open and stays there, and it immediately clicks what he's doing. Bait. A risky move only someone with powers as strong as his would dare to attempt, and also a terrible strategy for my quirk in particular. He's acting as if I wasn't here. I don't mind. I'd rather he act like this than make concessions for me, because then I really would be holding him back.
Then, out of nowhere, he skids to a stop and flings out his hand, releasing a wave of flames that has the air around it rippling. A singed orb thumps to the ground. Behind the ball, a group of brightly dressed ninja dweebs stand atop towers and pipes. As they gloat at Shouto, I briefly peek behind us. No one is immediately evident, but considering their choice of attire, it may not be safe to assume they haven't encircled us.
"And who are you?" The speaker suddenly shifts his attention to me. I watch him carefully as he examines me. "I don't think I saw you at the sports festival. Are you not from UA?"
I kindly raise my middle finger in response.
"The two of you must be pretty confident. Travelling in a pair as a choice?"
"She could just be tagging along for protection," one of them jabs, drawing a snarl from me.
"Either way, don't you think being in such a small group will cause them trouble?"
"It's ten on two, five of us for each of you. What're you gonna do now?"
"Thank you," Shouto sinks into a fighting stance, "for saving me the trouble of finding you."
Before any of them can react, he's frozen their feet where they stand and erected a protective barrier of ice between us and them.
"How can we find out if there really are only ten?" I question quietly, scanning our unprotected side.
"If there's more, they'll reveal themselves when their friends are in trouble," he reasons.
Suddenly, an impact shakes the ice wall, and we look up to find a giant bolt stuck in it. Then comes a giant nail that wedges itself in. Another one hits, and the ice begins to spiderweb. My jaw clenches. Of course they came prepared. Only an idiot would face someone this powerful without careful preparation.
"Kyou, go!"
"What?"
He doesn't look my way, his gaze focused in on his opponents with a new level of determination. "I told you, I can't afford to protect you, so get out of here!"
I whirl on him. "And I thought I told you that I don't need your protection! Have you forgotten who I am?"
He finally glances at me, and something crosses his expression to quickly for me to read. "Of course not, but—"
The ice shatters and our attentions immediately snap back to our attackers. Another giant bolt is hurling our way and Shouto raises a hand to blast it with fire. I leap to the side and he follows suit when he realizes his counter isn't working.
Disbelieving, he murmurs, "I couldn't melt it?"
"Of course not!" the red ninja declares, bolts between his fingers. "They're made of Tungsten, which can withstand high temperatures!" He flings the bolts and shatters the ice around his companions' legs. With all ten of them free once again, the red ninja mocks, "What did I say? You're overconfident!"
Shouto doesn't hesitate in blasting fire their way. They've got a solution for that too, though, as sand and water manipulators counter with their own full force. More ice, more projectiles, more clashes of fire and extinguishing elements, and the entire time I'm forced to dance away from any oncoming attacks. Most are aimed at Shouto, however, deeming him the dangerous force, and in this scenario, they aren't necessarily wrong. The utter lack of my involvement has me grinding my teeth, and my fists shaking with rage. Seeing us like this, Shouto and I really do have abilities on the opposite ends of the spectrum.
We're almost...incompatible.
Suddenly there's an explosion of smoke and Shouto is dragging me into a run. I stumble the first few steps, unprepared, then match his pace, his hand releasing my arm.
"What're you doing?" I huff, beginning to run out of breath. I can barely see him next to me in the dense smoke...or is it water vapor?
"Using the terrain. They wouldn't have given it to us if we couldn't use it."
As we're running, he ignites a poster, then pierces a giant storage tank, and I can hear gas quietly streaming out. He makes the hole a bit bigger to negate the noise. Then, grabbing me again, he rushes in the opposite direction. When the students chasing us approach the decoy poster, he blasts fire at the tank before immediately raising a wall of ice. I'm about to flatten myself against the ice wall when Shouto pulls me towards him, his arm wrapping around my shoulders. My eyes widen, but any chance to react is stolen from me when the tank explodes. As the resulting wind billows past us, I glance up at the boy who's pulled me to his side. He's entirely focused on our enemies.
As soon as the wind has somewhat died down, he releases me and dashes around the ice wall. I collect my bearings and follow. By the time I've rounded it, he's already frozen the injured students to the ground, all of their limbs covered in ice to prevent the use of their quirks. He pulls out a ball and approaches the closest incapacitated student. I also pop one of mine off its ring, and it inflates in my hand. I'm not too happy about leeching off of his victory, but by the same token, I'm not about to let go of some easy prey. Especially not when so many people have passed already.
Something flashes.
Without thinking, I chuck my ball. It collides with the little projectile and they both crash land off course.
That course being straight for Shouto.
A quick glance reveals the mysterious object to be a shiny grey ninja star. A glimmering, silver, lethal weapon.
My blood boils as I turn on the person who threw it. An oversized ninja dressed in green crouches at a distance, more stars in his hands at the ready. His clothes are ripped, his leg seemingly injured, but it's clear he escaped the brunt of the blast.
The next one he throws my way. I turn to the side so it grazes by before charging. He throws another at me but I don't even care. I fucking catch the thing, the blades sinking into my fingers and just barely missing my palm. By the time he's readied another, I'm pulling him up by the collar.
"You fucking dare throw something like that at Shouto? You wanna die? Huh? Do you?"
He attempts to stab me in the side but I bat his hand away as if it were a newborn's.
"Fine. I'll grant your wish, you son of a bitch." I throw him down roughly and raise my hand. It's been awhile since I've felt it, the way the dots on my hands and forehead attract. It's almost magnetic when the two collide. The hand on my forehead stays fisted, though. Instead I use my other hand, grabbing him by the temples and forcing the palm of my hand in front of his eyes.
The moment he's seen it, he's already gone still, but I dig my nails into his head anyway as he starts to quake.
A moment later, a blood curdling scream rakes out across the arena.
Well, this one was fun to write. A lot happened. The down side is I felt like Megumi didn't really do much for most of it, but unfortunately, this wasn't a good environment for her quirk to work with so I couldn't work it in...until the end. She uh...kinda lost it again. So...thoughts? Do you think she was significant enough in this chapter? I don't want her ever to just be along for the ride. I feel like too many OCs are like that. On another note, though, she also used her quirk for the first time. I know it was at the very end, so we'll probably get some more background on it next chapter, but first impressions? I nervously await your comments, and I'll see ya'll again next chapter!