"CLASSES 2-A AND 2-B, REPORT!" The blood-hero Vlad King, and homeroom teacher to Class 1-B commanded in a booming voice.
At attention, all 41 students stood straight up in two lines like soldiers in the army. Only, they were wearing their hero suits.
From here, the teachers nodded to each other, and Eraserhead, the homeroom teacher for Class 2-A spoke up. "Today we'll be trying a different kind of joint exercise. We will shuffle each and every one of you into teams of 2 or 3, given the odd number of you total. And you will compete against each other in a test similar to the ones that took place at the beginning of your first year."
Vlad King picked up where his colleague left off. "One team will be given the role of villains, guarding a fake nuclear warhead and defeating any heroes that try to stop you. The other team will be given the role of heroes, to stop the villains and disarm the bomb before time runs out."
As the students remembered this test before, there seemed to be a general grumble and moan about it.
"You've all spent your first year with your acquainted class. We felt a refresher with a twist would offer something new for you. Since you're all much stronger than you were before, this should only make it more interesting..." Eraserhead explained. The corner of his mouth lifted in a smirk.
Among the students in 2-A was Minoru Mineta, who was fine with the idea, so long as he was not assigned to fight against Bakugo or even... Midoriya.
Ever since last year, when Tomura Shigaraki and All For One almost destroyed everything they loved, his classmates haven't been seen as they once were. Sure, they were more approachable than they were last year, and Minoru had become decent friends with both of them, as well as the rest of their classmates, but they still terrified him given how much power they each possessed to defeat literal godly villains.
Besides that, he was good to go. And he even had a nice view in front of him. That Pony Tsunotori girl from Class 1-B was lined up directly in front of him, and her backside was quite the sight, he thought as he snickered to himself.
Instinctively, Tsuyu Asui, his frog-Quirked female classmate slapped him on the back of his head with her long, whip-like tongue, forcing him to focus again.
The teachers then took the next few moments assigning random people from both classes into pairs and threesomes.
"Minoru Mineta, Class 2-A. Ibara Shiozaki, Class 2-B." Vlad King called out.
Everyone stopped what they were doing, falling silent as their eyes landed on both individuals, stepping forward.
"Oh man, Shiozaki? I won't lie she's super hot but she feels kinda off limits. Her religiosity really is a turn off." Minoru thought as he walked forward and eyed her.
Ibara remained silent and stared ahead. The only thing she knew of Mineta was whatever her classmates told her, or conversations she overheard from Class 2-A girls. The last thing she needed was mingling with such a lustful man as he. This was just training to become a better hero. To be willing to work with those who live differently from you.
Despite what she had heard, she kept an open mind about everyone and assumed the best.
Something among his classmates caught Minoru's eye and he turned his head to see them staring daggers at him altogether. Ibara was perhaps one of the most innocent of UA students, up there with Nejire (who is now graduated), Pony, Koda, and Komori. Nobody from either class would tolerate him being... well, his usual perverted self around such a pure soul.
He gulped and turned back to listen to his instructors.
"Mineta and Shiozaki will play the role of the villains. They will face off against Kendo and Midoriya, who will be the heroes." Eraserhead declared.
Yet another moment of silence. Although this one was more for sympathy. Two of the strongest people from both classes against two who hadn't even spoken to each other before.
"Aw man. While I feel like Mineta sometimes deserves a good buttkicking, this might be too much..." Kirishima hissed.
Kendo and Midoriya looked at one another before turning to their opponents.
"We don't have to go too hard..." Midoriya spoke out.
"Yeah really it's no problem." Kendo agreed.
Ibara wanted to thank them for the offer, but...
Minoru stepped forward and spoke first. "Never! Just as Uraraka fought Bakugo at full power and never gave up, we want to do the same thing!"
He had been a coward his whole life. Hiding in his room. It wasn't until last year when he saw each of his classmates and friends take a stand against the unbeatable. They never backed down and neither should he. This year would be the year he turns that around. Now it was his turn to be brave.
"It's just a training exercise." Kendo rubbed the back of her head awkwardly, although appreciative of the pervert's boost in confidence.
This act did make Ibara's mouth drop for a moment longer than she realized however. It was actually kind of sweet that he said "we", standing up for her too. It meant he believed she could do it as much as him.
"Training exercise or not. We must be prepared for the worst." She added. "Give us everything you got!"
Minoru glanced up at her. The way the artificial light of the room hit her face and thorny hair, it wasn't like anything he saw in a magazine or website or from any real woman. It was like looking up at a goddess. A perfect blend of strength and beauty all in one pose. His cheeks grew pink, but nothing else really happened. What was this feeling? Certainly not lust...
