A/N:
steven: gives izuku a run for his money in bone breakage
recovery girl: healing powers don't mean you can break your bones whenever you want!
sorry about the cliffhanger but i didn't want to make the last chapter drag on
for any who are confused why steven isn't (rightfully) decimating everyone he fights it's because he's holding back. duh. i'd expect you all to realize this, but a reviewer on didn't get the memo so ¯\_(ツ)_/¯
however he is quite overpowered and we will get to see him absolutely livid for at least one fight- can you guess which one ( ͡° ͜ʖ ͡°)
Chapter 4: here, lemme just... shapeshift into you
"One!"
"Two!"
"Three!"
Mirio sank through the ground, and Steven immediately went on high alert. He had no idea where he would pop up, and he wanted to be prepared. With a deep breath, he allowed some of the stress he'd been experiencing to bubble to the surface, manifesting in a pink tinge to his skin.
Much like his other powers, Steven had realized that he could control his pink state and bring it out on purpose, though it was hard to manage. The more he allowed his diamond to affect him, the more unstable he became and the more difficult it was to hold back.
Now, though, he wasn't using very much. Just enough to give him a slight edge in this spar (and maybe he wanted to impress everyone watching— it wasn't often he could show off).
Suddenly, he felt it. The air shifted behind him and to the right, so he rolled in the opposite direction and turned around, flinging a shield at the emerging student. Unfortunately, it just clattered on the ground behind him, and Mirio appraised him again.
"Hey, you're pretty fast!" he laughed. "Let's see if you can keep up." With a smirk, he sank back through the ground, and Steven had to keep himself from swearing as he jumped straight up, avoiding a punch from below.
Rather than land, he brought to mind happy memories, and allowed himself to float. He tossed a series of larger-than-usual shields down at his opponent, but Mirio managed to boost himself up by somehow jumping off of them.
Steven backed away, grabbing the vulnerable Mirio's ankle and preparing to throw him to the ground, but the student just slipped through his fingers, to his frustration. He could understand now why Aizawa spoke so highly of Mirio— how could anyone defeat a hero who couldn't be hit.
The solution, in Steven's opinion, was to be faster. He fed his irritation into his powers, and burst towards the ground. Mirio attempted to kick him, but Steven formed a bubble around his opponent, the foot clattering uselessly against the pink orb. Before he could go intangible for the umpteenth time, the half-Gem dissolved his bubble and grabbed him with his newfound strength, throwing him to the ground faster than he could react.
Steven cancelled his floating completely, allowing himself to fall straight for the floor, on a trajectory to land on a stunned Mirio. However, the teen gathered his wits just in time and sank into the floor, and the floor Steven landed on formed a small crater.
That was enough to shake him, at least slightly. He'd allowed himself to go too far, and he pulled back. There was no reason to be taking this so seriously. He didn't want to hurt the other boy, and this was just supposed to be a friendly spar.
Mirio exploded out of the ground behind him, and Steven moved to block with a shield, forgetting that any sort of blocking was ineffective. His fist went straight through the weapon, and landed a solid hit on Steven's chest that actually made him wheeze. Mirio took advantage of this, and launched himself forward with a flurry of blows. Steven did what he could, dodging wherever possible and landing a few lightning-fast hits of his own, but neither was able to gain any ground.
Steven was still shaken by the crater he'd formed, and refused to power himself up too much for fear of losing control. Unfortunately, that meant he wasn't nearly fast enough to solidly overwhelm Mirio like he could earlier, which meant the two boys were at an impasse.
A piercing whistle rang out, and the two fighters backed away from each other and turned to Aizawa, who was looking at them with a neutral expression.
"Time's up, you two. Togata— you have class. Universe, you're with me."
Steven calmed down, releasing the energy within him. Mirio grinned and approached him with an outstretched hand, which he took graciously.
"Hah! That was really impressive! We should spar again sometime."
Steven huffed and smiled. "Sounds good. You're pretty slippery, yourself."
"Togata."
