Ignited Spark

by 3PeopleInACoat

When Midoriya Izuku was four years old, his quirk finally manifested - not a combination of his parents' quirks, but an entirely different mutation of its own. With the ability to blast lightning out of his body, a horrible accident convinces Izuku to give up his dreams of becoming a hero. But with the help of two girls, Izuku finds the inspiration to fight and become a true hero!

12. Battle Trial

"Alright!" All Might pumped his fist dramatically in his excitement, grinning as he pulled the door of the building they were doing their exercise in open, and holding it for the villain team to step inside. "Now that we've made sure your earpieces and equipment work, let's get this party started!"

Izuku gulped a bit nervously, but still took his cue to step away from their small group with Nejire beside him as All Might kept the door open for them to step through into the building. Behind them, the other members of their class had started heading off towards the observation deck so that they could watch their match through several camera monitors, Tenya trying to ask Yui her opinion on something and being flabbergasted as she pointed looked down at her feet rather than respond to him, and Setsuna punching Hanta's shoulder as she ran ahead towards Mina, unaware of Hanta's eyes flickering down briefly and going a bit red behind his mask. Once the class had begun walking into the building together, Katsuki smirking a bit at how nervously Izuku, Ochako and Itsuka were looking at each other, All Might gave the small group a grin as he looked up at the large, unassuming building with a fire escape on the side, where the 'weapon' that Izuku and Nejire had to guard would presumably be.

"Now then, the scenario has the villains inside the building already," All Might explained to Izuku and Nejire as they stepped through the doorway, "and then, after five minutes, the heroes will be let in as well to infiltrate. All four of you have already been supplied with capture tape - meaning that if you manage to wrap it around anyone on the opposing team, that means they've been 'captured', and they're out of the match! With that said, remember, Young Midoriya, Young Hadou - while you may not be on the hero team, this exercise will give an excellent opportunity to get inside the mindset of villainkind! Because this is a practical training exercise, go all out without fear of injury! Though we'll cut the match short if things get out of hand, of course."

Izuku gulped a bit, nodding - he didn't need to look behind him to know that Itsuka and Ochako were glaring at him, as though daring him to take All Might's advice to go all out without 'fear of injury'.

"With that said, since Young Midoriya and Young Hadou aren't familiar with the layout of the building, we're going to somewhat break the immersion of how a proper villain would react to a situation like this, and the five-minute timer will only begin once you both have entered the same room as the weapon you're guarding. This will give you both a bit of time to look around a tad bit, seeing as Young Uraraka and Young Kendou will also have that time to look over the building's layout map. Once that timer goes off, you all will have fifteen minutes to either capture the other team, or, in Young Kendou and Young Uraraka's case, secure the weapon. Should the hero team not touch the weapon in time, or the villains remain uncaptured when the timer runs out, the villain team will automatically win. Should the heroes capture the villain team or touch the weapon, they will win. Now then, we have no more time to lose! Good luck to all of you, and may the best group win!"

The two that would be on the villain team nodded at that, and watched as All Might spun on his heel and began sprinting off to rejoin the rest of the class in the observation deck. As Nejire skipped inside, talking a bit aimlessly as she looked around the hallway, Izuku hesitated to step inside the rest of the way, holding the door open, and then looked back around at Itsuka and Ochako.

Both girls were looking as conflicted as he was, glancing unsurely at each other before looking back at him - but once their eyes met his again, seeing his uncertainty through his body language, they tried to give him encouraging smiles and thumbs up. Pausing for another moment, Izuku tried his best to smile back at them through the respirator around his mouth, and then turned to follow Nejire inside, closing the door behind him.

Thankfully, it didn't take too long for the two of them to search the entire building - there were a lot of blind spots in the narrow corridors, sharp corners leading down other halls into the empty parts of the fake building. Nejire continued her unrelenting stream of questions behind him as Izuku went down every corridor and opened the doors to peek inside, sometimes being greeted by empty rooms, other times seeing furniture lined up against the walls, and sometimes just seeing pieces of plywood leaning against the walls. Mentally, though, he made notes of what Ochako could use as ammunition, and made the small plan to double check the top two floors of the building for anything she could float.

Although … well, making sure Ochako didn't have anything to throw at him was currently a secondary concern, he thought with a frown as he glanced down at the Full Gauntlet. There was something else he really needed to come to terms with before he could even try to find the motivation to fight his two friends - which he would have to do in about five minutes in addition to getting ready for them to enter the building. So, uh ... crap.

Finally, the two of them reached the top floor, and opening the door to have a look around. Unlike the floors below, it was one large room, with several panels of wood and barrels resting against the supports of the room, and standing in the middle of the room was a giant, ominous bomb, painted completely black except for three red stripes at the top of the weapon. Gulping a bit and being shaken out of his inner conflict, Izuku approached the bomb cautiously, hoping that UA didn't actually use real-life bombs as practice (something that wouldn't surprise him if it was true) and hesitantly raised his hand to knock on the weapon.

"Oh, good," He sighed in relief when he heard a hollow ding, "it's just papier-mâché, it's not gonna blow up if we screw up."

"So it's not a real bomb? Interesting!" Nejire hopped around a bit, taking a moment to run to the other side of the room and look out the window with a smile. "Maybe the second and third years deal with real bombs? Because some heroes have to deal with that kind of thing? Maybe? Hm, or maybe bomb handling is the police's responsibility, we just secure it and let them run in to disable it. That's what I think, anyway. Ooh, but this building is really, really big! But like - are all the buildings in this city like this? Big and empty and filled with bombs? Not real bombs, of course, but - well, maybe actual bombs, I don't know."

Realizing he hadn't said anything in the last few minutes, Nejire looked around, about to open her mouth and ask him a bit more about what he thought of the building, how big and empty it was, and what they could maybe do about Itsuka and Ochako - and then she blinked when she saw Izuku hunched over ea bit, playing with the red gauntlet on his arm absently as he took slow, deep breaths. Curious, she raised a glove-covered hand to her face and poked her cheek.

"Hey, hey, are you okay, Midoriya? You look like you just saw the ghost of your late grandpa telling you to eat mac and cheese at three in the morning. I speak from experience, by the way, but I also think that I was delirious with a cold when that happened - plus, I was like ten, so I might've been hallucinating. Which might not be good for you if that's what's happening right now. Are you seeing things?"

"N-n-no, I'm - uh - I'm okay, Hadou." He managed to say, looking over at her briefly before glancing away from her - honestly, he had been so distracted with his thoughts, he hadn't really registered what his partner was wearing. Although now that he had taken a look at her, he gulped at how … er … snug her costume looked, and pointed glanced away while hoping that anime logic wasn't somehow applying here and she couldn't make out how red his cheeks had become under his mask. "I'm just … er … I'm just kind of nervous."

"Nervous?" She repeated, feeling a bit concerned as she hopped over from where she was standing next to the window to stand beside him. "Nervous about what? Fighting Kendou and Uraraka? I'm kinda with you, I'm actually feeling a bit nervous fighting them too - they look really tough. Especially Kendou - she's got a lot of muscles, you know, I saw while we were putting on our costumes in the changing room."

"Er - uh - not … exactly that." He gulped a bit, blushing even hotter and choosing to ignore that last comment entirely - no need to think about Itsuka being - er - naked - no, no, Izuku, don't even think about it! "It's just … well, I'm not nervous about fighting Occhan and Kendou, I've done that loads of times in the dojo we trained in together. It's more like …"

Nejire tilted her head as Izuku hesitated again, staring off to the side for a moment before letting out another sigh, and looked around at her, his frown visible through the see-through respirator.

"... well … this is … well, it's a long story," He explained to her in a quiet voice, "but I've only ever used my - my quirk against someone else once in my life, and … and it didn't end well for anyone. I ended up getting someone injured, pretty badly, and … it scared me enough that for years, I swore off using my quirk. And now, I have to use it again against someone … and it's Occhan."

Feeling his eyes prickle with tears, he let out another sigh, and raised his arm with the Full Gauntlet on it to stare at his palm.

"A few months ago, the only reason I started using my quirk again was because I saw her in danger, and now, whenever I use my quirk, I think of saving her. But now I have to go through an exercise where I have to fight her with my quirk. And I … I don't know if I can do that. I don't know if I go through with ... with hurting her."

Nejire blinked a bit, keeping herself quiet for once while Izuku finished up his little story and stared sadly at his feet. There were a hundred thousand questions running through her mind that she really wanted to ask him - he used his quirk against someone before? It scared him? That made sense, his quirk was kind of scary, but he used it again thanks to Ochako? Or 'Occhan', which was his cute little nickname for her. Maybe she could call her 'Occhan' if she asked nicely? - but she knew that right now, he wouldn't appreciate her asking all her questions while he looked so sad.

Wait, wait, wait, she realized, she couldn't just let him feel sad about this, could she? They were partners! They had a match to win! And he couldn't do that if he was scared of hurting Ochako. So she needed to help him feel better. Thankfully, after taking a moment to think, she blinked as something came to her, and quickly nodded to herself.

"It'll be okay, Midoriya," She moved forward to pat his shoulder in comfort, which drew his attention back to her as she gave him a small smile, "I guess that it is a pretty long story about what exactly's bothering you, but we don't have time to go into it - y'know, no matter how much I really, really want to. You can tell me another time, though, okay? I'd like to hear what happened."

"I …" Izuku paused, and then sighed and nodded, "... okay, Hadou. I - yeah."

"But anyway," She gave him a small thumbs up, "if you're scared of using your quirk on Uraraka, maybe you don't have to use it."

There was a small pause in the top floor of the room, Izuku staring blankly at her while Nejire gave him an expectant, curious look - and then he blinked.

"I - huh?" He glanced unsurely down at the gauntlet and then back up to her. "I - what do you mean? N-not use my quirk against Occhan or Kendou? I - but I have to, Hadou - we can't win if I don't -"

"But look at it like this!" Nejire interrupted him, raising one of her fingers to hush him by pressing it against the part of the respirator where his mouth was (which did a good job of immediately zipping his mouth closed, his cheeks feeling very hot at the intimate action), "You mentioned that you've fought Uraraka and Kendou before without your quirk? Like - pow, pow, bam, punch, kick, kinda stuff? Then just do that! I don't know what you think, Midoriya, but we're pretty OP right now!"

"Uh … OP?"

"Yeah! OP! Like - we're overpowered! Look!" She threw her hands up into the air, and twin spirals of energy released from her palms, hovering there and drawing Izuku's attention to her quirk's effects as she bounced around a bit, "I'm super strong! And you're super strong too! I mean, we burned a hole through a zero-pointer's head! Well, technically you did that, I just kinda held you up in the air, but I helped at least! Of course, we also fell after that, and I'm pretty sure we would've splattered on the street if Hound Dog didn't save us - wait, where was I going with this? I had a point."

"Uh … something about how we're overpowered."

"Oh! Right! We're overpowered. That means that we're both super powerful - so it's okay if you don't use your quirk all that much! I can more than make up for us on the muscle side while you try to figure out what you wanna do - so you do you, and I'll back you up!"

Izuku stared up at her for a moment as she started unintentionally floating up into the air in her excitement thanks to her quirk, giving him a goofy grin and a thumbs up - and then he snorted a bit, and looked away as he was unable to stop himself from laughing a bit quietly. Still, he felt his heart warm a bit and the anxiety in his stomach lessen as he looked back up at Nejire, who had tilted her head in confusion due to his sudden laughter.

"S-sorry Hadou, I just … well … thank you," He smiled up at her, giving her a thumbs up in return, "it's … well, the fact you're so cool with me trying to - er - sort out my issues - it means a big deal to me. And - and for the record, we both destroyed that zero-pointer, not just me. I wouldn't have been able to do that if you hadn't flew me up there - so thanks again for - for helping me out."

"Of course I'll help you out! We're partners in crime, after all!" She nodded happily, floating back down and leaning forward slightly so her face was close to his, unaware of him gulping nervously at how close she was. "So I guess now that we figured all that stuff out, we need to make a plan?"

"Y-yeah," Izuku nodded, leaning back a tad bit while his face burned at her proximity to him, "let's - yeah, let's make a plan. So - uh - well, you pretty much know how my quirk works, and it's - it's not going to do us much good in this match. But what about yours? Er - well, I guess I should ask, what exactly is your quirk?"

"Oh, yeah! I didn't tell you yet - well, my quirk's called 'Wave Motion'," Nejire explained, opening her hands again and letting out a few more spirals of yellow energy, "it lets me convert my own vitality into energy, and releases it in my little spirals - y'know, like energy blasts, but I also used it to curl my hair up into these cute little horns. It's not really fast, though."

"Your vitality?" Izuku blinked, blinking as he suddenly found himself connecting dots in his head that he hadn't thought of before. "So your quirk draws on your stamina? And if you use enough energy, you get tired?"

"Yep! If I use too much of it, I get really sleepy."

"Wait - of course! That's what happened after we destroyed the zero-pointer, isn't it - you used too much energy and couldn't move afterwards."

"Mm-hm! If I overuse my quirk, I get really exhausted since my power source is pretty much my stamina. Luckily, I've got lots of stamina!" She balled her fists excitedly. "I worked on my quirk with my mom and dad, they've got me using up to - er - I think twenty percent of my power? I think that was the amount I used the last time I really practised!"

"Wait - twenty percent?" Izuku felt his jaw drop slightly, "so you fighting the zero-pointer - blowing up the robots - that was you only using twenty percent of your power?!"

"Maybe a bit less when I was fighting the smaller robots with you, but y'know! I had to make sure I didn't fall asleep until the end of the exam."

Izuku gulped a bit, nodding slowly and storing this information in his mind to put in his notebook later - seriously, how powerful really was Nejire? - but still, he could feel some of the gears in his head turning. Slowly, a plan began forming in his mind, glancing at the yellow spirals of energy still humming in Nejire's palms, and then he nodded.

"Okay," He sighed, "okay, I … I think I've got it, Hadou."

The floating girl blinked curiously at that, seeing Izuku look around at her as he straightened up and put his hands on his hips.

"Divide and conquer," He explained, "Occhan and Kendou are amazing on their own, but if what I saw really briefly during our admittance letter is any indication … they work too well together. If I know them, and I think I do, they'll try teaming up on us, or separating us and taking us both down one at a time. That means that you and I would have a better chance if we separated them, and took them down on the floors below. I'd say that since there are eight floors to this building, we shouldn't let them reach any higher than the sixth floor - although we'll also have to account for them trying to use the fire escape on the side to get in, we'll have to watch for them there."

"Okay, okay …" Nejire slowly nodded, "... so who am I fighting? Kendou?"