Midoriya and Kendo took one more look at each other, as if they were having a whole conversation telepathically, before nodding at the unlikely duo.
Ibara and Minoru were the first to be let out into the training ground. It was exactly the same as last year. The same multi-level building. Silently, they made their way inside and up to the open room where the faux bomb was standing up with a timer in the center.
"We should discuss a plan." Ibara said. "How are you with planning?"
Minoru didn't feel like bragging. They needed all the time they could get. "I remember seeing you in action from last year. The Sports Festival, the Joint Training, and...the war. We both have good trapping abilities. I think we'll focus on that advantage. It'll probably be what Midoriya and Kendo are planning, to exhaust our biggest strengths."
Ibara gave a determined nod. "Becoming an unstoppable force against the immovable object that is our enemy. I see. So what do you have in mind?"
Minoru scanned the layout of their surroundings. The room was big, but it also had a few pillars to support it. The only door to the room was in the center of the opposite wall. If they got through, it would be a straight shot to the bomb.
"I'll place as many of my balls as I can on the walls and doors. You spread your vines to the pillars and cover the bomb." He instructed.
"But if I cover the bomb, it won't to the damage we want it to." She said. "Ugh... Thinking like a villain is so taxing on my spirit... But I have to persevere."
"Just cover it where they can't touch it." Minoru specified.
"...You speak so calmly." She pointed out. "Are you not afraid?"
Minoru gulped. "I-I... I am. But we have a mission to accomplish."
Ibara's heart melted. His bravery was... She fanned herself, turning away briefly. "Do you really think we have a chance?"
Minoru sighed. Midoriya has beaten the most powerful villain in history and Kendo is also very mighty. He had every right to be scared. But something made him feel strong. Like he could do anything. Maybe it had something to do with this hottie from 2-B? She did seem to like him being brave. Chicks dig that, he guessed.
Clearing his throat, he answered. "I do, Shiozaki."
Much like the bomb in the room, a bomb went off in her head. "Get it together! It's Mineta!"
"Let the match begin!" The robotic announcer called from the building's intercom.
A thought crossed his mind and sweat began to drip down his forehead. Minoru grabbed at the balls on his head and frantically began covering the windows and walls.
"Mineta!" Ibara called to him.
He didn't listen as he threw layer after layer of balls in every direction. Ibara's vines reached his arms and grabbed them. They lifted him up and turned him to face her.
"Relax." She said in a soft voice. "We can do this, but we have to work together."
Minoru looked down at her vines, to avoid staring into her gorgeous starry-night eyes, and got another idea. "Let me stick some of my balls to these vines."
She raised her eyebrow before coming to the same conclusion. "Brilliant!" She smiled.
As he began to place them over the green tendrils, they heard a loud bang that shook the building. He rushed to the door. "Stay there and guard the bomb! I'll try to slow them down."
Another bang almost made them both lose their balance as the foundation shook.
"They're heroes! They can't do collateral damage here!" Minoru shouted.
Afraid to open the only doors to the room, he simply stood and watched as Kendo's enlarged fist broke through. In that instant, Minoru pelted her exposed knuckles with sticky purple balls. A few of them stuck her fist against the doorframe and remaining pieces of the doors themselves. She grunted as she tried to pull back.
Ibara knew Minoru had her classmate under control and looked around for her partner. The light from outside faded and ceased glowing through them. "Mineta, the window!"
As Minoru turned, Midoriya burst out of the glass with tentacles of his Black Whip reaching out to the vines over the bomb.
The grape-themed young hero swung his own ready-made whip made of his sticky balls, it snatched the black tendril of energy and pulled on it, throwing Midoriya off balance. Yet Fa Jin regained his composure as he yanked on the chain of balls, pulling Minoru towards the terrifying hero. All he could see was the emerald glow of Midoriya's eyes as he started to panic.
"As you requested, Mineta. I'm not holding back." He hissed as lightning flashed around his body.
Minoru attached the end of the chain to the ground and started to run back to Ibara.
Meanwhile, Ibara watched her classmate, Itsuka Kendo stomp through the doorway with bits of door stuck to her arm. The acting villainess quickly unleashed a wave of vines that began to ensnare the redhead.
Using her gigantic hands, she swung them together in a powerful clap so strong, that it pushed all the vines back and Ibara fell to her butt. Now her opportunity came, Kendo rushed ahead, dodging the remaining vines and sticky balls on the ground as she ran at the bomb.
In desperation, Ibara grabbed her ankle with a vine, tightly. The thorns cut into Kendo's exposed skin but she would not show pain, only frustration. "You're making this harder than it has to be, villain!" She shouted. Within range of Ibara, her hand raised itself over the girl's body as she remained on the floor in shock at the incoming fist.