"Yes sir!" Mirio broke off from the handshake and ran off, but turned around and called, "I'll find you later!"
Steven waved back, but frowned when he realized that he forgot to heal the boy. Hopefully he would visit the school nurse before he went to class.
Aizawa stepped up to him. "You didn't use most of those moves when we sparred yesterday," he observed quietly.
Steven shrugged in response. "Didn't see the point."
"And you saw a point here?"
"I already knew Mirio was powerful, and it's been a while since I sparred against someone who could keep up."
The hero's eyes narrowed. "You could have overwhelmed him at the end." It was a statement, not a question, and Steven turned away in embarrassment.
"I don't— I don't have the best control over myself when I go pink. Didn't want to hurt him. Can the floor be repaired?" he hurriedly deflected.
Aizawa's eyes remained narrowed, but accepted the change of topic. "Cementoss will deal with it. He can manipulate cement," he said, responding to Steven's next unspoken question.
Steven chuckled. "Dang. You guys have so many types of quirks for practically everything, it's insane."
The man ignored that. "I noticed you talking to some of my students?" They set off behind the rest of the class, who were on their way to the locker rooms to change out of their gym uniforms.
"Yeah." He swallowed. "I was just healing up some of their bruises."
Aizawa stopped in his tracks. "You can heal?"
"Yessir."
The hero flared at the teen, finally turning away and muttering under his breath. Steven could just barely catch "doesn't tell me anything" and "problem children".
Poor guy. He seemed stressed.
"We're doing quirkless spars today. Random partners, switch halfway through. The two of us will be correcting your form and giving you tips."
Steven straightened with pride at that. They had met not even a day ago, and already Aizawa thought him knowledgeable enough in fighting to assist his students.
It was hours after the events of the morning, and Steven felt significantly better than he did after he fought Mirio. If he was being honest, it felt good to let out some of the stress that had been building up.
He'd been given the option to spend the time afterwards sitting in on their classes, but he'd never attended a formal school and he didn't intend on starting now. Instead, he wandered the grounds, decompressing in the morning air and taking a break from everything. If he could, he would have been attempting to find the warp pads he knew of, but even that wasn't guaranteed.
What if Gems never came to Earth? What if Gems didn't even exist in this universe? If that was the case, then he was really all alone, and his only hopes were finding a quirk that could send him back or waiting for his family to figure it out from their end. But as much as he believed in them, he knew it could be years before they managed to reverse-engineer whatever that accursed artifact did.
Steven sighed, taking his mind off of his issues. He had other things to distract himself with, and turned to the class. Aizawa had assigned everyone to a pair, and they were all going at it already.
The nearest pair consisted of the girl with headphone jacks he'd healed in the gym earlier that morning and the purple haired boy who he's pretty sure brainwashed him or something when he first dropped in. He didn't know either of their names (or anyone else's) but he'd ask as soon as he had some advice.
Immediately, he noticed some pressing issues. While both of them exhibited clear knowledge of some sort of martial arts, they were both awkward about it. The boy was tall and lanky, with long limbs that should have given him an advantage over his much shorter opponent, but he stepped in far closer than he needed to, leading to him not being able to put much power behind his blows.
The girl, on the other hand, was unsteady and unsure. The way she was fighting was similar to the way someone five times her size would fight, but on her small frame it was inefficient and downright dangerous at some points. She would be better off taking advantage of her short stature and slender limbs to fight more like Connie did— smart, efficient, never taking a hit, and only striking at the right moment.
"Alright, cut it out," Steven stopped the spar before it could go any farther. "We need to make some changes here. Before I start, could I get your names?"
"Kyouka Jirou," the girl answered nonchalantly.
The boy narrowed his eyes in suspicion, but acquiesced to the request anyways. "Shinsou."
Steven nodded, preparing what he wanted to say. "So. Your foundations are good, both of you, and it's clear you know how to fight. What you two need to work on is adapting that knowledge of fighting to your own bodies.
