I do not own My Hero Academia or any of its characters.

Preparing

Lee turned the page in his book, glancing up at Momo. She was as focused as ever, one hand resting against the side of her head, her hair hanging free behind her, face set into a serious expression, as though she were about to find out the name of the person who ran over her puppy in a tractor trailer. He smirked, watching her for a moment before returning his eyes to his own book. She really did hit the books hard when she studied. No wonder she was a borderline genius.

"What?" Momo asked, not looking up from the books.

"You look like you expect that book to launch a surprise attack any minute," Lee said.

"I just recognize the value of studying," Momo said.

"I noticed," Lee chuckled. "Of course, there's something else you could be doing to prepare for the Sports Festival too."

"What's that?" Momo asked, looking up at him with an eyebrow raised.

"I once heard of this magical thing called training," Lee grinned.

Momo rolled her eyes. "I'm proficient enough with my Quirk already. And you obviously don't need it."

"I mean, sure you're proficient, but have you really mastered it?" Lee asked. "I definitely haven't."

"Yours is already amazing, despite its obvious disadvantages," Momo said.

"I mean, if I run with anything besides these boots on, I'll skin the bottom of my feet to the bone," Lee pointed out.

Momo shrugged, but sighed, putting a bookmark in her book. "Only for an hour."

"That's a good start," Lee nodded.

Momo rolled her eyebrows and stood, lifting her shirt up over her head and dropping it onto her bed, Lee yelping and covering his eyes. "What? I've got a bra on. I'm still decent."

Lee sighed. "You sure you want to work out without a shirt on?" He lowered his hand, only to freeze as he saw her pulling her foot out of her pants and tossing it onto the bed as well.

"Well I can't use my Quirk with my clothes on," Momo said. "Why? Is this a problem?"

"No!" Lee said, shaking his head. "Not at all. I was just checking."

Momo shrugged and they headed out to the massive back yard her family's mansion had. When Momo had mentioned that her family was rich, he hadn't realized she meant "lives in a mansion with servants" rich. He had to say, he was ridiculously jealous. Aside from Amy, he had no family to speak of. Their father had been killed by the same freak that invaded the U.S.J., the one with the hands all over his body. He had seen him do it, but when he'd tried to report it, no one had listened to him because he was just a dirty little child with a weird machine covering his body. No one wanted to pay him too much attention. His mother, on the other hand, blamed him for her being crippled. She'd claimed not to for a very long time, but she'd gotten drunk one night and her bitterness had come to light when she blamed him for her not being able to go to the beach with her friends.

"Are you ready?" Momo asked, readying herself.

"Yeah," Lee nodded, extending his exoskeleton's hands, seeing Momo eye them cautiously. "I promise not to hurt you."

Momo nodded and formed herself a bo staff. Lee shot forward, but just as he reached her, a second bo staff shot out of her upper chest, crashing into his chest against one of the ribs, hurling him away. He flipped, landing on his feet just as she reached him, swiping at him rapidly with her staff, the other lying in the grass behind her. He spun and ducked around it, deflecting a couple of strikes with his exoskeleton, then spun with his Quirk, tapping a fist against her other side before she could deflect or block it. She let out a relieved breath as she realized that he really want's going to hurt her, and spun, swiping the back end of her staff at him before swinging the other end down and around at him as he ducked under the first. He grinned as he leaned aside from the swipe, then dropped, placing a hand on top of her right foot before throwing his right foot into a kick at her head. She blocked it with the staff and his leg blurred from the knee down, smacking into the bar several times in a second before he flipped back to the ground and spun, sweeping her feet out from under him. She grunted as she it the ground, but immediately rolled to the side, avoiding his light punch, then grabbed her staff and rolled back, slamming it into the exoskeleton on his shoulder, shoving him off. She rolled over with him, straddling him and formed herself a knife but he knocked it aside with the metal on the back of his right hand, his left tapping her in the side a half dozen times in a second before he thrust his hips upward, throwing her off balance before grabbing her and rolling, pinning her to the ground before his arm flashed out and grabbed her knife off the ground. However, before he could put it to her throat, a battering ram exploded into his gut from her own, launching him off.

He flipped, landing on his feet and easily getting out of its way before watching her as she picked up her bo staff. He smirked, walking over and picking up the one she'd hit him with before, twirling it in his hands. Just as he did, lightning flashed from his eyes and suddenly screamed along the bo staff. He yelped, yanking his hands away and staring at the bo staff as it fell to the ground, completely harmless and devoid of electricity, Momo also staring at it, then him.