"No," He shook his head, grimacing slightly, "if I'm being honest, this fight's gonna be a bad match-up for both of us - Kendou's got the advantage over us in combat, and she can easily beat us down. And Occhan's dangerous to you too - you could theoretically stay in the air and out of her reach, but she'll be able to float up after you too. But if Occhan uses her quirk on me, that's game over - she'll float me, and either I'll have to resort to using my quirk to get around, or they'll disregard me and team up on you - and they'll win either way."

"Alright," Nejire nodded, looking suddenly professional as she clapped her hands together, "so in that case, what's the plan?"

"First," Izuku sighed, moving around to grab a piece of plywood against the support, "we're going to clear away all this stuff, so that in case Occhan gets up here, she won't have anything to float as weapons. We go down to the seventh floor and watch for them, and make sure they don't get any higher than the sixth floor. Like I said, this is gonna be a bad match-up for us both, but we don't have a choice. Since you can fly even if she floats you, you'll be the one to take on Occhan. And … well, I'll distract Kendou."

"Hm?" Nejire tilted her head. "'Distract' Kendou? Don't you mean 'beat' Kendou? Gotta stay positive, Midoriya!"

"Well, I'll be real with you, Hadou," Izuku shook his head, already resigned to his fate, "it's more than likely that no matter if we win or lose, she's gonna be kicking my ass either way."

---

"Honestly, I didn't expect to have to memorize the entire layout of the building in like - five minutes," Ochako sighed a bit as she leaned against the railing beside Itsuka they studied the two printouts that All Might had given them on the walk over in addition to their earpieces and capture tape. "I feel like we're gonna forget something."

"Well, I'm not too worried if we miss something," Itsuka tapped the paper with her finger as she looked over her own copy of the layout, "I don't think Midoriya and Hadou will have the time to hide the weapon in five minutes, so it'll probably still be up on the top floor. That means that they'll either be up there waiting for us, or they'll be spread around the building looking for us once we get the go ahead to head in."

"Mm-hm," Ochako nodded, looking around at her partner as she put the paper down, seeing her eyes studying the layout and nodding slowly, with Ochako already knowing that the gears were turning in her head, "so what are you thinking?"

"The fire escape," She leaned over to point at the metal staircase on the side of the building, looking up to note how far up it went, "it goes all the way to the seventh floor - we climb up it, find some stairs, and head to the top floor. We only have to touch the bomb to win, so we should prioritize finding it, and bum-rushing it."

"But Deku will probably think that we'll use the fire escape - he'll be watching."

"That's true. So instead of the seventh floor, we get off on the sixth. If either of them are watching for us to get off through the seventh floor window, we'll have a small opportunity to go around them. We should prioritize making it to the weapon and touching it, since that'll be an automatic win for us, but if we have no choice but to fight them, we'll need to team up," She looked around at Ochako, brushing some orange-locks behind her ear and careful to mind her mask, "we don't know anything about how Hadou's quirk works, but we know Midoriya like the backs of our hands. If only one of us goes up against him he could be dangerous, but if we team up against him, we can take him down easily. And then we move onto Hadou together."

"Okay," Ochako nodded, glancing back up at the building with a bit of reluctance, "I … yeah, yeah, that sounds like a plan."

Itsuka noticed the small, uncertain look behind her helmet's visor, and smiled a bit as she leaned back against the railing, putting her own copy of the floor plan on the ground.

"Bit nervous about fighting Midoriya?"

"Huh? Uh … well …" She giggled a bit nervously, slipping off her helmet and holding it in one hand while she fixed her hair somewhat, looking a bit sheepish and embarrassed, "... kinda. I mean, it's not like this is the first time we've fought, but … it just kind of feels different, you know? Now we're gonna have to fight him so we can get a good grade."

"I get it," Itsuka shrugged a bit, smiling as she looked back up at the building, "and I'm not gonna lie, I'm not exactly looking forward to this fight all that much either. I was kind of hoping that we'd get Bakugou to beat up so we could impress All Might - not, y'know, our boy."

"Yeah," Ochako giggled a bit, putting back on her helmet once she was sure she had fixed her hair, "if only."

"Well, we'll just have to be patient," She leaned back, scratching her cheek, "we'll get our chance to beat up Bakugou eventually. Hopefully it can be at the sports festival, so we can beat him up in front of -"

"Now then!" The two girls jumped a bit in surprise as All Might's voice boomed out over the speakers, making them look around in shock, "Let's get started with our first hero-against-villain combat training! Team C vs Team A! Start!"

Glancing at each other as a small horn blared, signifying that the fifteen-minute timer had started, Itsuka and Ochako nodded, getting into game mode as they balled their fists. They were still kind of nervous about having to go up against their friend in an actual testing environment, but they both knew that Izuku wouldn't appreciate them holding back on him. They needed to treat him seriously as a threat, so they tried their best to quell the tightness in their stomachs as they hurried over towards the fire escape, Ochako floating both of them up to climb over the railing.

Quickly climbing up, once they had reached the sixth floor, they slid the window open as quietly as they could, Ochako glancing up to make sure neither of their targets was peeking out the window above them to check for them, and with small grunts, they both hopped into the building.

"Infiltration successful!" Ochako pumped her fist slightly as Itsuka looked around with a small grimace.

"Crap, there's a lot of blind spots," She muttered, glancing around as though Izuku and Nejire were hiding just behind the corner, "let's be careful and look for the stairs. I think the layout said that there was one at the end of this hall."

"Right!"

Together, they began hurrying quietly down the hall with metal plates lining the walls, straining their ears to listen in case they could make out the sound of their opponent's footsteps - they knew Nejire could fly because of the tests yesterday, but Izuku didn't have that luxury, so they were sure to keep their ears open. So far, they didn't hear anything, but Itsuka had the suspicion that Izuku wouldn't stray too far from the weapon on the top floor - he knew Ochako's quirk like the back of his hand, and she wasn't convinced that Izuku wouldn't have guessed that they would use the fire escape.

They had fifteen minutes to get to the top floor and touch the weapon, or capture Izuku and Nejire. There weren't any timers on the walls, but Itsuka had the suspicion that they'd already taken up about two minutes to climb up the fire escape and into the building, so they only had about thirteen minutes left. So they needed to hurry.

"Here's the stairs," She gestured towards the open door, both girls hurrying to start heading up them. Remembering the map layout, they knew that these stairs would go to the seventh floor, and at the other side of the floor would be the stairs that would lead them to the top floor of the building where their prize was. So that also meant that if Izuku and Nejire were anywhere, it would be either on the next floor of the building or the one above that.

However, as they hurried their pace, taking one foot up the stairs, they suddenly heard the door above them bang open. Itsuka and Ochako froze slightly, pausing as they heard hurried footsteps heading down the stairs, and before they could even think to hide, around the corner came Izuku and Nejire, both of them looking shocked to see the their opponents just standing there, and skidding to a stop near the top of the stairs.

For a moment, all four of them froze in their step, staring at each other in surprise.

"Oh, uh," Itsuka chuckled awkwardly, giving them a dorky wave, "hi."

"I - uh - er - stop there!" Izuku managed to squeak out from behind his mask, doing his best to sound menacing and failing spectacularly. "You - you dumb heroes! You really think that you could have - uh - snuck up behind us villains like … um … that? We're - we're smart enough to figure out that you would've - uh - snuck up … behind … us."

Nejire gave him a curious look as his former bravado and attempt to sound like a villain faded into a lame finish, making him slump a bit while cringing, while Itsuka and Ochako tried to spare his dignity by not laughing out loud. "Ooooh, are you role-playing a villain? Should I do that too? I think All Might said that we should try that mindset, so I probably should! Okay, so - um - don't move, okay?!" She turned back to the other two below them, trying to look menacing and failing due to her just kind of pouting instead of looking angry. "I'm a villain right now! Don't come any closer!"

"Well, uh …" Itsuka glanced over at Ochako, seeing her shrug a bit before looking back up at the other two, "... that's some nice role-playing, you two, but, uh -"

And then, without warning, Itsuka and Ochako began charging up the stairs, bolting straight towards Izuku as his eyes widened behind his mask and he shifted automatically into a battle stance, seeing them balling their fists. Remembering their plan, they moved to attack him, wanting to beat Izuku down and tie him up with their capture tape -

"Hey!" Nejire snapped, throwing her up in the air as yellow energy began to swirl in her palm, making Itsuka and Ochako falter in their step. "I thought I said not to move! Couldn't you hear me?!"

Itsuka and Ochako both stiffened up and stared as spirals of yellow energy built in her hand - they had a feeling that they really didn't want to get hit by the energy she was obviously charging up. Very quickly, Itsuka hopped back down the stairs while Ochako kept charging forward, gulping as Nejire threw her hand down at Ochako, and blasted out a large swirl of power at her.

Yelping, Ochako ducked down to lay against the steps as Itsuka ducked around the corner of the stairs, and the large blast of energy shot down the stairs, blasting hard against the wall and crumbling down like several sledgehammers had hit it at once, collapsing hard against the floor with a loud crash.

For a single moment, both girls stared blankly at the destroyed wall as the yellow light dissipated, and Izuku turned his shocked stare to Nejire as she ducked a bit to make sure Itsuka and Ochako didn't accidentally get sent through that wall - and then Itsuka got herself back together.

"Uraraka!" She shouted, shaking Ochako out of her shock, "Go get the bomb!"

"R-right! Bomb! Right!"

Quickly, Ochako scrambled back to her feet and charged up the rest of the stairs. Izuku tried to reach out to grab her out of instinct, only to squeak when Ochako shoved straight past him, not even considering floating him as she muttered "Sorry, Deku!" under her breath, and took the rest of the stairs two at a time, eventually disappearing through the door and running as fast as she could down the hall.

"Oh, crap!" Izuku gasped, looking around at Nejire as he pointed to where Ochako had run off to. "Hadou, handle Occhan!"

"Right-o!" She gave him a small salute, and then she took off, using her quirk to float up the stairs at shocking speeds to where she had seen Ochako vanish. Gulping nervously, Izuku looked back around as Itsuka moved back from where she had hidden from the initial blast, seeing Izuku standing there in challenge.

"So you and me, huh, Midoriya?" She asked, smiling a bit as she shifted into her own battle stance, spreading her legs and raising her fists. "This wouldn't be the first time we've sparred, y'know - and I can't exactly recall you ever winning against me."

"Y-yeah, I know," Izuku gulped, and then began charging down the stairs, "but this time'll be different!"

Once he reached the middle of the staircase, Izuku chose to leap the rest of the way down, shouting as he remembered the technique Teko had taught him as his legs curled inwards, and then shot out towards Itsuka's face. He aimed to hit her nose with the heel of his boot, squeezing his eyes shut as he kicked out, and he felt his foot meet something solid. Wincing a bit at the sound of a thud, he opened his eyes, wanting to check that his kick connected to either her face or torso, and about to apologize -

- and then felt his eyes widen when he realized that he hadn't hit her in the face or torso, but instead, he had hit the palm of her hand.

The palm of her enlarged, gigantic hand, grown to be roughly the size of his own upper torso as her fingers slowly wrapped around him, trapping him as his eyes widened in terror at the sight of the confident smirk on her face.

Mistakes have been made.

"Y'know," Itsuka said conversationally, "you're right, Midoriya. If you somehow manage to win this fight, it would be the first time you've ever won against me."

He gulped, however, when she suddenly squeezed him with her large hand, her smirk widening as he began shaking in terror.

"But this is also the first time I've used my quirk against you in a fight."

At that, Itsuka wheeled around, letting out a small yell as she threw Izuku as hard as she could down the hall. With a yelp of terror, Izuku was sent flying through the air, bouncing off the ground once before rolling into the wall with a grunt. Eyes widening, Izuku quickly sat up, ignoring the pain his back felt from hitting the ground as Itsuka began running up the stairwell, heading upstairs to the seventh floor. Cursing himself for his rookie mistake, Izuku scrambled to his feet and ran back down the hall towards the stairs.

---

"Now then, everyone, you should all be observing this match closely," All Might instructed at the front of the group as everyone watched the large green monitor, several camera feeds giving them a good look at the situation from all angles as the two teams began fighting, "pay attention to what your classmates are doing in this situation, and think about what you would do in their place."

"Well, I'd definitely not launch myself at the enemy like Midoriya did." Hanta said as he chuckled, watching Izuku bounce off the ground after Itsuka threw him on the screen, "kinda got yeeted right off the bat."

"I mean, it's super manly!" Eijirou tried to defend his bro's weak attack, albeit with a wince. "He threw himself at the enemy without any hesitation."

"Pity it was with a kick that Ken saw coming from a mile away," Setsuna giggled a bit, "No offence to Midoriya, but that kick couldn't have been more obvious."

"Still, it was a nice kick, kero," Tsuyu put a finger to her chin, "but like you said, just a pity that Kendou saw it coming and could defend herself from it."

"I wouldn't put him down too badly, students," All Might decided to step in his own input, raising a clipboard to begin scribbling down a few notes, "it wasn't a bad strategy - testing the water in regards to an opponent isn't all that strange. Of course, it did backfire when Young Kendou reacted accordingly, but there's still eleven minutes left on the clock. Let's see what else your classmates might come up with!"

Young Kendou, Young Uraraka, Young Midoriya, he thought privately to himself as he adjusted the earpiece he could use to talk to them just in case, here you three are no more than students in my class. I'll be grading you strictly, without playing favorites. With that said …he winced a bit at Izuku tripping over himself to get back up and chase Itsuka, … Young Midoriya, let's maybe pick it up a bit.

Behind the small crowd of students watching the fight on the screen, standing near the wall and leaning on it, Katsuki let out a huff as he stared up at the two monitors skeptically, crossing his arms - or trying to, at least, what with the two giant grenades on his arms. If he were being honest, he wished that could take some satisfaction from the match that was about to unfold here, but he couldn't really. Not any long term satisfaction, anyway.

When All Might had announced that they would be having a battle trial, he had hoped that fate would be on his side today, so he would be able to get a chance to beat the hell out of the two pebbles in his path that were starting to annoy him, or the bitch that upstaged him and acted smug about it - and he couldn't even really take enjoyment in the fact that one of those three, or two of those three, were gonna get humiliated today because that meant that either way, one of them were going to win anyway. So he would have to just take in-the-moment satisfaction over long term satisfaction.

And that meant watching the upper left screen, watching Ochako run as fast as her fast legs could carry her, and hoping that she tripped and broke her nose on the ground.

---

"Hey, hey! Stop!"

Ochako let out a squeak as another blast of yellow energy shot down the hall towards her, glancing behind her over her shoulder and feeling her eyes widen as she had to throw herself to the side to avoid the spiralling energy, grunting when she collided painfully against the wall, and scrambled to her feet as Nejire threw another blast at where she had landed, taking back off towards the stairs - although at this rate, it was pretty clear that Nejire was going to catch up a lot sooner than she would've liked.