"Shinsou-san," he turned to him first, "it's clear you know a great deal of martial arts. Have you been training long?"
Shinsou blinked. "Almost a year now."
"Then that's really quick progress. One thing I've noticed that you do is you get in too close. Here, let me…" In a moment of concentration, Steven shapeshifted himself taller and skinnier to match the proportions of the student. He didn't even notice the wide-eyed looks he was getting from the two of them.
"When you fight," he demonstrated by approaching a wary Shinsou, "you get too close to really make use of your reach. You have height. You have reach. If you stand a bit farther away from your opponents, you'll have more room to maneuver and you'll be able to put more power behind your blows."
Steven turned to Jirou. "In a similar way, you aren't taking advantage of your body's size." He shrunk, now on eye level with the girl. "Jirou-san— are you a three hundred pound boxer?"
"No?" she answered with confusion.
"Then why are you fighting like one?" he questioned. "You've got some good foundations, but you're too stationary, and you're expecting your blows to hit a lot harder than you could reasonably manage." He crouched down in demonstration, bouncing from one foot to the other. "Instead, try to keep light on your feet and focus on dodging. It's better to land one smart blow without getting hit yourself, than to land a few hits that don't do anything while you get hit."
He stepped back and smiled, releasing the form. "Go back to the spar, and let's try out what I just said."
The two looked at each other, getting back into their fighting stances and carefully approaching. The improvements were evident from the start. Shinsou's punches carried a lot more force now that he wasn't cramping his arms, and Jirou was using up a lot less energy by not going for some of the more pointless hits. They weren't perfect, but there was a noticeable difference.
"That's perfect!" Steven congratulated them. "Both of you are already doing a lot better. Keep it up!"
He moved on to the next pair, leaving Jirou and Shinsou bewildered and wondering what had just happened.
Steven circled the room, offering thoughtful suggestions to those students he thought needed it— some of them, frankly, needed more help than he could give— and giving compliments to practically everyone, because every student was doing something right. Steven knew how much a sincere compliment could do, and he did his best to be as constructive as possible.
Some of the students were still wary of him, and that was fine. Many more were warming up to him, even asking questions that he was happy to provide the answers to.
Yes, things were certainly looking up.
Eventually, the class broke for lunch, but Aizawa called him over before he could follow them to the cafeteria. "What's up? Is something wrong?" he asked.
"Nothing's wrong, Universe," Aizawa said. "Considering you've been healing my students, I figured it'd be prudent for you to visit Recovery Girl."
Steven thought. "Is that the nurse?"
"Correct. She happens to have a quirk that, at least superficially, appears to work similarly to your own healing. It's not that I don't trust you, but I'd prefer she check it over and clear it before you go around healing anyone else."
That hurt a bit, but Steven understood where the man was coming from. If someone was going around doing strange things to his own hypothetical students that healed them completely, he'd be a bit suspicious too.
"Don't worry, Aizawa-san. It's all good!" he chuckled.
Aizawa stared a bit longer than necessary. "...Sure. Go get some food first. One of my students can direct you to her office once you finish eating."
"Yes sir, Mr. Teacher sir!" Steven did a cheeky salute and strolled out into the halls, where he could just barely see the tail-end of 1-A turn the corner. He ran after them, following them into the enormous, echoing room he assumed was the cafeteria. A line of students waited against the wall to pick up food, so he got in the queue behind them. A few weird looks were sent his way, presumably for not wearing the U.A. uniform, but otherwise he was mostly ignored.
The line moved quickly, and when it was Steven's turn to order he realized that he had absolutely no idea what was being offered. His knowledge of Japanese cuisine was, admittedly, lacking. After a moment of panic, he decided to leave it up to chance and asked the chef for "something vegetarian". Not even ten seconds later, he was given a bowl of dark noodles and he set off to eat it.
On first taste, he was surprised to find it sweeter than he expected, but fairly tasty nonetheless. He scarfed it down within minutes, and then left the room to find the nurse's office. Steven didn't bother asking one of the students, since he didn't want to bother them during their lunches, and he was pretty sure he'd figure it out eventually.