Minoru bounced off of the closest ball he could and landed his boot into Kendo's side. One successful blow! But she swiped him away with the back of her other hand, giving Ibara enough time to unleash another volley of vines, this time wrapping around Kendo's arms quickly.
"Release her!" Boomed Midoriya.
Minoru quickly got back up on his feet, standing between the hero and the bomb, and adjacently, to the girls. If he wasn't so terrified, he'd be turned on at the catfight in the corner of his eye.
"Surrender." Minoru ordered.
Midoriya sighed, then flashed lightning again as he rushed his classmate with great speed. Minoru had no time to react, except to clip one thing on to another.
As the green-haired hero stood holding Minoru by his collar, he noticed his wrist was bound by a handcuff, the other handcuff on the shorter boy's arm. "Aha! I-I actually got you!" Minoru cheered.
"I would've handcuffed you the same way. We both lose like this." Midoriya frowned.
Minoru's smile dropped. "Yeah... But not her." He looked over to Ibara who had finished covering Kendo's body in a cocoon of her vines.
They felt a sense of relief as the timer on the bomb went off. And the training had ended.
Ibara took a deep breath and realized what happened. "W-We won?" She asked as she raised her eyebrows. "We won!" She pulled the vines back to release Kendo. Midoriya set Minoru down.
"Um." Minoru realized how awkward they were with their height differences, being handcuffed together.
The first thing Kendo did out of her hero character was laugh. "You boys look like a father and son walking in the park together."
Ibara turned to them and laughed with her friend. But then she stopped and remembered what the grape-themed boy did for them. For her.
The robotic announcer called for each of them to return for their assessments, and they all walked out together, shaken up, but otherwise satisfied with the outcome.
"What on earth was that?" Eraserhead asked the four with a very deadpanned look. "Are you the same Deku that defeated All For One not even a year ago?"
Midoriya lowered his head.
"Even in training, every defeat must be learned from. How do you go from battling the embodiment of evil to letting Mineta of all people slip a handcuff on your wrist?" He questioned his student.
"Well, I told them to not hold back, Mr. Aizawa." Minoru spoke out. "I knew that despite all our best traps and efforts, nothing could stop Deku, and Battle Fist too. So my strategy was to eliminate the fighter the only way I could."
"By sacrificing yourself?" Eraserhead glared. "Have you learned nothing from being in my class?"
Truth be told, they did have a decent strategy. But he felt very off today. Yeah he had the occasional lewd thought and he was still able to plan. But it wasn't the panic of fighting Midoriya necessarily that made him throw himself out to defeat so quickly, in order to stop his powerful classmate. He looked over at Ibara, who held her head low, refusing to make eye contact.
Minoru didn't know why, but he felt terrible about it.
"Here's what I saw: you got lucky." Eraserhead said. "And, I think your classmates did hold back."
Ibara and Minoru looked from the teacher over to their friends.
"I...kinda have to hold back if there is to be a match at all." Midoriya confessed. "I'm sorry."
Why wasn't Minoru concerned about all this? He kept thinking about his teammate. "I-It's fine, I guess." He said. It actually wasn't. It was against his wishes. But what he felt was a connection there. When he was strategizing with Ibara.
"Perhaps next time you should pair up Mineta with a male student. He'll stay focused." Vlad King suggested to Eraserhead.
"I was hoping he was past that." The long-haired teacher explained with a frown in the boy's direction.
"I'm sorry about tying you up so harshly, Kendo..." Ibara apologized to her dear friend.
"Oh it's no problem at all!" Kendo smiled. "I'm proud of you. Looks like the boys had some issues but I think you did great!"
"Thank you." Ibara bowed and clasped her hands prayerfully. Even she was feeling off after that match. She needed to speak to Mineta.
As they were excused to join the other students in watching the other battles, Midoriya stopped the shorter classmate. "Hey, Mineta?" He addressed. "Are you feeling okay? Did Shiozaki do something to you?"
Minoru gulped and grew red as a tomato. "No! No! I'm fine." He glanced over at the woman his friend was literally talking about just across the crowd with Kendo.
"You have gotten better since we first met." His green-haired classmate pointed out. "You're more quiet about your inappropriate thoughts toward the girls and I've seen you give some great plans in the battles we fought. So... what made today so different? And I know it's not because you fought me."
"Y-You don't? C'mon, Midoriya! I had to battle the most powerful hero currently living! You shouldn't even need to do these exercises anymore!" He dodged the question.
"Well, I did lose. That's something I'll have to watch out for is villains who throw themselves at me for their teammates. But why?" He asked.