She was more than a little surprised that Nejire had caught up so quickly, and was now hyper focused on her. Honestly, though, maybe Ochako should have expected something like this - it was clear that Nejire's lack of focus might've messed up her stats during yesterday's surprise tests, and caused everyone to write her off as an airhead. Now she was hyper focused on Ochako, and serious. Which … was not good for Ochako, seeing as she needed to touch Nejire to use her quirk, and Nejire's long-ranged quirk was more than enough to put her entirely on the defence with no chance of going on the attack.

Throwing her hands back, Nejire charged up her quirk, pouting a bit as Ochako sprinted as fast as she could down the hall towards the upper floor. Izuku and she had already tossed most of the stuff upstairs out the window and onto the ground below (with Izuku quietly apologizing every time he threw a barrel out the window and sent it falling to the alley below, which she had found somewhat cute) but he had been absolutely clear that they shouldn't let Ochako and Itsuka step one foot upstairs - that would give them more options to touch the bomb, and that would be game over for them. So in that case -

"Full charge …" She muttered, sticking her tongue out the side of her mouth and squinting one eye shut so she could aim, "... output level ten!"

BOOM

Ochako glanced behind her shoulder again and felt her eyes widen as twin bolts of yellow spiralling energy shot out of Nejire's hands, blasting down the hall towards her. The shot she had seen Nejire fire yesterday during the ball throw had been kind of slow, seeing as the energy shot out in spirals, but here, in this smaller, more cramped environment, it wouldn't take long for it to reach and hit her, and she didn't have any room to duck in to avoid it, and no way to throw herself to the side. Either way, she was going to get hit, and it was probably going to hurt.

Gulping, she quickly looked around, trying to see if there was anywhere she could go or anything that could help her dodge the blast that was inevitably going to hit her at this rate. And then she spotted the window at the end of the hall.

Letting out a brief shout to hype herself up, Ochako quickened her pace, sprinting towards the window as she outran the fireball - or, rather, the large blast of yellow energy that was going to shove her out the window anyway.

Nejire wrinkled her brow as the yellow energy swept over Ochako, briefly obscuring her from Nejire's vision, and she paused her floating to watch as the energy blasted over Ochako, eventually slamming into the wall. It took a few seconds, but eventually it dissipated, giving Nejire a good look at the cracked walls and window, the outer wall apparently strong enough to withstand her blast -

- and at how Ochako had seemingly vanished into thin air.

"Huh?" Nejire blinked, feeling more than a little confused, and quickly floated over. Her quirk didn't do that, did it? Make Ochako disappear into nothing? She sincerely hoped not, mostly because if that happened, Ochako would be kind of, sort of dead right now, and that wouldn't be good for her health at all.

Ooooh, no, now she was feeling anxious, gulping a bit as she looked around for the smaller girl but not seeing her anywhere, nervously tapping her fingers together and biting her lip as she felt a bit of cool air from the window blowing in, about to raise her finger to her earpiece that All Might had given them and apologize for accidentally killing -

- wait.

That window wasn't open before, was it?

Wrinkling her brow, Nejire looked back around, seeing the window pushed open all the way, and pouted a bit as a sudden suspicion came to her. With a small grunt, she twisted herself in the air so that her back was to the ground and she was looking at the ceiling, carefully bracing her hands against the wall outside the window, and slowly poked her head out -

- and the first thing she saw was Ochako floating in the air and slowly opening the window to the eight floor above them, blinking when she felt something off and looking down to see the top half of Nejire's face looking up at her, squeaking in surprise and a bit of fear.

"Hey!" Nejire gasped, mouth dropping open in exasperation. "That's not fair!"

Quickly, she began crawling out the window after her like some kind of horror movie monster crawling out of a TV - albeit not as gracefully. It was a bit of a struggle, pushing herself out the window with her arms and her quirk, and watching Ochako quickly scramble to get inside the same room as the bomb before Nejire got out. Thankfully, Nejire managed to slip her feet out in time, floating outside the building, and quickly blasted up to grab Ochako's feet as she crawled half-inside the building.

This didn't work in Ochako's favor, seeing as she had floated herself and taken away her gravity to get up there, so that made it pretty easy for Nejire to drag her back outside while she yelped, Nejire holding onto the heels of her boots and blinking a bit as they stretched with a metal spring - wait, were heels supposed to do that?

But unfortunately for Nejire, Ochako decided to stop trying to get back inside the building, and took advantage of the fact that Nejire was so close now to swing her fist back, biting her lips slightly as she grabbed Nejire's shoulder roughly to keep her still.

"Uh, oh!" Nejire yelped in panic, and quickly threw her head back to avoid Ochako's fist nearly beaning her in the side of the head.

For a moment both girls struggled in the air, Nejire pouting a bit as she ducked her head under Ochako's flying fists, and Ochako instinctively wrapped her legs around Nejire to keep her from moving away. However, thanks to their struggling, Nejire's feet accidentally angled themselves backwards, and both of them let out small yelps as they flew towards the building with a bit more speed than -

WACK

Both girls let out comical grunts of pain as their heads smacked against the wall harder than they anticipated - the back of Ochako's head, and Nejire's forehead. For a few moments, they stayed still while continuing to float in the air, eyes clenched tight and mouths twisted into grimaces as Ochako's helmet slipped off her face, falling towards the ground below.

"Time out?" Ochako managed to ask through the pain, not even minding the sound of her helmet breaking on the pavement.

"Time out," Nejire agreed, moving back slightly so she could rub her forehead and Ochako could rub the back of her own head. "Ow, ow, ow, ow, ow!"

"Sorry," Ochako apologized sheepishly, shaking her head slightly and feeling relieved that she felt no blood in her hair - maybe only a slight bump, "I think that was my fault, I knocked you off balance."

"No, no, that was my bad," Nejire waved her hand good-naturedly, "I think I sent us flying a bit. I'm just happy I don't have a concussion! Are you okay?"

"Yeah, I'm okay. How about you? Are you okay, Hadou?"

"Yeah, I'm good!"

"That - yeah, that's good."

"Great!"

"..."

"..."

"... time in?"

"Time in."

And with that, Ochako shoved Nejire away from her as hard as she could, the blue-haired girl letting out a small squeak of panic and surprise as she flailed in the air trying to regain her balance, and Ochako quickly took advantage of her lack of weight to crawl up the wall to the window where the bomb was waiting.

---

Itsuka wasn't all that surprised that Izuku caught up to her so easily after chucking him down the hallway, knowing that he was a pretty quick runner after training with him for the last ten months. What she didn't expect, however, was for him to catch her running up the stairs and grabbing her by the ankle, and yanking it back to trip her. With a yelp, she barely managed to catch herself before she hit her head on the stairs, and with a growl, she kicked out with her other foot, hoping to catch him in the face.

Izuku was quick to dodge the kick, leaning off to the side, but thankfully it threw him a tad bit off balance, letting Itsuka slip her foot out of his grasp and crawl up the stairs the rest of the way. With a grunt, she rolled to her feet as Izuku charged after her, throwing back the arm he had the Full Gauntlet on, curling his hand into a fist and launching it towards her face. Raising her arm, she managed to block it, although she winced in pain as the blow forced her back.

Right. Metal gauntlets hurt. Ow.

Quickly whipping out the capture tape from her belt, she jumped back and avoided Izuku's other fist, growing out one hand to launch at Izuku again, but he was prepared this time, ducking underneath it and kicking out with his leg. Itsuka jumped back again to avoid it, and shrunk down her hand again so she could lower herself into a battle stance, giving both opponents a moment to breathe as Izuku panted slightly, raising his fists threateningly.

During their small break, Itsuka glanced at the gauntlet, and felt her brow furrow - there wasn't any electricity pulsing through it, and the small meter on the side was in the red. That meant that he must've been attacking her without the use of his quirk. Unfortunately, she had a feeling that she knew why, feeling her heart twitch a bit in sympathy for him - he must not have been comfortable using his quirk against his friends, so he was going without it.

Well … in the end, it didn't matter. If he didn't want to use his quirk, he better put his fists up and fight.

With a smirk, Itsuka moved her hand up, and gestured with her finger for him to bring it on. She could make out Izuku smiling a bit as well through his respirator - honestly, even Itsuka couldn't help but grin a bit at him. Other than the stress of this being something that was being graded, it was kind of fun going all out with him.

With a yell, Izuku launched himself at her again, Itsuka reacting by growing out her hand to catch him again - but that was what he was counting on, as instead of landing in her grasp, he adjusted himself to use her palm as a launch pad, making her grunt as she was pushed back, caught a bit off guard. This was what Izuku had been waiting for, landing back on the ground and immediately launching himself forward with his capture tape in hand to wrap around her wrist as he angled himself beneath her -

- but Itsuka caught on to what he was doing, eyes widening, and quickly growing back out her other hand to grab him with her other hand, and letting out a yell as she chucked him away, Izuku caught off guard enough that the capture tape slipped out of his grasp.

Izuku yelped as he was sent flying down the hall, slamming hard against a door with a grunt of pain and sliding down - and then his eyes widened in panic as he looked up, and he ducked just as Itsuka's gigantic fist slammed into where his head would've been, the strength of the blow hard enough to break the door off its hinges and send it flying into the room. Izuku took that chance to roll inside, trusting Itsuka to be single-minded enough at the moment to follow him in and continue the fight, and to his relief (and a bit of terror) she quickly followed him in, leaping into the air while bringing her giant fist back, trying to smash him into the ground.

"Hold still, would you?!"

Getting out of the way of the blow, Izuku quickly kicked out again, catching Itsuka in the back and sending her stumbling away from him and the door. She hopped away as he threw out another fist, moving behind a pillar to take another moment to breathe. Thankfully, Izuku had the same idea, moving behind another pillar so the both of them had a chance to calm their breath and reorganize.

As she panted slightly, taking small, slow breaths to calm herself down, Itsuka quickly raised her hand to her earphone and pressed it.

"Uraraka, can you hear me? Have you reached the weapon yet?"

"Yeah," She heard Ochako grunt, as though she was jumping out of the way of something, and she could faintly make out the sound of energy being blasted, "but Hadou's got the advantage over me, she's been keeping up in the air and blasting at me whenever I get too close."

"Okay," She slowly nodded, peeking out from behind her pillar and seeing a pair of tall green ears poking out from where Izuku was hiding near the door, which made her scowl as she realized there was no way she could get out the door if he was there to prevent her from leaving, "I'm fighting Midoriya right now, but I'm gonna try to break away from him and come to back you up. Just keep distracting Hadou, I'll be there in a few minutes."

"Okay - but hurry, I don't think we have much time left."

"Gotcha." She nodded, moving her hand away from her ear to take a moment to think.

She needed to either take Izuku out of the equation entirely, or book it up the stairs to help Ochako and deal with him pursuing her later. Neither were very good options - but Ochako was right, they didn't have much time left before All Might called it and declared the villain team the winners. So continuing this fight with Izuku wasn't an option - she needed to get upstairs to assist Ochako with Nejire.

But how? How could she make sure Izuku wouldn't be right on her ass if she booked it out the door? He was fast enough to catch up with her easily, and while he wasn't exactly on her level of fighting experience, he had the advantage that they were in a relatively cramped space, and Itsuka's quirk made it hard to swing her fists around. She needed to do something to confuse him, or fluster him -

- wait.

Fluster him.

Memories of Izuku going as red as a tomato whenever she so much as touched his shoulder suddenly came to mind. She blinked a bit as an idea came to him, and felt her mouth begin to quirk up. The viewers in the observation deck were a bit confused with how Itsuka, who was supposed to be on the hero team, ended up with an evil smile worthy of any villain as she slowly moved around the corner.

She had a feeling she knew exactly what to do to get under Izuku's guard - and god, she wished he wasn't wearing a mask at the moment, because his reaction was going to be absolutely hilarious.

"Hey, Midoriya!" She called out to him, swinging herself around the pillar with mock confidence. "You gonna keep hiding back there all day, or are we gonna settle this so I can go help out Uraraka?"

"Huh?" Izuku blinked, peeking out from behind his pillar in his confusion - but he quickly collected himself, clearing his throat as he moved around the corner as well and faced his friend down, quickly shifting into another battle stance.

"Y-yeah, Kendou - let's finish this right now."

"Really? You sure?" She raised an eyebrow, "You aren't gonna go easy on me, are you? Gotta say, this fight's kind of lacking - I don't think I've even bruised my knuckles yet."

"I'm not going easy on you," He made clear, narrowing his eyes somewhat behind the mask, "I respect you too much to do that, Kendou. Besides, you talk a big game about not having a single bruise yet, but you haven't put anything on me either."

"I mean, can you blame me?" Itsuka shrugged nonchalantly, leaning forward slightly while her mouth rose in a smirk, her eyes becoming teasing. "There's no way I can possibly beat up that nice face of yours. You're too hot to mess it up with bruises and scratches."

"Nice try, Kendou, but I -"

After a moment, it became clear that what Itsuka said finally registered to Izuku. He paused, staring at her blankly for a moment - and then he stiffened up, eyes going as wide as dinner plates under his mask.

"- huh?" He squeaked quietly.

Her grin widening from the sheer audacity of what she just did to her friend, Itsuka didn't hesitate, taking advantage of Izuku going as stiff as a board, and sprinted straight past him and right out the door, running as fast as she could down the hall and towards the stairs while unable to stop herself from cackling loudly.

"H-hey!" Izuku gasped, shaking himself out of his fluster and quickly taking chase, thanking every god above that his mask was secured around his face so nobody, either in the building or watching through the cameras, could make out how red it was. "T-t-that's not c-cool!"

He was also going to pointedly ignore All Might's increasingly weakening struggle to contain his laughter over the comms.

---

Ochako, meanwhile, was not having as good a time as her partner.

"Eep!" She squeaked as she dived behind another pillar, feeling the stone support crack as Nejire's quirk slammed against it, and making her gulp nervously as the room shook once again. They'd been playing a little game of cat and mouse for the last few minutes, with Ochako trying her best to sneak up on the bomb and touch it while Nejire floated just above it, squinting her eyes in concentration as she threw blast after blast after Ochako, forcing her to duck out of the way or get hit straight in the chest with … whatever the hell Nejire's quirk was supposed to be.

Ochako let out a small grunt as she rolled against the ground to avoid another blast of energy, knowing that this was getting more than a little dangerous - training with Teko for the last ten months had been enough to teach her how to fight, but those skills were pretty much useless when she was stuck on the ground and her opponent had the advantage of being far more flexible in the air than she would be. And she couldn't just float herself, since Nejire had enough mobility to just move out of the way, and then Ochako would be a sitting duck!