...
Or not, because after ten minutes of wandering he bit the bullet and asked a passing teacher for directions (at least, he assumed it was a teacher— they were wearing a cowboy hat and a gas mask, so it was hard to tell).
Finally, Steven knocked on the door to the nurse's office. "Come in!" yelled a voice from inside, and he let himself in. He found himself in a fairly large room reminiscent of Dr. Maheswaran's office, with two hospital beds and a desk where an old lady sat, presumably the nurse.
"Hi, i-is this Recovery Girl's office?"
"Yes, yes, you're speaking to her," the woman hopped off her chair and walked up to him. "What's the matter, dearie? Did you get hurt?"
"Oh no, nothing like that," he hurriedly explained. "I'm, well… has Principal Nedzu told you anything about me?"
"I haven't spoken to him in days. What's this all about?"
Steven sighed. This might be a long explanation.
"You mean to tell me," Shuuzenji took off her goggles to rub at her eyes, "that you are a human-alien hybrid, with seemingly magical abilities, and that you came here from a different universe."
"Sounds about right, yeah!" Steven nodded enthusiastically. "Principal Nedzu could tell you more, though."
"Yes, I'm sure he could," she muttered. Putting her goggles back on, she sighed. "Please get in one of the beds, if you would."
Perplexed, he asked, "Why?"
"Because knowing that rat, he'll be wanting a medical examination as soon as possible," she gathered her equipment and nudged him into sitting on the bed.
Knowing how this would go, thanks to his experience with Dr. Maheswaran, he allowed her to run her tests. He pointed out the fact that his gem made noise, and the nurse spent a solid five minutes examining it in every way possible.
An x-ray followed these tests, and Shuuzenji nearly had a conniption at the fracture lines lining nearly every bone.
"How are you even walking without collapsing in pain?"
Steven shrugged. "Healing powers?"
The nurse just stared incredulously, though he didn't know why. Healing powers were a perfectly acceptable answer to most of his problems.
"I swear…" she muttered, "healing powers are not an excuse to break your bones! How does your healing work in the first place?"
He frowned. "I mean, internal stuff kinda heals on its own? If it's a bruise or someone else is hurt, I just need to get some of my spit on them."
"The vehicle for your healing is saliva."
He shrugged. "I could cry too, but it's easier to just kiss them on the hand or something."
Shuuzenji looked appalled. Steven failed to see the problem.
"Oh!" he said, remembering something. "My sweat can also work."
She just stared at him, then shook her head as if to forget the last few minutes. "How do you even manage to break that many bones?"
Steven winced. "That's, uh, a lot. I guess you could say I had a lot of enemies who wanted to kill me? Don't worry, we're all friends now!"
She took a deep breath, letting it go slowly. "Well. I want to see your healing in action, dearie, since I still have no idea how it works. I'm sure it won't take long for one of the hero classes to send someone—"
The door burst open, two boys Steven's age rushing inside. "Recovery Girl! I might have broken Shigeo's arm!" yelled one.
"No, he definitely broke it. I would know," the other confirmed.
Shuuzenji got up, gesturing towards the other bed. "Which arm is it?" Upon being directed to the correct limb, she pointed at Steven. "You. Demonstrate."
Licking his finger, he gently swiped it along the boy's arm. Within seconds, the patient sat up. "Whoa! I'm not even tired after that!"
The nurse looked genuinely lost, and Steven sympathized. Gems could be a lot sometimes, even if he was only half of one.
End Notes:
i've actually been chatting with one of my readers over discord (don't actually know their ao3 username otherwise i'd plug it) and i have so many ideas! so much fluff! so little time!
the two students right at the end are completely inconsequential, they don't even have names beyond one of them being Shigeo but imagine they're second year hero students that share a single braincell
recovery girl is gonna have her work cut out for her lol
Add me on Discord at blobertthebob#3284 — just let me know what fic you're coming from!