"Are you alright?" she asked.

He stared at his hands. "I'm...fine. It didn't hurt me."

"I think...you generated it," she said. "Your eyes did that spark thing and then it was there."

He stared at her before kneeling and gingerly picking up the staff. When electricity didn't immediately scream along the staff, he tried activating his Quirk, electricity arcing from his eyes, only for the staff to again be devoid of electricity. He sighed.

"Damn," he sighed. "I would have loved to have something I can add to my exoskeleton besides just moving fast."

Momo shrugged, readying herself. "Where were we?"

He glanced at her and grinned, twirling his staff again before mirroring her stance. He had no training with a bo staff, or any other weapon, but he figured he could do a decent job faking it so long as he was using his Quirk to help out. Momo lunged, swiping at him and he deflected it, twirling his staff and swinging it up at her from below, as she had done to him earlier, only for her to sweep it aside, spinning and swiping at him with the back end of hers. He ducked under it, spinning his staff and hooking one of her legs with it, only for her to flip backward, driving one end of the staff into the ground to support her. As soon as she did, he swiped it out from under her, but she landed on her feet anyway and turned the momentum from him swiping her staff into an attack, swinging the staff around and slamming it down into the metal strip his exoskeleton had over his left shoulder. He launched himself to the side before the bo staff could skip into his neck and knock him out, then stepped forward, twirling his staff and swiping at her each time one end moved forward. She backpedaled quickly, avoiding the strikes before dropping and swiping his legs out from under him, instantly moving to straddle him, only for him to blur into movement, flipping her and pinning her arms above her head. When she generated a metal net to catch him, he grinned, electricity arcing from his eyes before he yanked her around into the net, slipping out of its path, resulting in her being caught in his place. He grinned as he stood over her.

"Now that is one beautiful catch," Lee grinned, Momo blushing slightly but rolling her eyes, pushing the net off of herself and standing. "That was fun."

"Oh yeah, tons," Momo said, wiping some sweat from her forehead. "I'm all sweaty now."

"Yes, that does tend to happen when you train," Lee said. "So, care to train me to use a bo staff properly?"

"You did pretty well," Momo said.

"That's because I was using my Quirk and my neural implant to move faster while seeing you as moving slower," Lee said. "But if I'd still like to have proper training."

Momo smiled and nodded, picking up the two staves and handing him one. Then, she began to drill him on proper form and technique. After a bit, they began to spar again, this time without him using his Quirk, and she began to mop up the floor with him, badly. However, the training also lasted multiple hours, so he considered it a victory for managing to make her forget about studying for a bit. Finally, they called it a day and they headed back to her room, Momo grimacing, as she wiped sweat from her forehead again.

"I'm going to take a quick shower," Momo said, collecting some clothes from her walk-in closet, then paused by the door. "Thank you, by the way."

"For what?" Lee asked.

"For getting me away from my books for a bit, and for training with me," Momo said. "I don't...usually do that, and it's more...it's nice to have someone to train with, for a change."

Lee smiled. "Any time."

She smiled as well and left the room. He picked up the book he'd been reading, a book about the possibility of having hidden secondary Quirks and how to learn to use them. He returned to the first page and began to read it again, paying it a lot more attention after that electricity incident. After a little while, Momo returned, wearing a fuzzy pair of pajamas. She retook her previous seat, opening her book and glancing at Lee. She grinned.

"You look like you expect that book to launch a surprise attack any minute," Momo teased.

Lee grinned knowingly, finishing his sentence before looking up at her. "It's about learning to use secondary Quirks, assuming you have any. I figured it might be useful information."

Momo nodded. "It seems like it might be."

Lee returned to reading, and after a minute, Momo sat beside him. He glanced up at her and she gave him a quick smile before returning her gaze to her own book. He raised an eyebrow before continuing to read. They remained like that for a long while before Lee called it a night and headed home. he was glad he asked her if she wanted to prepare for the Sports Festival together. It seemed like it was going to be fun.

Lee deflected Momo's staff and she spun, jabbing the end at him quickly several times, forcing him to step back out of her reach, then swiped his forward foot out from under him, holding her staff to his throat when he was on the ground. He sighed, raising his hand and she smiled, shifting her grip so she could pull him up with it. Instead, he spun, grabbing the staff and yanking, at the same time blocking her feet with his own, resulting in her falling on top of him. Then, he rolled pinning her arms out to the sides.