She was at a disadvantage - but if she could just reach the other girl in the air, and make sure she didn't move out of the way … but how? Nejire's attention was entirely focused on her, throwing blast after blast after Ochako as she ducked around the pillars, unable to get anywhere close to the weapon. So maybe … maybe if she …

Ochako hopped around to another pillar, glancing around the side to see Nejire throwing her hands together, a pout on her face as swirls of yellow energy started to build up. Gulping, and realizing that this was a pretty bad sign, and nowhere close enough to the bomb to distract Nejire and run to it, she felt a plan form in her mind, and she nodded to herself. With a grunt, Ochako threw herself around the pillar, facing down Nejire as the blue-haired girl prepared to blast her -

- and then she gasped theatrically, looking at something around Nejire's shoulder, and pointed wildly.

"Hadou, what's that?!"

"Huh?" Nejire blinked, her curiosity piqued, and looked around at …

… absolutely nothing.

With her distracted, Ochako took her chance, floating herself and leaping right into the air, her hands extended towards her classmate to float her - she figured that if Nejire's gravity was gone, she'd have a harder time fighting in the air if she couldn't control herself from floating up. As her hands stretched out, however, Nejire subconsciously lowered her hands, both of them still filled with mounting energy - and fired straight at the ground.

BOOM!

Ochako let out a shriek of surprise and terror as the force of the blast sent both of them flying in opposite directions - Nejire straight up into the air, colliding hard against the ceiling and making her groan in pain as her head slammed into the concrete roof, and Ochako flying off to the side at alarming speed. The gravity girl flailed in the air in panic, unintentionally bringing her hands together to restore her gravity and hopefully slow her down a bit so she didn't slam into the door at full speed.

And then, as she flew through the air towards the wall, the door leading downstairs slammed open.

Ochako's eyes widened at the sight of Itsuka standing in the door, looking around and seeing Ochako flying straight towards her, and, probably out of instinct, she squeaked and ducked, making Ochako yelp as she flew straight through the open door.

"You can't just - huh?"

Ochako's jaw briefly dropped as Izuku finally made it up the stairs, the look of annoyance, anger and embarrassment in his eyes fading as he realized what was about to happen, freezing up - and then she collided hard into him.

Both of them let out comical yelps of surprise as Ochako hit him with enough force to send them both flying briefly through the air, Ochako unintentionally bringing her hands together to release her quirk and restore her gravity - which, thanks to her weight suddenly reappearing, brought them both down on the stairs. Itsuka could only watch in guilt and a bit of sympathy as her two friends rolled down the stairs, grunting and yelping in pain as they tumbled over each other all the way down. Finally, the both of them landed in a heap at the bottom of the stairs, Itsuka gulping a bit at the sight of them laying there in defeat, and then shook her head and quickly ran back to the top floor and towards the bomb.

They did have a mission to get through, after all, so Itsuka would touch the bomb and then run back downstairs to make sure her friends were okay. Besides, she also had to take advantage of the fact that Nejire apparently hit her head again, the blue-haired girl wobbling in the air and clutching the back of her head while whining in pain.

Downstairs, Ochako let out a small groan as she finally registered that she was not dead, and had landed on something a bit soft but firm. Shaking her head, she put her hands down on the ground, lifting herself up and opening her eyes to have a look at what exactly she had landed on -

"Ugh … are … are you okay, Occhan?" Izuku grunted, also opening his eyes to look around at her - and then both of them realized what position they had landed in.

Izuku, laying on his back, with one arm spread out on the ground, and the other one holding soft in his hand - wait, that was her waist, he realized, he was holding her side just above her belt. Ochako, meanwhile, having both of her hands planted on either side of Izuku's head, sitting on his upper legs and holding herself up as their eyes met.

This wasn't the first time they'd been in a position like this, of course - Ochako had been a pretty rowdy kid, and had enjoyed wrestling around with Izuku when they were younger; and at Teko's dojo, they sparred all the time, and more than a few times those matches ended with Ochako pinning Izuku down. So this wasn't exactly something new.

And yet … as Izuku stared up at her, surprisingly not really all that bothered by this position as they had probably been in something like this all the time, for some reason, Ochako felt herself stiffen up. She stared back down at him in shock as she realized what position they were both in. And the hand that Izuku hadn't moved from her waist … for some reason, it was making her heartbeat suddenly quicken, beating weirdly fast as she felt a smudge of pink touch her cheeks.

"Uh … Occhan?" Izuku asked in an unsure voice, sitting up a bit in concern, "Are you okay? Do you -"

"HERO TEAM ... WIIIIIIIIIIIIIIINS!"

Both of them blinked, and then quickly looked around at the stairs, Izuku shocked and sitting up slightly while Ochako felt her jaw drop.

"Wait, what?!" She squeaked, attempting to get up so she could go check for herself - which, as it turned out, was a mistake. She felt her stomach lurch the moment she tried to stand up, and her cheeks puffed out as she immediately keeled over and collapsed onto her hands and knees, holding a hand over her mouth as the aftereffects of turning her quirk on and off on herself for the last ten minutes or so finally caught up with her.

"Occhan -?" Izuku asked in concern, looking around her shoulder at her in worry as she gagged - and then he realized what was about to happen, eyes widening, and he acted accordingly, hastily bending over to gather up all of her hair in one hand so it wasn't in her face as she retched.

Oh, great, she thought miserably to herself as her lunch made a surprise reappearance, seeing one of the cameras in the corner zoom in on them out of the corner of her eye, what a great win to celebrate my win - puking my guts out in front of the entire class.

---

"Ah," All Might felt himself cringe a bit as the cameras showed Ochako vomitting, "we may need a nurse."

Everyone in the observation deck nodded, besides Katsuki watching with a weird, satisfied look on his face at the sight of Izuku's loss and Ochako's humiliation, as the class observed the odd sight that greeted them on the screen. On one camera, Izuku rubbed Ochako's back in soothing circles while she spat out some bile, using his other hand to hold her hair back so none of it got in her face; and on the other, Itsuka stepped away from where she had touched the bomb to help Nejire get back to the ground, the martial artist checking the back of her head with a worried look while Nejire wobbled around slightly, talking a bit slower than usual and closing her eyes in pain as Itsuka looked through her long blue hair.

"Hm," Tsuyu poked her lip, "kind of an anticlimactic way to end the match, kero."

"Yeah," Kyouka crossed her arms, wincing and looking kind of queasy at the sight of the bile on one of the screens, "everything was so chaotic, and it just kind of ended with Kendou running over and touching the bomb while everyone else was distracted."

"It was smart of her to do so," Momo closed the notebook she had been writing notes with, staring up at the screen with an approving nod as she tucked the book under her arm, "while everyone had been confused, she took the chance to end the match without further delay. And it was good timing, as well - they'd almost run out of time."

"Girl, girl, girl!" Mina shook Setsuna's shoulder in her excitement, staring up at the screen showing Izuku helping Ochako to her feet while whispering frantically to her friend, "You said they're childhood friends? Childhood friends?!"

"Yes, yes," Setsuna nodded, letting out a small sigh at the utterly terrifying look on her friend's face and knowing exactly what that meant, "they're childhood friends, they're probably head over heels for each other and don't even realize it yet. You don't need to shake me so much, I know what you're thinking."

"Mm-hm. I'm a hundred percent onboard with this. Team green plus pink, let's go. I'm invested, I'm gonna make this happen."

"Well, good luck, girl, but if we gotta pick teams, as cute as those two would be, I'm unfortunately gonna have to oppose you. Team Ken, all the way. Our battle will be legendary."

"Young Midoriya, Young Kendou," All Might spoke into the mic, communicating with the two students relatively uninjured from the match as he typed a text to the nurse's office describing what happened, "do Young Uraraka and Young Hadou need the robots to come down and help them back to the observation deck? Or do they need to go to the nurse's office?"

"I don't think so, All Might," Itsuka said over the comms, still sounding a tad bit worried, as she looked around for a camera to look at their teacher through, "but Hadou might have a concussion, so I'm gonna walk back with her a bit slower so she doesn't make it worse. We might take a little while longer to get back to the observation deck."

"And Occhan's fine, too!" Izuku answered. "I can help her back to the observation deck."

"Very well! I will still have someone from the nurse's office meet you here so we can handle Young Hadou's concussion and any minor injuries you three may have. Good work!"

Closing the mic and finishing his text to the nurse's office explaining the situation, he sent off the message, and turned around with a flip of his cape, grinning widely at the other students staring at the screen as the lights above them unexpectedly turned back on, making everyone wince and groan as they shielded their eyes.

"Well, since it may take our first competitors a while to get back, we can get to analyzing their match and explaining our observations when they get back! With that said, I suppose we should start with the most important part of their evaluation - does anyone have an opinion as to who was the MVP of this fight? Young Midoriya, Young Uraraka, Young Hadou or Young Kendou?"

"All Might-sensei!" Momo immediately raised her hand to answer the question, which drew the attention of everyone in the room towards her as she straightened up. "From what I observed, I believe Kendou was the MVP of this match, and by a substantial amount."

"Oh-ho?" All Might raised an eyebrow in intrigue as he grinned, while Tenya pouted a bit and put down his own hand, accepting that he might not be able to speak his own thoughts, "Young Kendou, eh? I'm interested in hearing your reasoning, Young Yaoyorozu!"

"First of all," She put her hand down, looking back up at the screen with an analytical eye, "Kendou adapted the most to the context of the training, and adapted well on the fly as well. From watching the match during the beginning, it was clear that the hero team's initial plan was to separate and apprehend Midoriya before moving on with Hadou - not a bad plan, but it didn't account for Midoriya and Hadou also working together to attempt to separate them. What saved Kendou was her quick thinking, and requesting Uraraka to head up to the weapon while she distracted Midoriya. Even then, their fight consisted of Kendou attempting to get to the door in order to flee upstairs to get to the weapon and back up Uraraka. And while everyone had been distracted, Kendou took that opportunity to run in and touch the weapon, before anyone else could collect themselves."

"That's -"

"As for Midoriya," She continued on, unaware of everyone (even All Might) giving her surprised looks over the fact that she was going to actually summarize up the entire match instead of just who she thought was the MVP, "I would give him points for having the foresight to remove anything on the top floor that Uraraka could float, and made up the plan to keep them off the top floor entirely. Where he failed, however, was Kendou and Uraraka both flustering him into making mistakes, with him standing around and letting Kendou escape to the top floor, and not reacting in time before Uraraka sent him flying back down the stairs. Not to mention that had I not been keeping track, no one would have noticed that he didn't use his quirk once in the exercise - which put his team at a huge disadvantage."

At the back, Katsuki's brow furrowed at that, his mouth closing into a thin line.

"Uraraka, meanwhile, did very well in handling Hadou, and moving outside to avoid one of her attacks, but it was clear that she was at a large disadvantage when it came to handling an airborne enemy with nothing to throw at her. She did well to try and distract Hadou, but as we saw, it only took Hadou's attention off her attack, and could have had disastrous consequences in a real life situation if she had hit the weapon. Hadou, meanwhile, was easily distracted by Uraraka's distraction, although she did well in keeping her away from the bomb, and ultimately failed to stop Kendou from reaching the weapon. As well, both Uraraka and Hadou really just went along with the plans that their partners made and offered no input."

Putting her hands on her hips, Momo nodded. "To summarize, with Uraraka and Hadou making mistakes, and Midoriya not using his quirk and getting a bit too flustered at certain points, I believe Kendou is the undisputed MVP of the match."

There was a small silence in the observation deck for a few moments, with everyone looking at Momo in shock at the utter word vomit that had escaped her lips and how she had put down her classmates so brutally. Even All Might was taken aback, feeling a bit of sweat drip on his forehead as he tried to keep his composure and cleared his throat.

"Uh - well, er - Young Midoriya, Young Hadou and Young Uraraka did their jobs well, so we should give them a little credit, but - uh - well, that's correct! Good job."

Clearing his throat again, All Might turned back around to face the screen, trying to regain his confident grin as he typed in a few buttons, grabbing the clipboard from the side as he turned back to the class.

"Now then!" He cheerfully said, "Since we've gone through that brief review, let's keep this train going and get our second combat training match of the day started! As I've already selected our next competitors for the next round, we can get them down to the building and get them organized - Team E as the heroes, and Team B as the villains! Let's go!"

As the four students on those teams nodded and followed All Might out the door to the next building they were going to use for their exercise (deciding to leave behind the previous one due to the wall Nejire had collapsed), the class became aware of the sound of another door sliding open, and looked around. Trooping in and looking miserable were Izuku, Ochako, Itsuka and Nejire, all of them cringing and walking slightly awkwardly, Nejire most of all as she walked a bit slower, Itsuka keeping a hand on the back of her head and guiding her forward.

"Hey, good job, you guys!" Eijirou gave them a big thumbs up, grinning, "Kendou, Uraraka, you guys were great! Congrats on your win!"

"Did we win?" Ochako groaned a bit quietly, walking a little hunched over as Izuku patted her shoulder in comfort, "Kinda doesn't feel like it. I think I need to puke again."

"Ah. Er. Please don't puke again."

"Hadou, are you okay?" Setsuna asked softly to the blue-haired girl, keeping herself a bit quieter than usual just in case. "Those hits looked like they hurt."

"I'm okay." Nejire gave her a shaky thumbs up, although people felt a bit worried about how her voice was slightly slurred and hazy. "Just a little headache. And feeling kind of nauseous. Everything is very bright and very loud. Owie."

"Well, don't worry," Tsuyu assured her, reaching out to lightly pat her arm to assure her, "All Might asked for the nurse to come, so they can take care of your concussion in a bit."

"The … nurse?" Itsuka blinked, looking up from where she had been tending to Nejire at the frog girl with a bit of waringness, while Izuku and Ochako likewise stiffened up a bit, their faces going a bit red (Izuku's now visible thanks to him taking off his mask and pulling the respirator down to hang around his neck). "All Might called for the nurse?"

"Uh … yeah?" Mina raised a curious eyebrow. "Do … you not want one?"

"Er ... and … did he specifically exactly who -"

And, as if on cue, the door leading outside the observation deck slid open, making the entire class look around at their visitor.

"Hiiiii!" Himiko sang as she skipped inside, the sound of things being thrown around in the nurse's bag hanging off her shoulder making Nejire wince a bit, "I'm here to help out the cuties!"

"What the fuck? Katsuki's brow furrowed, staring at the older girl as though she had just crawled out of a sewer pipe. "Is that a fucking gremlin?"

"Says the gremlin in the corner." Himiko shot back without a moment of hesitation, which made everyone giggle, Katsuki grit his teeth furiously, and Izuku, Ochako and Itsuka sigh in relief when they saw that the nurse wasn't wearing something so risque this time; instead of the weird corset/nurse's outfit, she wore the same gym uniform they'd worn yesterday for Aizawa's tests.

Unfortunately, Himiko's eyes trailed over to Izuku and Ochako, and her cat-like grin widened.

