"Senji-!"

Senji blinked slowly, taking in her surroundings. She shook her head to chase away the lingering drowsiness, and finally realized she was in the Midoriyas' residence. Sprawled on the floor under her, with her scale-covered hand pushing against his skull, was Izuku. She heard something buzzing on the table beside her, a familiar rhythmic hum. Both of them were almost panting, likely from some sort of scuffle that had resulted in her pinning the boy down.

"S-sorry," Senji released him and reached for her phone. Her body failed her, though, and she ended up crashing down on top of him again. The rush of adrenaline that fueled her half-asleep assault faded fast, taking her strength with it. Izuku stammered helplessly under her weight for a moment while she caught her breath.

"I was-your alarm! It was going off, so I thought you had work or som-somewhere to be," he tried to explain. Senji rolled off of him and pulled her phone down to look at the time. She had set an alarm for an event she really hoped to avoid. She sighed and pulled herself up to get ready, apologizing again to Izuku on her way out.

…

"Huh? Senji?"

In a small diner, three students were gathered for a study session. Bakugo and Kirishima were seated already, with Senji just arriving and standing at the table. It was hard to judge her feelings from her expression, but it looked to be a mix of many things. She closed her eyes, took a deep breath, and exhaled heavily. Then she plopped her bag down beside the table and chose the seat next to Kirishima.

"Didn't you say you never needed to study for tests?," Kirishima pressed again.

"Ah, I'm not the best at classical Japanese, or reading kanji," she spoke quietly, as though a little embarrassed.

"If you're gonna be here then be on time, dammit!," Katsuki admonished her, covering his own awkward feelings on this matter. "Show me your notes."

"Uh, right," Senji trailed off and looked away.

"What's with that reaction."

"U-um! About that," she refused to meet Bakugo's stare.

"Oh, you look like you're usually asleep in that class," Kirishima chimed in. His enthusiastic answer made Senji flinch.

"What," Katsuki's patience, if he had any, was already waning.

"That's not true! Or, it's not on purpose? I'm not the best at writing in Japanese, either, so it's hard to keep up with the lecture. Anyway," Senji looked down at the table and fidgeted, "I don't have any notes.."

"Seriously?!," Bakugo shouted.

"Hey, we're in public, shithead! Keep it down," Senji snapped back.

Bakugo went to argue, but left it alone for now and pulled out his own notes. Senji ordered a drink and the three studied together for a few hours. At one point, Bakugo rolled up the notes that Senji was studying and started beating Kirishima over the head with it. The group ended up causing quite a scene, and getting scolded by the staff. Bakugo drilling information into Kirishima, Senji trying to quiet him down and apologizing to staff.

…

"Hey, check it out!," Mina pointed to an advertisement on the wall.

"Wow, doesn't that guy look kinda like Senji?"

Hakagure, and several other members of class 1A, stared in shock at the image. It wasn't unusual to see advertisements like that for different clothing stores and brands. But they weren't aware of their classmate being in any sort of modeling work. Sero snapped a couple pictures, while Kaminari and Mineta grumbled in the corner about something. Looking around, the ad had captured the attention of a lot of female shoppers. They seemed to all be talking about it, and the model's looks.

…

"Seriously though, why'd you go with Bakugo for help studying?," Kirishima took a break from his mental beat down while Bakugo was away for a few minutes. Senji finished answering the mock quiz in front of her before answering.

"Asking because of the fight?"

"Well, that, yeah. And you're close with Midoriya, right? He's got the best grades," Kirishima explained his reasoning.

"I wouldn't say I'm really closer to one or the other, out of those two," the usually quiet girl was more open to conversation than she appeared. Kirishima took the opportunity to talk more, being just as curious as the rest of the class about Senji.

"You went to middle school with them, though, right?"

"Yeah. I tried to avoid them mostly. Both of them were way worse then. I guess," Senji paused to think. She had made a deal with Bakugo, but she couldn't tell the red-haired boy that part. "Kat-Bakugo acts really loud and that makes you think he's stupid. But he isn't, and he's always really focused in class. Izuku tends to go overboard with explanations, too."

"You're right, yeah. I'm surprised though. You seem smart, but I guess most people have stuff they're bad at," Kirishima sipped his drink. Senji was glad he glossed over her name mix-up, at least.

"Japanese isn't my first language, so sometimes it's kinda hard," the girl answered while returning to her mock quiz. Bakugo returned loudly, getting onto Kirishima for slacking off. He checked over Senji's answers, not holding back on his critique at all. After a little while longer, Kirishima had to leave. He thanked Bakugo and headed off, apologizing to the staff on his way out.

"Wow, you're seriously bad at this," Bakugo didn't miss another opportunity to ridicule Senji.

"You know we made a deal, right? I won't go easy on you, either…'sides, Japanese is hard as hell," she grumbled back at him while packing up her stuff. She checked her phone, finding a string of missed calls from Inko Midoriya. There were also some other messages, which made her nervous.

"I'll pay."

"What?"

"I'll pay, so go already!," Bakugo raised his voice, but it lacked the usual fury. He avoided direct eye contact.

"Uh, thanks. Gotta go," Senji was completely disarmed with that, and left in a hurry. She sent a text to Deku before putting on her headphones and ducking into an alley. She removed her hoodie and tucked it into the bag, then stretched her wings and took off. Instead of heading home, Senji had another stop to make. One that she had hoped to put off a little longer, but it was clear that the league was getting impatient. Antsy. She had to give them something to keep them from going too nuts right now, and she had just the thing.