"Really?" Momo asked. "We've been here before, remember?"

"Yes," Lee nodded. "But this time, I've got a plan to nullify your Quirk."

"Oh really?" Momo asked, raising an eyebrow. "I'll bite. What is it?"

Lee grinned wickedly before his hands shot to her sides, his exoskeleton's arms retracting as he began to tickle her. She shrieked in surprise and began to try to fight him off futily, struggling to control her laughter. He grinned, not letting up at all until she managed to focus just long enough to shove him backward. He rocked back and grinned, relenting and allowing Momo to catch her breath.

"We're supposed to be...training," Momo reminded him, still breathing hard. "What's gotten into you today?"

"Being serious all the time is boring," Lee said. "We've got another week before the Sports Festival, let's do something fun today."

"Like what?" Momo asked.

"Movie?" Lee suggested.

Momo quirked an eyebrow at him for a moment before sighing. "Sure. Why not. I suppose I could stand to get out a bit more."

"Yes!" Lee grinned, standing and offering her his hand.

She accepted it, but only to twist and throw him to the ground, straddling his legs. "But after the movie, we're going to spend the rest of our training time being serious, deal?"

"Deal," he nodded.

She narrowed her eyes at him for a moment before standing and helping him up. They went inside and took turns taking a quick shower, Lee having begun bringing a spare change of clothes after they got rained on a couple days ago and ended up muddy and she gave him permission to shower while she washed his clothes for him. Once they were both clean, they left the house, Lee giving Momo a piggy back at his speed to the theater, Momo keeping her eyes closed and clinging to him the whole way.

Lee closed the book and stared at his hand. It had taken him two weeks to read the book, and it had had zero actually useful information. Only conjecture, theories, and "what if"s. He focused, trying to imagine lightning leaping from his hand, but nothing happened. He sighed. He supposed he never really expected that to work, but it would have been nice.

"Are you ready for the Sports Festival tomorrow?" Momo asked, handing him a cup of tea she'd made.

"Totally," Lee said. "I'd like to be able to use some flashy lightning ability for it, but I guess I'll manage with just my speed."

"You speed is pretty amazing," Momo said.

"Says the genius girl who can create basically anything but a living being," Lee smirked. "I'm fast and breakable, and you've got the most versatile overpowered ability I can think of besides high-powered telekinesis."

Momo shrugged. "My power's only useful as long as I can actually use whatever I make. Yours, on the other hand, is useful for travel, evasion, offense, and a long list of other things just by moving fast. Even if you can't attack directly because you don't have your exoskeleton, you could still throw things so fast they turn into bullets."

Lee opened his mouth to respond before stopping, then slapped his forehead.

"What?" Momo asked.

"I could have thrown a rock," Lee said. "Instead of punching that one guy, I could have just thrown a rock."

Momo blinked, staring at him before beginning to laugh. "That's true. I never thought about that."

"Damn," Lee sighed. "That's disappointing. I'm a little mad now."

Momo laughed again. "It worked out alright in the end, right?"

"I suppose," Lee sighed. "Definitely not making that mistake again. I'm going to carry a pouch full of rocks from now on."

Momo nodded. "Good idea. Oh, hey, by the way, did you ever get the info on how to make your exoskeleton pieces?"

"Oh, right," Lee said, pulling out his phone and pulling up the picture of the schematics and atomic data Amy and Tatsumi had put together for him, then handed the phone to her.

She thanked him, typing on the phone for a moment before handing it back. "I added my number and sent myself the pictures. Gotta say, I'm a little let down that we've been friends this long and you haven't asked for my number yet."

Lee shrugged. "Why ask for your number when I can just hang out in your mansion and mooch free tea off you."

Momo rolled her eyes, then glanced at the clock. "It's getting late. You should probably get going."

"Typicial," Lee said. "One bad joke and you kick me out. Some friend you are."

Momo threw a pillow at him and he caught it, throwing it back. "Get out of here you freaking bum."

"Oh fine," Lee said. "Spoil sport." He raised a hand over his shoulder as he walked away. "See you tomorrow."

"See you," Momo smiled.

Lee walked out of the house before taking off with his Quirk, heading home and going to bed.

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