"Well, well … I know you two," She giggled, skipping forward and patting Ochako's shoulder as she continued to look sick, "you both are starting to have a bad habit of staying out of trouble, huh? First fighting zero-pointers and winning, and now getting hurt during your exercises. Honestly, if you two wanted to come see me, I'm just at the nurse's office all the time, no need for the dramatics."

Katsuki, who had been leaning back against the wall, let out an irritated sigh and closed his eyes - and then something she said finally registered to him, making him snap his eyes open.

"Now then," Himiko reached into the bag, rummaging around a bit before pulling out a small capsule, and walking over to Nejire, "eat this, sweetie, it'll help out with your concussion since it's fused with Recovery Girl's quirk, you'll be back to normal in no time. And for you, sweet cheeks," She winked at Ochako, making her go a bit red as she pulled out another few gummy bears, "same deal as last time, eat these and your nausea will be gone in a few minutes. And as for you, big boy," She batted her eyelashes at Izuku, who went even redder than he had been before, "a few gummy bears that'll help with bruising and any other scratches."

There was a small pause, and then Himiko turned to Itsuka as though remembering she was there as well. "Oh, and the same treats for you too, Kendou."

Itsuka tried not to scowl too much as she took the gummy bears from Himiko.

"Now then!" She happily clapped her hands together, albeit a bit quieter for Nejire's sake. "I'm gonna hang around in the nurse's station in this building, so if you guys need me for anything else, you can just have All Might -"

"What the fuck?" Katsuki interrupted, getting off the wall and staring at her in shock. "What the fuck was that about zero-pointers?"

"Huh?" Himiko looked around at him, raising an eyebrow. "What about what zero-pointers?"

"The fuck is that about them winning against zero pointers?!"

"Hm?" Reiko looked around at the taller boy, which drew his attention as he wheeled around at her. "Didn't you know? Kendou and Uraraka made sure most of the people in our battle center passed the exam by distracting the zero-pointer. I know if they didn't make the thing punch itself in the face, I probably wouldn't have been able to get enough points. Thank you both for that, by the way - I wanted to bring it up earlier, but wasn't sure how to."

Katsuki blinked.

"Yeah," Mezo nodded from his spot near the back of the crowd, looking around at Izuku and Nejire, "not to mention Midoriya and Hadou melting a hole through our zero-pointer's head. I'd gotten enough points before they did that, but they did help Iida get that one boy to safety."

"Wait - melted a hole through a zero-pointer's head?!" Pony's jaw dropped, looking around at Izuku in awe. "Midoriya-san,that's awesome! You just got so much cooler!"

Katsuki's fists clenched.

"Wait, wait, wait, hold on, Ken," Setsuna threw her hands up, staring at her best friend in shock, "you made one of those giant assholes punch itself in the face? Girl, why didn't you mention that sooner? No shit you scored first place!"

"Indeed! It's impressive to hear of your accomplishments!" Tenya ridgedly gestured to both girls, the fact they weren't able to see him underneath all that armor meaning that it looked like a stiff robot was pointing theatrically at them. "I knew Midoriya and Hadou more than proved their worthiness by handling the zero-pointer in our area, but hearing that you both made sure others could succeed while you distracted your own obstacle … Kendou, Uraraka, you both have my respect as well!"

While everyone else started complimented the four people who had just arrived through the door, Izuku, Ochako and Itsuka looking sheepish and bashful while Nejire winced at the loud noises, Katsuki stared blankly at them, feeling his fsits clenching tighter and tighter at his sides the longer he stared at them in shock.

Everything that he thought that he knew was being rocked - Izuku and Ochako were weaklings, and Itsuka was some bitch that got lucky and probably hit two more robots than he did in the entrance exam. But to hear that they had apparently gotten into fights with the zero-pointers in their areas and had fucking won … that made him shake, but not in fear or anxiety.

Instead, his teeth barred, red eyes glaring straight at them as a vein throbbed in his forehead.

"You're fucking shitting me," He breathed out, and then he began to stomp forward, shoving past Yui and Hanta, both of them blinking as they they were knocked off balance. His storming towards them drew Izuku and Ochako's attention, both of them straightening up a bit - Izuku looking suddenly anxious, shrinking, and Ochako throwing him a sharp glare despite how sick and miserable she looked. "You fucking shits beat the zero-pointers? Bull-fucking-shit."

"I assure you, it's not a lie!" Tenya insisted, gesturing with his hand towards him. "Midoriya and Hadou really did destroy the zero-pointer in our area, I witnessed the entire incident myself if you would like me to recount the events to you. With that said, Bakugou, I urge you to speak to your classmates in a less disparaging tone -"

"Shut the fuck up!" Katsuki shouted at Tenya, which made the taller boy recoil in surprise and their classmates grouped around them jump - and making Nejire groan a bit and clutch her head, which made Itsuka and Himiko look around at her in worry. "You don't tell me what the fucking do, extra! I want some fucking answers, so keep your nose out of stuff that doesn't concern you before I blow it off!"

"Hey!" Himiko threw a hand up, which drew Katsuki's rage-filled glare to her as the formerly smug and flirty girl gave him a sharp glare as she pointed at Nejire. "We've got a concussed person here, and it'll take a bit for the medicine I gave her to affect her. So we don't need you screaming all your words -"

"You don't tell me what to do either!" He shrieked, whirling around at Izuku and Ochako and clenching his fists, small explosions appearing in his hands and making Izuku shrink up even more and Nejire groan more from the loud noises, "I'm gonna get some answers from the fucking usless shits whose asses you idiots keep blowing smoke up, and if any of you fucking extras are gonna - mmmgh!"

That last noise, however, was due to a sudden hand shoot out and grabbing Katsuki's face in a tight grip. The blonde boy's eyes widened in rage as Itsuka's hand shot out and grabbed his lower face tightly, drawing his entire attention and putting a pause on his screaming as she leaned in slightly, looking far angrier than anyone had seen her - even Yui and Setsuna looked taken aback by how furious their best friend looked, and the entire class faltered into a stunned silence.

"Bakugou." She growled through gritted teeth. "Shut. The fuck. Up."

If looks could kill, Itsuka would be dead on the floor, but it was clear that she wasn't messing around, what with her tightening her already painful grip around his face one more time as a warning before finally letting go. Katsuki, shaking and gritting his teeth, was tempted to just have at it and blow her up - no one ever treated him this way, he thought in rage, and this bitch really needed to be taught a lesson - but before he could even make a move to wipe that smug look off her face, the door on the side opened again, and everyone looked around, shaken out of their shock of the unfolding events.

"Ah, very good, you're here, Young Toga!" All Might laughed a bit, strolling inside and spotting the returning students, although he seemed not to pick up the tense atmosphere. "Have you treated the students yet?"

"Just did!" Himiko straightened up with a happy expression, acting as though nothing had happened during the time she got there and All Might returned. "All these cuties plus Kendou got their medicine, so I'm gonna head back to the nurse's station. Just call me if there's any other cuties that need my help!"

With that, she turned on her heel and started walking out the door, smirking a bit teasingly as Itsuka's eyebrow twitched at her. Teasing her orange-haired kohai was so much fun.

"Very good!" All Might pumped a fist, turning back to the screen and dimming the lights. "In that case, students, it's about time for our second match to get started, so let's turn our attention to the screen and observe! As for the students who just returned from the first match, we'll go over what we observed and where you can improve in a bit!"

With that, the students nodded, trying to act like Katsuki wasn't about two seconds from biting the hand Itsuka had over his mouth and giving her rabies as they joined All Might near the screen, Katsuki growling under his breath as he stomped back to his spot on the wall. As everyone stared up at the screen, Setsuna turned to glance at Itsuka, who was still glowering a bit from what had happened, and decided to add a little bit of levity to get her back in a happy mood.

"Hey," She leaned over slightly, catching Itsuka's attention, "so something I noticed during your match - you said something to Midoriya to get past him, but we couldn't hear what it was. Plus you were grinning like when you threw that one bully into the trashbin in fourth grade. What was up with that?"

Itsuka paused, while Izuku, who was standing in front of her beside Ochako, stiffened up, his face exploding in a blush - and then she smirked a bit, leaning to the side to whisper in Setsuna's ear. And if All Might had been curious as to why the green-haired girl suddenly let out an extremely loud cackle of laughter, he didn't comment.

---

After that, the rest of the matches for that day's battle trials officially went underway.

"Alright!" Denki cheered as All Might gave them the go-ahead to head in and start the match, "Let's do this, Jirou!"

"Yeah, yeah." Kyouka shook her head, following the boy hurrying inside the building they were doing their exercise in while putting her hands in her pockets. Instead of trying to copy the strategy Itsuka and Ochako had used during their match, knowing that Momo would've anticipated them using the fire escape, they decided to head in through the main door, pulling it open and walking inside. As they moved in, Kyouka narrowed her eyes slightly, and brought a hand out of her pocket to poke Denki's shoulder, getting his attention.

"Just to let you know, Kaminari - if you accidentally electrocute me at any point in the next fifteen minutes, it's on sight."

"H-huh?" He blinked, looking around at her in surprise. "No way, Jirou! I'm careful with my quirk."

"Right," Kyouka slowly nodded, not really believing him and not afraid to show that, "right."

"I am! Seriously, you've got nothing to worry about, I'm cool." Denki leisurely pointed at himself with a grin. "Besides, I got to prove myself today. Midoriya didn't use his quirk at all in the last match, so that means it's my turn to show off! He's kinda my rival, you know."

"... your rival."

"Yeah! Two electric quirk users, in the same class … gotta make sure he doesn't outshine me."

"… right. Whatever floats your boat. Now shut up for a minute, I'm gonna listen for Yaoyorozu and Awase."

"Are you sure, I could -"

"Shut it!"

Once she was sure he was going to keep quiet, she moved over to a nearby wall to poke her earphone jack in, taking a second to listen carefully while giving Denki a glare when it looked like he was about to open his mouth again and interrupt her. Finally, Kyouka heard the sound of feet running a few floors above, and looked around to Denki.

"They're up on the top floors. Running - wait, they've slowed down, they're walking now."

"Right! Then let's do this!"

Rolling her eyes, she still took off after him as they made for the stairs. They both had a pretty solid plan - pretty much amounting to taking down Momo and then having Denki electrocute Yosetsu, seeing as they weren't sure what his quirk was (since he didn't have any opportunities to use it at all during Aizawa's tests yesterday), so they prioritized Momo's takedown first. It was a good plan, or at least Kyouka thought so - take down the smartest person in the room, and then deal with the second problem together.

What they didn't count on, however, was getting up to the seventh floor, running up towards the eighth floor when Kyouka listened in again and pinpointed their location on the top floor - and then were promptly greeted by several thick pieces of metal covering the door.

"Uh …" Denki sweated a bit at the sight that greeted them up the stairs, "... that wasn't there before, was it?"

"Nope," Kyouka stuck her earphone jack into the wall next to the metal sheets, listening in, "and I can hear Awase and Yaoyorozu inside. They set this up to keep us out."

"Right. In that case, let's tear this thing down and get the bomb!"

They did not tear the thing down. As it turned out, Yosetsu had a pretty useful quirk that neither of them were aware of - the ability to fuse objects together at an atomic level, essentially able to stick anything he wanted together. A quirk that he used to seal the metal sheets that Momo had created together around the door, so it didn't matter how much Kyouka or Denki punched or tried to pry it apart, it wouldn't come down. Kyouka even tried to plug her jack into the speaker on her leg to vibrate it apart with her amplified heartbeat, but alas, apparently Momo made the metal out of some thick stuff, as it bent and groaned, but didn't break.

Finally, All Might called the time, and declared the villain team the winners of the match. Once Yosetsu had taken down the walls to get them out, Kyouka let out a small, disappointed groan but still congratulated them, fist bumping a confused but still happy Momo as the two girls started walking back together, chatting. Denki decided to walk back with Yosetsu in the meantime - they'd hung out a bit at lunch today with Eijirou, and Denki thought that, while Yosetsu wasn't as social as he was, he was still pretty cool to hang out with.

"So, uh …" He put his hands in his pockets, looking around at the boy with the bandanna on his forehead, "... I'm kinda curious. Where'd you get those metal sheets to block the door from? I don't think they were there during the last match."

Yosetsu stiffened up, glancing around at Momo as she made sure her costume's zipper was all the way up, and let out a small cough, scratching his cheek with a blush.

"I, uh … I think it's better if I don't say."

---

After they had gotten back and got their analysis for what they did good and where they went wrong from All Might and the rest of the class, it was then time for Team D as the villains to face off with Team H as the heroes.

THWIP

"So you wanna be the one to go downstairs?" Hanta asked as he shot out another long strand of tape around the weapon, wanting to complete their strategy of surrounding it and the room with enough tape that neither Reiko or Yui could easily get to it. "You sure? I saw Yanagi with that telekinetic quirk yesterday, that'll be a bit of a challenge for you."

"Oh, yeah, bro, it's no sweat," Setsuna floated her upper torso into the air to secure the tape against the ceiling, leaving her lower half on the ground, "I want to go down and make sure neither of them get up here. I just …" She paused to herself, and then, muttering in a low voice, "... I gotta prove myself."

"Huh?" Hanta looked around, wrinkling his brow. "Did you say something, Tokage?"

"N-nothing! Anyway, uh - yeah, I can go downstairs. I'm pretty sneaky, and Yui's never actually seen me in a fight. Or at least, a fight where I'm using my quirk. I've gotten into a few scraps while she was around, but I never used my quirk during them."

"Oh, yeah?" He grinned. "Did you win any?"

"Most of them, so it's the thought that matters. Anyhoo, I'll confuse Yanagi with my quirk, and probably just flash my boobs at Yui. That'll be enough to distract her for the rest of the match, and it'll be an easy win for us."

"Er - as nice as that strategy is, I'm not sure All Might would be cool with you just unzipping your costume and trying to get into a hero's pants to win. Or, y'know, maybe that is what a villain would do, but I'm pretty sure Kendou would hit you upside the head when we get back."

"Oh, probably!" Setsuna shrugged, giggling a bit mischievously. "Ken doesn't really need to look for any real reasons to hit me - she can just think back to the time I spiked her jello with pineapple, and the murderous intent will simply manifest itself. I'm very proud to know all her buttons."

"Yeah, I guess so." Hanta finished putting up the latest strand of tape, turning back around to look up at her as she secured another few pieces of tape in the air as he watched her arm pop off to head across the room, "So, uh … that's a pretty cool costume. I don't think I've ever seen a hero costume come apart like that so easily."

"Yeah, I had it custom made," She explained conversationally, "lets me use my quirk without having to literally strip down or wear something as revealing as Midnight's costume - y'know, the one she wore when she first debuted. Plus, it's really snug!"

"Yeah," Hanta coughed a bit, glancing up at her with a small blush on his cheeks, "really … uh … snug."

There was a brief pause, in which Setsuna slowly looked around back down at him with a knowing smirk on her face while he coughed and cleared his throat, looking away pointedly as she raised an eyebrow.