"Because Shiozaki is hot." Minoru answered as plainly as he possibly could, to rip off this band-aid.
Midoriya narrowed his eyes. "I don't think you see her like you've seen the others."
"Wh-What makes you say that?" The purple-haired boy asked nervously.
Midoriya then began to recount all the times he went on about the physical features of every girl in both classes, reminding him that comments about his girlfriend Ochako were off limits. "And then there's Shiozaki. In your words, she's 'too churchy. Cute face and hot bod but not worth the trouble'."
Minoru gulped again. "I dunno, man..."
Midoriya smiled. "You like her, don't you? Like, actually like her, not in an objectifying way."
"Do I look dumb to you?!" Minoru snapped defensively. Regaining composure as he stood up straight, he added: "She made a great teammate today. Her vines and my balls made excellent traps that stopped Kendo and slowed you down."
The user of One For All kept his smile. "Do you have much experience asking out girls?"
"Uhh. Do you?" Minoru redirected the question, which instantly made Midoriya blush.
He cleared his throat. "You should go talk to her. She doesn't seem all that off-put about you either."
"Not a chance." He stated flatly.
"Why not?" Midoriya asked.
"I told you! She's too churchy!" Minoru replied.
The taller of the two sighed. "It might be the best thing to happen to you, Mineta. A girl like Shiozaki could be worth it. Might even learn something about yourself."
"What, like finding Jesus?" Minoru frowned.
"Just go talk to her." Midoriya invited.
"No way, Midoriya." He declared.
Midoriya exhaled. Then expelled a large tendril of Black Whip which picked up Mineta by his shirt and carried him helplessly over the back of the classes to Ibara's side. He silently protested and cursed at his persistent classmate before making a peeping sound as his backside came to rest against Ibara's leg.
Looking up, his head bumped into-
He leapt back with a massive red blush across his face as she turned to face him. At first she was startled but then realizing it was him come to talk with her, her expression softened. Her cat-like eyes stared into his soul...
"Mineta." She addressed him warmly with a soft smile. "Thank you for your sacrifice today. I never got to express my gratitude earlier."
"Oh!" He blurted out. "T'was nothin'!" He scratched the back of his bumpy scalp. "Um..."
"Was there really no other way we both could have won together?"
"T-Together?" He repeated mindlessly. "N-No. Midoriya is too powerful, heh."
"Well, that was very sweet of you to give me that chance. Everyone saw us do it. A victory is a victory, right?" She smiled bigger, showing off gleaming white teeth.
"Yeah..." He said as he sweat nervously.
"I really liked that Grape Vine strategy you thought of. I wish we could have used it." She sighed.
"Oh? That? Y-Yeah that was pretty cool." He chuckled and pulled at the collar of his costume. To make room for some air, he pulled his mask over his head to expose his face.
Seeing him without his mask made her smile again. "Would you like to try and train that Grape Vine strategy again with me sometime?"
Now he was speechless. Training? With a girl? No not any girl. Ibara Shiozaki!
"Like a date?" He asked dreamily, not noticing at all he said that out loud.
Her smile dropped and a warm pink covered her cheeks. "Uh... No... Well, technically? I-I..."
Now Minoru really started to sweat. "No no! Forget that I said that! Not a date. Training! Yes! Training! No date."
Ibara tucked a vine behind her ear. "We could do something after the training..."
Her words echoed in his ears. "Say something, darn you!"
"I... like ice cream." He said in a low voice.
"What a wonderful idea! Training and ice cream! As teammates!" She clasped her hands over his and then broke away. "Would tomorrow work? After classes?"
Tomorrow? So soon? Was he dreaming?!
He gave a nod and a shaky smile, which only made her giggle with glee. "Wonderful! Thank you!"
He felt like his soul would leave his body any second. He wasn't feeling horny, or anything like that. His eyes had stayed locked on to hers. No, he was feeling giddy. Excited. Happy. Absolutely nervous, even worse than the news he was to battle Izuku Midoriya and Itsuka Kendo. But excited.
Turning himself around silently, he caught Midoriya and Uraraka giving him smiles and supportive thumbs up from across the room.
He had a date. With a real girl. And one who tolerated him.
Then his smile dropped as he realized what kind of person he was, about to spend the day with a perfect soul like Shiozaki.
Sensing this, Midoriya, as well as their friend Kaminari walked over.
"Midoriya told me what happened, man! That's awesome!" He smiled as he softly punched Minoru's shoulder.
"Guys... I wanna give Shiozaki a great time..." He told them.
They looked at each other and back to him.
Minoru cleared his throat. "I want you to make me a gentleman."