"Oh, come on, dude," She let out another mischievous giggle, "it's okay to admit that you've been checking out my ass since we got partnered up. I have eyes, y'know."

"Erk," Hanta winced, glancing off to the side with a guilty look on his face while he put his hands on his hips, "I, uh … well, sorry about that, Tokage. It's - uh - yeah. I'm only human, I'm not gonna pretend you're not attractive."

"Not just attractive!" Setsuna corrected him while looking proud. "Hot! Sizzling! Put some respect on my name."

"Yeah, yeah," Hanta chuckled, bringing the dark visor of his helmet back down so he didn't have show her his red face any longer than he needed to, which made her laugh as she attached another piece of tape to the wall, before turning back to him with a cat-like smile.

"Hey, if it makes you feel any better, I checked out your ass too. Not gonna lie, bro, you got a nice tush."

"... huh," Hanta blinked, looking back around at her with a small grin, "y'know, that - uh - huh. Y'know, that actually does make me feel a little better. Thanks, Tokage."

"You're welcome, Tapeman!"

"... no."

"Hm, swing and a miss, huh? Well, what about 'Tush Bro'? 'Cause we both got such nice butts."

"Yeah, no. Not 'Tush Bro'. You kinda suck at giving nicknames, huh?"

"Excuse me! I'm insulted by your baseless claims. I'm an expert at nicknaming people! I'll think up a good hero name for you yet."

After their - chatting? Flirting? - whatever that was, All Might called for them to begin, and the match went underway, with Setsuna heading downstairs to head off Reiko and Yui while Hanta stayed behind to guard the weapon. It was a pretty close match, what with Setsuna using her quirk's natural slippiness to mess with her opponents, and having to dodge around Yui shrinking down pieces of furniture and regrowing them when Reiko had used her quirk to throw them at her. Unfortunately for the villain team, Reiko eventually pinned down Setsuna enough to wrap the capture tape around her floating leg, and both girls headed upstairs to team up on Hanta. Two on one, it was a defeat for the villain team as Yui managed wrap the capture tape around his ankle when he had tried to use his quirk to move around the room, and Reiko simply floated the weapon over for her to touch, although she had sweated quite a bit while floating it over and panted when she put it down - it appeared that, similar to Ochako's quirk, she had a weight limit for her quirk as well.

Once they were back, All Might gave them a critiqued explanation of what he thought, praising all four of them while handing off small pieces of advice for them to keep in mind (his telling Setsuna that she did well had lifted her mood somewhat, the dinosaur-loving girl having been staring glumly at the floor ever since she had been captured). For Yui and Reiko, he had advised them to … well … actually talk to each other, since, according to the pro hero, they hadn't said a word to each other at all during their planning, simply choosing to look at each other and nod slightly.

Once Yui and Setsuna had rejoined their group, Itsuka gave the stoic girl and the silver-haired girl a worried look.

"Er … was it okay, teaming up with Yanagi?" She asked Yui softly, her best friend pretending to ignore Tenya's entire existence while the earnest boy looked more and more confused by her coldness, "You guys didn't say a single word to each other during your entire match - did you two not get along?"

"Hm? Oh, no, everything was perfect," Yui tilted her head slightly in confusion. "I got along very well with Yanagi. She's pretty much my best friend now."

"Mm," Reiko nodded in agreement.

---

After an ... interesting discussion about how two girls that hadn't spoken a single word to each other could consider each other life partners, Team F was declared to be the heroes of the next match, and Team I was set up as the villains.

"Oh, boy,"Pony muttered in English, staring at the door leading downstairs to the rest of the building while shaking a bit, "I guess we've got to go up against ... uh ... Sparky Sparky Boom Mannow."

"It'll be alright, Tsunotori," Mezo assured her as he moved some of the debris away from the weapon, using his quirk to grow multiple arms in order to sweep everything away quickly, "he might be unreasonably angry, but there's no way he'll actually try to inflict lethal damage on us while All Might is watching. And if he tries to come up here, I know how to fight - I can protect you."

"Uh … right."

Mezo felt his brow furrow at her unsure, scared voice, and looked around at her with an eye growing out of his arm while he put down the barrel he was carrying. She was glancing between the door and him, and looked clearly uncomfortable, which made him sigh quietly as he put down the canister he had been carrying with his other arms.

He had been kind of afraid of this when he had come to UA, but he could hear the shake in the smaller girl's voice when she spoke to him, and how she kept her hands clasped tightly together, clearly avoiding looking right at him. He could tell that she was afraid of him, and that made his stomach clench slightly. Still, they needed to work together for this match, and they couldn't exactly do that if his partner was too afraid to even look at him. So, scratching his cheekbone just above his mask, he slowly approached her, making sure to make it look like he wasn't suddenly charging at her.

"Tsunotori," he asked quietly, "are you afraid of me?"

"H-huh?"Pony blinked, looking around at him in shock for a moment while he slowly nodded.

"If you are," Mezo muttered, "I do apologize. I know my quirk can be quite disturbing to look at, and I didn't mean to -"

"O-oh, no, that's - that's not it!" She quickly assured him, waving her hands frantically in the air to stop whatever misunderstanding he was about to have. "I'm not scared of you! Er - not - not you, but - uh - sorry, it's kind of hard to explain."

Mezo merely watched as she brought her hands back together, twiddling her thumbs while looking embarrassed and sheepish.

"It's just ... when I was a kid, like five or so years old," She muttered, going a tad bit red, "my parents and I went to an aquarium on our vacation, and we visited the - the octopus exhibit. I leaned in a little too far over the railing and fell in, and ... and the octopus was really big, and ... I may have gotten slightly, kinda, only a little bit, only a tad bit ... heavily traumatized."

"Oh," Mezo blinked, understanding filling him as he nodded, "so it's not my appearance by itself that's making you uncomfortable - it's just that my quirk is reminding you of -"

"Tentacles wrapping around me and dragging me deeper into the water," Pony quickly said, glancing at the floor, "yeah."

"Ah. Well, Tsunotori, I'm ... sorry to hear that happened to you. I just want you to know -"

"And now our fourth match begins! Start!"

Both students jumped a bit, whirling around towards the door. They'd gotten distracted with their little conversation about how Pony was only slightly severely traumatized, they had forgotten about what they were actually doing - but now, they knew that Katsuki and Eijirou were about to enter the building, with Katsuki probably still being just angry from when Itsuka had told him to shut up an hour or so ago.

But Mezo had made Pony a promise to protect her, looking down at her as she balled her fists and stared at the door with a bit of suspense, and nodded, also clenching his fists and glaring at the door. He said he would protect her, so that's what he was going to do.

And that's when they started hearing the explosions.

BOOM

Both of them let out noises of surprise as the ground shook beneath them, the sound of a distant explosion making them tense.

BOOM

That one sounded closer, making Mezo grow out an ear and put it to the floor to listen. It probably wasn't as good as Kyouka's quirk was, but it was enough to let him listen a bit closer.

BOOM

That one came from the fifth floor, he realized with his eyes widening. Which meant that he was coming up - and coming up fast. Why, if he wasn't -

BOOM

That one came right from the floor below theirs. Which meant -

"Tsunotori!" Mezo shouted in alarm, which drew her attention from the door to him, and making her large, doe-like eyes widen in shock as he dived towards her, hands outstretched -

BOOM!

The door to their floor exploded in a loud explosion of heat and sound, sending the metal door flying through the air towards them. Thankfully Mezo got Pony out of the way in time by wrapping his large arms around her and shielding her from the explosion, both of them grunting as they rolled away from the entrance to their floor. As the door smashed out the window and slammed into the building next to theirs, sticking there, their eyes widened, realizing that they would've been hurt if they hadn't moved out of the way in time.

Mezo quickly sat up, putting Pony back on the ground (and not noticing her glancing up at him while muttering "World cold and cruel, multiple arms soft and warm?") as he watched someone lumbering into the room, smoke blowing out from his gauntlets giving him a nightmarish appearance as he smirked.

"There you are," Katsuki sneered, explosions popping in his hands as he shifted his stance, "let's make this fun!"

With another loud explosion, Katsuki rocketed himself towards the two, eyes narrowed at them and smirk widening in delight at what he was about to do to them. Mezo grunted as he rolled away, using two hands to push Pony to the side away from Katsuki and barely managing to avoid the explosive pomeranian crashing into him -

- only to let out a yell of pain as Katsuki threw an explosion at his exposed back, sending the taller boy flying through the air. As he landed against a pillar, Mezo grew out a few more fists, only for his eyes to widen as Katsuki launched himself back at him with surprising speed.

"Shouji-kun!" Pony gasped, and quickly put her index fingers to her head.

With a small flash of yellow light, her horns popped off, soaring straight towards Katsuki as he threw up his hand in the air - but he saw it coming out of the corner of his eyes, grunting as he blasted himself back into the air, twisting himself right above the horns. Pony's eyes widened in terror as he looked around at her with a wicked smile, looking less like a hero and more like the villain she was supposed to be playing right now.

"You wanna go first?!" He cackled. "Then die!"

"Die?!"She squeaked fearfully in English.

"DIE!"

Exploding both figuratively and literally, Katsuki lunged at the smaller girl, smile widening when she tried to get up and run on those weird hooves of hers - but she was too slow. The moment she had turned to run away and give them some space, he reached her, grinning sinisterly as he clapped his hands together and released a large explosion from both palms.

BOOM!

Pony let out a cry of pain as she was sent flying through the air, flailing slightly before slamming into the wall and sliding to the floor. Groaning weakly in pain, she rolled onto her side, clutching the back of her head with both hands as she struggled to get back to her feet. On the other side of the room, Mezo's eyes widened, sitting up from his spot on the ground where Katsuki had thrown him with his quirk, and then lunged to his feet and used his quirk to form several fists.

As Katsuki turned in his direction, Mezo threw out a fist, hoping to take him by surprise with a swift hit to the back of the head - but Katsuki was quicker, ducking underneath the blows with a feral expression as his explosions crackled in his palms. Launching himself forward, Katsuki began throwing explosion after explosion, and the only thing that Mezo was able to do was form a small shield around his body with his arms as Katsuki hammered at him with explosions - until, finally, Mezo could take the pain and heat anymore, gasping as he was blasted back into the wall by an even more powerful explosion than before.

And the moment he hit the wall, gasping as the air escaped his lungs, Katsuki grinned, and threw one more explosion right at him, slamming right into the taller boy. Groaning, Mezo slipped down to sit on the floor, clearly defeated, while Pony groaned weakly and held the back of her head, feeling a bit of blood escaping the bump that was now forming.

Panting slightly, Katsuki grinned as he straightened up, looking around at the two defeated classmates. Mezo, rolling onto his hands and knees and weakly grunting, and Pony holding the back of her head while groaning softly. It was clear that he had won, he thought with a sneer, and not only that, it was probably the easiest win of the day - not counting Momo and Yosetsu, who just blocked up the door and called it a day. He actually earned this win, and didn't have to rely on shitty teamwork to get it done.

Speaking of that, there was the sound of panting at the door, and he looked out of the corner of his eye to see Eijirou making it to the top floor of the building at last, blinking in surprise at both of their opponents already down on the ground.

"Holy crap," He breathed, hurrying forward to check on Pony, "you don't know how to hold back, do you?"

"Hell fucking no," Katsuki huffed, "I came, I saw, I fucking conquered."

With that, he strolled forward and merely rapped his knuckles against the bomb, and All Might declared the hero team the winners. Eijirou wrinkled his brow a bit, and moved to help Pony and Mezo back to their feet, while Katsuki merely strolled out the door with a victorious grin. He wanted to get back to the observation deck to get his marks, knowing that he definitely beat out Itsuka and Ochako's performances in the battle trial, and he knew that he was about to head back to have All Might declare him the MVP of the match.

When they did get back, however, he was to be bitterly disappointed.

"I would say that Young Shouji is the MVP of the match!" All Might announced with a grin, putting his hands on his hips while Katsuki's jaw dropped and Mezo looked around at All Might in surprise.

"What?!" Katsuki yelled, which made All Might raise an eyebrow and look around at the boy suddenly barring his teeth. "The fucking octopus is the MVP?! How the fuck?!"

"Hm," All Might tapped his chin, not really liking how Katsuki called his classmate an octopus and seeing Mezo slump his shoulders, which made Pony give him a concerned look, "an interesting question, Young Bakugou. Can anyone explain?"

Katsuki's teeth gritted when Itsuka's hand immediately shot up, but thankfully All Might picked out Tenya instead so he didn't have to hear her shrill shrieking. Although it wasn't like the four-eyed asshole was any better.

"Sir!" Tenya stiffly lowered his hand, "Bakugou did not adhere to the rules you instated in the test. He did not work together with his partner at all and left him behind to instead confront the villain team on his own. He also caused severe damage to the building when he moved up the building, and caused severe harm to our classmates! Shouji, on the other hand, kept a level head during the attack, and kept Tsunotori from danger! I'd say that he kept focused on the task at hand, and due to Kirishima not having a chance to get in before Bakugou moved inside on his own, and Tsunotori being taken out very quickly, I believe Shouji is the MVP of the match!"

"I agree!" All Might gave him a thumbs up, which made Tenya stiffen up with shock and emotion that the Number One Hero had agreed with him. "Young Shouji is definitely the MVP of the match, due to his quick thinking and intuitiveness, even if it didn't last very long. Do you understand Young Iida's points, Young Bakugou?"

"..."

"Young Bakugou?"

Instead of answering, Katsuki merely growled under his breath, and stomped away from the small group and back to his corner. All Might watched him go, feeling his confident smile falter a tad bit. Still, he did have two injured students, and turned back to the two heteromorph students with a kind expression.

"Young Shouji, Young Tsunotori, do you need to go visit Toga? She can probably help patch you up in her nurse's office."

"Er ... probably," Mezo shrugged, glancing down at Pony in concern, "Tsunotori may have a concussion. I'd offer to carry her there, but I ..." He hesitated, and then muttered, "... I don't want to make her uncomfortable."

At that last remark, Pony winced, feeling regretful of their conversation earlier as she took off the harness around her head.

"All Might?" Itsuka raised her hand, giving the two students a look of worry, "In that case, can I escort them? I don't think they should be moving on their own, and I can help Tsunotori."

"Y-yeah," Izuku nodded in agreement, taking a step forward, "if - if they need help getting to the nurse's office, I can help them out."

Giving both of them a smile, All Might nodded, and watched as Itsuka wrapped Pony's arm around her shoulders to help her out the door, Izuku likewise doing the same while helping the larger boy out the door and muttering to him some small assurances, and All Might turned back to the screen, tapping on the keyboard to inform Himiko that there were students incoming. And out of the corner of his eye, he turned slightly, seeing Katsuki leaning back against the wall and fuming.

He knew that Aizawa had pointed out that Katsuki had the risk of being a problem student, and now he could see what he had meant - the boy was a mass of pride and arrogance, and it was clear that there was something personal going on between him, Izuku, Ochako and Itsuka, mostly due to the glares the explosive boy had thrown at them, and being answered by glares from Itsuka. That was something that would need to be fixed soon, whether it be Katsuki getting a reality check or someone to talk to him. Hopefully, when Aizawa saw the tapes later today, he'd know how best to approach the situation and advise him on how to proceed.

Soon after the four students had returned, both Mezo and Pony looking a bit better at least, the final match of the day went off without another hitch, with Tenya and Mina on the villain team managing to score a win against Fumikage and Tsuyu on the hero team (despite Tenya's identity crisis of playing a villain, which had amused Mina greatly), by simply coating the halls with Mina's acid and Tenya using some of his speed carefully through the halls to pursue Tsuyu when she climbed up on the walls. Granted, it wasn't an easy win, what with the villains' strategy working against them somewhat and making Tenya slip at one point, sent sliding into the wall without any dignity or grace (thankfully everyone was too busy laughing to notice the stars in Yui's eyes as Tenya's legs and butt stuck up in the air), and once the timer had run out and the villains were declared the winners, they were finished the battle trials.

As soon as they ran through the last evaluation, All Might led the class back to the entrance of Ground Beta outside, giving all twenty students a radiant smile as Himiko waved goodbye to them all, winking at Izuku and Ochako as she strolled away back down the tunnel to the nurse's office. And it was good timing for the pro hero, as well - he knew he was almost out of time, so he needed to hurry back to the teacher's lounge before he reverted back to his weakened form.

But before that,he thought as his eyes flickered to Itsuka …

"Good work today, everyone!" He praised the class overall, looking around at the tired but satisfied looks on all their faces from their matches that day, the sole exception being Katsuki. "We don't have any major injuries, and the injuries we did have were fixed up by Young Toga rather easily. I'm so happy to see that you all took this test so seriously! You've all done a great job for your first training exercise."

"To have such a proper class after Aizawa-sensei's class," Tsuyu raised a hand to point something out, while everyone in the crowd shuddered a bit at the memory of the sinister expressions of their homeroom teacher, "it's kind of anticlimactic."

"Well, we are free to have proper classes as well!" All Might threw his arms wide, his blue and red cape flying in the wind. "In any case, we've done good work, and it's almost time for the bell to ring - which means that it's time for you all to get changed and head on home! In the meantime, Young Kendou," He turned to look at Itsuka, the girl blinking at being addressed as he gestured to Pony, "I think Young Tsunotori is still wobbling a bit - could I ask that you walk her back to the classroom after you're finished getting changed, just to be safe? And bring her to the nurse's office if she thinks she needs to go there again."

"O-oh, yeah, sure, All Might," Itsuka quickly nodded, straightening up and looking over to her classmate - the pro hero had a point, Pony still looked kind of wobbly even after coming back to the observation deck after being healed up by Toga's medicine, so she might need a hand getting back to the classroom. Quickly, she started hurrying around the crowd as they started heading towards to the changing room, chatting excitedly between each other as All Might watched them go -

"Young Kendou."

Itsuka faltered in her step, hearing the low voice of her mentor muttering to her, and looked around at him. He still wasn't looking at her at all, instead staring ahead at the other students, before he tilted his head slightly, looking at her out of the corner of his eye.

"When you're finished getting changed and helping Young Tsunotori," He whispered in a low voice so that she could only hear, "come to the Nap Room."

"The ... Nap Room?" Itsuka blinked, looking up at her mentor, but before she could question him, he suddenly began speeding away, running full hilt down the hall towards who knows where.

Confused, Itsuka still shook her head and straightened up - even if she had no idea what he could want, she wasn't going to just ignore a request from All Might, and quickly hurried forward to help Pony to the changing room, walking behind the rest of the girls a bit slower to match the pace of the small horse girl - and ignoring Katsuki throwing her yet another dirty look as he slammed the boy's change room door shut behind him.

---

The first words out of Aizawa's mouth as he strolled into the principal's office for their meeting were, without a moment of hesitation, "Transfer Hadou over to Class 1B or I quit."

Principal Nezu let out a loud laugh at that as he looked around from where he had been staring out the window, smiling mischeviously, "Oh, Aizawa - as if I would simply let you quit! I'm afraid I'll be having you teach here until your hair is completely grey."

Aizawa grumbled in displeasure as he slid the door shut behind him, feeling more tired after yesterday and this morning than he had in the last six months - all thanks to his new blue-haired student who would not stay quiet for any longer than a few seconds. The school bell had just rung to wrap up the day, and Class 1A had just finished their first Hero Basic Training lesson with All Might - he had said that there were a few videos Aizawa could review, which he would be doing thoroughly to make sure his students weren't slipping up on their second day.

Before that, though, he had received a summon to the principal's office for a meeting, so he had reluctantly unzipped himself from his yellow zipping bag, threw a dirty look at Midnight when she flashed him a teasing grin, and shuffled up to the office on the top floor of the building.

"As much as I may pity you, Aizawa," The mouse principal said cheerily as he moved towards his large leather chair, "I can't exactly transfer Hadou to Class 1B just because you don't want to deal with her. Now, if she were to be a troublemaker, then I'd consider it, but from what you described, she's simply a curious mind that doesn't quite have a filter. I'm sure being taught by you will encourage her to find a way to temper herself."

"That's assuming she doesn't drive me to alcoholism first," Aizawa shook his head as he walked towards the chair on the other side of the principal's desk, "I'm half tempted to accept Midnight's offer to go out for drinks this Friday."

"Well, in case you succumb to your depression, I offer you good luck," Nezu sat down in his seat, pulling his laptop a bit closer to him, "seeing as I'm much fonder of tea than alcohol, I will not be joining you all. Now then, we can get back to that in a bit - I heard that besides Hadou, you've had a bit of a surprising development with your class's unexpected tests yesterday, what with you not expelling anyone for once this year."

"Midoriya ended up surprising me," He shrugged, "so he stays. For now."

"Oh?" Nezu chuckled, "And if you had ended up expelling him, would Midoriya have been re-enrolled the next day like all the others, or would this have been one of the rare instances where he was permanently kicked out of the program?"

Aizawa pointedly didn't answer that question, instead moving to take his seat in the chair opposite of the small principal, and crossing his arms as Nezu settled back in his chair.

"Well, in any case," The principal typed a bit more into his computer, the small smile on his furry face fading as he looked back up at the tired teacher, "I wish that we could talk a bit more about your academic adventures, but I'm afraid that this conversation will not be so light. You had mentioned before that you wanted to keep updated on the ongoing Trigger situation."

Aizawa blinked at that, looking up at his boss as he leaned slightly back in his seat. He knew exactly what Nezu was talking about - the Trigger thievery from last summer. He had been the one who had initially found the warehouse up in Hokkaido, working in the underground network and finding out about the fight, and had reported the situation to the upper heroes, with the exception that he would be kept up to date with the investigation. It wasn't just because of this recent situation, either - he had been a part of the investigation of the initial Trigger outbreak years ago, working with the police to try and apprehend the villains that had been manufacturing the drug, and they had reached a dead end with the death of their suspect. But now that there was a new lead into it ...

"From the investigations All Might, Hawks and Ryukyu had conducted from the last two months," Nezu turned his laptop towards Aizawa so he could read a bit, "they weren't able to pick up any trails that this hypothetical villain took the barrels. They were, however, able to conduct an investigation of the warehouse, and who owned it in the first place."

"So the gang that developed the drug in the first place." Aizawa nodded, quickly reading through the report. After briefly scanning it, his eyes narrowed. "Of course. Humarise."

"Indeed," Nezu tapped the screen with his paw, "after the arrest of their leader, the cult broke down into several splinter cells throughout the globe. After their failed terrorist attacks, a group of former Humarise agents arrived in Japan and used the cult's remaining funds to purchase the warehouse and turn it into a drug lab. It's clear that from what they found from the cell leader's email that they were planning a terrorist bombing up in Hokkaido - that was, until this other group came in and slaughtered them.

"Right," Aizawa leaned back, frowning, "what did Officer Kaniyashiki say? She was part of the initial Trigger outbreak, along with Detective Tanuma."

"Well, from the autopsies that they had made from what they found on the bodies, we found that the Humarise cultists were … well, they were brutalized." Nezu frowned. "Beaten down, slashed with knives, strangled. Nothing quite to go by there."

The quirk erasing teacher sighed, nodding - he had expected that, for them not to have anything on the other villains that would've been there that day. However, Nezu suddenly pulled the laptop back to him, which drew his attention as the mouse principal gave him a serious look while tapping on the keyboard.

"However," He tapped a paw against the closed computer, "from that autopsy, it gave the heroes another lead - for an entirely different case."

Aizawa furrowed his brow at that, watching as Nezu found what he was looking for on his computer, and then turned it back to him to look at. The teacher leaned forward, tilting his head slightly at the two pictures of heroes on the screen - one with a hero in gundam-like armor and a red cape, and another hero with an iron-like jaw.

"Do you recognize these heroes?" Nezu asked. "Three months ago, these two heroes from two separate parts of Japan were both brutally attacked and put in the hospital. Ordinarily the HPSC would dismissed this as the work of the Hero Killer - and seeing as they already have a few of their own agents working on that case with Ingenium, it would be out of our hands. However, Endeavor did a bit of investigating himself, and found a curious connection," The mouse principal raised his eyebrows, "both heroes showed signs of being beaten down, strangled, and stabbed as though with knives."

"The same type of injuries from the warehouse," Aizawa nodded, putting the pieces together, "you think the group that took the Trigger is the same group that attacked these heroes."

"Indeed. It is just a theory, though."

"But why?" AIzawa shook his head, "What would be the point of that? It would simply draw attention to them - unless that's what they want. But if they went to such great lengths to make sure we couldn't pick up a trail on the Trigger, it would be foolish for them to draw attention to themselves."

"Well, this is where it gets intriguing, Aizawa," Nezu leaned in, looking grave. "The HPSC wants to dismiss these two incidents as work of the Hero Killer, and granted, they do have injuries that seem to match sword wounds, but they were kept alive when the police and paramedics found them - which meant that these attacks weren't meant to kill them. They were both brought to the hospital for tests, and the doctors confirmed an … odd connection between their injuries."

"Besides the stabbing and strangulation and beating, you mean."

"Yes. The doctors discovered that their quirks were … gone."

Aizawa stopped at that, staring blankly at the screen for a moment, before looking back up at the principal as he sipped on some tea, looking far more serious than he had ever seen him as he put the cup back on the saucer.

"As though they never had them," He elaborated, "their quirks have been lost. They had a quirk specialist come in to investigate, and found that it was as though they were never there. As though they had always been quirkless."

Closing the laptop, the principal returned his gaze to Aizawa as the teacher looked more than a little confused by that, "Two heroes, attacked and having their quirks somehow erased without a trace, and several barrels of Trigger taken away from a terrorist cell. I want to say that this is a mere coincidence, but I'm not a fool, AIzawa. I know that the last time we had to seriously deal with Trigger - before Humarise's attempted attack on society - things came very close to disaster with the lockdown in Naruhata. And I fear that this might not be two different factions of Humarise fighting over some drugs. I believe, with what little evidence we have … this may be connected to the original Villain Factory."

"Wait. You don't mean -"

"The original two villains who helped spread the initial Trigger outbreak - Kuin Hachisuka and Number Six," Nezu raised an eyebrow, "both of them currently out of action - Hachisuka was extracted from both Tamao Oguro and Kazuho Haneyama, and is currently serving out her sentence in Tartarus; and Number Six died during the Naruhata situation. And yet, we know that those two were merely working for the true mastermind behind the Trigger development, and we never caught them."

"Number six," Aizawa muttered, eyes widening in realization, "and there was a number painted on the wall of the warehouse …"

"It may be a coincidence," Nezu nodded, "but I sincerely doubt it. Whether this Trigger thief could be an original member of the Villain Factory that escaped its disbandment by All Might, or someone else serving as its new face for the original Trigger mastermind, I cannot say. But what I do know is that we will have to tread carefully, AIzawa. There's someone out there with barrels full of a drug that can fuel the villain underworld for months on end, and someone attacking heroes and somehow getting rid of their quirks. I pray they aren't connected, but I'm smart enough to consider that these two incidents may be the work of the same individual."

"And there's no way the HPSC will let anyone below the Top 10 near that," AIzawa grumbled, crossing his arms again, "they'll want to make sure the public thinks that everything's nice and dandy while sweeping everything else under the rug."

"Indeed," Nezu picked back up his tea to sip, "so that is why we'll have to be cautious. We'll bring All Might up to speed on the two heroes who had their quirks disappear, but for now, I would like you to keep this on the downlow. Concentrate on your teaching responsibilities, and when you are out working tonight, keep your ear to the ground. If there's someone out there capable of removing quirks, it does not matter if you are in the low hundreds in the rankings or the number one hero - you will have to be careful."

---

Thankfully, by the time they got back to the classroom, Pony's small wobble had faded away, and she believed that she was good to go home without another visit to the nurse's office, giving Itsuka a big thumbs up. Still, Itsuka wanted to make sure that Pony was okay, and was relieved when Reiko offered to walk with Pony to the train station just in case, both girls walking into the classroom to gather up their things. After that, Itsuka told Izuku and Ochako that they could go home without her today, as she needed to do something, and then went off in search of the Nap Room - from his request, All Might might be there waiting for her right now, and she didn't want to keep him waiting.

Thankfully, it didn't take long to find it - after asking Cementoss for instructions, she went up to a floor upstairs, finding a door with the sign 'NAP ROOM' written in kanji at the top. Hurrying her pace, she approached the door, and quickly knocked on it.

"Come in." She was relieved to hear All Might inside, and his voice wasn't really as bombastic as it had been all day - which must have meant that he was out of time for the day, and back to his weakened form. Sliding the door open, she immediately spotted All Might sitting on the couch, his formerly muscular frame shrunken down to his weakened form and his costume hanging loosely around him. There was a tea maker on the small coffee table, and he was currently filling up the two cups beside it as he looked around at her, a small smile on his face.

"Young Kendou," He greeted her, "come in, come in."

"Hi, All Might," She gave him a small wave, sliding the door shut behind her and walking into the room, moving towards the small stool on the other side of the coffee table, "are you doing okay? You were in your muscular form for hours today - that must've been exhausting, wasn't it?"

"I'm fine, Young Kendou," He waved off her concerns with a chuckle, finishing pouring a cup of tea for his pupil and sliding it across the table to her as she sat down, "I was definitely a bit rushed for time at the end of the lesson, and barely made it to the teacher's lounge before I lost my form - but it's alright, I expected that to happen. Of course, we also have to account that today was going to be stressful anyway, seeing as it was my first class - but I'm sure that with practice, I'll know how to better manage my time."

"A-ah. I see."

"Indeed. Well, in any case, I have to offer my congratulations," All Might smiled at her, "winning your first battle trial with Young Uraraka. I'm going to have to make sure I don't team you two up again for a long while after today - you both seem to be unstoppable together."

"Ah, well …" Itsuka chuckled sheepishly, "... we make a good team."

"That you very much do. I have to say, though, I didn't quite imagine your first combat training would pit you against Young Midoriya of all people - but all three of you performed very well, if not making a few basic mistakes, but I'm not too worried."

"Uh … right," Itsuka chuckled a bit weakly, sipping on the tea she had been offered while All Might likewise did the same. After a moment of silence, All Might put the cup back down on the table, letting out a small sigh as his smile slipped off his face.

"Now then," He cleared his throat, "I imagine that you're curious as to why I asked you to meet with me."

"Um … maybe a little."

"Well," All Might sighed as he adjusted himself in his seat, leaning back on the couch slightly, "I'll start with this, then. Young Kendou, for the last ten months or so, I have trained you with two simple goals in mind. The first was to prepare you for UA's entrance exam - to train your body until it was at its peak performance, and that you would be ready to succeed once you took the exam. There were a few hiccups along the way, but in the end, you've not only met my expectations, you've far surpassed them, and for that, I'm very proud of you."

Itsuka nodded and said nothing at the moment, unable to stop a small smile from spreading on her face from his praise.

"And," All Might leaned forward, "there was a second reason why I had you move garbage across the beach. One simple, albeit difficult reason. Something that's, at this point, very long overdue. I think you know what I'm talking about."

At those cryptic words, though, Itsuka blinked a bit in confusion, sipping absently on her tea. Another reason to train on the beach? What could All Might be talking about? Didn't she train on the beach so she could get herself ready for -

- oh.

"What I'm saying is that I want to get into UA just like Midoriya and Uraraka are, like Set and Yui and Kirishima are. I want to get in on my own merit. I want the entrance exam ... basically, I want this to be the way I prove that I've earned it."

"You mean …"

"I want to get into UA without using One for All. Just with my quirk. If I can do that ... if I can get into UA just using my own quirk ... then I think I'll be ready for One for All."

Slowly, Itsuka realized what All Might was talking about, feeling her eyes widen in shock as she looked back up at her mentor and straightened up in her seat. Memories of their agreement on New Year's Day, of Itsuka's promise to enter UA on her own merit, filled her mind. Of what All Might had offered her that day, and what she had softly rejected at the moment so she could prove herself worthy of it. Something that All Might had been training her for for almost a year.

He seemed to have read her mind, seeing as All Might smiled, nodded, and folded his hands in his lap.

"Indeed, Young Kendou," He told her, "we've had a few bumps along the way, and this may have been delayed more than I would've liked it to have been - but it's time to transfer One for All to you."

There was a small silence in the Nap Room, with Itsuka staring blankly at her teacher while he tapped his foot absently against the ground. And then she said, in a small, shocked voice, "Oh."

"'Oh'?" All Might chuckled a bit, picking back up the kettle to pour himself some more tea, "That's all you have to say, Young Kendou? I was somewhat expecting something profound, or another reason to delay again."

"O-oh, no, that's - that's not it!" Itsuka quickly assured him, gulping a bit and putting down her own cup. "I just - well - things have been pretty busy lately, and - and I kind of forgot that - yeah. I forgot that was supposed to happen. Plus, I kinda - well, I kinda expected it to - to be a lot more - uh - ceremoneous than just - er - giving me One for All while sipping on tea in the break room."

"Well," All Might shook his head while laughing, "I definitely don't think we don't have to be so dramatic! So unless you have any other reasons to delay, Young Kendou, I believe we can finally transfer One for All to you right now."

"N-no, I - yes, we can do it now," Itsuka quickly straightened up again, giving her teacher her best serious look. "Let's - yeah."

"Alright," All Might smiled a bit, sitting up properly in his seat. On her side, Itsuka gulped nervously, staring at her teacher as he moved his hand to his hair. This was it. She had honestly almost completely forgotten about One for All, mostly due to how busy the last two days had been and not having seen All Might for a while before today - but she was ready, she knew she was as she gave her teacher a determined look. She was prepared for One for All.

She watched as All Might grabbed a pluck of his hair, yanking it out with a small wince. And then, smiling, he brought the strand of blonde hair towards her, as though offering for her to take it.

"Young Kendou," He grinned, "eat this."

"..."

"..."

"... what?" Itsuka asked in a blank, emotionless voice.

"Well, to inherit my power, you need to ingest some of my DNA!" All Might laughed a bit, seeing Itsuka's face twist into disgust as she stared down at the hair as though he had just pulled it out of a sewer grate, "That's how it works!"

"I - but - does it have to be hair?!"

"Hm - well, not necessarily. It could be blood, if you wanted. Or if you'd like, I could spit into your drink."

"..."

"..."

"... god damn it." She growled, and reached out to take the hair from her mentor, pinching it between her fingers. There was a small moment as Itsuka stared down at the hair with a mix of disgust and remorse, as though she were only now regretting every decision she ever made that led her to become All Might's successor - and then, with a deep breath, she moved to put the strand in her mouth, her face immediately twisting into a grossed-out expression, and she quickly grabbed her cup of tea so that she could swallow it down.

As she slammed the cup back down on the table, shuddering in disgust, All Might laughed a bit louder than the situation probably deemed worthy, which drew her glare to him.

"My apologies, Young Kendou," He chuckled, patting his knee, "but that was how my own mentor transferred One for All to me - I couldn't resist a little callback."

"Guh," Itsuka shuddered again, taking another gulp of tea, and then looked down at her body, her brow wrinkling, "I don't … er … I don't feel all that different. Did it work?"

"Well, of course you don't feel any different yet! The hair will need some time to digest! You should start to feel something in a few hours, though - so I recommend if you feel any weird tingling, lie down."

"Weird tingling. Great."

"Now, some general advice," All Might's smile slipped from his face, staring seriously at her, "you may be a proper vessel, but please keep in mind that, in comparison to my own training, you were put together in a hurry. You won't have had any time to get used to One for All, so prepare for a little kickback when you first use it. We won't have any time to practice with One for All for the rest of the week, but once the weekend comes, we can head back down to the beach so you can practice."

"Yeah … yeah," She nodded in confirmation, sitting up a bit, "I think that's a good idea. So, uh … how exactly do I use One for All? O-once your, uh, hair's been digested. Bleh."

"Well," All Might grinned, "it's simple! When you want to use One for All, you clench up your butt, and shout from the bottom of your heart: 'SMASH!'"

There was another pointed silence in the room while Itsuka's face fell and All Might smiled at her - and then she said, in a monotone voice, "Is it too late to give this quirk back to you? I don't think I want it anymore."

"I'm afraid it is, Young Kendou. But anyway," He shook his head, letting his smile fall again, "now that One for All has been transferred to you, we'll have to be careful with how you use it. It won't come naturally to you at first - it's like if you asked a person who suddenly grew a tail to do a trick, they wouldn't even be able to control it right off the bat. We'll have you practice with it, and once you figure out how to regulate the power, you can put out just as much as your body can handle. The more you temper the vessel, the better you can control the power."

"I see …"

"Of course, we'll also be reaching out to the quirk registry to update your form, and pretend it was a natural power up of your quirk … but there are also two other people we'll need to consider as well."

"Huh?" Itsuka blinked. "Two other people? What are you talking about?"

"Young Midoriya," All Might seriously said, "and Young Uraraka."

"W-wait, what - what about them?" Itsuka straightened up, looking surprised at the mention of her friends and feeling a bit concerned. "What do they -"

"Young Kendou," All Might sighed, "for the past ten months, we've trained together on the beach with them. You've grown, fought, and endured alongside them all the way, and you know their quirks by now - probably enough to know why Young Midoriya didn't use his at all during your match today."

"... yeah."

"So with that in mind," All Might leaned forward, not looking very pleased by what he was about to say, "do you think that it's possible to use my power, something completely different than your own quirk … and they wouldn't notice?"

Itsuka opened her mouth to refute that - and then she stopped. Blinked. Looking briefly away, and then back to him. And then her mouth slowly closed, realization filling her eyes again as he realized what All Might was saying.

"... oh." She said quietly. "So … so you think …"

"Yes, Young Kendou," He nodded, "we … will probably have to let them in on the secret."

"I - w-wait a second," She shook her head a bit, feeling strangely frightened by that and not exactly sure why as she leaned forward again, "I - I thought you said that One for All is a - a closely guarded secret pretty much no one should know about. I - I know that you said that we might eventually bring them into this, but isn't this too soon? Shouldn't we -"

"Young Kendou," All Might smiled gently at her, "I've put a lot of thought into this as well, for the last few months or so. When Gran Torino first came to the beach, he told me that Young Midoriya and Young Uraraka finding out about One for All would be an inevitability rather than a possibility - and he was right. They are both smart - Young Midoriya with his eye for quirks, and Young Uraraka for her perceptiveness. If you used One for All, they would put the dots together that something was off, and they will want answers."

"..."

"And yet … if they ask, I believe we can trust them. The last ten months have ensured that you three have become close - close enough that we can trust them with One for All. As I trusted them both with my true form, we can trust them with One for All's secret. But don't spend time worrying about it now," He reached out to pat her hand, "right now, you should go home, take a well deserved break, and relax. Ultimately, Young Kendou, the decision to tell them of One for All will be up to you - so go at your own pace, and if you need my help to explain everything, just let me know and I will come assist you."

"I …" Itsuka hesitated again - and then nodded, letting out a small sigh as she straightened up again, "... okay, All Might. I'll … I'll think more about it. Yeah."

"Very good," All Might smiled gently at her, "in that case, Young Kendou, I believe we're done for the day. I need to go meet with Aizawa to discuss your training for the day. You can go home now."

"Yeah … yeah. Okay." Slowly, she stood back up, trying her best to smile back at her mentor as she moved around the stool, and back out the door, giving him one last wave as she slid it shut. Once she was outside, her small smile slipped from her face, and she let out a small sigh as she leaned briefly against it, closing her eyes.

Telling Izuku and Ochako about One for All … honestly, she knew that it would be stupid not to, she thought as she softly banged her head against the wall. All Might was right, they were both too smart to not notice something change when she inevitably used her … her new quirk. And she wasn't an idiot either, she knew that if she told them, they would believe her. It was just …

"Kendou!"

She jumped a bit at the sound of a familiar voice on the other end of the hall, and quickly looked around, her angsting thoughts interrupted before they could even properly begin. As though she had mentally summoned them, Izuku and Ochako were jogging down the hall towards her, smiling and waving, and she could make out Nejire following behind them with her own smile. She stared blankly at them for a moment, feeling as though her heart was trying to force its way up her throat - and then she gulped it back down, letting out a small sigh as she tried her best to smile at them without it looking fake.

"H-hey, guys," She waved back at them, turning to face them as they slowed to a stop, "I thought I said you guys could've headed home without me."

"Well, we thought about it, but we decided to wait for you," Ochako shook her head, adjusting her backpack on her shoulders as Nejire caught up to them, beaming as the four stood near the entrance to the Nap Room, "are you done now, though? We can always wait back in the classroom if there was something else you had to do."

"N-no, I'm done, I - we can go home together if you want. Have Set and Yui gone home yet?"

"They're going to stay behind for a bit," Izuku explained while shrugging, "Tokage wanted to talk to Ashido for a while, and Kodai was kind of … uh … staring at Iida for some reason. A-and Yaoyorozu already went home, she was going to walk to the train station with Jirou. So, uh - if you're ready to go, we can."

"Great!" Itsuka smiled at him, and then glanced over at Nejire, "Anyway, are you feeling better, Hadou? Did those gummies Toga give you earlier help you out?"

"Yeah! I'm good as new." The blue-haired girl beamed at her, but then she blinked and tilted her head as a thought came to her, "Well, not 'good as new', technically, because I'm only fifteen years old, and that's not really 'new'. But I'm definitely feeling a lot better - no bright lights or loud noises are bugging me anymore, anyway. Thanks for asking, Kendou! You were super awesome today! Even though me and Midoriya lost, I'm not too bummed about it because you guys put up a really great fight! Especially you, Uraraka! I bet if you didn't try to lunge at me, I would've eventually run out of stamina, and you would've beat me up!"

"Er ... no, I wouldn't have beaten you up," Ochako gulped, blushing a bit, "but thanks, Hadou. I'm glad you're - uh - you're feeling better. W-well, anyway, we were about to walk home. Uh ... do you wanna -?"

"Yes!" Nejire quickly nodded, smiling happily, "I'd love to walk home with you guys! Yuuyu's already left, she wanted to get home quick so she can grab her skateboard and go to the park - I'm not much of a skater, or at least, not with a board, I'm a lot better with my rollies, but anyway, I'm not waiting for anyone either! I can go home with you guys."

"Uh … great," Izuku nodded, adjusting his backpack over his shoulders, "I guess in that case, we can get going -"

"Yeah! Let's go!" Without warning, she moved forward, grabbing Izuku's arm and beginning to tug him away. Like yesterday, Izuku squeaked at the physical contact, and went bright red when Nejire slipped her arm through his, pretty much walking him back down the hall while she happily hummed, having a long list of questions she wanted to ask him on the way back home.

Behind them, Ochako and Itsuka stared after them, the formerly happy moods they had been in evaporating as they stared after the other two with a strange lack of light in their eyes.

"I guess we should follow them, Kendou." Ochako said in an emotionless voice.

"Yeah," Itsuka nodded, sounding equally as empty, "we'd better catch up."

With that, the two girls hurried forward to catch up with the other two, Itsuka subtly grabbing Nejire's backpack to pull her away from Izuku, and soon enough, the small group was moving out the entrance of the school and back into the evening air, the sun setting in the distance and showering them in a golden light. As they walked and talked, Itsuka glanced around at her friends, seeing Izuku doing his best to keep up with Nejire's questions while Ochako giggled a bit, and found herself smiling softly to herself.

All Might was right, she supposed, there wasn't a huge rush to tell them. She could wait a little bit to figure out exactly how she was going to figure out how to explain the concept of One for All to her partners later. Right now ... well, it had been a long day, so she wanted to head home and relax a bit. So she pushed One for All to the back of her mind, and tapped on Ochako's shoulder to ask her what she and Tsuyu had been chatting about in the changing room.

And with that, the four friends walked out of UA on their successful second day of school, enjoying the warm evening air relatively stress free. Of course, none of them really paid heed to the distant storm clouds coming in from across the distant ocean, moving a little quicker than clouds usually would - as though the dark, lightning filled clouds were following someone.